The 2014 B2B Oscars: Call For Nominations

With award season upon us, it’s almost time for OpenView’s 2nd Annual B2B Oscars. Before we honor this year’s most compelling B2B marketing videos, we need your help. Which videos impressed you the most this year?

The nominees may be in for this year’s Academy Awards, but we need your help selecting the best standout B2B marketing videos from 2013.
Last year, we decided to hold our first annual B2B Oscars as a way of recognizing the growing quantity — and improving quality — of B2B marketing videos being created on the web. In the 12 months since we revealed the winners of those awards, that trend has only increased. With AdAge reporting that more than 60 percent of B2B businesses are now incorporating video into their content marketing plans, and with budgets on the rise, there’s little doubt that B2B videos are set to become even bigger and better.

Call For Nominations! Which Videos Knocked Your Socks Off in 2013?

Last year’s winners served as great examples of what B2B tech companies can accomplish through the power of video — from breaking down the promise of their product or service in a concise and entertaining way, to showing what makes their company and employees so special.
This year the bar has been raised even higher, and we need your help narrowing down our nominees. Was there a video that blew you away last year? Did your company make a video that deserves some love (and some hardware)?
Nominate it in one of the five categories below by leaving a comment or tweeting it with the hashtag #B2BOscars!

We need your help to determine the nominees for five categories:

Creating a viral video remains an imperfect science (and a marketer’s white whale), but there’s no denying the impact those types of videos can have on driving awareness. Which B2B viral videos grabbed your attention this year, made you to stop what you were doing, and immediately share them with your network? Last year’s winner: Grasshopper: Sh*t Entrepreneurs Say Tweet your nomination!

The old excuse for not using video in a B2B content strategy was that it wasn’t always the best format for quickly and compellingly conveying the value of a highly technical software solution. As the winner of last year’s Best Explainer Video proved, however, explainer videos have largely rendered that excuse moot. Which explainer videos helped you quickly (and entertainingly) understand a complex IT solution in 2013? Last year’s winner: Crazy Egg Tweet your nomination!

In the never-ending war for top tech talent, is there a better way to showcase your company’s culture and personality than through a short video? We don’t think so, and the same can be said of last year’s B2B Oscar nominees. Which B2B organizations gave you the best, most intimate look into the day-to-day life and culture at their company? Last year’s winner: Hubspot: Inside Hubspot Tweet your nomination!

This is a new category this year, but we think it’s an obvious one. Founders are often the personification of their brands, and, done right, featuring those founders in a well-crafted B2B video can yield big results (see: Dollar Shave Club and CEO Michael Dubin). Which founder-featured video made you laugh, cry, or awkwardly cringe in 2013? Tweet your nomination!

In another new category, we thought it only right to honor the hallmark objective of all great B2B video — conversion! After all, it’s all well and good to produce a hilarious viral video, but if that video doesn’t encourage viewers to take some sort of subsequent action, what good was it? What companies have found innovative, irresistible ways to get you to click? Tweet your nomination!

Have a video you’d like to nominate for any of the categories above? Tweet your nomination or let us know in the comments below.

We’ll be presenting the official short list of nominees on Friday, February 21st. That’s when we’ll open up the voting and you will decide the winners!
Image by Lincolnblues