Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Assignment on
Submitted by:
Group 2
Sl No PGDM No. Name
1 17004 Anshul Babu
2 17029 Rakshit Shah
3 17062 Ikenna Uzoma Waturuocha
4 17084 Saurabh Singh
5 17103 Ankita Pawar
6 17138 Suman Kumar Das
Submitted to:
Prof. Sugant R
Associate Professor – Marketing
SDMIMD, Mysuru
Coding: ............................................................................................................................. 10
Classification: ................................................................................................................... 10
Tabulation: ........................................................................................................................ 10
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Associative analysis: ................................................................................................. 10
Results: ............................................................................................................................. 14
Influencer: ................................................................................................................. 15
Gatekeeper:................................................................................................................ 15
Decider: ..................................................................................................................... 15
Buyer: ........................................................................................................................ 15
User: .......................................................................................................................... 15
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Technical Expertise: .......................................................................................................... 16
Interview stage 3: reflection on the meaning: “What does it mean to you?” ............ 16
Conclusion.......................................................................................................... 21
Bibliography ...................................................................................................... 22
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Introduction
The business-to-business market differs in key areas from business-to-consumer research and
requires a unique approach in terms of market research. There are many differences between
consumer and B2B markets. B2B particularly its industrial segments, requires an entirely
different approach to market research because of the importance of both performing and
interpreting research in the business context. Sophisticated research techniques, while
valuable, are less important than understanding technical product applications or complex
business models. As a B2B market research professional you need to get the data right, but
you need also to be a strategist and approach each research project as a business case
analysis.
Market Research
B2B analysis provides a direct contact with buyers and sellers, this can include the traders,
industrialists, middlemen, drop shippers and wholesalers from across the world. It provides
an ideal opportunity to expand business network. One can identify the influential companies
and can get directly in touch with them to create mutually benefiting partnerships. Small
business owners can get more visibility in the market through B2B analysis. Helps you
identify Sales Leads and not waste time chasing the wrong ones.
Scope’s market research can help organizations to identify potential customers, gain a more
detailed understanding of buyer’s need, buyers’ views on a product or service, market size,
develop effective strategies, impact of current economic and demographic trends on the
future of the business, identify new opportunities in the market and forecast future trends.
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Market share analysis
The market analysis is one of the most important parts of any start up strategy. It can
help reduce risk because if you really understand your potential Buyer and market
conditions, you’ll have a better chance of developing a viable product or service.
Sales Analysis
The analysis of sales reports to determine various sales metrics is known as Sales
Analysis. The various metrics are: inventory stock, effectiveness of sales force,
company’s performance against the set goals etc.
Forecasting
Forecasting is most commonly used to determine future sales/demand size as well as
budget allocation. In the B to B forecasting help the organization to predict the buyers
demand based on previous orders and it helps the organization to maintain the
inventory.
Competitor Analysis
Competitive analysis involves collecting, compiling, analysing and interpreting
information about your competitor’s service or product, pricing strategies, target
customers, new product launches, and R&D.
Benchmarking
Benchmarking is the process of comparing factors such as cost, quality, product
features and functionality, scope, service, response and availability of your offering
against competitors in the same market – whether that be geographic or industry
sector. By creating a comparative matrix of your competitors’ product or service
offerings you have the beginnings of a business case to make any necessary
improvements and develop an optimum offering.
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Marketing Research Process:
Business marketers, after identifying the areas of marketing research, face the question – how
to conduct marketing research? In other words, what are the task involved in business
marketing research? The answer to these questions is to follow the logical steps involved in the
marketing research process, shown in the below figure. Each step is briefly described with the
focus on the business marketing research.
Research Paper:
Sources of data:
Primary Data:
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It consists of original information gathered for specific purpose like survey. You can go for the
various research methods for primary data collection as shown below in the figure
Secondary Data:
It consists of data or information that exist somewhere and was collected earlier some purpose
like data from the book, research paper, some articles etc.
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Sampling Plan:
The sample is a part of population which is selected to obtain the necessary information. The
population consist of all the items under consideration in research project and depends on the
research objective. It consists three decision i) sampling unit ii) Sample size iii) sampling
procedure.
Editing: It consists of checking the completed questionnaire for any errors and omissions, and
correcting, wherever required. This ensures consistency and accuracy.
Coding: It includes assigning symbols and numerals to answer so that the answer can be put
into Limited categories. The researcher should ensure that coding errors are minimized or
eliminated.
Classification: Classification of data consists of arranging the data into groups or classes,
based on common characteristics.
Tabulation: It is an ordinary arrangement of data in two columns and rows so that further data
analysis can be done.
1. Researcher should collect the information about the profile of the executives who would be
interested in Research report from the user company. The researcher should not use too many
technical terms or jargons.
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2. The main research finding should be relevant to the marketing research objectives.
3. The researcher should logically justify the choice of research method, data Collection
method, analysis techniques etc.
4. The researcher must not try to satisfy the personal likes or dislikes of the executives in the
user company.
5. The research report should have clarity of thought and expression.
There are three types of decision support that can be used in a research, they are: target
decision, design decision or go/no go decision.
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Second Phase: Conclusive Research
It is a theory testing research. It may use laboratory experiments such as large-scale
sampling for mailed or interview surveys, with multivariate analysis or direct
observation of consumer behaviour.
Market Segmentation
The most common approach in B2B markets is to apply a market segmentation based on the
size of the company size. But there are other ways to classify them as, demographic or
firmographic, based on behaviour or needs, such type of segmentation helps when the company
wants to treat large companies different from the smaller once where they want low cost offer
for the services. If both are treated in the same manner, then one or both will feel unfulfilled
and be vulnerable to the competition,
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Benefits desired
Reactions to product, service
The nature of the buying decision process
Communications methodology
Research to Support Go/No-go Decisions
Under this type of research, three questions must be answered at the different stages:
Case Study
In order to understand the three decision types in a better way, a case study has been taken
based on Greif Inc. who provides industrial packaging and services.
Objective: To analyse and understand customers need and to improve sales call effectiveness,
ultimately improving the market share.
Process followed:
Targeting Decision: Determining expectations of products & service performance
among current customers; measuring performance as perceived by current customers.
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Design Decision: Identifying those aspects of products and services that are important
to the customers and focusing on them rather than unwanted features.
Determining competitive position among the customers.
Identifying various opportunities in order to differentiate the products and services.
In-depth telephone interviews with 25 individuals at targeted companies.
Results:
Introduction of Performance Improvement Maps into the client’s account planning
process, which enabled them to make strategic decisions according to each customer.
This lead to perfectly designed sale call, which acted as a catalyst for a direct and
productive conversation between the supplier and customer.
Some customers wanted Greif Inc. to partner with them in order to improve their
internal operations, so this was followed which resulted in savings of energy and reduce
waste.
Greif took over major competitors, and the revenue increased by $3 million dollars
more.
In consumer market the company used to produce goods to sell to the households who purchase
food for them on consumption, in B2B market the goods are purchased by the company for the
production of product and services that are sold, rented or supplied to other companies.
Concentrated markets:
In B2B marketing the market is very small and there is a very few players in the market so the
strategy here is the product is developed and marketed for a well-defined customer population.
In all the B2B market a customer distribution confirms a Pareto principle or 80:20 rule. There
is a small no of consumer in the market unlike to the consumer market where there are millions
of customers. This scenario is quite similar for the large B2B companies where the company
might have less than 100 customers that make differences in their sales.
There is also a matter of scale. In consumer market a person can buy a reasonable amount of
goods but in business market the amount a company buy is quite large than a consumer in
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business market. There is heavy user of consumer products but the differences between the
light user and the heavy user is a matter of small degree compare with the scale of differences
in B2B market. The amount of spending in the largest and smallest buyer in B2B market is
likely to be much, which is much larger than the range of spend between the largest and smallest
spend by buyers in consumer market.
Initiator: Ideally the person who will actually use the product or service and
feels the need.
Influencer: It affect the purchasing decision by supplying information for the
evaluation of alternatives or by setting buying specification.
Gatekeeper: It controls information reviewed by other members of the buying
centre.
Decider: It actually makes the buying decision.
Buyer: It has the formal authority to select a supplier and implement all
producers connected with securing the product.
User: These are the personnel who uses the product.
Since the buying centre is a concept from the informal organization, it appears as an elephant
in the room among groups of B2B marketers, groups of Supply Chain managers and even
mixed groups of Buying/Selling managers. Everybody knows about the Buying Centre
but there is really no document that lists the members (being informal). Thus the discussion
rarely achieves focus and output about what the Buying/Selling managers can do to address the
mostly legitimate concerns of the members of the Buying Centre.
Innovation in the Buying organization can happen if the supplier gets a chance to perform. By
recognizing the Buying Centre and its concerns both Supply Managers and B2B Marketers can
help innovation.
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Technical Expertise: It is an important aspect for the B2B marketing because the technical
expertise will give a competitive advantage of a company over its competitor. When a technical
developers have a strong base of knowledge about the technical aspects of a potential new
product, and when they can proficiently pass through the new-product-development process,
these products succeed.
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The third stage can be productive only if the foundation for it has been established in the first
two.
Even though it is in the third stage that researchers focus on, the participants’ understanding of
their experience is reflected in all three stages. When participants are asked to reconstruct
details of their experience, they are selecting events from their past and imparting meaning to
them in interview stage 3. Focus is given to the research question in context, and the process
of making meaning becomes the center of attention.
In depth interviewing leads to a deeper understanding and appreciation of the intricacies and
coherence of people’s experiences. It leads to a more conscious awareness of environmental
context. Most important, researchers gain an appreciation for the value of story-telling and for
the participants who live the stories.
Many B2B companies are unaware of the identities of all relevant people at their clients’
organizations. Yet they often have precisely the information needed.
Another B2B sampling-related complexity relates to companies vs. sites. In situations where the
equipment is at many sites, most times client operations and service personnel exist at each site
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and it may be necessary to get feedback from multiple sites to fully reveal how well the product
is serving this type of customer.
Be flexible as to eligible job titles given that the meaning of titles varies.
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Buying Centre Interaction
The buying centre is a subset of the organizational actors. The buying centre was earlier defined
as consisting of five roles: users, influencers, deciders, buyers, and gatekeepers. Since people
operate as part of the total organization, the behaviour of members of the buying centre reflects
the influence of others as well as the effect of the buying task, the organizational structure, and
technology. This interaction leads to unique buying behaviour in each customer organization.
The marketing strategist who wishes to influence the organizational buying process must,
therefore, define and understand the operation of these four sets of organizational variables—
tasks, structure, technology, and actors—in each organization he is trying to influence. The
marketer's problem is to define the locus of buying responsibility within the customer
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organization, to define the composition of the buying centre, and to understand the structure of
roles and authority within the buying centre.
Source: R.E. Webster, Jr and Y Wind, journal of Marketing, 36, pp 12-17, April, 1972.
The functioning of buying centre is influenced by the organisational variables, the environmental
variables and the individual variables. The output of the group decision-making process of the
buying centre includes solutions to the buying problems of the organisation and also the
satisfaction of personal goals of individual members of the buying centre.
Managing Uncertainty
Segmentation and Targeting: Basic demographic, geographic, psychographic and behavioural
information about target businesses market can aid in determining the features that the offering
should encompass in order to fit into the businesses requirements.
Product Development: Knowing how the product fits the needs of clients and what changes are
needed to make the product more attractive is essential. Popular approaches to this focus on
utilising User Testing and User Experience Research.
Market and Competitive Analysis: Know the current marketing situation! Not only an
important element for new products but also for current products given the ever-changing
market dynamics. If marketers fail to stay in touch with current consumer, trends they can face
rapid market share loses.
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product features compared to competitors. Forecasting future sales are also important to utilise
for budgeting, production and staffing decisions.
Conclusion
Conducting marketing research can make B2B companies more self-aware, attuned to the
marketplace and better prepared for change. It is a powerful tool. Whether the company is
wondering how to build momentum again, what is going on in the marketplace, why the top
competitor is winning all the business or how to keep competitive edge, the answers are out
there. One just needs the will and the way to extract them.
Finally it is important that the researcher has a stubborn and cynical personality because they
are not box-checkers. They don’t think inside or outside boxes – they don’t use boxes at all. In
the world of research, possession of the cynical trait indicates that they will question
everything, challenge all assumptions and not rest until the competitive landscape is laid bare
and the path forward is obvious to all. At the end of the day, that is the mission of the B2B
researcher: Make the competitive environment transparent so good strategic decisions can be
made.
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Bibliography
A general model for understanding organisation buying behaviour. (n.d.). Retrieved from
https://archive.ama.org/archive/ResourceLibrary/MarketingManagement/documents/9604
142669.pdf
A structural guide to in-depth interviewing in business and industrial marketing research . (n.d.).
Retrieved from
https://engagedscholarship.csuohio.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.c
o.in/&httpsredir=1&article=1121&context=bus_facpub
The Webster ad Wind Model . (n.d.). Retrieved from R.E. Webster, Jr and Y Wind, journal of
Marketing, 36, pp 12-17, April, 1972
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