B2B Buying Process: 6 Stages, Key Stakeholders & Strategies for 2026

Z&D continues its research by learning more about these tools and reading about Rainstorm Storage and its competitors. After deciding employees are wasting too much time on this process, Z&D starts researching on Google. B2B and B2C buyer journeys can vary, as prospect motivations and sales cycles differ by industry. They have decided on the best approach to solving their problem and are confident with their research up to this point. Prospects in the decision stage have compiled a list of appropriate businesses and are ready to purchase. At this point, they are researching their options with more intent for a resolution or purchase.

The Buyer Insights series includes interactive reports and custom data cuts that allow you to explore buyer behavior by industry, region, role, persona, and company size. As buyers lean more on answer engines in their purchasing processes, marketers must evolve their content and messaging approaches to break through. Based on Forrester’s latest Buyers’ Journey Survey, this research reflects how real buyers — across roles, industries, and regions — think, research, and decide.

Mapping the buyer’s journey is like creating a roadmap for your customers. It is crucial to address these questions proactively and provide clear and concise answers. This is why buyer journey b2b it is essential to provide them with the necessary resources to make an informed decision. They may need to gather information from multiple sources and consider the pros and cons of different options. Now that buyers know their problem, they start exploring different solutions.

Furthermore, by regularly sharing stand-out, educational content about industry challenges, opportunities, and the approach and category, you are becoming known in your industry—or in other words, known by the people your buyers ask for a recommendation. For example, while educating our buyers about the Account-Based Marketing (ABM) approach, we’ll point out things that are often missed in ABM programs (such as warm-up programs, account research, pilot abm campaigns…). Once the buyers settle on a specific category, they will start researching, evaluating and comparing the different vendors.

Data + AI powers better experiences and outcomes

Spend more time connecting with followers with HubSpot’s time-saving suite of social tools. It’s important to note that content marketing is most effective when brands align content with the various stages of the buyer’s journey. We’ve talked about how B2B customers are focused on expertise, driven by logic, and want to be educated.

Why the Shift in the B2B Buyer Journey

• Vendors who provide ready-made business case templates, compliance documentation, and ROI calculators dramatically reduce friction at this stage.
• Websites provide an easy way to share information about products or services with all stakeholders involved in the buying decision.
• The goal of this hub is to show how AECOM solves their clients’ complex challenges while keeping innovation and sustainability at the forefront of their work.
• After the selection, the final step is the exchange of contracts, upon which the official purchase is made, and the implementation phase can begin.
• Finally, review the steps you’ve identified to see if something was missed.

This encompasses the steps they take during the purchase process and the factors influencing their decisions. Recognizing these nuances shapes how businesses approach each persona. Marketers use this data to craft messages that resonate with potential customers’ ambitions and pain points. It involves examining their role within an organization and the goals they strive to achieve.

Decision Stage – Selecting a Vendor

But when a prospect enters your funnel via a referral or peer recommendation, they already have those answers. Mapping the B2B buyer journey means breaking down how prospects actually experience your brand, from the first moment of awareness to becoming a customer (and beyond). If a prospect downloads your whitepaper on “AI Efficiency,” your follow-up shouldn’t be a generic sales pitch. It requires an 8-step framework that starts with deep persona research and ends with continuous optimization.

What Is a Buyer’s Journey?

If you want to know why the buyer’s journey and the customer’s journey are disparate, this understanding begins with having clarity on how each journey is actually defined. For example, a B2B SaaS provider may offer custom pricing based on a company’s size and needs, while a B2C subscription service (i.e., Hulu or Netflix) has set monthly pricing. For example, a B2B tech company might generate leads through LinkedIn outreach; a B2C fashion brand may focus on Instagram influencers and flash sales to drive conversions. However, in the B2C buyer’s journey, there’s a reliance on brand awareness through ads, social media, influencer marketing, and promotional strategy. In the B2B buyer’s journey, marketing and sales efforts often hyperfixate on relationship-building, education, and value-driven content (i.e., case studies, webinars, email nurturing, etc.).

In large enterprises, there may be multiple people in each role across different business units. This article walks through the full B2B buying process as it actually works today, not as it worked five years ago. Statista projected US B2B online sales reaching $1.8 trillion by 2023, a figure that has only grown since. Buyers complete most of their research before your sales team ever enters the picture. You can also quickly identify gaps where you lose customers and provide more content and sales effort to compensate.

How do teams typically use Buyer Insights research?

The marketing agency would monitor how the new software impacts their reporting process, assessing whether it meets the expectations and needs that were identified in the Awareness stage. The insights gathered during this stage help determine if additional support or training is needed to encourage more consistent use or if the software fully meets the agency's operational requirements. It's a critical period for identifying any barriers to full adoption, such as usability issues or gaps in training, and for gauging the software's integration into the agency's workflow.