Thought Leadership Insights, Episode 3

In this third episode of Thought Leadership Insights, we speak to Alison Tattersall, Corporate Marketing Director at Barclays Bank, about the crucial role thought leadership plays in their overall marketing strategy. From digital-first and custom content, to smart activation strategies and essential metrics for tracking ROI, this rare glimpse into the world of global marketing at one of the world’s largest banks is essential listening for all senior B2B marketers.

Topics covered

00:00 Introduction
00:40 Alison’s role at Barclays
02:50 Building trust for your brand
04:15 Thought leadership at Barclays
06:40 Short-form vs. long-form content
07:45 Marketing long-form content
08:50 What does a good thought leadership campaign look like?
10:40 Activation
12:20 Timely vs. quality content
13:45 The internal thought leadership process
15:00 Measuring the impact
17:00 Social media and thought leadership
18:50 Industry specific campaigns
19:50 Maximizing ROI
20:55 Internal insights
22:15 Responsiveness – attracting interest
23:45 Future opportunities from thought leadership
24:40 Making thought leadership relevant

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Podcast Transcript

Fergal: Welcome to episode 3 of FT Longitude’s thought leadership insights podcast. I am very pleased today to introduce Alison Tattersall. Alison is Corporate Marketing Director at Barclays Bank

Welcome to the Thought Leadership Insights podcast, Alison.

Alison: I’m delighted to be here, Fergal. Thank you very much for inviting me.

Fergal: It’s great to have an opportunity to speak to you today to talk about the work that you’re doing at Barclays… maybe a good place to start would be if you could tell me a little bit about your role at Barclays and how it has evolved in recent years.

Alison: Yes, of course. I look after the marketing for corporate banking at Barclays, which is everything from medium-sized UK businesses, right up to global multi-nationals.

My role involves the full marketing mix. So, we do above the line, digital, we look after our client facing website and we do lots of content and thought leadership from quite in-depth research pieces, to short snappy LinkedIn and Twitter content.

I’m lucky enough in my team that I’ve got both an industry and regional marketing team. So, I have a team of marketeers across the regions that we serve and also that focus on specific industry specialisms. And to me, the real nub of B2B marketing is making it really, really relevant. And showing our clients that we understand the communities in which they operate and the businesses and the sector that they serve and operate in.

I think, in terms of how it’s evolved in recent years, my audience are getting younger. They’re getting more familiar with mobile. And I think there’s a real variety of needs and appetite that we need to serve, from really short insightful content, through to more in-depth pieces.

I think it’s really interesting having this conversation in early 2017. I think the economy, the political landscape is so interesting and unusual and people are desperate for information and opinion from different sources and trusted sources, that to me it’s inviting that conversation and inviting that opinion and perspective and engaging in that dialogue with clients and with prospects.

Fergal: That’s very interesting. You talk about building trust. Can you talk a little bit about what needs to happen for this promise to be realised?

Alison: I think it’s a really interesting point. And I think it’s been really understanding, where as a branch you have permission to play and where you don’t have permission to play. And it’s really interesting.

If I look at the content we’ve done over the last few months, things like the apprenticeship levy on modern slavery act have done really well, because people are looking for information in a trusted brand, which Barclays is – to have an opinion and perspective to help direct them.

I know the best performing piece of content we’ve done over recent years has been our response to the EU referendum vote. So, I think it’s an ideal opportunity in the perfect storm that we’re in, is to actually have an opinion and perspective.

But, also, don’t try and go too far from where your brand operates. I don’t think we’ve got permission to go everywhere and anywhere. I think we need to understand that, for me, I work for a financial services brand. I help businesses operate in the UK and around the globe. But I don’t have permission to go everywhere. I need to understand what my heart land is.

Fergal: That’s a very interesting point you make and it speaks to the proliferation and the danger of thinness and straying into areas that you don’t have permission to operate in.

How does thought leadership fit in, would you say, into the corporate marketing at Barclays?

Alison: If I think about my team over recent years and also how I think it’s going to evolve over coming years, I think thought leadership is becoming increasingly important, both in terms of what we do and through digital, through webinars, but also what we do for our events.

And my audience are really interested in events and opportunities and content that enables them to learn something and to engage in an interesting dialogue. Gone are the days of more hospitality focused marketing and it’s got to have some real depth and content and it’s got to add some real value. So, we spend a lot of time thinking about what are the really interesting things that are coming up. Changing regulation, changing climate, changing politics and how can we leverage that and provide that content.

Fergal: There has been a proliferation of content – new types of content, new media- where does traditional thought leadership – white papers and surveys and rigorous research driven communications – fit in to content marketing at Barclays today, Alison?

Alison: I think it’s got a place and certainly if I think about what we do here at Barclays, where we do lots of industry specific thought leadership.

Whether your audience know an awful lot about their industry and they’re looking for real in-depth, detailed research and opinion and added value. But I also think there’s a really important role for content and thought leadership in parallel to that, that is more shorter.

We did some work recently with a writer and they were doing some teaching and training with my team. And they came up with a lovely quote they shared with us: “Just remember your reader is selfish, lazy and ruthless”.

So I think that we have to leverage new channels and social media to provide snippets and ready access to people on the move, on the go, who don’t have much time. How can we actually add value and share those snippets, as well as doing the more in-depth research at the same time.

Fergal: Right. It seems for many companies today this in-depth survey & research content provides a foundation, a base that feeds this shorter, snappier, easier to access content, but you need to have both.

Alison: Definitely. I think the more detailed research is really valuable, because it enables the perfect marriage of marketing and PR, because often journalists are looking for something that’s more detailed. You’ve also got the industry bodies and the KPIs who are totally immersed in their specific sector, they’d probably want that more detailed analysis.

So, I think it’s how we leverage that and use the snippets and the more detailed. For me, increasingly, our focus is not on one and done, from a content perspective. How can we actually amplify that research and the more detailed in-depth thought leadership and get those snippets out.

So, we don’t just do one piece of research. We actually leverage that through events, through social and we get much better reach and breadth through what we’re investing in.

Fergal: Right, can you talk a little about how you amplify the more detailed in-depth thought leadership?

Alison: We work with each of our industry teams and the PR team at Barclays to really understand what will be attractive to the sector, what will be attractive to the media for that sector and the industry bodies. And we work o...

PODCAST: Alison Tattersall on thought leadership and marketing strategy