AUSTIN, TX — (Marketwired) — 05/25/16 — , the professional network for IT, today announced the results of a new survey examining technology marketers– priorities, barriers to success, and their “complicated” relationship with the IT buyers they–re trying to engage and help. While technology marketers and buyers are aligned in some cases, the report “” found clear disconnects in terms of the content they use and channels they leverage. For instance, less than one-third of IT buyer respondents said they trust content on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook, and only 25 percent said they use these social networks to learn about products and services.
“Technology buyers want to be approached by brands in ways that are going to help them do their jobs — in the right place, with the right content, at the right time,” said Sanjay Castelino, VP of Marketing at Spiceworks. “The study shows it–s time for marketers to focus on acing the basics by being clearer when it comes to technical details, pricing, and how IT buyers– peers are benefitting from their solutions. Lastly, while it–s tempting to focus on short term results, it–s important to invest in building the lasting relationships with IT buyers that lead to brand advocacy and peer recommendations.”
More than 450 IT buyers were surveyed to understand the content they use most often during the decision making process. Ninety-nine percent said they use product reviews, followed by technical spec sheets at 95 percent, IT articles at 93 percent, and free product trials at 90 percent.
While 80 percent of marketers produce IT articles, it was the only clear area of alignment between what marketers produce and what IT professionals use most. Only 58 percent of marketers make free product trials a priority, 73 percent produce technical spec sheets, and 60 percent prioritize product reviews, the piece of content nearly all IT buyers use.
The same IT buyers were asked to identify the details they find useful and marketers were asked to reveal the type of information they include in their content. While both parties prioritize and use customer testimonials, gaps exist across most other areas. For instance, 90 percent of IT buyers said product and service specifications are most useful and 88 percent said pricing information was important to them.
However, marketers are least likely to include this information in their content. Only 51 percent of marketers include product specifications and 23 percent include pricing information. Instead, 84 percent of marketers include graphics/imagery in their content and 70 percent include company or industry-related information.
The survey also revealed several other key findings and disconnects between marketers and IT buyers:
When IT buyers were asked how much they trust the content they find online, 90 percent said they trust peer recommendations and 82 percent said they trust the information they find in IT forums.
In addition to Spiceworks, IT professionals use vendor websites, Google, and IT forums most often to learn about products and services.
Fifty-five percent of marketers said they gate white paper content followed by webinars at 45 percent and e-books at 36 percent. When IT buyers were asked which content types they–d be willing to fill out a form to access, webinars were cited by 37 percent of respondents followed by white papers at 21 percent and case studies at 19 percent. E-books were cited by 18 percent of IT buyer respondents.
Fifty-four percent of marketers said acquisition/lead generation was their top priority, followed by brand awareness at 45 percent, and sales conversion at 40 percent. In terms of the top barriers to success, 40 percent of marketers said budget constraint was their biggest barrier, and 25 percent of respondents said measuring ROI, an insufficient quantity of leads, and audience targeting were also top barriers.
“Let–s face it — IT buyers– relationship with technology brands is complicated,” said Mark Miller, IT manager at Clayton Bank. “We rely on technology brands to create amazing products and services that help us solve tough challenges. However, too often, technology brands forget IT professionals aren–t leads in a database. We–re technical experts interested in creating lasting, win-win relationships with brands that help us both succeed.”
The survey was conducted in March of 2016 and included 346 marketer and 467 IT buyer respondents from North America and EMEA. Respondents are among the millions of technology marketers and IT buyers in Spiceworks and represent a variety of company sizes including small-to-medium-sized businesses and enterprises. IT buyer respondents come from a variety of industries including manufacturing, healthcare, non-profits, education, government, and finance. For more information and a complete list of survey results, visit .
Spiceworks is the professional network millions of IT professionals use to connect with one another and thousands of technology brands. The company simplifies how IT professionals discover, buy and manage an estimated $600 billion in technology products and services each year. Headquartered in Austin, Texas, Spiceworks is backed by Adams Street Partners, Austin Ventures, Institutional Venture Partners (IVP), Goldman Sachs, Shasta Ventures and Tenaya Capital. For more information visit .
Follow Spiceworks on Twitter: and connect with Spiceworks on Facebook: .
Spiceworks is a registered trademark of Spiceworks, Inc. All other names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.
Adam Schaeffer
Spiceworks
You must be logged in to post a comment Login