New Study Finds Tech Buyers Rely on Search

Search Marketing Blog

New Study Finds Tech Buyers Rely on Search

Posted by Sean McMahon on 06.06.2007

An important study of nearly 3,000 B2B marketers and technology professionals in April 2007 was released today by KnowledgeStorm. This study, conducted in partnership with MarketingSherpa, reveals the value that technology buyers place upon search engines to locate information pertaining to product and services research. KnowledgeStorm is top-ranked search resource for technology information that provides technology vendors the means to reach businesses who are conducting buying decision research.Though traditional search engine wisdom says that you need to be on the first page of results, search is becoming more sophisticated, with technology buyers using more complex terms of three or more words and often looking as deep as five pages. They also have read paid ads that appear in their search results at least sometimes, with many marketers incorporating paid search into their content positioning strategies.

Here are the important highlights of this revealing study:

Eighty-four percent of technology buyers begin their online search for information with on the the major search engines.

When technology buyers start their search using one of the major search engines, 56% use phrases of three or more words. An additional 19% use search operators. Only 6% use one word or an acronym.

Fifty-three percent of technology buyers scan, on average, three to five pages of search results.

Sponsored links, or paid ads that appear in search results, are read by 53% of technology buyers “frequently” or “sometimes.” Thirty-four percent click on the link or ad “sometimes” or “frequently.” Sixty-five percent of marketers use a paid ad strategy to place their content on search results.

Sixty-six percent of marketers say they have a strategy for achieving a high organic or natural placement for their content on major search engines. Fifty-six percent thought that their content was consistently indexed and usually accessible within the major search engines.

Nearly 80% of technology buyers will register for a white paper, which is also the top content type marketers deem as worth requiring registration. By contrast, only 38% of buyers will register for a demo and 31% for a Webcast.

Finally, concludes the report, technology buyers place the highest value on high-quality educational materials, particularly white papers and case studies, and are consequently most willing to register for them. In addition, technology buyers want to read an abstract of at least a paragraph to determine whether they will register for specific content.