Small business owners spent much of the last two years trying to move forward as the ground shifted beneath their feet. From extended closures and supply chain issues to labor shortages and changing health regulations, the far-reaching effects of COVID-19 brought one unprecedented challenge after another.
Early in the pandemic, the global B2B marketing team at American Express recognized this turbulent new landscape and responded by creating an education platform called Business Class. The platform quickly grew into a widely used source of information and support. It’s a big reason why American Express earned a spot on Fast Company‘s 2022 list of Best Workplaces for Innovators.
A NEW LEARNING PLATFORM
“When the financial crisis happened, our small businesses needed customers, so we created Small Business Saturday to encourage people to visit local stores,” says Clayton Ruebensaal, executive vice president of Global B2B Marketing at American Express. “When the pandemic hit, our customers needed education and guidance to navigate the unprecedented change, so we built Business Class. Our Business Class team has now created nearly 650 new resources, across eight countries.”
American Express works with more than 3 million small businesses in the U.S. At the outset of the pandemic, those businesses understandably had a lot of questions, on topics that ranged from accessing federal relief loans to converting to e-business channels.
The B2B Marketing team realized that a pressing need for small business owners was current and relevant information—and that creating new educational content was a low-cost solution that could both help customers and drive engagement. The team converted an existing weekly marketing newsletter to a daily and gave it a new purpose: to tackle the avalanche of queries from small business owners struggling during the pandemic.
The new format was immediately popular. Despite the increased frequency of the emails, open rates shot up from 10% to more than 40%, and the community quickly grew to more than 600,000 monthly users. American Express built upon the success by expanding social media content, holding live day-long workshops and other digital events, and introducing a video series that featured the likes of Shaquille O’Neal and culinary entrepreneur David Chang.
“We focused on three things: accessibility, usefulness, and entertainment,” Ruebensaal says. “I think it was that combination that allowed us to be successful.”
A CULTURE OF CREATIVITY
Ruebensaal says that the development of platforms like Business Class is a reflection of a larger environment that supports creativity and innovation. The global B2B marketing organization consists of a collection of smaller teams based in cities around the world, including New York, Sydney, Mexico City, London, and Toronto. “Each team is given latitude to create content that works in their respective markets, and this content serves as a Petri dish for innovation in other markets,” Ruebensaal says.
More broadly across American Express, internal competitions are held that encourage employees at all levels to pitch their company-improving ideas to decision-makers. The most promising ideas secure funding to be transformed into real-life solutions. In 2021, these competitions were focused on supporting small business customers facing pandemic-related challenges.
“Trust is the bedrock of creativity,” says Ruebensaal. “We aim to create an environment where people feel secure and inspired to do their best work.