Key takeaways
Invest in target customer insights: Understanding specific customer segments and gathering qualitative data can significantly impact customer willingness to pay, the efficiency of your sales funnel, and overall company growth. It’s crucial for B2B marketers to dedicate time and resources to obtaining these insights through targeted research methods like surveys and interviews.
Focus on actionable insights: Knowing the difference between data and insights is key. Data is passive, collected through tools like surveys or desk research, while insights require context and interpretation to reveal the “so what” and “now what.” Marketers should aim to extract actionable insights that can directly influence decision-making and business strategy.
Ensure clear ownership: Peep Laja emphasizes the need for a clear owner or lead for managing insights and making decisions. Decisive leadership is vital. B2B marketers should assign accountable leads to ensure that insights are transformed into actionable strategies efficiently, rather than relying on committees.
Adopt continuous and agile research: Embrace an always-on approach to research for continuous data and strategic flexibility. “Little r” research involves ongoing, smaller-scale studies to help maintain organizational alignment and adaptability.
Customize findings for different roles: Research isn’t always a team sport—different stakeholders have varying needs and perspectives. Present findings in ways that effectively influence different stakeholders. B2B marketers should contextualize and customize insights for different audiences to drive impactful business decisions.
What to listen for
[02:00] The benefits of regular customer research
[04:45] The perception of research costs
[06:05] What are target customer insights?
[12:00] Desk research
[21:30] Have a clear plan to act on research insights
How to design effective research and choose the right approach
If you can’t get enough about this topic, here’s a list of questions to consider when choosing the best research approach based on your needs.
What are we trying to do or accomplish? Business- or team-specific problem you’re trying to solve
Why / what specifically will that inform or allow us to do? How will we use this information?
What are our knowledge gaps to close or validate? Any existing hypotheses?
What type of information / answers will help us close those knowledge gaps?
Has someone already asked or explored this? Is there helpful (or essential) context that can provide a stronger foundation for our research?
Where do we find that information? Across all sources, what’s the best way to reach / engage the source of that information
What specific questions do we need to ask to get the information we need?
Download the full PDF guide to selecting the right research methodology here.
