the anti-boring B2B effect, from corporate sameness to cultural moments: an exclusive interview with Emma, Senior Brand Marketing Manager at Work.Life
In a world where B2B marketing feels like a never-ending parade of stock photos featuring people in suits pointing at whiteboards, Work.Life decided to take a completely different approach. Instead of glossing over workplace frustrations like everyone else, they made them the star of the show.
I recently sat down with Emma, Senior Brand Marketing Manager at Work.Life, to understand how they've completely flipped the script on B2B marketing. From animated characters calling out office annoyances to £40 cultural moment activations that punch way above their weight, Work.Life has tripled their brand awareness and proved that being cheeky in B2B actually works.
Could you introduce yourself and tell me about your role in the Work.Life marketing team?
Hi! I'm Emma, Senior Brand Marketing Manager for Work.Life. My role is pretty far reaching (fellow marketers I'm sure you relate!!) and my remit covers brand management, PR, design, events, member communications and community management, campaigns, and I have the wonderfully unstoppable Emily Jones in my team who leads social, content and demand gen (but is also involved with a lot of the above!), and Sarah Sich at the helm (our Marketing Director, who's been with Work.Life since the early days).
Work.Life have a super bold, funny approach to marketing in the B2B space. Was this cheeky style always part of your brand DNA, or did it kind of evolve as you went along?
Thank you! A lot of hard work from the whole team has gone into getting the brand to where it is today. There's definitely always been an appetite for this, but I'd say the Mini MBA in Brand Management (shoutout Mark Ritson) really spurred us on to pursue long term brand building as a key business priority.
We've also been working with a fantastic independent creative agency, Defiant (founded by Will Poskett), for over three years now. They helped us define our brand purpose and creative platform, 'Work Made Happy.' A bold approach that sees us do what no other brand does in the category - call out all the worst bits of office life we all love to hate.
Was there initial hesitation about taking such a bold, irreverent approach for a B2B brand? How did you build internal support for this direction?
Yes! We are lucky to have a forward-thinking and trusting leadership team, but when I showed some first drafts of animated characters I'm not going to lie… it did take a little bit of convincing! Thankfully, working in partnership with our agency, we were able to make a clear business case for being bold and disruptive.
With budgets a fraction of those of our biggest competitors, we knew we had to outsmart if we couldn't outspend. And that's exactly what our creative platform delivers. The bold, distinctive characters cut through a sea of category sameness. While the campaign has a tongue-in-cheek tone, it always ties back to a real truth about the brand: our mission has always been to make people's work lives happier.
I also put a lot of time and energy into getting our entire team onboard and making sure they felt part of what we were doing - from All Hands presentations to polls to pick the favourite copy lines to many overly energetic slack messages and just generally trying to create a lot of excitement about what we were doing with the whole team - don't underestimate your internal stakeholders! We have an incredible team who all joined in on engaging with the campaign.
So your "Office Pitfalls" campaign from 2023 absolutely smashed it - tripling your brand awareness! What blew you away most about how people reacted to seeing these office frustrations called out so bluntly?
Seeing people find it funny was the best part of it. Marketing can feel like an echo chamber sometimes, and even though we do the research, test on people, tweak copy countless times, it's always reassuring to be like 'oh okay that actually is something people find annoying, it's not just us!'.
The trickiest bit was probably getting the attention we wanted with a smaller budget - we're lucky that we have a good performance vs brand split and our leadership team are supportive of and believe in the impact of brand. And while we're not quite at the point where we can afford Oxford Circus, nothing beats the feeling of seeing our work plastered across London and shared on LinkedIn."
I absolutely loved your London Marathon "Running late to work starts as cardio, right?" and that Valentine's Day "Single hot desks in your area" campaign! How do you spot these cultural moments and turn them into something that feels so perfectly Work.Life?
All the credit to Emily for this! We've taken a lot of inspiration from brands like Hubspot, Surreal, Gymbox and love jumping on these cultural moments. We take a bit of a two pronged approach - we do some work upfront to identify key moments we know will happen that we want to activate, and then Emily does a great job of keeping her finger on the pulse of what else is going on and jumping on these.
I.e. the marathon idea - I think this was turned around in about 2 weeks and we spent about £40 on getting some foam boards printed - that was it!
Your marketing tackles workplace annoyances head-on with humor instead of glossing over them like everyone else. What parts of your marketing do you think have been most effective at making Work.Life stand out from the crowd?
We've done a lot of work on our brand over the last few years, and have a distinctive visual style and tone of voice which helps us stand out more broadly. We're also a bit obsessed with who our customer is and trying to get to know them, so we've probably seen the most success on when we really get that right, like with our newsletter and peer support group we've just launched for business leaders - it feels like we're really creating that value for our core audience, which is what it's all about really.
Emma, you've previously mentioned the coworking industry was "incredibly same-y" before your campaign shook things up. How did you identify these pain points that everyone experiences but no one was talking about?
We are diligent with tracking our brand - when you run a lot of activity that is more difficult to attribute I really see the value in running regular brand surveys to get a sense of things like awareness and sentiment. These surveys help us identify pain points and help guide us more broadly.
For this campaign specifically, we ran a few different focus groups with our ICP to firstly understand what these painpoints were, and secondly get a sense of how the creative concepts landed (which was really positive!). We also ran creative tests through ProQuo with some ad-cepts to check with a larger audience that we weren't going to destroy the brand ;)
That post-Covid survey you did found some pretty concerning stats about wellbeing, with over 4 in 10 adults reporting low happiness levels. How has this shaped your mission to make "people's work-lives happier," and what effect has it had on the community you're building?
There's a strong belief across the business that what we offer goes far beyond just providing physical workspace. Our COO, Paul, is especially passionate about this - and we're constantly asking ourselves how we can deepen the value we bring to our community.
At the heart of it, we want our members to feel like they can truly be themselves. We create spaces where people can connect on a human level - real relationships over small talk. We often hear from members that our membership teams feel like an extension of their own team, and that's something we're really proud of. Everything we do ties back to our mission.
Of course, we know we're not a magic fix for unhappiness. But we show up every day with a genuine drive to make people's work lives a bit better - whether that's removing friction (like sorting an invoicing issue quickly), making someone a matcha latte after a tough pitch, or throwing one of our infamous community events to help people unwind and have a laugh. It's those little, thoughtful moments that help build a happier work life - and a stronger, more connected community.
What's your top piece of advice for B2B brands looking to escape the "same-y" trap in their industry?
I was actually reading something recently which sums this up perfectly - 41% of marketers see creativity as a risk, though it is the highest profit multiplier (x12) behind brand size (System 1 Group, The Creative Dividend 2025 Report).
Essentially - don't be scared to be creative, and some of our best ideas have come when we've least expected it, or we've overheard something in the office (we need to start a series on this).
What's the biggest risk in taking such a bold approach to B2B marketing, and how can brands mitigate it while still standing out?
I think the biggest risk is not taking a risk at all. We live in a world more distracted than ever, with attention spans in freefall. In such a world, the real danger lies in playing it safe. You need to be different, bold, and aim for fame at all costs - especially when you're a challenger brand like us, working with smaller budgets and fewer resources.
We've also learned the power and importance of LinkedIn in the B2B space. If you're willing to be bold and stick your neck out, you dramatically increase your odds of earning organic reach and brand fame.
After seeing such amazing growth in brand awareness, what's been the most unexpected win from breaking the traditional B2B marketing mold?
The biggest surprise? Realising that what feels bold, scary or even a bit risky to us as marketers isn't nearly as big a deal once it's out in the world. We can really overthink things at our desks - and we definitely had nerves about parts of our campaigns - but the truth is, people don't scrutinise it the way we imagine. If anything, the bolder moves have been the ones that paid off most.
Key Takeaways for B2B Marketers:
1. Make the business case for boldness: Don't just pitch creative ideas - demonstrate how differentiation drives business results, especially when working with smaller budgets.
2. Get everyone on board: Internal buy-in isn't just about leadership approval. Create genuine excitement across your entire organization to turn every team member into a campaign advocate.
3. Research fearlessly, then act boldly: Use data to identify real customer pain points, then have the courage to address them in unexpected ways.
4. Master cultural moment marketing: Keep a finger on the cultural pulse and be ready to activate quickly. Sometimes the best campaigns come from £40 and two weeks of turnaround time.
5. Remember that the biggest risk is no risk: In an attention-deficit world, playing it safe is actually the riskiest strategy of all.
Work.Life's success proves that B2B doesn't have to be boring. By authentically addressing real workplace frustrations with humor and humanity, they've built a brand that people actually want to engage with. In a category full of corporate speak and stock photography, sometimes all it takes is the courage to say what everyone's thinking but no one's saying.
As Emma puts it: "Don't be scared to be creative." In a world where 41% of marketers see creativity as a risk despite it being the highest profit multiplier, maybe it's time more B2B brands took that advice to heart.
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