Performance Branding: The Overlooked Strategy

B2B marketing has a bit of an identity crisis.

On one side, you have performance marketing—all sharp elbows and spreadsheets. It’s hungry for clicks, conversions, MQLs, ROI. The stuff the C-suite can point to and say, “Look! Numbers!”

On the other side, there’s brand marketing. Softer. More patient. A slow-burning fireplace instead of a gas stove. It tells stories, builds trust, fosters affinity. It’s the reason someone chooses you over a cheaper, louder alternative.

The problem? Many B2B companies treat these two approaches like rival siblings. They keep them in separate rooms, assign them different KPIs, and hope they get along.

Spoiler: They usually don’t.

And when they don’t? You get bland content, fatigued audiences, confused buyers, and missed revenue targets.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Because there’s a better model. One that blends the urgency of performance with the staying power of brand.

It’s called Performance Branding. And yes, it works.

Let’s Start With the Tug-of-War That Got Us Here

Performance marketing is obsessed with now.

Brand marketing is obsessed with forever.

And because they’re chasing different time horizons, they rarely speak the same language. Performance teams want to hit this quarter’s pipeline goals. Brand teams want to shape perception and spark recall.

In B2B, this split is especially pronounced. We chase leads like they’re golden tickets. We optimize everything including subject lines, CTA buttons, asset gates. But often, we forget that the buyer is human. That emotion plays a role. That trust is earned.

We try to rush a relationship that was never meant to be transactional.

And that’s why your paid campaigns are getting more expensive. Why your win rates are stagnating. Why your brand feels invisible until someone Googles your name and finds... a case study from 2018 and a few webinar invites.

We’re selling in a world where buyers are skeptical, distracted, and 70% through their journey before they ever fill out a form. If they fill out a form at all.

So how do you cut through?

You do both. You don’t choose.

You build a brand and you drive performance.

Let’s Talk Numbers (Because Your CFO Wants To)

First, a reality check.

According to Binet and Field’s now-famous research, the optimal marketing mix for long-term growth is 60% brand and 40% performance. Not 90/10. Not 100/0.

Why? Because brand creates mental availability, the likelihood that your company comes to mind when a prospect is ready to buy. Performance, on the other hand, captures existing demand.

No brand = no preference. No preference = you're in a pricing war.

Also:

• LinkedIn found that B2B buyers are 6x more likely to engage with a brand they recognize.

• Google data shows that branded search terms convert 2–3x better than generic ones.

• Gartner reports that 77% of B2B purchases are considered complex or difficult. A familiar, trusted brand makes that process easier.

  
  

Brand lifts performance. Performance proves brand.

It’s a flywheel.

Okay, But Who’s Doing This Well?

Let’s pull back the curtain on a few brands walking this tightrope with style.

1. Oral-B Professional: Bridging Science and Sales

When Oral-B launched a new electric toothbrush designed for dentists and hygienists, they didn’t just drop a “Buy Now” ad into inboxes and hope for the best.

They led with authority.

The campaign combined clinical credibility (backed by research from dental associations) with a limited-time offer to drive urgency. They ran educational webinars, case studies featuring real dental practices, and retargeted viewers with precision-timed email CTAs and follow-up ads.

In short:

Brand move: Built trust by showing expertise and aligning with professional values.

Performance move: Used timed promos, click-through retargeting, and ROI-based measurement to drive purchases.

Results? 

A 25-point jump in market share. 400% ROI on the campaign. Trust and transactions. That’s performance branding in action.

2. Salesforce: Not Just CRM, a Category Creator

Salesforce didn’t become a category leader by simply buying ads.

They did it by becoming unmissable.

They’ve built an entire ecosystem around their brand. From Dreamforce (their annual event that feels more like a cultural festival than a conference) to Trailblazer stories (real customers solving real problems), their brand is baked into everything they do. But here’s where it gets performance-y:

They take all that brand goodwill and feed it into precision performance campaigns.

• Visitors to Dreamforce are retargeted with customized product offers.

• Webinars are sliced into bite-sized content, optimized for paid ads.

• Their content guides, on topics like customer retention or AI in sales, are gated, tracked, and nurtured into warm leads.

  
  

Brand move: Emotional connection, community, and thought leadership.

Performance move: Funnel-optimized experiences that convert attention into pipeline.

Salesforce isn’t just buying clicks. They’re earning belief, then turning that belief into revenue.

3. InsightLoop (Composite SaaS Company): From Lead Gen to Trust Machine

InsightLoop, a mid-sized SaaS company in the B2B analytics space, was hitting a wall.

They were running high-performance paid campaigns: Google Ads, LinkedIn lead gen forms, downloadable whitepapers. CPL looked good on paper. But the leads? Lukewarm at best. Their brand was invisible. Prospects didn’t know who they were, just that they offered another tool in a crowded category.

So they pivoted.

They shifted from "download this eBook" to "here’s what we believe."

• They launched a branded content series called The Signal, sharing raw, honest interviews with data leaders.

• They put their founder front-and-center with POV LinkedIn posts.

• They introduced storytelling into product pages focusing less on specs and more on how customers were solving real problems.

  
  

But here's the kicker: every piece of brand-led content was tagged, tracked, and measured. They monitored brand lift, site engagement, and downstream impact on qualified pipeline.

Brand move: Built visibility and emotional resonance through story and thought leadership.

Performance move: Created structured lead paths, retargeting flows, and smart attribution models to show what was working.

Outcome?

• 40% reduction in customer acquisition cost

• 20% increase in demo-to-close conversion

• AND, first time in company history, they were included in a major analyst’s top-5 vendor report

  
  

That’s not luck. That’s performance branding finally doing what performance alone couldn’t.

So, What Is Performance Branding?

It’s not a buzzword.

It’s not a marketing re-org.

It’s a decision to treat every campaign like it matters for now and for later.

Think of it like this: Brand is the gravity that pulls people in. Performance is the engine that turns momentum into movement.

Performance Branding means:

• Your performance ads sound like your brand, not a PPC robot.

• Your case studies read like stories, not PDFs.

• Your marketing team has shared goals, shared dashboards, shared accountability.

  
  

You build demand. You capture demand. You measure both.

And most importantly, you stop making your audience feel like a transaction.

Here’s What It Looks Like in Real Life

1. Shared Goals

Marketing, sales, product, brand on the same page. Not just in the pipeline, but in positioning. Everyone aligned on who you are, what you stand for, and what success looks like.

2. Full-Funnel Thinking

You don’t just throw budget at paid social and hope it sticks. You create:

• Top-of-funnel: narrative videos, thought leadership, founder stories

• Middle-funnel: how-tos, interactive tools, comparison guides

• Bottom-funnel: retargeting, trials, ROI calculators, personalized follow-ups

  
  

Each one reinforcing your brand voice. Each one optimized for performance.

3. Metrics That Tell the Whole Story

Leads and conversions? Yes. But also:

• Branded search growth

• Content engagement depth

• Share of voice in industry conversations

• Brand recall and preference over time

  
  

4. Creative That Connects

We’re done with dry white papers and recycled email templates.

Great performance branding uses:

• Voice and tone that reflect your values

• Messaging that acknowledges the pain and ambition of your buyers

• Content that’s generous, not pushy

  
  

Why Now? Why You?

Because the world has changed.

Attention is scarce. Competition is noisy. And the B2B buyer? Smarter, more skeptical, more in control than ever before.

You don’t need another lead magnet. You need a reason to matter.

You don’t need to shout louder. You need to speak more clearly.

Performance Branding is the shift from marketing that interrupts to marketing that invites. From transactional touchpoints to trust-building moments.

And if you’re reading this wondering if it’s too late to start, it isn’t.

But it is too late to keep pretending brand and performance can thrive without each other.

Let’s Build a Marketing Strategy That Actually Works

At Craft, we help B2B (and B2C) companies move beyond random acts of marketing. We architect strategies that do the hard work of making you relevant and revenue-generating.

So if you’re ready to ditch the divide and start building something that lasts, let’s talk.