It would seem to be a ‘no-brainer’ that enterprises buy technology – but why do they? Does a CEO or managing director wake up in the morning and think ‘I need to buy some Ethernet’? A CIO or office manager might, but that would be because they need to do it to meet a business need.
Generally, strategic drivers cover areas such as making the enterprise run more efficiently, the need to improve customer satisfaction or retention, the opportunity to open up new markets or channels and acquire new customers, the requirements of integrating operations after a merger or acquisition, the need to deal with company growth/shrinkage, the desire to save money, the need to improve the evolving supply chain, or to improve reporting finance or sustainability targets and achievements (which can result in the need for anything from more bandwidth to better mobile access, to new applications and more).
The role of technology
Obviously, technology plays a vital role in addressing all these needs and aspirations as it is at the core of all enterprise activity from multinational manufacturers to local plumbers – in the same way that all businesses rely on financial services, logistics, contracts/legal, and so forth.
So what do you do about it as a B2B technology service provider? First and foremost, understand the customer. Get to know their commercial and operational priorities – this will give an insight into how your propositions (and those of your business partners) can help meet their needs and aspirations, not just for today but also for tomorrow too. Long-term relationships are far more profitable than one-off transactions. You need to have the mindset of winning the customer, not closing the deal.
Buying solutions
So technology must prove itself commercially. Providing case studies is always welcome as proof of competence – the more the merrier. Alongside these, any evidence of quantifiable business improvements is like gold dust as it helps to persuade the decision-makers.
More often than not they will be familiar with concepts like the cloud, IoT, cybersecurity, broadband, mobility, and so forth – but not the nuts and bolts of how things work. In conclusion, enterprises definitely rely on and buy technology – but what they are really buying is solutions to meet business needs.
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By GlobalData
