Update: I was dead wrong about short form content for B2B

Used to think short form video was a total waste for B2B content. Like who's gonna buy enterprise software from a 30 second clip? Then I ran an A/B test with a client in Phoenix last quarter. We made one set of LinkedIn carousels with quick stats and another with long form white papers. The short stuff got 4x the click through rate and actually brought in two qualified leads. Saw the data in our analytics dashboard and it hit me that attention spans are shot even in professional settings. Now I'm mixing both formats but that stat flipped my whole strategy. Has anyone else seen B2B audiences actually engage more with short content than they expected?

2 comments

2 Comments

black.pat1mo ago

That line about "attention spans are shot even in professional settings" really hit home for me. I was the SAME way - I used to make these dense white papers thinking my B2B clients wanted to read a novel before buying anything. Then I accidentally posted a 45 second video of me just explaining one stat from a report and it got more engagement than anything I'd ever done. Made me realize I've been writing for the version of myself that has infinite patience, not for the actual humans out there who are probably reading my content while hiding in a bathroom stall between meetings. I still do both formats too but now I lead with the short stuff and use the long form as backup for people who actually want to deep dive. And yeah, it's a humbling feeling when you realize you were fighting against how real people actually consume information.

ross.felix1mo ago

I actually read this thing from a guy named Rory Sutherland, he's like a behavioral economist or something, and he said people don't actually want more information they want less uncertainty. That hit me because I think we all fall into this trap of thinking if we just throw more data at people they'll finally understand. But really they just want to know if it's safe to buy or not. Your bathroom stall example is perfect because that's exactly where I read half the stuff I look at on my phone too. I've started treating my short content like a handshake, just a quick "here's the thing that matters" and then the long form is more like a sit down conversation for the two people who actually stick around.