Are B2B decisions emotional?
By Meghan VH
February 9, 2010
We recently gave a talk at the Boston Product Management Association’s (BPMA) monthly event held at Oracle in Burlington, MA.
In the talk we reviewed literature on how humans do not follow the rational economic model of decision making, but rather are heavily influenced by unconscious and emotional factors in day-to-day decision making. We also introduced our advanced unconscious research methods, which utilize implicit measures to understand what consumers can’t – or won’t – tell us about their attitudes toward brands, products and services. The method gets to the heart of emotional decision-making and helps identify the nonconscious consumer emotions that lead to trial and purchase.
The talk was well received, and the audience was clearly engaged, if not convinced, that consumers are largely irrational and rely heavily on emotions and the unconscious to make decisions. Yet, one very interesting theme continually arose during the post talk conversation: Are business-to-business decisions emotional? Are decisions on which software to implement for your company emotional or are they calculated, deliberate, rational?
The Sentient perspective on human decision making would argue that all preference based decisions are emotionally based whether they are about what chip to buy or what database application to roll-out across divisions. But we’re curious to find out the collective opinion of the business community.
So our question of the day to our readers is: Are B2B decisions emotional?
In the talk we reviewed literature on how humans do not follow the rational economic model of decision making, but rather are heavily influenced by unconscious and emotional factors in day-to-day decision making. We also introduced our advanced unconscious research methods, which utilize implicit measures to understand what consumers can’t – or won’t – tell us about their attitudes toward brands, products and services. The method gets to the heart of emotional decision-making and helps identify the nonconscious consumer emotions that lead to trial and purchase.
The talk was well received, and the audience was clearly engaged, if not convinced, that consumers are largely irrational and rely heavily on emotions and the unconscious to make decisions. Yet, one very interesting theme continually arose during the post talk conversation: Are business-to-business decisions emotional? Are decisions on which software to implement for your company emotional or are they calculated, deliberate, rational?
The Sentient perspective on human decision making would argue that all preference based decisions are emotionally based whether they are about what chip to buy or what database application to roll-out across divisions. But we’re curious to find out the collective opinion of the business community.
So our question of the day to our readers is: Are B2B decisions emotional?
