We asked three generations – Baby Boomers, Gen Xers and Millennials – how they make decisions on B2B technology purchases. Their responses upturn the conventional wisdom about influences and influencers in the buying cycle.

The current state of content distribution looks more like the upside down funnel below in terms of prioritization and resources spent. Because of this, paid distribution priorities are in disequilibrium with content creation priorities.

This isn’t an issue for many of the innovators and early adopters because they have substantive domain authority and are still heavily rewarded by organic channels. 

As the early majority to laggard brands begin to figure out their distribution priorities are in disequilibrium with their production priorities we’ll start seeing major growth in spend on native advertising. It’s already being widely predicted, too.

Awareness -> Evaluation -> Purchase -> Usage -> Repurchase -> Advocacy is an example of a linear funnel. All of the dots associated with each step of the funnel create a tornado.

As you can imagine, tornadoes are a bit more difficult to deal with than simple linear funnels. Why? There are two core reasons (among many others): growth attribution and points of optimization.

So, how do you manage tornadoes? The same way you manage linear funnels… with a few tweaks. The first step is to understand your users’ behavior with conversion research. Next, you’ll want to set up your analytics configuration.  

To maximize that moment, tech providers need to think about:

• Installation or Activation (for As a Service) – How to make it easy to start using the product or begin the project.  (Some of the most popular product videos on YouTube are “unboxing” videos.
• Onboarding – Helping everyone involved to understand the path to value and what is available to them.
• Help Options – Guiding users on where to go for assistance.

None of these activities should be taken for granted.  In fact, I’d posit that more emphasis should be placed in all of these.   Do it right, and things get easier.  Do it wrong, and your steering the customer toward thinking about other options or just giving up.

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