Enterprise & B2B Market Research
Want to explore an opportunity with a professional audience before making a big product investment? Our team of qualitative user researchers can help you quickly gain audience insights, test assumptions, pivot ideas, and get closer to product-market fit.
Qualitative Market Research with Professionals: 7 Examples
BI Incorporated
Audience
Case specialists in large federal government agencies, plus county government officers and administrators, who use BI’s enterprise software for case management.
Research Goals
Understand case workflow and pain points with systems. Identify top scenarios and tasks for core user groups. Uncover and prioritize customer needs.
Methods
5 full-day site visits to a mix of government offices plus a call center. 25+ one-on-one interviews, observation sessions and MVP test sessions. Followed by 2 on-site analysis workshops near Denver.
“What does a typical day look like for you? What are your biggest challenges?”
UN System
Audience
Economists, statisticians and data researchers at federal government agencies around the world — with a focus on a unique set of process owners within central banks and statistical bureaus who use 1 of 3 data platforms.
Research Goals
Understand and define 3 audience segments. Observe their processes for country-level data collection and sharing, including various tools used. Validate workflow problem hypotheses.
Methods
11 one-on-one contextual interviews conducted remotely. Followed by an analysis workshop in Washington DC to align on problems and opportunities.
“What are the top 3 data-related tasks you have for your job? Tell me about the last time you performed one of these tasks.”
Travel Leaders Group
Audience
Corporate travel managers with unique decision-making authority at enterprise and mid-market organizations using a specific type of travel management process.
Research Goals
Test stakeholder assumptions about the audience’s content consumption habits and knowledge gaps. Uncover problem areas where they need new technology solutions.
Methods
7 moderated interviews plus concept tests, conducted remotely. Followed by a remote analysis workshop with a mix of stakeholders in Minneapolis, New York City and Virginia.
“How is travel managed at your company? How did you select your current travel management solution?”
Humentum
Audience
Country managers/directors and VPs of large international NGOs. A mix of Humentum members, non-members and legacy members, including some in developing countries.
Research Goals
Gain insights into the pain points, goals and needs of Humentum’s member and non-member customers. Guide marketing, content and strategic planning. Inform personas.
Methods
One-on-one remote interviews along with observation of users interacting with online content. On-site analysis workshop in Washington DC.
“What are the biggest challenges in 2019 for your organization? How have you interacted with [NGO software] in the past?”
Baileigh Industrial
Audience
Manufacturing buyers and procurement owners at companies of all sizes with industrial metalworking needs — typically spending over $15,000 per purchase.
Research Goals
Understand the buyer journey and product information needs of this audience. Test hypotheses about the decision-making process and ecosystem for large manufacturing purchases.
Methods
Moderated interviews with Baileigh website visitors who abandoned shopping carts with big-ticket items. Remote workshop with stakeholders in Wisconsin, to align on findings and generate solution ideas.
“How have you shopped and/or purchased industrial tools in the past 5 years? When you are shopping for industrial tools online, in your mind, what information are you looking to find?”
National Fire Protection Association
Audience
Fire protection engineers, designers and architects at large and mid-size organizations, who research fire codes as part of their day-to-day work.
Research Goals
Understand this audience and its fire code research processes, tools, gaps, and pain points. Test an MVP of a new code research application. Iterate and test again.
Methods
1:1 moderated interviews with 9 participants recruited through LinkedIn. 2 full-day analysis workshops at NFPA headquarters in Boston.
“Have you ever had any difficulty looking for up-to-date or accurate fire code information? Can you tell me a little bit about that?”
GEICO
Audience
Hundreds of customer service reps and supervisors at contact centers across the U.S., who use GEICO’s enterprise service application throughout the day.
Research Goals
Understand core tasks and workflows. Observe live system interactions during customer calls. Prioritize gaps and pain points. Generate research program concepts.
Methods
Call center site visits with 15+ “double jacking” observation sessions and 10 one-on-one interviews with a wide range of employees.
“As a supervisor, is there anything that you might be in a unique position to observe that we might not learn from talking to reps?”