The Impact of Social Media On IT Purchase Decisions

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions
A European Perspective
The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective
Table of contents
Review .......................................................................................................................2 Foreword ...................................................................................................................3 Who uses social media? ...........................................................................................4 The importance of using social media ....................................................................7 Is social media a bigger influencer than the channel?........................................10 Consumer or trend creator? .................................................................................14 Trends in the usage of social media too ...............................................................15 Social networks .......................................................................................................19 Traditional marketing vs. Social marketing; Measuring the importance of social media ............................................................23 How to achieve competitive advantage using social media for IT products and solutions purchase? Moving towards a collaborative market model ...........................................................................................................27 Country outcomes ..................................................................................................30 Conclusion...............................................................................................................31 Annex: General facts and figures. Methodology .................................................33
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Review
This research tackles the use of social media through the eyes of IT professionals and tries to measure their contribution to purchase decision regarding IT products and solutions. The analysis aims to shed light on whether social media converts brand awareness of IT decision makers (ITDMs) into procurement action. Of course, this is also corroborated with their business strategic needs.
Selling complex IT products and solutions requires that more comprehensive information is put at the customers disposal and marks the transition of the IT pro as a simple consumer towards an era where they have to procure more custom-built IT products and solutions. As social communication and collaboration platforms penetrate further into the entire business ecosystem, the IT pros experience becomes based more on connected market behaviours than oligopolistic ones.
The research is based on interviews with IT pros about whether social media tools create further opportunities for both marketers and themselves as these two categories are the main actors of social media use for business purposes. Understanding both the consumer and the vendor through social media use allows for a better understanding of the synchronisation of their market behaviour in terms of IT market demand and supply. We delineate different user categories and social media models in order to refine a profile of IT professionals purchasing behaviours. A questionnaire survey1was conducted in parallel to quantify our research.
Differing country characteristics are also taken into account throughout the whole study. A comparison of major six European countries (Germany, France, Italy, Spain, the UK and the Netherlands) was completed by other cross-analytical angles: by business sector and by size.
Interviews were conducted in the period Feb-Apr 2011.
The evolution of social media use in the enterprise also brings out the idea of merging traditional marketing tools with these modern ones, and as such, positions the ITDM as a customer 2.0. Moving towards new types of collaboration engenders further changes in enterprise IT purchasing habits. Thus businesses tend to replicate each other by trying to adapt social media for their own use.
Foreword
Does social media mean anything to you? If not, youd be characterised as being behind the times. Are you present on social media websites? If the answer to the first question is no then theres need to answer this either. Two to three years ago, companies had a choice over whether they played a part in social media. This it is not the case today. Social media has become a real business phenomenon, driving an important part of a companys market presence and rapidly evolving business strategies. This evolution is exponential, yet many parts of the jigsaw are missing and the puzzle of how to harness maximum benefit from this growth remains unsolved. In order to understand social medias roots we have to go way back in time. Some researchers mention the early nineties; some state that true social web interaction saw its first attempts at the beginning of this century, with the real transition from a static to a more interactive web; and the stubborn ones dare to go way back to the fifties. One thing is for sure though; business interaction, globalisation and web 2.0 have all had a definite role to play in shaping todays social media landscape.
.
Who uses social media?

When analysing IT professionals purchasing behaviour as regards social media, we detect their different profiles taking shape as part of the procurement process. By contrast, it is important to examine both sides of IT purchasing-related social media interactions, with vendors on one side and the end-using IT pros on the other. Other specific groups of end users are considered as influencers on social networks. Sales, for example, can certainly exert influence within the social networks, but they are undoubtedly not the most important group, as they do not act by themselves; they use other factors to encourage customers to make a purchase. The breakdown of IT consumers into multiple categories suggests that social media can no longer be ignored when it comes to business purposes. The fact that they all consult social media suggests ITDMs already take it into account in one way or another within their current approach to IT vendor marketing. .
SOCIAL MEDIA USER CATEGORIES
100%
Figure 1
90%
80%
26%
20% 44% 41% 35% 33%
70% 60%
50%
45% 53% 34% 34% 16% 42% 43%
Passive user / Just for information Active user
40% 30% 20% 15% 10% 0%

7%
Interactive communicator Community manager
8% 13% 18% 9% ES FR IT 17% 8% UK 15% 13% 10% Major 6
DE
NetMediaEurope
This client typology can be seen as proportional to their status of their buying power, as follows: Low profile users(33%), ranked moderate, with diminished effect on the purchase; they want to simply keep up with the market by staying informed; Active users (43% in average), ranked as a regular presence and user of social media;
High profile users (23%), who were involved in making active connections and highly interactive with the social media on a site; they fill the sites with their own content and keep up with market trends.
At first glance, the profile break down of UK users is in line with the market average. Notice the contrast between the rather low-profile French users, and the Spanish ones, who were more active on websites, socially speaking. This finding is related to the fact that the Spanish sample is slightly more consistent in medium-sized companies than expected. These companies have more access to internet-based resources and are therefore more socially active. A different approach to the same problem introduces the product related dimension:
CUSTOMER PROFILE REGARDING THE USE OF IT PRODUCTS AND SOLUTIONS
100%
Figure 2
12% 90% 28%

80%
9%
25% 21%
27% 17% 37% 22% 14%
70% 60% 30%

50% 10%
No add-ons consumer 28% 33% Convenience consumer Info-seeker Techno centric 5% Early adopter 3% 9% 17%
Socialite
1% 26% 25% 24% 13%

20% 18%
40% 30%
3% 10%
24% 10% 0% 4% DE 12% 4% ES FR 18%
25% 12% 4% IT UK
21%
8% Major 6
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The profile of the kinds of IT pros that procure and consume enterprise IT products are good indicators of their purchase behaviour. Evolving from a simple device consumer, the IT professional has had to become a more complex technology consumer. Todays influences on their purchasing decisions may come from anywhere, starting with their peer group and extending to information gained from the internet and social media platforms. If technology influences come from diverse sources and social groups then, when it comes to the procurement decision-making process per se, groups seem to exert a more decisive influence than IT individuals. It seems that a group consensus has a stronger impact than the individual experts involved in the buying decision.
Traditional marketing channels have evolved to make room for new market interactions. The exchange of information is more immediate in todays social media-driven world and customers seem evermore in touch with media and communication tools that they increasingly use in their daily usual tasks. When associating consumer behaviour with different market aspects, those slower to embrace new social media concepts were also more reserved with regards to following market changes.
For example, the No add-ons and Convenience consumer segments are characterised as being very independent in terms of their decision making. This is the case for representatives from UK and German companies, who said they were more basic and cost oriented in their purchase decisions than their Latin peers. At the same time, the ethnocentric were much more oriented towards collaboration. So are the Early adopters, who are much more focused on content creation, of technical related content especially. They were, however, still pragmatic in their buying decisions. The Socialites category (interactive communicators or community managers) characterise themselves according to the importance and amount of contacts within their social groups and by how much they fully benefit from their networking interactions. Split by country, it appears as though the French are more driven by social status than the others, followed by the English, who are less active. But, of those who are the most active networkers, they do so to try to take advantage of the potential influence of social media tools. Europe-wide, the research suggests a good balance between the strongly technical social media users and those using IT products and solutions as a necessity. Nonetheless, only one out of twelve ranks as an authentic social media socialite.
In the prosumer era, where consumers drive demand for IT products oriented to their needs and regularly make use of social media. For that matter, they consider themselves better valued when directly interacting with vendors and their brands entire ecosystem on the social media websites. Offering the opportunity to find out about the best deals or optimised solutions, they use social media to stay up-to-date with every development and remain actively informed about the latest tehnology news.
The importance of using social media

A company selling IT must ensure its marketing strategy is aligned with their clients procurement process of each and every one of its specific products and solutions. In Europe, around half of the respondents on average declared that ratings and reviews play an important role when deciding to buy an appropriate IT product and solution. It has been qualitatively proven that this kind of review can even help change a persons mind about what product or solution to buy. Nowadays, consumer reviews are stated even in specific business contexts as being one of the most credible forms of indirect product marketing. IT customer reviews, comparison charts, editorial reviews or shared shopping lists are regularly a popular resource on the World Wide Web. These types of social interaction, together with multimedia marketing, advertisements and all the other customer communication support tools used, are considered to be marketing influencers in the buying decision. The worlds biggest brands can become links to user generated content. Today users are more likely to check online reviews before making a purchase than they were compared to one to two years ago. Question and answer (Q&A) exchange pages are also often frequented by ITDMs because they see them as the place where companies post the most helpful information
Figure 3
100% 13% 90% 80% 70% 60% 28% 50% 40% 30% 20% 27% 16%
IMPORTANCE OF SOCIAL MEDIA FOR IT PURCHASES
4% 20% 28% 35% 17%

14% 21%
16%
18%
18%
Not important (1) (2) (3)

(4)
30% 43% 36%
28%
31%
Very important (5)
19% 27% 10% 10% 0% DE ES FR

15%
22%
19% 14%
4% 7%
8%
10% Major 6
IT
UK
NetMediaEurope
Ascertaining the importance of exchanging information via social media is another way of measuring its perception among the respondents. Once again we observe an overall equilibrium of opinions regarding the exchange of IT-related information on social media. Basically, one third could live without it, one third had mixed feelings about it and only one third identified themselves with social media with regards to product-related information.
Taking a more in-depth look at the survey results, we notice that the Germans gain the most confidence from higher social media ratings (in a proportion of 42%), while Italian respondents do not rely on information exchanged on social media. Germans take longer to adopt social media tools but, when they do, they put more stock in its influence; but, by contrast, Italian respondents remained more faithful to traditional market influencers. Germans also dedicated more business time exchanging IT information using social media tools than any respondents from the other European countries. And Italians remained faithful to traditional market methods.
BUSINESS TIME ALLOCATED TO SOCIAL MEDIA
Figure 4
5% 10%
11%
63%
12%
< 1 hour per week 1-2 hours per week 2-4 hours per week > 4 hours per week No use/ Not important
NetMediaEurope
Nevertheless, the research suggests that the great majority of users (63%) are the most reticent ones, who declare that they not to allocate a lot of their business time to social media or not to allocate any time to it at all. Lets not forget that our audience is composed of IT pros, less business oriented, more technical and pragmatic.
It should be noted that within each statistic, some of the IT professionals questioned could not identify themselves as belonging to any of our predefined groups, as they play a less important role in their companys management processes and therefore a less important role in the act of purchase. Europe-wide, on average, 38% of the respondents react at least once a week to the social media discussions. Meaning one out of three is active; and a further 12percent dedicate more than 4 hours per week to social media engagement. Perhaps more importantly though, it was not the quantity of social interaction, but its quality and effectiveness that mattered.
Is social media a bigger influencer than the channel?

An entire ecosystem isinvolved in the purchasing process, including resellers, services providers and other specialists in the field of IT. And the information provided by all actors is meant topositivelydefine optimal IT investment and use. As such, the channel is an integral part of the buying process. Channel suppliers are also involvedin social networks. With theirproactive attitude, they are constantlywilling to put themselves in the spotlightto gain a piece of the procurement action. Therefore, they are automatically perceived as a sort of an expert witness on a topic, particularly as niche markets specialists and valued-added service providers trying to develop a closer relationship with their clients. IT vendors with complex products and solutions require industry-specific expertise and needs,involvingdifferent marketing strategy deployments.
Figure 5
10
The so-called market gurus or mavens have an important role to play in the IT procurement decision-making process. These IT experts exert an influence on ITDMs in search of advice. Their contribution is perceived as a constructive one. The role they play is more one of a consultant, where they are seen as having an informed opinion. And figures prove that this category of influencers is the most effective to target. The biggest influencers in the process of IT purchase are considered to be both customers and experts. Both categories are well perceived and with similar influence, with 40% of the votes. The channel only figures in terms of their level of influence much later.
IT PURCHASE INFLUENCERS
MANUFACTURERS
60%
Figure 6
50% 40% 30%
53%
20% 10% 0% DE ES FR IT UK Major 6
42% 35% 19% 19% 33%
NetMediaEurope
When talking about IT purchase-related search on social media, IT customers expect vendors to be more than present. They indirectly support the entire distribution process and therefore their contribution is not inconsiderate. Their reputation varies however from one country to another. Spanish end-users really rely on brand perception and popularity while, for the English or Italians IT pros, other categories are more influential. The responses from France put it within the market average, with 35% considering the influence of manufacturers as important in the IT procurement process. And, just like regular consumers, the average IT pros tend to recommend the IT brands they regularly buy during conversations with their peer groups.
11
INLFUENCE OF RESELLERS ON IT PURCHASING

.
40% 35% 30% 25% 20%
35%
15% 10% 5%
0%
28% 21% 16% 12% 10%
DE
ES
FR
IT
UK
Major 6
Figure 7
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While the European average influence of manufacturers remains low, it appears as though Spain remains faithful to the influence of the channel. But overall, pure resellers have a diminished influence in the purchase process, in spite of an ongoing barrage of loyalty programmes. However, some particular reseller categories, such as value-added resellers (VARs) and service providers, usually tend to be more involved in the process when it comes to carrying out more complex product evaluations. As a result, these types of channel providers wield more influence because they are perceived as more effective in finding the most appropriate solution compatible with the procuring enterprises predefined demand criteria. For ordinary IT products and solutions demands, even professional consumers tend to research, when possible, via the web. It comes top out of all the preferred remote sales methods. When looking for the information, e-commerce websites have started to become the routine place to purchase a computer, tablet PC or a printer. As more IT retail sales are carried out over the web, this promotes the creation of closer relationships between all web influencers. The reasons for this are numerous: customers may be searching for the best price, best product or for a simple brand comparison. This has proven particularly effective in the retail industry, where increasing levels of marketing promotion are being diverted through social media websites. Its no surprise that this popularity among retailers is also down to the fact that, budget-wise,this type of marketing has been proven to be a lot cheaper.
12
Retailers and e-tailers with social media-based strategies have an advantage on their competitors. Using these different, direct routes to the customer and taking advantage of the power of the web can positively impact the purchase decision. These particular market behaviours also exert a certain pressure on the channel. And from the manufacturers point of view, having a multichannel presence will always prove more effective than operating through one single channel.
Overall though, when it comes to IT and telecoms products, the good news we note is that at least half of the respondents were very keen on seeking some kind of external procurement advice.
13
Consumer or trend creator?

Prosumers tend to do much more research before proceeding to purchase new technologies. With the help of social networking, technologies are now more closely reviewed, including special expertise and skills as well as the products themselves. The rise of social media also allows consumers to set the trends in terms of market offers. It incites brands to better target consumers with more adapted market offers. Social media enables qualitative and quantitative based analysis of recently purchased IT products and solutions.
IT PURCHASE INFLUENCERS CUSTOMERS

Figure 8
60% 50% 40% 30%
45%
20%
49% 33% 27%
48% 41%
10% 0%
DE ES FR IT UK Major 6
NetMediaEurope
End users are becoming trendsetters and, as we see, their opinion counts. Slightly varying from one European market model to another, consumer opinion tends to differ according to country nuances. Consumer opinion is more robust in the UK, France and Germany than in the other of the countries surveyed. Or, to put it in a different way, the customer is more of a king in the UK or France than in Italy or Spain. This hierarchy is in some way correlated to their active interest in social media-related results.
14
Trends in the usage of social media tools

Prosumers start their research regarding product information on search engines, which allows them to cast a wide net online before conducting more refined research for specific product information. They also consider the different social media tools at their disposal. Their next step is to narrow their choices and connect them with activities on social platforms.
As enterprise networking seems to also be an up-to-date tool within companies, together with all the other additional communication tools communities, forums, wikis and blogs that allow collaborators to work in groups on their own projects the same social tools can be easily implemented and used alternatively for the same or different purposes.
Figure 9
15
Below is our own attempt to distinguish the following trends regarding the use of social media identified tools within the past five years. Our estimation is based on our findings regarding usage levels in European businesses. The following trends were observed: Messaging boards and forums: usage +; trend =
The first prototypes of messaging boards were built in the late seventies. These were among the first forms of social media to be adopted by businesses. Their use was definitely not adopted on a large scale. We estimate that one third of the companies use them in average. Forums are very popular these days as they represent a reliable source of information with active customer interaction in the shape of regular reviews. Forums are currently used by more than half of the businesses. Blogging: usage +; trend +
Considered trustworthy, blogs have registered an impressive growth in the past years; definitely more than 60% of companies now make use of blogging websites and content within their marketing strategies. Wikis: usage =; trend =
Very popular these days and very useful for project management, wikis also help create a mechanism for knowledge transfer and best-practice collaboration, where one out of four companies currently tends to make use of such tools. Online video and podcasts: usage =; trend +
We estimate a little fewer than half of companies have adopted these tools. Video blogging is becoming more and more popular in the field of academic research. And the mixture with the visual entertainment medium implies a visually driven marketing approach. It is used in average by one out of three businesses. Social networks: usage +; trend +
The adoption figures speak for themselves, growing from one out of five companies to over 85% within the past three years. Mainly used a marketing tool, it has been adopted at all levels. In an overall view, social media is used by a consistent amount of the IT pros. This proportion grows to half if we take into account the European average.
16
SOCIAL MEDIA TOOLS: COMMUNICATION

Figure 10
Major 6
51% 67% 19% 50% 76% 57%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80%
UK
IT
FR
ES
DE
NetMediaEurope
A couple of years ago blogs were considered of no use in Germany, as the internet was perceived as dangerous and full of malware. But big corporations had to align their marketing and communication strategies with the phenomenon as they have started, little by little, to feel the pressure of their absence from the socially-driven internet. Blogs and web forums seem to have more impact regarding purchasing decisions on social networks. Blogs initiate a discussion with a known or unknown resource considered trustworthy enough to influence the purchase decision. This is partly why mavens weigh more in terms of influence than a vendors advertising these days. There is also a behavioural difference between active and passive blog readers. Statistically, half of the respondents define themselves as reading a blog on a regular basis, at least once a month. Frequent readers are defined as those reading more than one blog per session. Furthermore, IT pro readers tend to trust comments more on blogs than on social network websites. People that actively participate on blogs or social networks can be analytically defined as passionate for a certain domain, experts or good observers and interpreters of the decisionmaking options. Some of them become real experts or gurus in their field; and advertisers try to take advantage of this situation. But sometimes this pays, and sometimes an expert review goes bad. For example, Germans have a reputation for being tough critics on blogs, when it comes to customer dissatisfaction.
17
The second category made up of collaboration tools are the most frequently used. But it has not been directly proven that they directly impact the purchase decision process. And, according to the figures, blogs and forums are definitely more trustworthy than social networks, but more and more people connect to social networks. So, how to define the current
SOCIAL MEDIA TOOLS: COLLABORATIVE
Major 6
Figure 11
collaboration tools? They are tools directly related to productivity,
48% 36% 60% 54% 39% 47%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%
UK
collaboration and communication. The most used collaboration solutions in companies by country are social platforms, followed by wikis. Social platforms come in second
NetMediaEurope
IT
FR
ES
DE
place. They are perceived as very
trendy these days, with the ability to multiply and diversifying the marketing platforms of vendors and their brand offering in their attempts to give the solution to the client. Their use is also backed by the fact that one third of those interviewed belong to the IT sector. Less frequent are multimedia tools, but still, one out of three companies make good use of them.
SOCIAL MEDIA TOOLS: MULTIMEDIA
Major 6
Figure 12
This can be seen on the likes of YouTube, where it is easy to choose
33% 51%
any IT brand and browse thousands of miscellaneous shared video casts.
UK
IT
32%
We distinguish their use as particularly

FR
43% 12% 28%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%
ES
important in France and the UK. These two countries emerged as the relative trendsetters in the corporative use of media tools on the European market.
NetMediaEurope
DE
Data classification using tags, shared files, bookmarks, monitoring new projects and discussion forums seem to be efficient in driving and representing IT professionals market communities. Business email solutions, online webcasts or intelligent document sharing are all proposed as new, alternative solutions. These potential customers are thus invited to assess at first their existing infrastructure and to estimate the possible gains of a potential purchase.
18
Social networks
The social dimension of a marketing strategy allows for a different methodical approach that analyses customer behaviour via a sort of social intelligence approach. The web-2.0 concept represents nowadays a potential connection between marketing and the market reality. Web interactions are no longer about one-way, or even two-way communication; they enable multidimensional levels of interaction. But are ITDMs exploiting all these avenues and giving their opinion on community tools? Or are they satisfied with their traditional sales and marketing methods? In the battle of traditional versus modern marketing activity, who will win in the end? Will they stick together or cannibalise each other? Under ideal circumstances the two activities should support each other and create some synergies. Our analytical approach is meant to clarify this issue to a certain extent. Community networks become automatically a compulsory passage to validate the buying decisions of the consumers but they are still largely underused in marketing campaigns. Conversely, social media currently represents a fertile ground for purchase-related decisions. More and more consumers tend to turn to these tools to be up-to-date on the latest product news or to find out about products sometimes only available on the web. The web is the place to be right now, especially when we talk about IT. As communication tools, social networks are ultimately much more developed, as modern marketing takes an approach that goes beyond simple networking between professionals, providing information resources or common interest areas. The development of social media has become more obvious since the rise of large scale used sites in the lights of Facebook, LinkedIn or Twitter. While the other social websites were seen as marginal in terms of social media usage.
Figure 13
51% FACEBOOK 41% LINKEDIN
33% TWITTER
8% other
19
It is well known that a lot of new wave consumers tend to actively use social networks when making a purchase decision. And it is more than obvious by simply taking a look at the common topics on Facebook, Twitter and other well-known social media websites. The common profile of usage for new marketing tools becomes clearer if we eliminate the group represented by having less than 100 employees. At the same time, ironically, the rate of adoption is 10% lower in larger companies than on average, meaning it is higher in small and mediumsized (SMBs) businesses. A quick parallel allows us to profile IT professionals. Europe-wide, Facebook takes the lead in the business arena, coming way ahead of LinkedIn, Twitter and other social platforms in terms of usage. But this ranking changes with each countrys individual characteristics.
LINKEDIN: USE FOR BUSINESS PURPOSE

Figure 14
Major 6
41%
UK
66%
IT
56%
FR
54%
ES
65%
DE 0%
8%
10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70%
NetMediaEurope
Take France or Italy, where more than one out of two IT professionals uses LinkedIn for business purposes. Notice that Germany as well differs vastly from other countries in terms of its adoption levels. This is simply because Xing, a local platform, still dominates German business, leaving LinkedIn way behind compared to other countries. In Germany, national social media websites started to grow faster than Facebook and its counterparts, proving that cultural barriers exist even at this level.
20
It appears that more than half of the ITDM pros use Facebook as a source of information on companies and products. More than a third of the respondents think that social media websites are a good source of information about companies and products overall. But, undoubtedly Facebook remains the most frequented social media platform at all levels for now The contrast between Facebook as a popular social tool and its professional side could be said to be very prominent, as the average user is often perceived as the teenager killing time with their mates online. In reality, disparate profiles can coalesce into groups on a variety of social platforms to sometimes offer simple solutions to complex unsolved issues. The explanation for why this happens is quite simple. Marketers tend to be present where their customers are. And we know the number of Facebook users. A huge database spiced with some BI to make room to customized publicity and content for both business-to-business (B2C) and business-to-consumer (B2B) interactive users. And more users means more traffic, more content and even more reasons to be present and so on, the spiral effect is there thus the need to be present. By definition, when you think Facebook, you think young user when in reality our analysis
UK Major 6
FACEBOOK: USE FOR BUSINESS PURPOSE Figure 15

51%
45%
suggested that it is also regularly

IT
25%
used for business purposes. The

FR
46%
profile of IT professional present on Facebook is of a person in their mid-thirties. As we have

ES
43%
DE 0% 20%
76%
40% 60% 80% 100%
discovered, some of these users are also decision makers considering
NetMediaEurope
information about IT products and services. This affirmation emphasises that IT vendors are looking to influence these users online through a diverse number of ways as a fact.
When we reduce our target market to SMBs alone, the scenario looks slightly different. The internet and social media play a different role in shaping their purchase decision, as they seek advice differently and are very budget oriented when buying IT products and solutions.
21
Traditional marketing vs. Social marketing; Measuring the importance of social media
If we take a close look at the graphic below, we notice the first bad news for IT vendors: in spite of all the problems IT managers face regarding messaging congestion, propagation of numerous documentation sources, multiple communication methods and poor use of IT resources, as well as lack of compatibility between the different solutions, they still do not think that these alternative complex tools are any more effective than their existing or traditional marketing tools.
But the IT procurement decisions within a company remain the responsibility of the IT manager or a similar high-level decision maker. Therefore, this type of decision does not concern the majority of the panel. And there is more to it than this lets take a closer look. It appears as though social media use is Figure 17 more oriented towards networking and marketing.
But its use in procurement, even if it exists in contrast to the other objectives, is still an increasingly popular trend.
SOCIAL MEDIA: USED FOR IT PRODUCTS AND SOLUTIONS PURCHASE
Major 6
12% 15% 6% 18% 22% 10%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25%
UK
IT
FR
ES
Figure 18
DE
NetMediaEurope
23
Regionally, there was a real contrast in Germany in terms of using Facebook and LinkedIn for business purposes. Even if users in this country were perceived as hesitant to use social websites, when it comes to Facebook, for business purposes this was far from the case. Even so, the situation was different two years ago, and the big picture has evolved in favour of social media.
Twitter represents the IT professionals ultimate challenge in terms of being more present on social media. Sharing purchase related information on a larger scale is essential to achieving this.
TWITTER:
Major 6
USE FOR BUSINESS PURPOSE
Generally speaking, when it comes to Twitter, respondents were divided
33%
into several categories: one-third

UK
54%
share their opinions, another third ask

IT
13%
for opinions or recommendations and

FR
42% 47% 31%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%
ES
the
last
third
actually
make
DE
recommendations. Splitting publicity from the real content is Twitters original approach
NetMediaEurope
Figure 16
to test a different marketing model. As far as we can see Twitter is even less used by the ITDM as, above all, it is more like a communication tool. The idea of intensively targeting social media companies via publicity on their websites seems to be an efficient one. At least at first sight. But this marketing approach has therefore its limits, where the intensive use of these marketing tools might turn off consumers ultimately lead them to also reject all alternatives. But, also in relation to Twitter, we notice that the categories of active respondents are rather equal and the nature of the platform (where the interact ions are short and concise) can make the purchase cycle even shorter.
To conclude, social media websites such as Facebook, Twitter and other well-known social networking tools generate online visibility and offer a good platform on which to do so. But beyond these well-known social media websites, when defining social media, those we interviewed did not place it high on their list of priorities.
22
When it comes to particular European countries, some make more use of social media as a marketing tool than others. Spain and France shared the top ranked position in this context, followed by the UK.
SOCIAL MEDIA USE: BREAKDOWN BY SECTOR
Moreover, any comparison to the IT sector makes no difference. The rate remains unchanged. Marketing and consultancy companies, as well as services companies take the stage in terms of social media usage for business purposes. Figure 19
All sectors
Sales and distribution
12% 8% 17% 7% 8% 26% 12% 10%

0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30%
Other services (public, private) Other Medical, education, research Marketing and consultancy ICT related Banking, Finance
NetMediaEurope
But the results change significantly when the question about whether they use social media in support of the IT products and solutions purchase is posed.
64% 33% 29%
Experts or specialist consultants

Word of mouth
Customer ratings Traditional marketing from the vendors
27% 25%
Social Media
2%
Other
Figure 20
24
Reaching out to experts or people with same profile, sharing the same job issues and having the same profile has become the norm. Sharing ideas on the market has become one of the advantage social media affords todays current dynamic markets as well, and marketers, and especially those in the IT and telecom industry, are about to take the lead in new social media marketing. Industry analysis and reports also play an influential complementary role, as they give the business decision maker an optimal viewpoint for aligning the IT procurement options with budgetary and marketing factors. The influence of advertising and direct marketing are considered among the least important information sources when shortlisting possible IT products and solutions to purchase. Apparently the second most important influencer in the world of IT procurement remains traditional word of mouth. Word-of-mouth interaction is even stronger between IT specialists, and social media and bloggers tend to amplify this phenomenon, where the idea is to enhance the readers degree of confidence. IT decision makers give user-generated sites equal importance to traditional media sources when considering technology purchases. Decision makers consider also their personal experience when determining what products and solutions they should they purchase.
When defining social media, the ITDMs surveyed do not automatically associate it with the idea of influencing their purchasing decisions. Instead they see it as a more important support tool for the purchasing, deployment and usage of IT products and services. And we can see that the other traditional tools make no difference, except for the opinion of the experts.
PERCEPTION OF PURCHASE RELATED INFORMATION ON SOCIAL MEDIA
100%
Figure 21
10% 90%
8%
11% 29%
13%
15%
80% 70%
60%
29% 35%
42%
38%
38%
Waste of time / Unreliable Neutral
50% 39% 40% 41% 30% 20%

10%
44% Useful 38% 39% 24%

8%
37%
Very useful
24% 14%
13% 2% IT UK
11% Major 6
0% DE ES FR
NetMediaEurope
25
Additionally the purchase-related information on the social media websites was perceived as being simply useful or neutral. Social media resources tend to replace classic search engines as new work instruments. Their marketing success is also key to social media marketing. All web related search optimisation processes are added to the overall strategic marketing process. Web marketing is becoming powerful and goes hand in hand with the classic marketing tools.
Social media is not perceived though as the ultimate tool to replace classic marketing tools, as it is advisable to use them as complementary tools in business and sales interactions. Before embracing social media, it is important to take into account of the fact that it is a very subjective way to quantify the information and transform it into action. From a qualitative standpoint, it is seen as offering a rich and interactive source of consumer information and product or services feedback.
26
How to achieve competitive advantage using social media for IT products and solutions purchase? Moving towards a collaborative market model
Nowadays, it is a very complex task to evaluate a companys activity and perceived added value in their respective market when compared to its competitors. Better targeting and pricing closely associated to product development can all contribute to enhance competitive advantage. Understanding the entire customer ecosystem of a product and extending into it on a social networking basis can help brands keep up with the fast pace of high-performance markets. The web-2.0 trend has also made its contribution to creating business benefit in addition to changing the face of the current go-to-market strategies of IT and telecoms companies. Figure 22
6%
SOCIAL MEDIA MARKET MODEL

100% 90% 20%
80% 5%
Suddenly, with social media, small companies really have a chance to stand out among all the other with huge massive
4%
7%
5% 15%
7% 7%
19%
15%
28% 9%
70% 60%
14% 27%
24% Outside in Inside out
competitors
50%
40%
25% 40%
58%
Bottom up Top down 58% 40% 36%
budgets. As such, the market model undergoes changes
30% 20% 29% 10%
and is not budget driven anymore. Authenticity and
6%
0% DE ES FR IT UK Major 6
NetMediaEurope
innovation
become
more
important than notoriety.
Overall marketing budgets remain the same or slightly increase, as parts of those budgets are theoretically split over social media. Media coverage will gain user-generated content and will become one of marketings primary objectives. Marketing changes the face of social media and vice versa.
27
Better channel information related to products; Be a pioneer among your fellows, by staying interactively in touch with the latest market trends.
In the medium-term, it is thought that collaborative tools will tend to prevail over traditional marketing tools. But this has yet to be proven.
On the flip side, Google stated, not long ago that social networks are simply a chapter in internet history. Since then, the company has become actively involved in the development of this era. As of today, Google has also re-launched itself in competition with social networks like Facebook and Twitter, in order to get rid of its web 1.0image. Lets take another example: good old IBM. Everyone would have thought that there is a real cultural gap between the giant ex-machine maker as a current complex solution provider. I am talking about IBM on Facebook. And yet its presence on the social network is a fact. And take also, for example, the likes of Dell, who do not only actively promote only their products and solutions on social websites, but also their human assets. IT vendors today can no longer afford to concentrate on one or other type of marketing as part of their go-to-market strategy. They must mingle business, market knowledge, taste of IT, technical skills and BI. And why not include market culture? At the same time, their business model constantly evolves through innovation to meet the demand. IT and telecoms products and services are part of a very dynamic and competitive market and a lot of prospective buyers spend time on the social media sites. This means that, for the IT vendors selling to them, having a social media presence is compulsory. This is why today more and more IT prosumers turn to social channels for input on their purchase decisions and vendors must find themselves where prospects spend time online on the social websites. This, in turn, means that the idea of marketing products and services on the social websites has become more and more attractive to the vendors, as potential customers tend to spend more and more time looking for the right advice to buy best or most adequate product. The idea of going viral also means making sure that marketing messages are targeting to appear where consumers spend time online. It also means that the brands marketing strategy must also consistent and coincide with the consumers needs. Or even better, it should develop to meet certain, emerging needs.
28
Having a successful presence on social media sites and using them efficiently tends to mean vendor brands must resonate, communicate, collaborate with their audience and competitors, and not dominate them. Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn generate a huge amount of data, making them an even richer and more desirable marketing tool in the eyes of the IT vendor. And this is how social networks will take the use of such data to the next level. Another issue related to the market aspects is to ensure coherent messaging between complementary tools where prospects tend to spend a lot of time. Consistency is also a key aspect that vendors can use to create good sales opportunities by directing an online conversation towards the customer. In order to increase sales using these new marketing tools, vendors have had to create their own communities in order to keep their brand and message in front of the consumers. These different marketing tools give more influential weight to the information they provide, while still enabling consumers to easily share this information more widely among their own peer groups. By encouraging consumers with users generated content, brands can actually facilitate social interaction online. By also creating their own communities on the social sites, vendors can keep their brand and message in front of consumers in a less sales-oriented way. Moreover, they encourage powerful viral or word-of-mouth marketing by enabling consumers to easily share the information they provide about their offerings within their own social networks. At the very least, by engaging consumers with user-generated content and allowing them to interact with other consumers, vendors will eventually contribute to helping them reach a purchase decision more quickly. Ratings and reviews, forums, storytelling, and picture and video sharing are all great examples of value-added content social media can offer.
Analysing IT vendors and their social media strategies employs the same or similar methods to the measuring of their propagation or interaction through advertising messages. Social media also supports an improved buying experience and the more efficient exchange of information. And vendors are willing to use social media in an attempt to enhance their relationship with the consumer and in order to further refine their networking profile.
29
Country outcomes
Some country specifics are also worth highlighting: German IT professionals used to lag behind in terms of social websites use; nowadays they are voracious Facebook users. They trust and invest time in social media, and consider it a reliable support of IT purchase (in a proportion of one out of three) and information, compared to their European fellows. They mix traditional and modern through highly skilled marketing knowledge. Spanish IT managers consider themselves very active with regards to social media tools, even if they also remain loyal to traditional market models. They think that it is good to be present on social media websites, just as the internet is a good place to do business. Marketing is not their strong point (which might be a budget-related issue), but they rely strongly on communication tools and the channel. Just like their German counterparts, they find a rather positive correlation between social media and IT purchase information. French IT prosumers have a rather atypical profile. They declare themselves more passive then their European fellows with regards social media, but at the same time they are the most socialites. They prefer collaborative marketing and consider the current IT distribution model as being consumer-driven. They have an average presence on classic social media sites, they rely on traditional word-of-mouth and their marketing decisions related to social media are made from the bottom-up (i.e. they come from professionals). Italians IT pros are very technology-oriented, less into communication and more into collaboration. They seem to be the least interested in social media tools and their market model is more top-down. As a minor observation, this finding is partially altered by the fact that our Italian sample, who are usually dominated by small companies due to the markets granularity, was composed of a significant number of corporations, who use centralised decision making processes in terms of their market strategy.
Finally, the UKis ahead of the social media curve. UK remains the pioneer of European social media, or the European capital of Twitter if you will. English IT pros invest time and presence on social media. Just like their fellow Germans, they tend to combine traditional and modern marketing and strongly rely on word-of-mouth when purchasing IT products and solutions.
30
Conclusion
Our results suggest IT professionals have a reticent attitude towards admitting to regular use of social media in support of their IT purchasing decisions. Yet, the results of our research suggest they are influenced by it more than think and the research testifies to this. While 12 percent of IT decision makers declared that they make use of social media when purchasing IT products and solutions that number is more than doubled when social media is characterised as a support tool. This means that, for now, only one out of eight among them makes use of social media when deciding to purchase an IT product or solution. But one out of four uses social media as a support tool, to guide purchases or for other decision making. Who would have thought this would be the case, given that the use of social media was all but prohibited from general use in companies a few years ago. Today they are positively encouraged to employ social media for corporate use. And decision makers get involved and feel much more valued in their job function as social media affords them the opportunity to become promoters of an idea and content generators.
The research provides the foundations of our first findings: Experts tend to successfully support IT purchase decision; their opinion leads into positive decisions; and moreover, their opinion is essential (as 40percentof those questioned take them seriously into consideration in the purchase process). Channel participation yields mixed results in terms of the ability of their use of social media to influence IT procurement processes, as on average only one out of five of our ITDM respondents considered their advice important in the purchase decision. This was even less so the case in the UK. Financial and business-related input, as well as the opinion from other colleagues and customer reviews, were seen as having positive influence as well on the purchase decision.
The archetypal current IT professional is a new age prosumer relying on all possible supports at their reach, where social media likely to be included. They are not necessarily part of a big corporation, but are very up-to-date with social tools.
31
A high proportion use Facebook for business purposes (51percentis the European average, rising to 73percent when it comes to corporations).Twitter and LinkedIn are rated less highly (where, in the case of corporations,45percent used LinkedIn, and less than 40percent said they used Twitter). But the use of social media does not only constitute using Facebook. And quite a high proportion of those interviewed (more than a half) declared that they used social media tools, in different guises, including communication, collaboration or multimedia tools. These kinds of communication tools are used half of IT professionals, while collaboration ones were a bit less popular, and multimedia ones were used by one third. This means that IT pros use social media in their marketing and for other purchase related actions. B2B blogs, social networks and other collaborative communities have not yet their reached the peak in terms of adoption and usage. But current trends are promising, particularly if we take a look at the impressive evolution of their influence within the past two years. The IT pro who is generating social media content, both offline and online is, in one way or another, using social networking tools. But the majority of post-social media communication involving the entire process of purchase still takes place mostly offline. One curious observation though, is that the ones who declared that they did not to rely on social media information, also do not rely on traditional word-of-mouth. Conversely social media use goes hand in hand with an intense reliance on word-of-mouth. Companies also tend to invest more and more resources on social media to the detriment of traditional marketing methods, despite having very clear methodologies in place or a clear visibility on how to measure return on investment. But the prevalent use of social media means few businesses want to be left behind on the adoption trail.
These findings lead us to conclude that social media is here to stay for now and that IT pros had better to take advantage of it. Our conclusion partially solves the social media puzzle. IT pros tend to use more and more social media for technological purchase. But social business in Europe is not very purchase oriented. However, IT pros are less likely to take the opinions presented through the different social media from market experts and other specialists into account, especially when it comes to supporting procurement decisions.
32
Annex: General facts and figures. Methodology
A social media strategy that is allied to business strategy can be applied to any business model. Moreover, it is recommended to combine it with traditional decision-making methods. Interactive collaboration of any type can be easily relied on as part of the purchasing decision process. A development strategy can therefore involve social media initiatives among other alternatives: More and more incentives, IT product /solution needed Analyze alternatives Social media initiatives Purchase decision Figure 23 gu
initiatives and marketing projects are being delivered via social media and social networking. But how can we better measure them? In order to try to answer this question, we interviewed IT
professionals on whether social media tools engender further market opportunities for both IT marketers and buyers. We delineate user categories and social media models allowing to better profile IT professionals purchase behaviours. A questionnaire survey is conducted in parallel to quantify this correlation. But before going into further details lets take a first look at our sample choice.
The survey panel was chosen to give a good overview from the major European countries. Therefore, we interrogated around 100 IT professionals, mainly decision makers from six European countries. Five samples were proven consistent: France, Germany, Spain, Italy and UK. The Netherlands, being less consistent in volume, was added only to the European overall sample for further consistency.
33
Taking into account the perception of importance of IT products and solutions in business, the
IMPORTANCE OF IT PRODUCTS AND SERVICES FOR THE BUSINESS

100% 90% 80% 70% 38%
60% 50%
majority perceived IT and telecom products
2%
9%
2%
2%
8%
as
necessary for (and
or their an
17%
strategic
39% 39% 63% 39% 41% Not essential for your business Necessary
activities
average of 89 percent of all those This
40% 30% 52% 20% 10% 0% DE ES FR IT UK Major 6 45%

35%
59%
59% 48%
Strategic for your activity
questioned).
figure strengthens the reliability sample.

NetMediaEurope
of
our
Figure 24
Different analytical perspectives are combined in our regional approach to highlight the consumer categories in each of the six major European countries, by market and social behaviour, affinity, and contact profiling methods (taking into account characteristics of size, industry, sectors and other profiling elements). The entire ecosystem of the IT pros purchasing decision process will be put under the spotlight to give a broad perspective on this subject.
BREAKDOWN BY SECTOR
OF ACTIVITY
Our particular interest in looking at business activity by sector was to see how particular sectors react to the IT purchasing process, whether they were ICT-related, from a core industry or other sectors. Also the demand for IT products and solutions varies according to the core activity. The survey panel Figure 25
Medical, education, research 5% Industry 6% Banking, Finance 6%
Other 19% ICT related 34%
Sales and distribution 8% Marketing and consultancy 9%
Other services (public, private) 13%
NetMediaEurope
was homogeneous; however, our breakdown is slightly different from the classic approach. As this particular split is set to distinguish how different sectors react to the use of social media, in particular the IT sector
34
The way a company refreshes its IT and telecoms estate is directly related to the core activity of a company, as well as its size. Internal IT resources are also very dependent on the core activity of the company.
Breakdown by Company Size
Figure 26
< 100 100 - 249 250 - 499 > 500
Breaking down IT and telecoms demand in this way is essential to the research results. If we take a look at the companies with less than 100 employees, their business cycle is more atypical and therefore the implication of their interactions with social marketing is also different. In small companies, procurement processes are less complex, much like their decision making. They are rarely adopters of new technologies and solutions, unless the core activity is highly technologically focused. In large corporations, IT purchase decisions are not made autonomously by individuals, but by heterogeneous groups involved in their given related IT processes. The essence of the problem lies in trying to understand how decision making roles are combined in the overall procurement process and what role each party plays. In addition, there are the strategic marketing and external tools they use to make successful decisions. Moreover, financial input and successful collaboration from all the departments is also required. For methodical reasons, we have opted for a balanced sample between companies with more than 100 employees (small and medium-sized) and those over 100 employees (medium and large companies).
35
When asked about IT budget allocations for 2011, the responses from the majority of those surveyed indicate that spending levels will remain stable. We have taken this to mean that this factor does not negatively affect the current purchasing decision processes of our subjects. On the contrary, it reinforces the hypothesis of the study and gives more legitimacy to the results. Figure 27
13% 22% 24%
IT BUDGET ALLOCATIONS FOR 2011

100%
10%
90% 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30%
9%
7%
43% 56% 57% 57% 49% 53%

Decrease Remain stable Increase
50%
20% 10% 0%
DE ES FR IT UK Major 6
34%
34% 22% 27%
34%
NetMediaEurope
Once again, there were no noticeable regional variations, except perhaps for the fact that French IT professionals were more positive about their budget development, while the UK was the most reserved in terms of IT budget outlook. Even so, overall, the majority of UK ITDMs still felt IT budgets would remain stable, comforting as well the hypothesis of our study.
36
Research Analyst: Camelia Nita Publication date: April 2011
NetMediaEurope was founded in July 2007 after a group of leading managers in VNU together with the Online CEO, Dominique Busso, joined forces with Truffle Ventures in Paris to successfully carry out a Management Buy-Out of the online assets of VNU Business Media Europe (now known as The Nielsen Company) in four countries. NetMediaEurope publishes a portfolio of websites aimed towards IT professionals and end-users. With its more than 40 sites across Europe, NetMediaEurope is the leading European B2B sales house to target this audience and market segment. NetMediaEurope is also the exclusive pan-European sales representative for the online properties of various third parties in the UK, Belgium, Spain, Italy and other European countries. Our portfolio includes brands such as The Inquirer, PC Professional and Silicon in different territories For more information go to: www.netmediaeurope.com
France NetMedia Europe S.A. 60 rue Caumartin 75009 Paris Phone: +33-618 39 79 71 Spain NetMediaEurope Spain SL Julin Camarillo 29 Ed. D1 - 3a este 28037 Madrid Phone: +34 91 4401 013
Germany NetMediaEurope Deutschland GmbH Karl-Theodor-Str. 55 80803 Mnchen Phone: +49-89-30 90 45 202 Italy NetMediaEurope Italia s.r.l. Via Monfalcone, 39 20092 Cinisello Balsmamo (MI) Phone: +39 02 8928 3604
UK NetMediaEurope UK Ltd. Europe 7 Carlisle Street treet W1D 3BW London Tel.: +(44) 20 7087 2860

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The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

Interviews were conducted in the period Feb-Apr 2011.

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

Who uses social media?

20% 44% 41% 35% 33%

45% 53% 34% 34% 16% 42% 43%

Passive user / Just for information Active user

40% 30% 20% 15% 10% 0%

Interactive communicator Community manager

8% 13% 18% 9% ES FR IT 17% 8% UK 15% 13% 10% Major 6

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

12% 90% 28%

27% 17% 37% 22% 14%

70% 60% 30%

1% 26% 25% 24% 13%

24% 10% 0% 4% DE 12% 4% ES FR 18%

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

The importance of using social media

IMPORTANCE OF SOCIAL MEDIA FOR IT PURCHASES

4% 20% 28% 35% 17%

Not important (1) (2) (3)

30% 43% 36%

Very important (5)

19% 27% 10% 10% 0% DE ES FR

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

BUSINESS TIME ALLOCATED TO SOCIAL MEDIA

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

Is social media a bigger influencer than the channel?

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

42% 35% 19% 19% 33%

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

INLFUENCE OF RESELLERS ON IT PURCHASING

28% 21% 16% 12% 10%

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

Consumer or trend creator?

IT PURCHASE INFLUENCERS CUSTOMERS

49% 33% 27%

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

Trends in the usage of social media tools

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

SOCIAL MEDIA TOOLS: COMMUNICATION

51% 67% 19% 50% 76% 57%

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

collaboration tools? They are tools directly related to productivity,

48% 36% 60% 54% 39% 47%

place. They are perceived as very

This can be seen on the likes of YouTube, where it is easy to choose

any IT brand and browse thousands of miscellaneous shared video casts.

We distinguish their use as particularly

43% 12% 28%

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

LINKEDIN: USE FOR BUSINESS PURPOSE

The impact of social media on IT purchase decisions A European perspective

FACEBOOK: USE FOR BUSINESS PURPOSE Figure 15