IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
Understanding and Influencing the International IT Buyer
A TechTarget Global Marketer Services White Paper
Part One: Common Attributes of International IT Buyers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
Demographics/ About TechTarget
About TechTarget
TechTarget has offices in the US, UK, Singapore,
Australia, India and China and serves the IT community
both through its globally focused tech market specific
websites along with 68 localized websites for nine
different countries in six different languages. With
extensive Global Marketer Services and rich local
capabilities, we help global technology marketers get
to market faster in all the regions they care about most.
About the survey
The survey was fielded in the spring of 2012 in English
and, where appropriate, in local language. We garnered
a statistically significant set of results in the world’s
most important international markets: UK, France,
Germany, Benelux, Italy, India, China, Japan, ASEAN,
and Australia/New Zealand. Each country’s survey
received a minimum of 140 responses. In total, we
collected 750 European respondents and 1,100 APAC
respondents.
To recieve the full report data, contact Renee Cormier.
Helping marketers understand research preferences of international IT buyers
International online marketing contains no shortage
of conventional wisdom, some of which is true and
some of which is not. To shed some data-illuminated
light on how IT buyers actually behave—as opposed
to how we may think they behave—each year
TechTarget fields an International IT Buyer Profile
Survey. The goal: to help technology marketers better
understand the unique composition and research
preferences of IT buyers across 10 different geographies.
The results reinforce some commonly-held marketing
beliefs and debunk others. TechTarget publishes this
research in its presentations at Online ROI summits
and in this four-part white paper series from our Global
Marketer Services group.
Part one: Common attributes of international IT buyers
Part One of the series focuses on who you are market-
ing to. The research provides a profile of the Interna-
tional IT Buyer by addressing the following questions
that have implications for your go-to-market strategies:
• Do international buyers have specialized or more
general roles within their companies?
• Is there a “single buyer” at each organization that
you should aim to reach?
• How many projects does each buyer and buying
team research in any given quarter?
• What role does the IT manager play in conducting
pre-purchasing research on the Web?
Part two: Evolution of international buyer research
patterns
Part three: Translation, localization and content
preferences
Part four: Engaging international buyers by phone
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Italy
54%UK
52%BENELUX
50%France
49%Germany
38%
Australia
52%India
52%ASEAN
50%China
41%Japan
33%
What does this mean for you?How does this distribution of specialists, generalists and IT managers affect your content strategy? Each of these stakeholders approach an IT purchase with their unique requirements in mind, so each one of them needs to be addressed when delivering your marketing message.
Prospects are looking for technical content When marketing mature technologies, assume that your targets have a sophisticated, specialist-based knowledge of features and competitors in your market. Don’t shy from deeper technical problems as prospects are likely looking for content focused on it.
Foundational content still important SMB targets are more likely to be generalists, with less experience and technical expertise. They will want appropriate content. That’s why it is important to also have foundational content available. That can be content that either you or your media partners produce.
Tips to Target the Enterprise When targeting the Enterprise, you should assume they are sophisticated on the tech-nology front, but for those serial specialists who may still be getting up to speed, it never hurts to have a full chain of content at the ready.
Conventional wisdom has held that IT professionals out-
side the US lack a specific technology focus—such as a
storage administrator, a network manager or a database
developer—and tend to be generalists. However, across
nearly all markets in Europe and APAC, the direction of
IT roles and buying leans towards specialization.
We asked respondents whether they are a special-
ist, a generalist or an IT manager. In almost all coun-
tries, nearly half identified themselves as a specialist
in a specific technology area full time or throughout a
specific project’s lifecycle. Germany and Japan seemed
to be exceptions where more respondents described
themselves as having multiple IT responsibilities.
These results indicate that IT generalists are actually
more of the exception, with merely 1/3 of the overall
audience noting that they are in fact a ‘jack of all trades’.
17–23% of the respondents identified themselves as
an IT manager. Although this proportion decreases as
the company size increases, it remains an important,
distinct segment from the IT generalist.
International IT Pros are more specialized than you think
A significant number of IT pros in all countries identify themselves as project specialistsThe trend towards specialization is even stronger at larger companies; 55%–60% of respondents from companies of >250 employees reported being specialists.
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
Demographics/ About TechTarget
What does this mean for you?Each team member has bias to content This is good news. Buying teams with multiple members offer you more ways to penetrate an account. But, as we learned earlier, you need a greater breadth of content to fulfill everyone’s unique area of interest. Application managers, storage admins, proj-ect managers and the IT Director may all work on a project, but each will have a bias to different types of content. The research process is collaborative and marketers should aim to influence the entire buying team.
Nurture leads and look for additional account contacts The sales strategy must also be structured in a way to understand and communicate with all the individuals on the buying team. Directing a follow-up conversation based on a lead’s role or content downloaded is a good first step to nurturing that lead. Once a name has been collected, assume there are others on the buying team, look for more names to call and remessage. Any contact you DON’T know is an opportunity for another vendor to capture, influence and ultimately steer the conversation away from your solution.
Team buying at all companies Team buying at companies >500 employees
India
Japan
Australia
ASEAN
China
96%
96%
94%
93%
84%
BENELUX
UK
Germany
Italy
France
96%
96%
91%
87%
72%
India
China
ASEAN
Australia
Japan
91%
90%
89%
88%
83%
BENELUX
UK
Germany
France
Italy
85%
85%
84%
79%
66%
84% 91%
The single IT buyer is a rarity—IT buying is a “Team Sport”
The next piece of conventional wisdom we put to the
test is the notion that outside of the US companies rely
on a “single buyer” and that buying is generally more
hierarchical. This turns out to be a myth. In fact, only
16% indicate that their company has a single buyer
scenario. While buying teams outside the US are typically
a bit smaller, at most companies in EMEA and APAC
a team of at least two or more individuals contributes
to the IT research and decision-making process. In the
majority of countries, more than 80% of respondents
indicated that IT purchases are made by a team and
not a single individual—and in companies of more than
500 employees, the percentage increasts to over 90%.
The single-buyer scenario is somewhat more preva-
lent in three markets: Italy, France and China. In Italy 34%
of companies indicate there is a single individual driving
purchases; however, this is likely the result of Italian
companies being relatively small. When we look at com-
panies of more than 500 employees in Italy, the results
fall in line with those of the other European nations.
The single buyer is no longer—team buying is prevalent across all geographies55–75% of respondents indicate that the most common buying team consists of 2–4 people, but the size of the buying team increases at larger companies.
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
Demographics/ About TechTarget
What does this mean for you?As a marketer, the busyness of researchers has implications for the way you build your campaigns. You should:
Influence buyer’s while they research Insert your message “at the point of research” for a prospective customer by aligning with third-party thought leadership and best practices content. In short, you need to influence buyers as they are doing research. Evaluate advertising platforms based on whether they feature the type of content likely to attract a serious buying audience for your solution.
Educate researchers about related issues Capitalize on the ability to be a one-stop shop. Organizations with broad portfolios can try to address multiple concerns for a user by educating researchers about related tech issues that arise related to the project they are currently researching. Plenty of cross-sell opportunities exist, especially when organizations prefer to manage fewer vendor relationships.
Make content easy to find Respect the researcher’s time by making content readily available and easy to access both within your content assets and on your website. This means taking an always-on and on-demand approach to content distri-bution, as opposed to forcing researchers to view material on your timetable rather than theirs.
Project 1Project 2
Project 3
China
India
Australia
ASEAN
Japan
Germany
France
BENELUX
Italy
UK
60%
58%
57%
51%
31%
62%
54%
53%
53%
52%
IT buyers are busy, typically working on more than 2 projects each quarter10–15% of respondents research five or more projects simultaneously.
The research offers a quick reminder on capturing
mindshare. As much as marketers may like to think
decision-makers are focused squarely on the technology
they are introducing, the survey shows just how busy
IT researchers are. Across the countries, we find that
the majority of IT pros are multi-tasking, researching
more than one potential purchase each quarter. In fact,
as many as 10–15% of respondents research five or
more projects simultaneously. This is true across all
company sizes and has not changed year over year.
The notable exception is Japan, where often times
outside consultants are enlisted to manage a purchase
from research through implementation.
IT buyers are multi-taskers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
Demographics/ About TechTarget
i i ii
52%of IT Managers at companies with more than 250 employees assign early stage research to their teams
Research is not only done by IT managers, but the entire teamIT managers work with their teams to address IT purchase research needs across the buying cycle.
IT Managers rely heavily on their teams to do pre-purchase research
What does this mean for you?Influence each specialized team member Expectations regarding the ability to reach IT managers should be tailored to the realities of how more senior members of the buying team actually conduct research. IT managers at larger organizations are more apt to delegate and less likely to personally investigate solutions in the early stages. As previously noted, a successful marketing strategy encompasses all members of the buying team and features content designed to influence each partici-pant based on his specialized role. Content specifically designed for IT managers is useful and necessary, but when targeting the enterprise it is likely to have greater success in the consideration and decision-making stages of research.
A common tendency among IT marketers is to focus
resources exclusively on targeting IT management titles.
Unfortunately, the research shows that this approach
risks removing your company from the vendor selection
shortlist straight away.
Across all markets, the vast majority of IT managers
do pre-purchasing web research. However, the point at
which they personally go online varies significantly based
on the size of their organizations. At companies of more
than 250 employees, the majority of IT managers assign
early stage research to their teams. The IT Manag-
er at larger companies typically becomes more heav-
ily involved in later stages when vendor shortlists are
being determined. At smaller companies, however, the
IT manager typically takes on the early stage research
responsibility. As a result, campaigns targeting IT man-
agers at SMBs with awareness-stage content assets
are better positioned for success. The research did not
uncover significant differences by region or by country.
Across all geos, in the later stages of the IT buying
process all purchasing team members are conducting
online research.
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
Demographics/ About TechTarget
What does this mean for you?A common approach and content strategy based on rich, technical content can be highly successful especially if the content addresses an IT problem from a variety of different IT perspectives.
Key takeaways
Buyers are highly specialized
Requiring content targeted to their individual roles
and responsibilities within the organization
Buyers are collaborative
Working in teams to reach a decision on the best
solution for their companies.
Buyers are multitasking
Conducting research on multiple purchases simulta-
neously and needing to be influenced at the point of
research.
Buyers are online
Increasingly using the Web to collect information
for IT purchases.
The research uncovers some similar attributes of IT buyers across geographies
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Part four provides insight into telemarketing and the
effectiveness of phone-based offerings, answering the
following questions:
• When, if ever, are researchers receptive to receiving
phone calls from IT vendors?
• How does the willingness to field a call vary based
on a user’s research stage or country?
• How accurate is the data telemarketers collect
about a company’s purchasing timeline and budget?
In part two Understanding and Influencing the
International IT Buyer, we take a look at how research
patterns are evolving, answering the following
questions:
• How heavily is the internet being used to research
online purchases?
• How heavily relied upon are more traditional
resources like print publications and face-to-face
meetings or events?
• How do the research habits of developing nations
like China and India differ from other markets?
How should this affect your marketing strategy?
• How do buyers prefer to interact with vendors
and how has this changed in the last two to three
years?
Part three addresses the types of content that resonate
best from market to market, answering the following
questions:
• How important is localized content? Does its
importance differ by market?
• How critical is translated content, especially in
countries where many researchers are comfortable
with English?
• How much progress can marketers make
repurposing English language content for
international campaigns?
• Which content assets do users find most valuable:
whitepapers, case studies, trial downloads?
More in this series
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Demographics/ About TechTarget
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
IT pros arespecialized
Buying is a team sport
Buyers aremulti-taskers
The entire team researches
Key takeaways More in this series
Research Habits for International IT Buyers
Demographics/ About TechTarget
About TechTarget
TechTarget (NASDAQ: TTGT) is the online intersection
of serious technology buyers, targeted technical content
and technology providers worldwide. Our extensive
network of online and social media, powered by
TechTarget’s Activity Intelligence™ platform, redefines
how technology marketers view and engage technology
buyers based on their active projects, specific technical
priorities and business needs. With more than 100
technology-specific websites and a wide selection
of custom branding and lead generation solutions,
TechTarget delivers unparalleled reach, innovative
opportunities, and extensive Global Marketer Services
to drive technology marketing success around the
world.
TechTarget has offices in Atlanta, Beijing, Boston,
Cincinnati, London, Mumbai, San Francisco, Singapore
and Sydney.
To learn how you can engage with serious technology
buyers worldwide, visit techtarget.com and follow us
@TechTarget.
To recieve the full report data, contact Renee Cormier
Company size EMEA APAC
< 100 38% 28%
100 to 1,000 26% 36%
> 1,000 36% 36%
Job title EMEA APAC
IT management (manager IS/IT) 16% 17%
Consultant/systems integrator 14% 6%
IT staff 11% 15%
Project management 7% 5%
Senior IT management 6% 6%(CIO/CTO/VP/director)
Systems management/ 6% 7%administration
Programmer/developer 6% 9%
Network management/ 5% 8%administration
Architect 4% 3%
Senior non-IT management 3% 2%(CEO,CFO,VP,director)
Analyst 3% 5%
Application manager 2% 2%
Database administrator 2% 3%
Privacy officer 1% 0%
Telecommunications manager 1% 0%
Other 14% 11%
Survey responder demographics