Ruth Stevens: Spotlight on the expert

In this series, we dig deeper into the stories of our expert contributors. This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Ruth Stevens found her way into B2B marketing by accident, as many B2B marketers do. Her route took her through the publishing industry, then grad school, before diving into the intersection of marketing and technology by learning database marketing.

Thus began a career combining marketing and technology for B2B businesses like Ziff Davis and IBM.

One constant in Ruth’s career: teaching. From teaching English in Japan in her 20s to teaching marketing to university students, education and knowledge sharing is central to almost everything she does.

Ruth’s teaching experience includes Columbia University, NYU Stern School of Business, Hong Kong UST, Singapore Management University, Athens College, San Andres University (Buenos Aires), Jagiellonian University (Krakow) and Indian Institute of Management Bangalore.

Q: How did you get into marketing, as a career?

A: I got into marketing in Japan, where I spent most of my 20s living in a beautiful provincial city called Kanazawa. I was teaching English conversation, like many young foreigners, and I loved the city and had lots of friends visit and they all expected me to show them around. I started making notes so that I didn’t have to take them on private tours and those notes ended up becoming a guidebook, which was quite successful and earned me a job at an English-language publishing company in Tokyo.

I got an opportunity to move to New York and open a marketing office for that publishing company. So I learned self-taught publishing, PR and marketing and realized I needed an education. So I went to Columbia and got an MBA. After Columbia, my first job was at Book of the Month Club, where I happily learned database marketing. And after that, I moved to Ziff Davis and IBM, where I worked in B2B marketing and thought, “Boy, this is great because in B2B, the marketing mission is more complicated.”

Q: B2B marketing seems to be in this constant state of change. One of the most recent changes we’ve seen is the shift in philosophy from lead gen to demand gen. What do you take from this constant search for strategies that deliver revenue?

A: The changes all stem from a change in buying behavior. And the reason buying behavior has changed boils down to two major drivers: one is the arrival of the internet and everything digital. But then the other is the fact that we have many buyers in our buying committees and our prospect audiences who grew up as digital natives. And the way they want to research and make purchase decisions is different from the way my generation did.

Dig deeper: How to map your selling process to the way your B2B customers buy: A case study

Q: One of the common criticisms of B2B marketing is that it doesn’t focus enough on brand building and brand awareness. Do you think a lot of B2B marketers are missing an opportunity by under-investing in brand?

A: That [brand-building] mission is still needed, but it’s different today, of course. The vehicle through which we build awareness is less about print advertising and it’s all digital. But the function is still essential: a business buyer is not going to buy from someone that they haven’t thoroughly researched. And if we help them get that research done, that’s very important.

Q: A lot of B2B marketers had a rough year in 2023. What are you excited about for this space in 2024?

A: AI. I hate to say it. I’m already kind of sick of it. But it’s just everywhere and it came up so suddenly. I’m kind of overwhelmed, but it is really, arguably, the biggest shiny object to come along in a long time — I would argue, since the internet.

The other thing I’m excited about is the return of events. After COVID it’s ramping up. I do still have concerns, though. In B2B, as trade pubs and trade associations and professional associations have declined because the profit model blew up, the event space is heavily dominated by vendor events. And that is a concern to me. They have wonderful conferences. But they can’t even pretend to be objective and industry-focused the way a professional association and a trade organization could at least claim to be.