It’s Time to Humanize your B2B Brand: Why Emotion Drives Results

In B2B marketing, logic has long reigned supreme. Product features, performance metrics, and value propositions have traditionally shaped how companies present themselves. Yet, as competition intensifies and differentiation becomes harder to sustain on functionality alone, something critical is often missing from the equation: emotion.

This isn’t about replacing substance with sentiment. It’s about recognizing that even in B2B, decisions are made by humans—not spreadsheets.

The Fallacy of Hyper-rational B2B Marketing

We live and work in emotional times. It's not just that we’re feeling more emotions or experiencing them more intensely — those emotions are increasingly shaping how we interpret the world. They are just as present in our professional lives as in our personal ones. That’s something B2B marketers can’t afford to ignore.

Even before the pandemic, data was stacking up: B2B brands were underestimating the power of emotional branding. Research by Les Binet and Peter Field for the LinkedIn B2B Institute revealed that emotion-led strategies are 7x more effective at driving long-term growth than rational messaging alone.

Even if your audience is trying to be logical, they are still far more likely to remember your brand — and believe your message — if you’ve made them feel something.

Emotion regulates our response to marketing. It’s not fluff — it’s an evolutionary mechanism for interpreting the world. The more disorienting the world becomes, the stronger emotion’s role becomes in shaping how people react to your brand.

Debunking B2B Emotional Marketing Myths

To make room for emotion in B2B marketing, we first need to discard a few common myths:

• Myth 1: Emotion requires a visible reaction.
  The most powerful emotional responses are often subtle. Feeling understood by a brand builds trust far more than a flashy campaign ever could.
• Myth 2: B2B products can’t evoke emotion.
  Not true. Trust is cited as a top decision factor in 59% of B2B sales in Europe. If you've ever closed a deal based on reputation, you’ve already used emotion.
• Myth 3: Emotion is only useful for brand awareness.
  Emotion plays a critical role in activation marketing as well. It guides attention, shapes memory, and drives response — all the way to conversion.

Categorizing Emotions: What really Matters in B2B

To use emotion strategically, we need frameworks—not guesswork. One of the most enduring is the Plutchik Wheel of Emotions, which outlines eight core emotions: Joy, Sadness, Trust, Disgust, Fear, Anger, Anticipation, and Surprise. Each can combine or vary in intensity to form more complex emotional responses — such as Optimism (Joy + Anticipation), Love (Joy + Trust), or Awe (Surprise + Fear).

In B2B contexts, understanding these dynamics helps marketers move beyond functional messaging and toward storytelling that creates resonance and relevance. After all, brands don’t communicate in an emotional vacuum — they interact with how people already feel.

Emotions that Matter Most in B2B Marketing Today

Recent campaigns show how top B2B brands are integrating emotional layers into their communication:

• EY’s “Shape the Future with Confidence” campaign blends visual storytelling and forward-looking tone to inspire optimism and confidence.
• Goldman Sachs’ rebranding initiative focuses on projecting modernity and approachability — building emotional proximity through a cleaner, more humanized identity.
• Zendesk brings internal culture and employee experience into the brand narrative — reflecting support and emotional alignment with its audience.
• Sustainability-driven branding trends show how Optimism and Hope are now central to future-facing B2B communication.

Branding is Your Strategic Differentiator

In mature sectors, technical parity is the norm. Features alone no longer win deals. What separates winning brands is emotional positioning, storytelling, and customer connection.

"A strong B2B brand becomes a magnetic field—attracting the right clients, talent, and partners before a single spec sheet is even read."
→ Why branding resistance in B2B holds you back

This is also reinforced in Everything but B2B marketing, where branding is positioned as a bridge between business purpose and emotional value.

Emotion Complements Logic — It Doesn’t Replace It

Buyers still need facts and figures — but emotion is what makes the facts stick.

→ See also: Customer experience: what is it and how can it benefit your business.

How to Start: Humanize your B2B Brand

Ask yourself:

• What do your clients feel, not just what do they need?
• Are you building empathy, confidence, and connection?
• Are you telling a story that people want to be part of?

→ The role of value proposition in B2B contexts.