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Enquiro Search Solutions, Inc. a market research company has recently released a 2007 study on the B2B buyer and their buying behaviors. The study is large and comprehensive with just one of three white papers released at this time. The study was done to help B2B companies understand and market more effectivey in their industry. It reveals just how the B2B marketplace has changed.

Although the study covers all B2B (technology, office supplies, industrial) there is still important information for the industrial buyer to review. They have broken down the buying process both online and offline into phases: Awareness, Research, Negotiation, Purchase.

The study looked to answer the question, "How important is online research in business to business (B2B) purchase decisions?" Even the research team at Enquiro was surprised by the results, "We certainly believed it to be important, but even we were surprised by just how important respondents to our survey indicated it was to them. We found a heavy reliance on online research in all aspects of the purchase cycle."

Here is a summary of the study. You can download the entire white paper here (note: this is a 51 pg pdf file)

What are the Top Influences through all of the buying phases:
There was a tie for #1. The two most popular answers were:

1. A company's website

2. Word of mouth from a colleague.

The least popular were tradeshows, online trade publications and online general business publications.

What type of information do B2B buyers want to find online?
It is important to note here that things such as "podcast, webinars and multimedia (video) were among the lowest ranked factors.

What was most important was good, clear, text format, detailed information so the buyer can make a purchasing decision:

- Pricing
- Extensive Product Info
- Downloadable Information
- Comparisons
- Companies Approach
- Technical Papers

How many online researchers actually convert (purchase) online?
There as a 50-50 split between those who convert from doing their research online and buying online. Half made the purchase online and the other half went offline to make the purchase. The exception was with the purchase of the "Parts" where over 70% of the purchases were made online.

How soon before the purchase does the research begin?
Most popular answer was - a week or two, followed by 1 month.

Online vs. Offline Conversions - by Budget Range -
The study showed that over half of smaller purchases (under $50,000) were made online.

What were the most popular items bought online?
- 69.8% Parts
- 52.2% Equipment
- 49.3% Business Services
- 50.6% Supplies
- 47.3% Software
- 55.0% Hardware

In what purchasing cycle phase were the participants most likely to use online resources?
92.0% Awareness
91.6% Research
66.4% Negotiation
81.3% Purchase

(It is interesting to note that the buyers go online to research and may go offline to discuss pricing and then on line again to complete purchase.)

Where did they start their search?
The study found that in the early stage of the purchase (Awareness stage) most users (over 65%) start with the general search engines however as the user progresses through the buying stages he becomes more likely to use a B2B vertical.

(This could be because the buyer finds the vertical through the use of a general search engine.)

Preferred General (Horizontal) Search Engines:
Google 77%
Yahoo 14%
MSN 7%
Other 2%

Preferred Vertical Search Engines:
73% Business.com - (general services, legal, financial, travel, etc.)
22% Knowledgestorm.com - (technology products - IT suppliers)
5% ThomasNet- (industrial suppliers)
all others did not have enough users within the sample to report

Organic. Vs. PPC (Pay per click) Click Through Rate:
These number have stayed consistent over the years. Most people click through the organic listings rather than the Pay Per click "sponsored listings" on the general search engines:
74.2% Organic Listings
18.9% Pay Per click
6.9% Missing

Would you like a free website evaluation? Just give me a call or send an email. I always appreciate your feed back. If you have any questions about this article or your ThomasNet program, feel free to contact me at mary@trconn.com or (860) 601-0150. This article was written by Mary Dykas MVP representing ThomasNet