Leapfrogging the corporate gate keeper:

Reliable, high-quality business-to-business (B2B) market research is essential to help an organization make accurate, data-driven decisions. Gathering robust insights is vital. Yet getting access to the right audiences is often tricky; they may be time poor, work in a hybrid arrangement, or have an attentive PA!

Why is B2B market research important?

Not only does B2B research pave the way for developing products, services, and campaigns, it also drives innovation, improves competitiveness, and fosters long-term growth.

While it differs from consumer research, procurement decision makers in organizations are just as heavily influenced by branding, marketing, and recommendations as consumers are. They too can prioritize personal implications over business considerations. It’s important to recognize that this is human nature, and work to understand the dynamics at play.

There are five ways that insights from B2B market research help companies. It enables them to:

1. Understand customer needs – What are their unique needs, pain points, decision-making processes, or purchasing behaviors? Who are the key decision makers and influencers within the organization? Understanding these elements helps companies develop products, services, and solutions to meet customer requirements effectively, enhancing customer relationships in the process.
2. Gain competitive intelligence – This is the gold dust. What are other companies offering? What are the strengths, weaknesses, strategies, and market positions of competitors? Where are the gaps in the market? How do you compare? Competitor insights help an organization benchmark its products or services and develop strategies that aid differentiation and gain a competitive advantage.
3. Optimize marketing and sales strategies – B2B research is essential to make sure any marketing or sales activity is optimized to meet the organization’s objectives. It helps to sense-check core messaging and choice of marketing channels to assess if it effectively reaches and persuades business decision-makers to act. This research also helps to test concepts, prototypes, and new product or service ideas, enabling a company evaluate demand and pricing sensitivity.
4. Identify growth opportunities – With so many factors influencing a company operating in the B2B sector, it’s important to be one step ahead when it comes to industry trends, emerging technologies, and shifting market dynamics. Research can uncover new opportunities, potential partnerships, or areas for expansion.
5. Mitigate risks – This is important in regulated industries, but it’s also beneficial for any business to anticipate potential risks or disruptions that could be a threat to their business model. This assists them in streamlining operations and proactively mitigating these risks.

“To understand the business and professional services industry with precision B2B market research, is to understand how the world works!”

Why can B2B market research be complex for companies?
B2B research can involve qualitative methods like in-depth interviews, focus groups, and ethnographic studies, as well as quantitative surveys. And for most organizations, such research falls outside of its core competences.

There are some key differences between business-to-business market research and consumer research, which makes it more challenging. These include:

• Access difficulties – It’s not easy to contact a CEO, business owner, leader, or head of department; and that’s before facing the corporate gatekeepers!
• Smaller samples – The pool is considerably smaller compared to the general consumer population.
• Longer decision-making process – It’s sometimes difficult to know where to start, especially when conducting research for the first time. You’ll need to identify target survey respondents, decision makers, stakeholders, and the purchasing department representative.
• The purchaser and the user may be different people – Frequently, individuals in business make purchases, but they may not be the ultimate user; and the opposite is also true. It’s critical to focus research on the right audience.
• Geographical differences – Data collection methods, such as focus groups, are more difficult with B2B research studies because respondents can be scattered across the country or the world. This is where online methodologies shine!
• Lower response rates – People are busy, and it’s more difficult to convince a professional with competing demands on their time to complete a research

The Savanta team has extensive access to business decision-makers across over 100 markets worldwide – in different sectors, roles, levels of seniority and business size – to help clients navigate even the most complex B2B markets.

We are experts in designing business-to-business research projects – ensuring you speak to the right people, and quickly access quality, considered insights. Find out more about our B2B market research and our access to this audience.