Principles of marketing/PMKT102/Assessing customer behaviour/Organizational buyers

Those who supply goods and services to consumer markets are themselves in need of goods and services to run their business. These organizations - producers, resellers, and governments - make up vast marketing organizations that buy a large variety of products, including equipment, raw material, and labor and other services. Some organizations sell exclusively to other organizations and never come into contact with consumer buyers.

Despite the importance of organizational markets, far less research has been conducted on factors that influence their behavior than on factors that influence consumers. However, we can identify characteristics that distinguish organizational buying from consumer buying and typical steps in the organizational buying process.