What our business to business decision-makers want to find out is fairly straightforward, what customers think, what customers believe or how customers act. But effective business to business research is particularly demanding.

And even though our various business to business clients serve completely different customers – the research approaches we use have many common elements.

First, proper sampling is more exacting and important. The appropriate respondent is often quite specific and usually is difficult to find and reach. Qualifying respondents is more complex as well. Those that might be familiar with a product or service might not be the ones that make the final buying decision or that decision might be shared. Starting with customer supplied lists or custom commercial lists, we have an exceptional track record in reaching respondents. Second, asking questions well is more demanding. Details are important so informed and articulate interviewers are critical.

Finally, business decisions makers are busy and often unwilling to participate in surveys in a tedious “you ask - we answer" style. Interviewer flexibility and rapport is a must.

Most often our business research takes the form of a telephone survey. However, the style of that survey can vary markedly. For example, in one survey we interviewed marketing vice presidents of Fortune 500 companies (with a 90% response rate). These interviews had to be more open ended conversations, in-depth/qualitative or executive interviews, using our most senior interviewers. For others, such as building contractors, a mix of open ended and closed ended questions worked. But again, the skill of the interviewer was paramount.

We can use advanced statistical methods including cluster analysis to segment customers into groups to properly tailor marketing programs. In fact, Market Decisions has been using psychographics (segmenting customers by attitudes, beliefs, interests, and values) to profile groups of customers since the late 1980’s. An example of this approach can be seen in Market Decisions’ report, The People of Maine, where segmentation was used to help leaders understand the basis for public opinion on various issues.

Our use of a specially designed survey instrument and a sophisticated analytical tool called perceptual mapping with multidimensional scaling allows clients to visually see the competitive map as consumers see it. In this approach respondents make comparisons, evaluating similarities and differences in a series of paired questions. The responses are then mapped and the position of competitors are descriptive of perceived differences. For an example of such a map, click here.

In some cases focus groups are appropriate, but incentives to attract participants can be quite high and even with high incentives it is difficult to attract the most senior decision-makers. Further, in some industries it is difficult for respondents to be completely candid in a one-on-one group setting. We find that in most cases an in-depth/qualitative or executive interview either over the telephone or in person proves more candid information and at a lower cost.

Market Decisions also uses proprietary software to conduct online focus groups. These are ideal in situations where customers are dispersed, where anomininty is important, and for examining visual content such as websites, catalogs and communications materials in an interactive way.