Is this company a lead customer? Estimating stages of B2B buying journey

Neda B. Marvasti; Juho-Petteri Huhtala; Zeinab R. Yousefi; Iiro Vaniala; Bikesh Upreti; Pekka Malo; Samuel Kaski; Henrikki Tikkanen

doi:10.1016/j.indmarman.2021.06.003

Is this company a lead customer? Estimating stages of B2B buying journey

Neda B. Marvasti^*
, Juho-Petteri Huhtala
, Zeinab R. Yousefi
, Iiro Vaniala
, Bikesh Upreti
, Pekka Malo
, Samuel Kaski
, Henrikki Tikkanen

^*Tämän työn vastaava kirjoittaja

University of Queensland

Tutkimustuotos: Lehtiartikkeli › Article › Scientific › vertaisarvioitu

23 Sitaatiot (Scopus)

443 Lataukset (Pure)

Abstrakti

By advancement in digital marketing, business-to-business (B2B) buyers carry out over half of the buying process through digital touchpoints before they establish any significant contact with the B2B seller. Knowing the buying stage of a potential buyer can bring a substantial advantage to the B2B seller given the complexity of the transaction and the associated value. In this paper, the authors propose a machine learning approach to infer the stages of the B2B buying journey by observing the online browsing behavior of buyer companies. It is shown that observing the buyer's online behavior effectively allows us to estimate the buying stages with high accuracy by utilizing the hidden Markov models. Managers in B2B seller companies may use these techniques for adjusting their marketing efforts to improve the fit with the information demands of the B2B buyer prospects along with their buying journey, and thus, improve the hit rate of marketing and sales activities.

Alkuperäiskieli	Englanti
Sivut	126-133
Sivumäärä	8
Julkaisu	Industrial Marketing Management
Vuosikerta	97
Varhainen verkossa julkaisun päivämäärä	13 heinäk. 2021
DOI - pysyväislinkit	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.indmarman.2021.06.003
Tila	Julkaistu - elok. 2021
OKM-julkaisutyyppi	A1 Alkuperäisartikkeli tieteellisessä aikakauslehdessä

Rahoitus

The authors would like to thank Business Finland (the public organization for innovation funding and trade, travel and investment pro-motion in Finland) for funding this research project (B2BAI). The authors would also like to thank Aalto Science-IT project for providing the computational resources needed to perform the simulations and real-world dataset experiments. This work was funded by Business Finland project number 3380/31/2017 .

Pääsy asiakirjaan

10.1016/j.indmarman.2021.06.003Lisenssi: CC BY

Is this company a lead customer.1-s2.0-S001985012100105X-mainFinal published version, 804 KBLisenssi: CC BY

Muut tiedostot ja linkit

Linkki julkaisuun Scopuksessa

B2B AI
Tikkanen, H. (Vastuullinen johtaja) & Huhtala, J.-P. (Projektin jäsen)
01/06/2017 → 03/06/2019
Projekti: Business Finland: Other research funding

Science-IT
Hakala, M. (Manager)
Perustieteiden korkeakoulu
Laitteistot/tilat: Facility

Siteeraa tätä

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title = "Is this company a lead customer? Estimating stages of B2B buying journey",

abstract = "By advancement in digital marketing, business-to-business (B2B) buyers carry out over half of the buying process through digital touchpoints before they establish any significant contact with the B2B seller. Knowing the buying stage of a potential buyer can bring a substantial advantage to the B2B seller given the complexity of the transaction and the associated value. In this paper, the authors propose a machine learning approach to infer the stages of the B2B buying journey by observing the online browsing behavior of buyer companies. It is shown that observing the buyer's online behavior effectively allows us to estimate the buying stages with high accuracy by utilizing the hidden Markov models. Managers in B2B seller companies may use these techniques for adjusting their marketing efforts to improve the fit with the information demands of the B2B buyer prospects along with their buying journey, and thus, improve the hit rate of marketing and sales activities.",

keywords = "B2B buyer journey, Hidden buying stage, Hidden Markov model, Internet browsing",

author = "Marvasti, \{Neda B.\} and Juho-Petteri Huhtala and Yousefi, \{Zeinab R.\} and Iiro Vaniala and Bikesh Upreti and Pekka Malo and Samuel Kaski and Henrikki Tikkanen",

note = "Funding Information: The authors would like to thank Business Finland (the public organization for innovation funding and trade, travel and investment pro-motion in Finland) for funding this research project (B2BAI). The authors would also like to thank Aalto Science-IT project for providing the computational resources needed to perform the simulations and real-world dataset experiments. Funding Information: This work was funded by Business Finland project number 3380/31/2017 . Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2021 The Authors",

year = "2021",

month = aug,

doi = "10.1016/j.indmarman.2021.06.003",

language = "English",

volume = "97",

pages = "126--133",

journal = "Industrial Marketing Management",

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T1 - Is this company a lead customer? Estimating stages of B2B buying journey

AU - Marvasti, Neda B.

AU - Huhtala, Juho-Petteri

AU - Yousefi, Zeinab R.

AU - Vaniala, Iiro

AU - Upreti, Bikesh

AU - Malo, Pekka

AU - Kaski, Samuel

AU - Tikkanen, Henrikki

N1 - Funding Information: The authors would like to thank Business Finland (the public organization for innovation funding and trade, travel and investment pro-motion in Finland) for funding this research project (B2BAI). The authors would also like to thank Aalto Science-IT project for providing the computational resources needed to perform the simulations and real-world dataset experiments. Funding Information: This work was funded by Business Finland project number 3380/31/2017 . Publisher Copyright: © 2021 The Authors

PY - 2021/8

Y1 - 2021/8

N2 - By advancement in digital marketing, business-to-business (B2B) buyers carry out over half of the buying process through digital touchpoints before they establish any significant contact with the B2B seller. Knowing the buying stage of a potential buyer can bring a substantial advantage to the B2B seller given the complexity of the transaction and the associated value. In this paper, the authors propose a machine learning approach to infer the stages of the B2B buying journey by observing the online browsing behavior of buyer companies. It is shown that observing the buyer's online behavior effectively allows us to estimate the buying stages with high accuracy by utilizing the hidden Markov models. Managers in B2B seller companies may use these techniques for adjusting their marketing efforts to improve the fit with the information demands of the B2B buyer prospects along with their buying journey, and thus, improve the hit rate of marketing and sales activities.

AB - By advancement in digital marketing, business-to-business (B2B) buyers carry out over half of the buying process through digital touchpoints before they establish any significant contact with the B2B seller. Knowing the buying stage of a potential buyer can bring a substantial advantage to the B2B seller given the complexity of the transaction and the associated value. In this paper, the authors propose a machine learning approach to infer the stages of the B2B buying journey by observing the online browsing behavior of buyer companies. It is shown that observing the buyer's online behavior effectively allows us to estimate the buying stages with high accuracy by utilizing the hidden Markov models. Managers in B2B seller companies may use these techniques for adjusting their marketing efforts to improve the fit with the information demands of the B2B buyer prospects along with their buying journey, and thus, improve the hit rate of marketing and sales activities.

KW - B2B buyer journey

KW - Hidden buying stage

KW - Hidden Markov model

KW - Internet browsing

UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/85109835876

U2 - 10.1016/j.indmarman.2021.06.003

DO - 10.1016/j.indmarman.2021.06.003

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85109835876

SN - 0019-8501

VL - 97

SP - 126

EP - 133

JO - Industrial Marketing Management

JF - Industrial Marketing Management

ER -

Is this company a lead customer? Estimating stages of B2B buying journey

Abstrakti

Rahoitus

Pääsy asiakirjaan

Muut tiedostot ja linkit

Sormenjälki

Projektit

B2B AI

Laitteet

Science-IT

Siteeraa tätä