Segmenting B2B Technology Markets via Psychographics: An Exploratory Study

TLDR: In this article, the authors examined how marketing executives employ psychographics as part of their target marketing strategy in business technology markets and found that psychographic thinking without formal analysis was a commonly used strategy evidenced by 59% of the companies.

Abstract: This article examines how marketing executives employ psychographics as part of their target marketing strategy in business technology markets. In spite of the increased attention in the recent business-to-business segmentation literature, psychographics is not used as a major segmentation dimension (only one in five companies used this base). Psychographic thinking without formal analysis, however, was a commonly used strategy evidenced by 59% of the companies. While there was no difference in target marketing success found between formal and informal psychographics, both approaches fared significantly better than firms not bringing a psychographic mindset to their segmentation strategy. Firmographic and demographic variables did not impact the use of organizational psychographics. Motivation, relationship and risk variables were used by marketing managers as psychographic inputs. Implications for management practice and a research agenda for segmentation scholars are presented.