“It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.”
― Ernest Hemmingway
The concept of buyer personas, as a means for understanding buyers, has been around now for over a decade. It is an understatement to say many things have changed in the world of buying and selling since their beginning.
We have witnessed the changing dynamics of the buyer-seller relationship. The dynamics I refer to are buying behaviors and buyer goals. On the other side of the coin, we see marketing and sales making attempts to adapt. The concepts of content marketing, lead nurturing, insight-based selling, customer experience, and brand management emphasized. These practices have been introduced as gateways to connecting with buyers in the new digital age.
Adapting to New Realities
Personas, at their core, were introduced as a tool to communicate the goals and behaviors of users and buyers. Specifically for informing strategies related to product design and marketing to buyers. For B2B Marketing and Sales, a clearer picture has begun to emerge around the goals and behaviors of buyers. Yet, there are many more miles to go. My endeavor and work with organizations over the past decade lead me to... Read more
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5 Buying Behaviors of the Persona Buying Cycle
Tags: brand, buyer behavior, buyer experience, buyer journey, buyer persona, buyer personas, content marketing, customer, demand generation, Digital Marketing, lead generation, marketing, Sales, tonyzambito.com
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Grow SMB Revenues With Buyer-Based Marketing
This is part 3 of a series on the challenge of targeting SMB markets and how the use of buyer-based modeling and buyer-based marketing help organizations to grow their SMB customer base.
The sheer size of the SMB makes for a daunting task for any organization intent on marketing to the SMB segment. When you consider some Fortune 1000 or Global 2000 organizations can have in the 10’s or 100’s of thousands of companies in their customer bases, the expression of zeroing in on your target buyer can sound near impossible. It is a dilemma however that cannot be ignored. The U.S. Small business Administration estimates that the SMB segment accounts for better than 98% of all businesses in the United States.
In the previous article in this series, How To Get To Know The New SMB Buyer, I touched upon the means to get to know the SMB buyer. Marketing to the SMB segment and buyers should first start with visiting the segmentation issue a little deeper. There have been many means tried for SMB segmentation whether it is by size, type, vertical, products, solutions, and etc. To some degree, they have helped to... Read more
Tags: buyer behavior, buyer experience, buyer insight, buyer journey, buyer persona, buyer persona development, buyer persona marketing, buyer personas, buyer strategy, buyergraphics, buyerology, content, content marketing, Digital Marketing, small business, small business marketing, Strategy, Targeting, Tony Zambito
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3 Ways To Connect With Today’s B2B Buyers
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This is part 4 of a limited series on why buyer choice modeling is the new view B2B Business must adopt to improve revenue performance and develop long lasting relationships with buyers.
Connecting with today’s B2B buyers is on the minds of most CEO’s and their teams today. Not too long ago, reaching and connecting with B2B buyers was a straight forward proposition. Depending on surveys from such sources as IDC, IDG Connect, DemandGen Report, Forrester, and more, we know that buyers are remaining invisible to B2B businesses and spend only a quarter of their time talking directly to sales when making purchase decisions. The idea of connecting to B2B buyers has gone from straight forward to major league complex.
There are plenty of debates regarding the best tactical means to connect with B2B buyers. The effectiveness of these tactical means, as reported by once again the likes of IDC and etc., show that many B2B leaders believe these tactical efforts such as content marketing and marketing automation may only be effective about a quarter of the time. It does represent a big gap and it begs for a rephrasing of the challenge – this... Read more
Tags: b2b buyer, b2b marketing, B2B Sales, Buyer, buyer behavior, buyer decision model, buyer insight, buyer modeling, buyer persona, buyer persona marketing, buyer personas, buyer strategy, buyergraphics, buyerology, Chief marketing officer, cmo, content marketing, marketing, predictive analytics, predictive buyer modeling, Tony Zambito
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How B2B Leaders Respond to the Psychology of Buyer Choice
This is part 3 of a limited series on why buyer choice modeling is the new view B2B Business must adopt to improve revenue performance and develop long lasting relationships with buyers.
When it comes to understanding the psychology of the buyer, much has been done in the world of B2C to get inside the mind of consumers to understand buying choices and preferences. For B2B, it has been harder to translate B2C research dynamics into ways that would make the psychology of B2B buyers more readily understood. However, what we do know is that there is an increasing consumerization effect happening in B2B buying whereby B2B buyers have the same desires for more experiential purchasing as opposed to a heavy emphasis on sterile transactions.
In part 2 of this series, I discussed the Buyer Orbit and the elements of the Buyer Choice Model. Each of these now filled with more psychological aspects related to why B2B buyers buy. This comes with many implications for B2B leaders to not only understand new buyer psychology but to also shift business models, operations, strategies, and interactions that transforms the way they connect with B2B buyers. In part 3,... Read more
Tags: Buyer, buyer behavior, buyer decision model, buyer experience, buyer insight, buyer persona, buyer strategy, buyergraphics, buyerology, content marketing, marketing, Sales, sales enablement, sales funnel, Tony Zambito
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Revenue Growth by Choice and The Buyer Orbit
This is part 2 of a limited series on why buyer choice modeling is the new view B2B Business must adopt to improve revenue performance and develop long lasting relationships with buyers.
Growth is getting harder and harder to come by. With this comes the realization that some of the embedded thinking about how to reach and market to buyers are not working well. In part 1 of this series we looked at how the funnel is facing a slow death and the limitations of so called funnel thinking. We are entering a new era of the buyer. Buyer behaviors are shifting yet we know only a fraction about this shift. One emerging insight is that of buyer choice. Simply stated, buyers are making multiple choices prior to as well as well after buying decisions.
Buyers Have Many Options. The floodgates have opened on channels, social media, old media, the Internet, and countless other ways to interact, explore, retrieve, and digest information in this new era of the buyer. With countless options available, buyers are making choices on where to start their exploring.
The Buyer At The Center Of Strategy, Marketing, And Sales. ... Read more
Tags: business buyergraphics, Buyer, buyer behavior, buyer choice, buyer choice modeling, buyer experience, buyer insight, buyer modeling, buyer orbit, buyer persona, buyer persona marketing, buyer personas, buyer strategy, buyergraphics, buyerology, content marketing, creative, Digital Marketing, mobile marketing, predictive buyer modeling, Tony Zambito
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