The Froth Problem
Two decades in B2B communications and 16 years running her own agency, on putting the human opinion back into content and why people buy people, not brands.
"You can't start with revenue in mind."
Victoria Usher is CEO and Founder of GingerMay, a B2B communications agency she has run for 16 years. She is known for a psychology-led view of PR and marketing, a refusal to call selling anything other than relationship building, and a sharp critique of the soulless content that AI has flooded the market with.
Usher's route into communications was, by her own description, a wonky one. She began in politics as a researcher for two MPs, then moved into a data analyst role, where she met the woman who became her mentor and is now an adviser and director at GingerMay. That mentor spotted a passion for marketing Usher had carried since childhood, when she watched the adverts more closely than the shows, and helped develop it into a career.
She has spent 20 years in B2B communications, a field she says is her genuine passion and one she prefers to B2C. As founder and CEO of GingerMay, she has led the agency for 16 years, building it around the principles she calls rigour, relationships and remarkable thinking. She argues that personality profiling sits at the core of PR, that PR now runs as a seam through generative engine optimisation, and that the CEOs who thrive are the ones willing to be storytellers.
People are interested in people, they're not actually interested in brands.
"Authentic people really stand out."
Usher refuses to call selling anything other than relationship building, and says the two skills that matter are asking great questions and active listening. She points to people who genuinely want to help, rather than counting revenue, as the most successful sellers she knows. For her, remembering things about a person because you care, not because you read your notes, is what makes anyone stand out.
"People that don't are gonna be left behind."
Usher says that in 16 years of running a business, even through COVID, she has never seen so much change, and that a lot of the claims made about AI are overstated. Her answer is relentless curiosity: LinkedIn courses, experimenting with ChatGPT and Perplexity at weekends, and internal information sharing. Those who refuse to keep up, she warns, will simply be left behind.
"But PR is a huge, huge chunk of that, that's why it's so exciting."
Usher argues that generative engine optimisation, while early for most clients, has PR running straight through it, with high-ranking publications rated more heavily by the models. She notes there is no single fix, only 200 things done together, from up-to-date site content to a Q&A and a site map. Her proof point is clients still surfaced for Wall Street Journal coverage years after it was placed.
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