The business-to-business world is often filled with jargon and technical detail that consumers never see. While b-to-b brands are getting more creative with their marketing, the sector is still plagued by boring work.

As agencies struggle to differentiate themselves in a crowded marketplace, some like Umault and Zulu Alpha Kilo with its “Left Handed Chutney” awards spoof, have created work to showcase themselves and give potential clients a glimpse into what they can expect from them. B-to-b digital video agency Umault is upending the usual straightforward, jargon-filled b-to-b campaign with its take on how campaigns should present themselves to other businesses. Its latest branding efforts court the holiday season with traditional Christmas Carols that skewer bad cold outreach techniques.

Enlisting a group of carolers to sing emails

Umault—the name is a play on umlaut, meant to draw attention to what would otherwise be overlooked, like b-to-b ads—wanted to put a new spin on b-to-b video branding. Last year, the agency came up with a Halloween spot that showed a woman clicking to download a white paper on boosting productivity. The spoof horror spot then shows the relentless emails, calls, texts and postcards that create a scary stalker of a company.

That first successful spot—25,000 views on YouTube and more on the Umault website and social channels, and won a Chip Shop Award from The Drum—led them to do a self-promotional Christmas ad and a second Halloween ad this year.

For the 2022 holiday season, Umault, now known for its humorous and satirical videos, decided to take its Christmas ad to a group of tuneful professionals. Agency founder and chief creative Guy Bauer had been wanting to do something with the onslaught of terrible cold emails and DMs that every marketer gets on a daily basis, and the holidays seemed a perfect vehicle.

“One day, it just hit us like a ton of bricks. Why don’t we just start a file of all the cold emails we’ve gotten, the worst offenders, and then just put that to holiday carols? And we basically came up with some lyrics and hired a real caroler group,” Bauer told Adweek.

The carolers put their own spin on the lyrics. and their Victorian charm bring lyrics like “Hi {first name}, does {company name} need to hire?” burst with cheesy harmony.

The Umault crew had enough material to make a second tuneful video, complete with lyrics like “Just checking in with you again, have any need for business leads?” to the tune of “Hark, the Herald Angels Sing.”

Upping the ante on b-to-b ads

Umault was founded with a mission to do better and more entertaining b-to-b ads. They have done successful work for Samsung, Deloitte and Nuance, most with a humorous angle, though the agency does produce more serious work when needed, as it did for MassMutual insurance. But it’s humor that breaks through for Umault, like one it did for PremiumBeats about a voice-over guy who tries to hit the perfect recording every time.

Bauer, who had a production company that eventually morphed into Umault in 2019, decided that the agency needed to promote itself in a less traditional way than blogs and white papers, and he heard on a podcast that agencies used to put self-promotional ads in newspapers all the time, but that tradition faded with print.

Bauer realized that since Umault’s medium was video ads, the best way to promote the business would be to make something and have clients be able to point to as examples of what they might want to do.

“What we try to do, especially with the holiday videos, is point out the absurdity of the status quo, and then put our logo at the end. And I think that resonates with people and they trust us,” said Bauer.

Those self-promotional videos are garnering a building buzz, and Umault uses those videos as a test kitchen of sorts. When the company started doing self-promotional ads, it didn’t have the same budgets as those of its clients, so they had to think about leaner productions while keeping high value.

“It’s like R&D because we’re the client so it’s relatively low risk. This allows us the ability to fail and learn, then use those learnings on our clients,” said Bauer.

Umault has a goal of releasing one promotional ad a month, which is a tall order but one it sticks to. Bauer said that creativity in b-to-b is relatively new, but there are a few pioneers, including what Ryan Reynolds and Maximum Effort are doing for their respective companies. What makes Umault stand out is that its videos are both entertaining and educational on the b-to-b side of the business.

The company’s self-promotional videos range from productions that skewer the industry, like its “Don’t Get Trapped in a Corporate Video” spot, to fun informational explanations by Bauer, to a hilarious “Kids Discuss B-to-B Marketing” series.

Bauer is aware that not every company in the b-to-b world is right for Umault’s way of marketing, but he hopes that he helps grow the category of b-to-b and creativity, and that, in turn, will help grow the Umault brand, because he states that the brand is playing the long game, one humorous video at a time.