Getting to know everyone behind an enterprise technology purchase

An enterprise technology purchase can involve many people with different priorities. A company that sells such technology wanted to know each of them, and what would win them over, so we built a program that grew with its market.

Client
Enterprise technology company
Industry
Enterprise technology
Markets
Four markets
Kind of work
Business and expert research
Our role
A staged buyer research program, from persona survey to message testing

What happened next

The company has commissioned new work from us every year since the program began, and a proposition we explored with it later launched publicly.

The question

The company wanted to understand everyone who shapes an enterprise technology purchase, from IT leaders and buying groups to the people choosing an AI provider.

It wanted to know how each of them influences the decision, what each needs to hear before they choose a supplier, and how to talk to all of them with one voice.

Our approach

We built the program in stages, each starting from what the last had made clear.

Buyer personas came first, grounded in a survey of IT decision makers in four markets and shaped together with the company’s own team.

Then we took the company’s messages to the buyers they were written for, persona by persona, and sharpened them as the conversations went on.

Later stages brought in the people who influence the choice of AI provider, and technical leaders and industry analysts, so the picture kept up with the people the company sells to.

What the team came away with

The company’s teams got buyer personas built on survey evidence and sharpened in conversation, with messaging guidance for each audience.

Marketing leadership had one shared view of everyone behind the purchase, and of how to talk to each of them.

Who we heard from

IT decision makers across buying groups, the people who influence the choice of AI provider, technical leaders and industry analysts, in four markets

What we do
Strategic research

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