B2B Marketing: 2015: How many of marketing’s qualified leads don’t convert due to the dysfunction and unpredictable behavior of the buying group?

1. MARKETING
TO GROUPS
FPO IMAGE

2. Patrick Spenner of the CEB and frequent contributor to Forbes, details the complexities of group
buying in a series of compelling and convincing articles.
Spenner states: “In a complex B2B sales environment, there are multiple stakeholders and
decision makers causing the ‘buying group’ to behave in an unpredictable way.”
Even those marketers sitting upon the most sophisticated technology stacks aren’t equipped to
measure this important dynamic in enterprise B2B marketing and selling.
Which brings us back to a question that CEOs and CFOs are constantly posing to their CMO
counterparts: “Why aren’t ‘qualified’ leads converting into sales?”
Complex enterprise purchase decisions are rarely, if ever, decided by one individual.
And, while this notion
of a buying group is
not new, this group
buying dynamic is
now front and center
facing marketers
who are trying to
market to only one
member of the group
and wondering why
their organizations’
sales conversions
are tanking.
Whether your organization passes leads at the MQL or SQL level, all of these leads have a “Q” in
the middle of their acronym, which stands for qualified.
The CEO and CFO want to know: what does qualified really mean? After all, if leads are passed to
sales in your organization, somehow, these leads are deemed qualified.
How many of marketing’s qualified leads don’t convert due to the dysfunction and unpredictable
behavior of the buying group?
No matter how complex the marketing technology stack, regardless of the mountains of
engagement data that marketing automation and CRM provide, group buying dysfunction flies
under your radar.
Group dynamics is an unequal mixture of personal feelings, fear, risk, politics and positioning,
where the status quo is always the perceived safest choice.
What is your organization currently doing to counteract the unpredictability and dysfunction that
takes place within the confines of the buying group meetings?
HOW MANY OF MARKETING’S QUALIFIED LEADS
DON’T CONVERT DUE TO THE DYSFUNCTION AND
UNPREDICTABLE BEHAVIOR OF THE BUYING GROUP?

3. WHY DO MODERN MARKETERS NEED TO PRACTICE
GROUP-BASED MARKETING?
According to a recent study by the CEB, a group is considerably less likely to buy than a single
decision maker. When one additional person is added to the buying decision, those two people are
26% less likely to buy than the individual was. In groups of six or more people, the group is 50%
less likely to buy than the individual would be. These are eye-opening numbers. If the average
buying team or group is approximately 5.4 people, enterprise marketers are, and have been,
fighting an uphill battle to convert corporate buying decisions that are being made by groups.
As marketers, we’re usually first to point out that dealing with group buying dynamics is a sales
problem. After all, sales is intricately and personally involved in the back and forth with the
prospects. Therefore, sales should know if there is a group problem and sales should know how to
deal with it.
The truth is, group consensus isn’t a sales problem; it’s a marketing problem. The reason why is
fairly straightforward. According to a combined Google/CEB study, group conflicts peak when
the buying cycle is only 37% complete. Sales usually steps in at 57% completion of the buy cycle.
Because group conflict peaks early, marketing cannot rely on sales for early conflict resolution.
Therefore, marketing must take on responsibility for resolving, or better yet, preventing or
mitigating early group conflict to positively drive purchase consensus.
When you consider the possible mixed dynamics of any six people in one room trying to decide
whether or not their corporation should purchase something, it’s a miracle anything gets sold.
Group decision-making dysfunction can be attributed to a multitude of things; however, we can
narrow it down to three distinct dysfunctional areas.
Disparate perspectives: Everyone has a point of view. The sole reason corporations have
groups making buying decisions is to bring multiple perspectives and points of view into balance,
in theory, to make the best possible decision for the organization. It’s a great philosophical idea;
however, with different perspectives also come different personalities, goals, worldviews and
personal agendas.
Fear: One of the greatest motivational factors known to humankind is fear. Individuals are
LIKELIHOODTOPURCHASE
100% Purchase likelihood drops dramatically as
soon as a second decision maker is present.
50%
0%
1 2 3 4 5 6+
SIZE OF BUYING TEAM
81%
55%
60% 60%
53%
31%
5.4AVERAGE BUYING
GROUP SIZE
SOURCE: CEB/MOTISTA 2013 B2B BRAND SURVEY, CEB ANALYSIS N=3,000LIKELIHOOD TO PURCHASE

4. uncertain how others in the group will perceive them and their points of view and perspectives.
There may be previous baggage between some of the group members that will influence and
motivate them to behave one way or another. There are those who avoid conflict at all costs
and, on the other end of the spectrum, those who seek out and thrive on conflict.
Resistance: Maintaining the status quo, or simply doing nothing, is always the safest choice
for decision makers. Other forms of dysfunctional resistance include unwillingness to reason
or compromise, the usual political power struggles and the effects of interpersonal struggles on
the rest of the group.
PERCEIVED INDIVIDUAL RISK INCREASES AS THE
SIZE OF THE BUYING GROUP INCREASES
One might think if fewer people are involved in the buying decision, the greater the sense of
risk for each person involved will become. Not so. Most people believe there is greater risk for
themselves as the size of the buying group increases.
Specifically, losing respect and credibility was a concern of 50% of respondents in the CEB
study as the group size reached six members. The fear of losing a job is significantly less than
the fear of losing respect and credibility.
How, then, can we as marketers best address the dynamics of group buying in an enterprise
environment? How can we speak to disparate perspectives of the buying group members? By
identifying shared needs, wants or goals of the stakeholders and leveraging those shared needs
within the messaging of the content, marketers can find the buying group’s common ground
and address common needs to establish a positioning and message that resonates with all or
most of the group.
What can we do to reduce the resistance from group members, while simultaneously arming
those most likely to be change agents to champion our cause? Enable the change agents by
providing them with the persuasive and compelling facts, tips, tools and coaching they need to
engage other group members.
How do we address and reduce the fear that group members are feeling? To mitigate the fear
of change, position the reward as being worth the risk by focusing on the personal, group and
organizational benefits. Group based marketing begins with understanding customers’ personal
goals and emotions.
PEOPLE MAKE UP THE
AVERAGE BUYING GROUP
5.4
According to CEB/MOTISTA According to TECHTARGET
PEOPLE MAKE UP THE
AVERAGE BUYING GROUP
2 4TO
OF ALL COMPANIES
GROUP BUY
84%
OF ALL COMPANIES
OVER 500 EMPLOYEES
GROUP BUY
91%
BUYING IN GROUPS IS THE NORM

5. WHAT IS GROUP-BASED MARKETING?
Marketers need to understand the unpredictable behavior and the other dynamics of group buying
to quell the dysfunction of the buying group with group-based marketing. In order to mitigate
dissention among group members, in a quest to help the group make a positive decision, marketers
can include the following:
• Focus on the shared needs of the group
What is the rally point that all members of the group can get behind? What do all
members of the buying group need? Start with the shared need to build the positive
thought process that provides the positive consensus.
• Address personal stakeholder risk
Rather than avoid the issue of why each of the stakeholders is vulnerable to risk,
address the risk head-on. Doing this provides marketers with opportunities to nullify
the perceived greater risk, by discussing the actual risk, along with the greater risk of
organizational inertia—the risk of doing nothing.
• Enable change agents of the group
Use communication and response devices to identify the likely change agent or agents of
the group, and arm them with the information or materials that they need to champion
your cause amongst the other members of the group.
• Understand and leverage interrelations
The interpersonal interrelation of group members is an important dynamic to address.
There are generally followers, leaders, change agents, apathetic members and proactive
members of the group. Develop communications that relate to each of these different
dynamics within the group.
• Group content strategy
When setting a content theme, top line message and strategy for content across the
10-stage modern buyer’s journey; develop different content that addresses the different
points of view across the group buying dynamic.
• Group lead scoring, nurturing
One of the major issues with current best-practice demand generation is that an
individual member of the group may meet the criteria to be passed to sales as an MQL,
SAL or SQL, while the other members may be nowhere near ready to be passed to sales.
Scoring and nurturing needs to be rethought—with the group dynamics top of mind.
• Group influencer marketing
There are influencers of each member of the group, as well as influencers within the
group. Understanding the organizational structure of the targeted prospect company will
enable you to market around the prospect and the group, as well as within the group.
• Personalization within groups
We know that personalization works to significantly lift response and engagement. Using
personalization within the group allows the proposition to be framed for the group.
• Group lead distribution
Working within the new parameters of group lead nurturing and group lead scoring will
require a new criteria threshold to be determined for the passing of group leads that meet
the MQL, SQL and SALs.
During our development of group-based marketing (GBM), we fielded several repeated questions
that queried us on the difference between GBM and account-based marketing (ABM).

6. ACCOUNT-BASED MARKETING
The goal of a successful ABM inititive or campaign is to treat named key strategic accounts
as one rather than as individuals in order to gain greater share of wallet and/or to acquire net
new accounts.
GROUP-BASED MARKETING
The goal of GBM is to market to members of a buying group addressable as individuals and as part
of the group to help acquire net new customers in a complex B2B sale with multiple stakeholders
and decision makers. GBM can be a sub-strategy of an ABM campaign.
Within the key strategic accounts being targeted in an ABM campaign, there are business units
that are the segmented targets. Each business unit may have BANT; however, a group decision is
needed to convert the sale. This is a perfect example of how GBM works as a sub-strategy of ABM—
marketing to the decision makers in each business unit being targeted in an ABM campaign.
According to Siriusdecisions
WHO MAKES
UP THE BUYING
GROUP?
CHAMPION
CXO
INFLUENCER
USER
RATIFIER