B2B Marketing

By Paul Hague, Nick Hague and Matt Harrison of B2B International Ltd.

FOUR FACTORS THAT MAKE BUSINESS-TO-BUSINESS MARKETING SPECIAL

Is business-to-business marketing really different to marketing to the general public? Does it really require a different approach to consumer marketing? Since marketing is about the profitable satisfaction of needs, aren’t the fundamentals of getting the right product to the right person, at the right price, exactly the same – isn’t it only the detail that is different?

In this paper we argue that although there is a cross over, business-to-business marketing is different from consumer marketing in deep and fundamental ways and this most certainly affects the way that b2b marketing should be carried out.

As always, we must be clear about our definitions. What are business-to-business markets? To answer this question it is useful to consider the value chain that starts with a consumer demand and from which dozens of business products or services are required. Take the example of the simple shirts that we buy. They do not arrive in the shops by accident. There is a value chain of enormous complexity that begins with cotton or some other fibre that must then be woven into cloth, that in turn is machined into a garment, packed and distributed through various levels until finally we pick it from the shelf. This is illustrated in the diagram below. We call this the chain of derived demand since everything to the left hand of the shirt is pulled through as a result of the demand for the product. Businesses sell cotton to merchants who sell it to spinners who sell it to weavers who sell it to garment makers and so on. None of the businesses buy the products for pure indulgence. They buy them with the ultimate aim of adding value in order that they can move the products down the chain until they finally reach us, the general public.

Business-to-business marketing is therefore about meeting the needs of other businesses, though ultimately the demand for the products made by these businesses is likely to be driven by consumers in their homes.

There are four key factors that make business-to-business markets special and different to consumer markets:

• The decision making unit is far more complex in business-to-business markets than in consumer markets
• Business-to-business products and their applications are more complex than consumer products
• Business-to-business marketers address a much smaller number of customers who are very much larger in their consumption of products than is the case in consumer markets
• Personal relationships are of critical importance in business-to-business markets.

We will take each in turn.

THE COMPLEXITY OF THE DECISION MAKING UNIT

In most households, even the most complex of decisions is confined to the small family unit while items such as clothes, food and cigarettes usually involve just one person. The decision making unit (DMU) in business-to-business markets is highly complex or at least it has the potential to be so. Ordering products of low value and low risk (such as the ubiquitous paper clip) may well be the responsibility of the office junior. However, the purchase of a new plant that is vital to a business may involve a large team who makes their decision over a protracted period. Often the DMU changes during this negotiation period as specialists enter and leave it to make their different contributions.

                           The Risk-Value Purchasing Decision Matrix

This complexity has implications for business-to-business markets. The target audiences for b2b communications are amorphous, made up of groups of constantly changing individuals with different interests and motivations. Buyers seek a good financial deal. Production managers want high throughput. Health and safety executives want low risk. And those are just their simple, functional needs. Each person who is party to the DMU will also bring their psychological and cultural baggage to the decision and this can create interesting variations to the selection of products and suppliers.

A Typical Decision Making Unit In A B2B Environment

This raises the most interesting question on the effect of functional as opposed to emotional factors on the buying decisions. People in the business-to-business DMUs often know as much about the products they are buying as the companies that are selling them these products. Research shows that high levels of customer satisfaction and loyalty are driven by the softer issues that are easy to ignore in the so called “rational” buyer. People don’t leave their emotions at home when they come to work!

The Rational And Emotional Influences On The “Rational” Business Buyer

Given the complexity of the decision making unit and the many influences (rational and emotional) on these decisions, it should be no surprise that it is difficult to arrive at a needs based segmentation in business-to-business markets.

THE COMPLEXITY OF THE PRODUCT

Just as the decision making unit is complex in relation to business-to-business markets, so the same rule applies for the actual products in these markets. Business-to-business products – and their applications – are far more likely to be complex than is the case with their counterparts in consumer markets.

Where the purchase of a consumer product requires little expertise (perhaps nothing more than a whim), the purchase of an industrial product frequently requires a qualified expert. Where consumer products are largely standardised, industrial products are often bespoke and require high levels of fine-tuning. Even relatively complex consumer products tend to be chosen on fairly simple criteria. A car might be chosen because it goes fast and looks nice, and a stereo might be purchased on the grounds that it is tremendously loud.

Industrial products, on the other hand, frequently have to be integrated into wider systems and as a result have very specific requirements and need intimate, expert examination and modification. It is difficult to imagine a turbine manufacturer or commercial web-site design buyer having a look at three or four products and then choosing one simply because it looks nice. The choice of turbine will involve a whole host of technical, productivity and safety issues, whilst the choice of web-site might be based on its integration into a wider marketing campaign, its interactivity with users and the degree to which it draws potential clients via search engines.

These differences have a great impact on the way consumer and industrial products are marketed. Buyers of consumer products are not interested in the technical details of what they are buying. The vast majority of car buyers are far more interested in what speed the car will reach than in how it will reach that speed. Similarly, the buyer of a chocolate bar is likely to be far more interested in the fact that the item stops them feeling hungry and tastes nice than in the technology and ingredients that make it so. As a result, consumer products are frequently marketed in ways that are superficial or even vacuous.

Car manufacturers frequently completely ignore not only how a car performs, but often the fact that the car performs at all, and instead seek to apply non-physical attributes such as sex appeal to their products. Business-to-business campaigns, on the other hand, seek to educate their target audience by providing specific factual information. Many target companies in business-to-business campaigns are already well-informed on the product area, in which case promotional material may have to go as far as offering product specifications. Often, however, campaigns are promoting products that the target market is unaware of – in such cases, the physical benefits of the product must be concisely conveyed.

THE LIMITED NUMBER OF BUYING UNITS

Almost all business-to-business markets exhibit a customer distribution that confirms the Pareto Principle or 80:20 rule. A small number of customers dominate the sales ledger. Nor are we talking thousands and millions of customers. It is not unusual, even in the largest business-to-business companies, to have 100 or less customers that really make a difference to sales.

The Rational And Emotional Influences On The “Rational” Business Buyer

Because such small numbers of customers dominate the lives of businesses, database management is a crucial part of business-to-business marketing. Customer relationship management systems (CRM) now allow databases to be kept up-to-date with personal details of members of the DMU together with every transactional and contact record.

There is also a matter of scale. In consumer markets there are reasonable limits to the amount that a single person can buy and use of any product. Certainly there are heavy users of all consumer products but the difference between the light user and the heavy user is a matter of small degree compared with the scale of differences in business-to-business markets. You can fit most buyers of consumer products into a “typical spend per month” with a few heavy spenders and a few light spenders at the extremes. The range of spend between the largest and smallest buyer in a business-to-business universe is likely to be much much larger than the range of spend between the largest and smallest buyers in consumer markets. Small numbers of customers of widely different sizes is a major distinguishing feature of business-to-business markets and this requires a completely different marketing approach to that required for consumer markets.

THE IMPORTANCE OF PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS

The fourth distinguishing feature of business-to-business markets is the importance of the personal relationship. A small customer base that buys regularly from the business-to-business supplier is relatively easy to talk to. Sales and technical representatives visit the customers. People are on first name terms. Personal relationships and trust develops. It is not unusual for a business-to-business supplier to have customers that have been loyal and committed for many years.

The consequences of this for marketing budgets are a relatively high spend on people (sales and technical support) and a more modest expenditure on other forms of promotion. Advertising budgets for business marketers are usually measured in thousands of euros and not millions.

THERE IS A DIFFERENCE

The differences between business-to-business markets and consumer markets that have been outlined in this paper are clearly considerable. So, what does this mean to the business-to-business marketer? Small customer numbers, complex decision making units and complex products and applications throw the emphasis on close targeting and personal relationships. Consumer marketers face the challenge of communicating with a much wider customer base and ensuring that their products or services are in perfect condition at the point of sale.

The common challenge for both business-to-business and consumer marketers is to truly understand their customer needs and to be able to communicate that their products or services really are special in being able to satisfy them. There is usually substantial room for improvement in both respects.

However, the most neglected marketing opportunity in the business-to-business arena is the building of a strong brand. In a world where it is becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish one product from another, it is even more important to have the support of a powerful brand. It is difficult to measure the precise contribution of a company’s brand to the buying decision. However, those who have made estimates suggest that in industrial and business-to-business markets, the brand plays less than a 5% role in influencing the buying decision compared with a 30%+ role for consumer products. The opportunities for business-to-business companies to develop their brands to play a
more important role in supporting their products and services are the subject of another white paper from
B2B International Ltd.