How well-informed B2B teams use video to win deals before they even begin In B2B marketing, there is a dangerous misconception that video is just a way to raise brand awareness. We typically divide video into two categories: The “viral” top-of-funnel asset that gets views but no leads.
The dry product demo at the bottom of the funnel that generates leads but no views. This binary thinking is breaking your pipeline.
Because of my position at LinkedIn, I have unique access to the B2B purchasing ecosystem. According to the data, the most successful businesses don't use video for just one stage of the funnel. They consider it to be a multiplier. The effectiveness of your video strategy increases, resulting in as many as 1.4 times more leads when implemented throughout the entire buying process, connecting your brand to demand. The new data on how B2B video buyers actually make decisions support this strategic framework for building that system. The actual situation: The "first impression rose" The window to influence a deal closes much earlier than most marketers realize.
LinkedIn’s B2B Institute calls this the first impression rose. Like the reality TV show “The Bachelor,” if you don’t get a rose in the first ceremony, you’re unlikely to make it to the finale.
Research from LinkedIn and Bain & Company found 86% of buyers already have their choices predetermined on “Day 1” of a buying cycle. Even more significant, 81 percent end up making a purchase from a vendor on that Day 1 list. You will be competing for the remaining 19 percent of the market if your video strategy waits for the buyer to be ready to buy or in the market. To win, you need to be on the shortlist before the RFP is even written.
Dig deeper: LinkedIn wants to be the TikTok of business — will it work?
That requires a three-play strategy.
The objective is to reach people who can say no. Most video strategies target the champion, the person who uses the tool or service. However, in business-to-business, the champion rarely handles money. Consider this scenario. You have been courting the VP of marketing for months. They adore your answer. They are all set to sign. But when they bring the contract to the procurement meeting, the CFO looks up and asks: “Who are they? Why have I not heard of them before?” The deal comes to a halt at that point. You’re suddenly competing on price because you have zero brand equity with the person controlling the budget.
Reach out to those who are able to say no. Our data shows that if the entire buying group, not just the user, knows you from day one, you are more than 20 times more likely to be purchased. The strategic shift: innovative cutting-edge You can't just be there to get to that larger group. You have to be memorable. Reach and recall are needed. LinkedIn data reveals exactly what cut-through creative looks like in the feed:
Be bold: Video ads with bright, distinctive colors get 15 percent more views. Be process-oriented: 13% longer dwell times are achieved when messages are broken down into clear, visual steps. The perfect length: Between 7 and 15 seconds, short videos perform better than long-form ads and very short ads for increasing brand awareness. The Silent Movie rule: Design for the eye, not the ear. 79% of LinkedIn’s audience scrolls with sound off. In the first five seconds of your video, you've lost 80% of the audience if you rely on a talking head to explain the value of the prop. For instant attention, make use of visual hooks and captions that have been hard-coded. Learn more: GenAI taking over the creatives of digital video buyers Play 2: Educate and nudge by selling ‘buyability’
The goal: Mitigate personal and professional risk
This is where most B2B content fails. We rarely focus on buyability (how safe it is to buy us), but we do focus on selling capability (features, specs, speeds, and feeds). A B2B buyer is navigating career risk when shortlisting vendors. Our research with Bain & Company found the top five emotional jobs a buyer needs to fulfill. Only two were about product capability.
Reduce personal and professional risk with LinkedIn and Bain & Company. "I felt I could defend the decision if it went wrong" was the most emotionally charged job (34%). The strategic shift: Market the safety net
To drive consideration, your video content shouldn’t be a feature dump. It should be a safety net. How does that actually appear? The buzz effect, or momentum, is safety; buyers want to bet on a winner. According to our data, brands that generate momentum through "buzz" generate 10% more leads. You can manufacture this buzz through cultural coding. Engagement rises by 41% when brands make reference to pop culture. Engagement can rise by 111% when memes are used, yes, even in business-to-business settings. It shows that you are important, real, and involved in the current conversation. Authority builds trust (the expert effect): If momentum catches their eye, expertise wins their trust. But how you present that expertise matters. Video ads featuring executive experts see 53% higher engagement. Engagement increases by 70% when those experts are filmed speaking on a conference stage. Why? Authority is implied by the setting. It signals, “This person is smart enough that other people paid to listen to them.”
Consistency is credibility: You can’t “burst” your way to trust. Conversion rates for brands that are always present are 10% higher than those that are intermittent. A metric based on cumulative trust is Play 3: Remove friction to convert and capture The objective: Stop persuading and start helping The buyer trusts you and knows you (Play 1) by this point. Don’t use your bottom-funnel video to hard sell. Use it to remove the friction of the next step.
At this point, buyers perceive three distinct types of risk: Risk of execution: "Will this really work for us?" Risk of a decision: "What if I make the wrong choice?" Effort risk: “How much work is implementation?”
Recommendations, having relationships, and being relatable all contribute to the closing of deals. LinkedIn, Bain & Company - The number of factors that influence buyability The change in strategy: deal with the anxiety. Your creative should directly answer those anxieties.
Scale social proof and eliminate execution risk: Ninety percent of buyers consider social proof to be influential information. But don’t just post a logo. Use video to show the peer. When a buyer sees someone with their exact job title succeeding, decision risk evaporates.
Activate your employees – kill decision risk: People trust people more than logos. Startups that activate their employees see massive returns because it humanizes the brand. The stat that surprises most leaders. Just 3% of employees who post regularly can drive 20% more leads, according to LinkedIn data. Show the humans who’ll answer the phone when things break.
The conversion combo – kill effort risk: Don’t leave them hanging with a generic Learn More button. We see 3x higher lead-gen open rates when video ads are combined directly with lead-gen forms.
The video explains the value, the form captures the intent instantly.
Short sales cycle (under 30 days): Use video and lead-gen forms to speed things up.
Long sales cycle: Retarget video viewers with message ads from a thought leader. Start a conversation instead of asking for a sale. Learn more about the Savannah Bananas: What can marketers learn from them? It’s a flywheel, not a funnel
If this strategy is so effective, why isn’t everyone doing it? Budget or talent are typically not the issues. It’s structure. In most organizations, brand teams and demand teams operate in silos.
The top of the funnel is owned by the brand (Play 1). In Play 3, demand controls the bottom. They rarely collaborate on creative because they fight over budget. The multiplier effect is destroyed by this fragmentation. When you break down those silos and run these plays as a single system, the data changes.
Our modeling shows that an integrated strategy drives 1.4x more leads than running brand and demand in isolation. It creates a flywheel:
The retargeting pools are created by your broad reach in the first game. Your educational content (Play 2) attracts these audiences, increasing click-through rates. Your conversion offers (Play 3) capture demand from buyers who are already sold, lowering your CPL.
The "Day 1" list includes the brands that balance the funnel by investing in memory and action. And the ones on that list are the ones that win the revenue.