Your B2B Marketing Research Is Backwards
Most companies interview prospects to improve marketing, but your richest insights hide in casual conversations with existing clients.
Here's how almost everyone approaches B2B research:
- Schedule formal interviews
- Prepare detailed questions about product features and ROI
- Seek validation of marketing messages
It's completely backwards because it misses the fundamental truth of B2B buying behavior – organizations don't buy products/services, they hire solutions to make strategic progress. A CTO mentioning their upcoming board presentation during a quarterly review reveals more about your enterprise software's true value than twenty structured interviews about technical specifications.
Understanding this reality transforms how we learn from clients. Instead of bringing questions, bring curiosity about their organizational progress story.
Key questions that reveal deeper insights:
- "What first made you start looking for a solution like ours?"
- "Tell me about the moment you realized this was working."
Rather than filling out your predetermined timeline, let them paint their complete journey – including the seemingly irrelevant details about team dynamics or past attempts at solving their problem. These "tangents" often reveal the crucial internal pressures and motivations that your marketing must address.
Natural conversation exposes the forces that shaped their buying decision:
When a client casually mentions "I had to get all three VPs on board" before purchase, you've discovered a key buying dynamic to address in marketing.
When they reference a competing solution they piloted two years ago, you've uncovered the real timeline of their struggle.
Most importantly, when they describe their progress using phrases like "I stopped getting midnight alerts from the team" or "Our quarterly planning actually means something now," you've found marketing language that will resonate deeply with your audience.
Stop interviewing prospects about features and start having real conversations with clients about their organizational progress. Your next breakthrough marketing insight isn't hiding in another capabilities survey – it's waiting in the story of how your solution already transformed a current client.