One of the most common questions we’ve received since the release of our 2024 Buyer Experience Report is how the key findings differ across industries. The short answer: not by much – except for manufacturing industry purchases.
In this report, we highlight the relatively small differences across all industries assessed, and we dive deep into how manufacturing companies differ in our report, Different from the Rest: Manufacturers’ Unique Path in the B2B Buying Journey.
First, here’s a quick run-down of what we know about B2B buying generally.
The typical B2B buyer is a group of 11 individuals who conduct an 11.5-month buying journey. During that journey, buyers evaluate an average of 4.6 vendors and have more than 800 interactions – content and people interactions – across that journey. Crucially, the typical buying group does not engage with sellers until they reach the 70% mark of their journey, and by that time 85% of them will have mostly or completely set their requirements, and more than 80% will have picked a favorite vendor.
In this article, we report on how these numbers and others vary (or don’t) by industry.
Key Findings by Industry
The table below presents ten key findings from our 2024 Buyer Experience Report, organized by buyer industry. In the sections that follow, we explore each in more detail.
Point of First Contact Between Buyers and Sellers
There are small, but statistically reliable differences in the point at which buyers reach out to sellers in their purchase journey based on industry. The industries on either end of the horizontal axis are statistically distinct from one another. The point of first contact for Technology and Software is reliably later than all but Professional Services; Professional Services engage a bit later than those in Manufacturing. Other differences in the chart above are not statistically reliable.
More importantly, while there are statistically reliable differences, the earliest and latest are not far apart. In practical terms the differences between the latest and earliest points of first contact amount to only 25 to 26 days in a 12-month buying journey.
Buyer-Initiated First Contact
As with the point of first contact, there are small but statistically reliable differences in how often buyers initiate contact with sellers across industries; buyers in Manufacturing are notably more likely to initiate contact than their peers. However, across all industries, at least three out of four buyers initiate contact with sellers rather than respond to seller outreach.
When Buyers Set Their Purchase Requirements
Across all industries, a minimum of eight out of ten buyers largely establish their requirements prior to contacting sellers. There are small but statistically reliable differences across industries in the degree to which buyers fix their requirements pre-contact. Buyers in Manufacturing and Professional Services are reliably more likely to have their requirements set than their peers.
Buyers Choose a Winning Vendor Before They Connect with Sellers
One of the most startling findings from our buying journey research is that buying groups rank their shortlist of potential vendors with a likely winner atop the list before they begin engaging with vendors. And when they start to engage, they begin with their favorite. Globally, buyers have identified that favorite in more than 80% of cases prior to reaching out. As shown in the graph above, this holds across all industries. Buyers in Professional Services are the least likely to have identified a favorite in advance, but even there two-thirds still do.
The Help of Analysts and Consultants
Globally, over seven out of ten buying groups rely on analysts or consultants for guidance during their purchase process. This practice is prevalent across all industries, though slightly less common in Manufacturing, where just 56% of buyers seek external advice.
How Long is the Shortlist?
Most buying groups evaluate nearly five vendors, while those in Manufacturing typically evaluate three to four. The number of vendors evaluated has a cascading effect across other key parameters of the buyer process. For example:
- The number of vendors evaluated and the purchase cost explain over half (54.4%) of why a buying group may be larger or smaller than average.
- The size of the buying group accounts for almost half (49%) of the variation in how long the buying process takes.
- The number of vendors considered and the size of the buying team also account for over half (54.2%) of the total interactions with vendors.
In the next sections, we will see how Manufacturing buyers’ tendency to evaluate fewer vendors makes their group size, interactions with sellers, and the length of the buying cycle look different than their peers.
Buying Group Size
Across industries, buying groups that evaluate nearly five vendors typically consist of 11 to 12 individuals. In Manufacturing, however, buying teams are statistically smaller. These groups, which usually evaluate just three to four vendors, have an average of only 7 to 8 members.
Number of Buyer-to-Seller Interactions
The chart above shows the cascading effect of evaluating fewer vendors. Buyers in Manufacturing reliably evaluate fewer vendors, have smaller buying teams, and engage in fewer interactions with sellers. On the other hand, adding more vendors to the evaluation process increases the workload, requires more people to share that work, and results in each member of the buying team having more interactions with sellers.
Buying Cycle Length
The impact of evaluating fewer vendors becomes clear yet again when we look at the length of the buying cycle. Buyers in Manufacturing consistently evaluate fewer vendors, have smaller buying teams, and engage in fewer interactions with sellers, leading to shorter buying cycles. In contrast, their peers in other industries tend to evaluate more vendors, require larger teams to share the workload, and have more interactions — materializing in longer buying cycles.
Buyers Know the Field
A new question in this year’s survey asked buyers whether they had prior experience with vendors they evaluated for the purchase in question. Collectively, 84% of buyers indicated they had previously worked with the vendor they ultimately selected. The chart above shows the distribution across industries. Buyers in Professional Services are somewhat less likely to follow this norm, with 77.1% having prior experience with their selected vendor. While reliably less likely to have prior experience with vendors than buyers in other sectors, Professional Services buyers are still overwhelmingly likely to know the field prior to their buying journey.
One of These Industries Is Not Like the Others
Compared to buyers in other sectors, manufacturing buyers tend to evaluate fewer vendors, resulting in smaller buying groups, fewer interactions with sellers, and shorter buying cycles compared to their peers. Our research indicates that hardware and machinery purchases—common in the manufacturing sector—are generally less complex, regardless of the industry making the purchase. However, buyers in manufacturing look notably different even when it comes to purchasing other types of solutions, such as software and services. This can be explored further in our report, Different from the Rest: Manufacturers’ Unique Path in the B2B Buying Journey.
Outside of manufacturing, differences in buying processes across industries are more subtle than expected. Across sectors, it’s evident that buyers operate as cohesive groups, aligning on requirements and selecting a preferred vendor before seller engagement in most cases. All revenue teams must acclimate to this new reality of B2B buying.
