My Favorite B2B Marketing Examples (brands I’d steal from right now)

I get asked about my favorite B2B marketing all the time and always choke, so this newsletter is my answer. Here’s a list of cool examples from brands across different industries, plus a few not-so-obvious picks. Not a definitive list, just stuff I’d steal from right now (and I want to hear your favorites too!). Let’s go.

1. Ramp: Your data is the content

What they do: Finance platform for cards, expenses, bills, and procurement.
ICP: CFOs and finance teams at startups through mid-market and enterprise.

• Proprietary data. Ramp turns spend data from 70K+ businesses into research like the Ramp AI Index, cited by the Fed, WSJ, NYT, FT, CNBC.
• Experiment aimed at AI agents. Ramp hid offers on ~50 pages that only AI could see, to test whether they’d pass them on to users. Claude: 1. ChatGPT: 0.
• Entertainment brand stunts. From Kevin from The Office doing expense reports in a livestreamed glass box in NYC (112M views) to “Tony Stock: Pro Trader,” a Tony Hawk miniseries ending at the NYSE.

Steal this: You don’t need a Super Bowl budget to copy Ramp’s data program. Just data only you have, a point of view, and the discipline to publish consistently.

2. Anthropic: Pick a fight your competitors can’t take

What they do: The AI company behind Claude.
ICP: Enterprises and developers, plus consumers.

“A Time and a Place” 2026 Super Bowl campaign. Each spot shows someone asking AI a personal question, then receiving a sponsored answer. Endcap: “Ads are coming to AI. But not to Claude.”

This ad simulates a conversation between a man and a therapist, where the therapist launches into an ad for women’s health products without warning.

Steal this: I love this one. AI is heading toward ads, and Anthropic made “no ads” the message. Find what your category does that customers hate, and plant your flag against it.

3. Rippling: Scrappy beats polished

What they do: Unified HR, IT, payroll, and spend platform.
ICP: HR, People Ops, and finance leaders, SMB through enterprise.

• iPhone-shot street videos to promote webinars. Instead of polished agency work or static graphics, Rippling went scrappy: they flew a real Chess.com customer to NYC in a chess-piece costume and filmed the social team eating hot dogs in the freezing cold. On LinkedIn and in promo emails, the videos crushed their static ads, per VP Marketing Ryan Narod on the podcast.
• HR horror stories, recreated in miniature. For its first UK campaign, Rippling turned real HR disasters (like the guy who brought an emotional-support clown to his own firing) into tiny figurine scenes, then took over London’s Liverpool Street station with them.
• “Because HR Deserves Better.” A breakup campaign telling HR leaders to dump their bad software, with TV spots and billboards starring real customers.

Steal this: Rippling has a Super Bowl budget, and the chess costume guy still wins. Big brand and scrappy content aren’t either/or. Do both.

4. Bland AI: Make the ad the demo

What they do: Voice AI agents that make and answer phone calls for businesses.
ICP: High-call-volume enterprises, especially regulated industries.

• “Still hiring humans?” billboards in San Fran. With a live number to call the AI. Per the founder, about $400K drove ~$2M ARR in 4 months.
• Soulja Boy campaign (Mar 2026). An AI agent picks up the fan line from his 2008 hit “Kiss Me Thru the Phone,” for ~60M impressions in the first week. We discuss both campaigns on the pod.

The billboard didn’t advertise the product. It WAS the product.

Steal this: My favorite kind of ad. If people can experience what you do in 10 seconds, put that in the ad.

5. Clay: Build the profession, not just the product

What they do: GTM data-enrichment and workflow platform.
ICP: GTM engineers, RevOps, and growth/ops teams.

• “Every Artist Has A Medium. GTM Has Clay.” Invested $1M+ in SF billboards and used its own account data to decide where they went. They filmed the install and turned it into content.
• Sculpt, its own GTM conference. Held in San Fran this month, featuring the $50K “Clay Cup” GTM-engineering competition.
• Community. Clay University offers free courses + certs. Clay Clubs (meetups) in 90+ cities, ambassadors on 35+ campuses, and a creator program.

Steal this: Clay is building the GTM engineer profession and the tool it runs on. Give your buyers a title, identity, and community, and they’ll do your marketing.

6. Databricks: Make your event the brand

What they do: Data and AI platform.
ICP: Data, AI, & analytics leaders at enterprises, including 70% of the Fortune 500.

• Data + AI Summit 2026. 31K+ attendees and 240+ sponsors, including AWS, Microsoft, and OpenAI.
• Cal Athletics (Sep 2026). Databricks Field, the ACC’s first helmet decal, and the biggest deal in Cal Athletics history. UC Berkeley funded it by becoming a Databricks shareholder, a nod to the company’s Berkeley roots.
• Data + AI World Tour. The summit goes global with regional events.

Steal this: The event is the brand. When AWS, Microsoft, and OpenAI are paying to show up at your conference, you own the category conversation.

7. PostHog: Show your work

What they do: Open-source product analytics, session replay, and feature flags.
ICP: Product engineers at high-growth startups.

• Parody billboards. One is styled as an injury-lawyer ad and after its run, the retired vinyl was sold as duffel bags.
• Published its 2026 marketing budget. About $1.2M/month, including a $45K “do more weird” line.
• Open newsletter-growth handbook. They made their playbook public.

Steal this: Most companies guard their marketing budget like a state secret. PostHog published theirs, line items and all. When you sell to developers (skeptical buyers!), that transparency beats any ad.

8. ManyChat: Make your customers the hero

What they do: DM automation for Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp.
ICP: Creators, solopreneurs, and small businesses (1M+ users).

• #MyRealJob (2026). Creators proved “It’s not a real job,” and the winner got a Times Square billboard.
• Handwritten postcards at Cannes Lions. A nod to personal DMs at Creators Beach.
• Creator-first paid creative. 4 in 10 paid impressions run as ads from creators’ own accounts because audiences relate better to unique voices.

The winner got a Times Square billboard for the ‘It’s not a real job’ campaign.

Steal this: ManyChat lets creators make the ads and puts customers on the billboard. Your customers want to be the hero. Let them.

Bonus: Boring industry, Grand Prix work

No startup darlings here. These three prove “but we sell to industrial / legal / construction” isn’t an excuse.

• SKF. Bearings for industrial OEMs in energy, rail, and auto. Its “Faroe Islands Space Programme” tidal-energy story won the 2026 Cannes Lions B2B Grand Prix (839M impressions).
• Hilti. Power tools and software for contractors. “Pros Know” made contractors the heroes, not the tools: 222M impressions and double-digit sales growth.
• Thomson Reuters CoCounsel. AI assistant for lawyers and tax pros. An ILTACON 2025 takeover with hologram “digital clones” drove 2,250 leads and $6.5M in revenue by December ’25.

If a bearings company can win the Grand Prix at Cannes, your category isn’t the excuse!