In our last BICSI Bytes, we covered a Foundry report that said 60% of tech buyers regretted their purchases. This month, Foundry released its ‘2023 Role & Influence of the Decision-Maker (ITDM) report, providing more insight into tech buyer attitudes.
The report noted that technology budgets somehow appeared to be “recession-proof” with the majority of ITDMs expecting their budgets to either increase (50%) or remain stable (38%) over the next 12 months, similar to last year’s results. However, 61% agree that the purchase process is becoming increasingly complex (increasing to 66% in enterprise organisations).
Adding to the complexity is the number of influencers involved in the purchase process which has increased to 25 (up from 20 in 2022), while the time it takes to move through the process increasing to 6.5 months (up from 6.2 months in 2022).
“With the increased complexity in the tech-purchase process, customers are looking to their vendor partners for help,” said Stacey Raap, Marketing & Research Manager, Foundry. “This year’s study identifies that the process is more likely to get hung up within the product evaluation and authorisation stages. Customers need additional resources or assistance from a vendor during that evaluation stage, creating an excellent opportunity for vendors to provide resources designed to educate at that stage.”
The report also noted that 88% of ITDMs said their budgets are stable or growing. This overall stability is consistent across organisations of all sizes and regions.
ITDMs are faced with finding a balance between innovation and maintaining business-as-usual. The organisation’s IT strategy is driven by status-quo tasks and keeping the lights on (36%), responding to internal events (31%) and responding to external events (28%).
Large enterprises reported a greater likelihood of a sale stalling than did their SMB counterparts at five of the six stages. Looking at where the choke points in the process are, combined with where customers feel they need additional resources, provides a roadmap for how vendors can help.
The number-one resource (43%) they rely upon is technology content sites followed by white papers (37%), and webcasts/webinars; technology vendors via phone, email or video conference, and tech vendors (via vendor website).
This year’s study found that 65% of ITDMs typically spend more time-consuming content from well-known and trusted brands because they are confident their time will be well spent on these sources. This increases to 73% for ‘millennials’, and 68% for ‘GenZ’. Meanwhile, 65% agree that when all stakeholders are aware of a brand, it makes the internal sell-through process easier, and this increases to 73% for ‘millennials’, and 70% for ‘GenZ’.