Millennial B2B Buyers / Commerce Today Episode 134
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[00:00:00] Hi everybody. Welcome to this week's episode of Commerce Today. I gotta say, this one's a little painful for me because we're talking about millennials and their impact on B2B buying millennials are getting old. I am a millennial. It's interesting. I, when I first learned about generations, was told that I was Gen X and then at some point the boundary between Gen X and millennials changed.

And I am officially a millennial. I have been told that I'm a geriatric millennial. Which not a big fan of that. Also been called an elder millennial, which has a little bit more of a ring to it. But if you're like me, you're probably thinking of all those headlines years ago of how millennials are ruining this company.

Millennials are ruining that company and millennials in their avocado toast, and I think a lot of people still view millennials as the kids, and we're not the kids anymore. Millennials are those born between 1991 and 1996, so they're now. Between 29 and [00:01:00] 44 years old they have become the dominant cohort in B2B purchasing.

They now make up 73% of all B2B buyer roles. 44% are the lead decision makers. So big shift that means that a lot of the people buying from businesses today grew up. If you're like me, you grew up. Pre e-commerce, but you, by the time you were an adult you were already starting to see things like Amazon, Google, and then smartphones.

You, and then of course, the. Younger millennials. Yeah, y'all grow up, grew up with Amazon and Google and smartphones, so there's a lot of B2C style expectations. We're the ones that are changing those expectations and saying, you know what, we're not gonna fax in our orders and we're not gonna use your website.

That looks like it was designed in 1999. We want the Amazon experience, we want the B2C experience. Even in B2B, procurement we're the ones, although I feel like Gen Z is [00:02:00] doing even more and even better with this, but we're the ones that started using text messages for negotiating B2B purchases and not just.

Fax and picking up the phone and calling and emails. So I wanna look at how millennial buyers are changing the demand for B2B e-commerce websites and what their requirements are. Things like transparent pricing, quick self-service purchasing, and a seamless digital experience. And if you're a B2B brand out there, how you can meet all of those.

And I love this this next bit, I, I don't play golf and and I know there's a lot of people, I have a lot of friends that play golf. I have nothing against golf, but I grew up in hearing about the, I. Lengthy RF Qs meeting on the golf course, like that kind of sales and executive networking experience.

But that's not my life. That is not what I've experienced as someone that makes a lot of B2B purchases. Millennials really [00:03:00] prefer to research independently to get information instantly, and then transact online whenever possible. 68%. And I think it's higher. I think I think some of y'all weren't honest when you were surveyed, but 68% of millennial B2B buyers prefer self-service research tools over talking to a sales rep.

Wait till you see the numbers for Gen Z if you don't make these adjustments. Now for millennials, I. You'll be flat out of business as a B2B brand when Gen Z starts making up the majority of the buyers in the B2B world. Many of the millennials out there that are making B2B purchases will complete the majority of the buying journey digitally before ever contacting sales.

They also value speed both in finding info. So they want one click access to pricing. They also want speed and delivery. They want to know. When are they gonna get it? They want real time order updates and they want it to get there fast. So we're gonna look at all of that and it really matters for your B2B brands out there.

Gartner predicts [00:04:00] that by next year, 80% of B2B sales interactions between suppliers and buyers will happen in digital channels. So that could be video calls, so still the call. That could be online chat, but also a lot of that is self-service, e-commerce. And again, I mentioned Gen Z already, but that's only going to intensify this shift.

If you don't offer what these buyers want, they will just find another supplier. They will go somewhere else and you might think, oh, we're the only place, or We've got the market cornered. But there's been so much disruption, there's so many interesting brands out there. Intentionally launching now to disrupt B2B buying by making it digital.

So look out. So buyer expectations for millennials, it's really all about self-service, transparency and speed. Typically millennials will spend, I. 50 to 70% of their buying process doing research online before they ever actually reach out to [00:05:00] make a purchase. They expect your website to have rich content.

Specifications, demos, case studies, they want to educate themselves. 85% of millennial buyers are gonna consult peer reviews or testimonials before finalizing a purchase. So your digital presence and your reputation on industry forums, review sites, et cetera, can make or break you. They're also a lot less likely to be swayed by a slick sales pitch.

They're gonna trust what other customers say and what they can verify themselves. One of the loudest demands that we hear from in the surveys of millennial B2B buyers, I. Is pricing transparency. If you have contact us for pricing or really opaque enterprise pricing tiers, you will lose your millennial buyers.

86% of B2B buyers across all ages in a LinkedIn survey said they want full pricing information upfront. The millennial subset in particular won't even reach out to you. If pricing isn't visible, they'll move on to a [00:06:00] competitor that shows pricing. Now, I know for a lot of y'all this could be pricing behind a login wall.

It could be negotiated pricing with that particular buyer's company. And that's fine, but it shouldn't be something that requires them to stop and call and say, I need to get access to my pricing. It should be a completely self-service process. Also a fast response is critical. If a buyer is requesting a quote or a custom quote, it needs to be done in hours, not in weeks.

And it doesn't need to be, oh, I'll call you with this. It needs to be online and digital. If you haven't seen it, go check out some of the videos. Demoing Adobe Commerce's B2B module and functionality. Adobe Commerce has, I think, the best. Request a quote and quote, negotiation flow. And it's designed for the buyer and the seller to basically each be sitting at their computer and to be able to go back instantaneously with a custom quote and negotiate that out and turn it straight into a purchasable cart.

That's what millennials want. [00:07:00] That's why Adobe designed it that way. Also, millennials increasingly expect to buy business products online with minimal friction. 74% of B2B buyers conduct more than half of their B2B purchases online now. And many of those want self-service ordering. Once they have the initial terms set, that initial account set up, I mentioned earlier, so you have to have an e-commerce portal.

You have to have online purchasing. If not, Amazon business exists and Amazon is coming for the B2B purchase, B2B. Transaction as well. So it gets too frustrating trying to deal with your company and your products or similar products are sold on Amazon business. You're gonna lose your millennial buyers to Amazon.

Just like we have seen on the direct to consumer side. Millennials grew up in a lot of cases with prime shipping, and it has influenced the expectations around delivery. 78% of millennial buyers said that in a B2B purchase, they would switch to a supplier that offers faster delivery, clearer [00:08:00] pricing, or a better online checkout.

They are valuing efficiency and speed of placing the order and speed of receiving the order as much as they are valuing what your price is. 65% of these buyers expect real time order tracking and updates on their B2B orders. They want Amazon style notifications. That's why if you look like Grainger and MSC have invested a lot in capabilities, showing exact inventory available, giving two day shipping guarantees, all that good stuff.

So make sure you're developing features for your e-commerce website, for your B2B brand that offers those things. Millennials are often multitasking. We grew up in an omnichannel world, so we use multiple channels fluidly. We'll go between the web, mobile app, chat and it's really a basic expectation that there's a consistent experience among all those.

So they might be researching your brand via your website at their desk. Then they might actually place the [00:09:00] order from their phone later. If your site isn't mobile optimized. If you require a fax, which thank goodness that hasn't been as common, but I still every once in a while talk to a B2B brand that says, oh yeah, most of our orders come in via fax.

If you're acquiring a fax, you're not gonna attract new millennial buyers. It's just not gonna happen. A Gartner future of sales study even predicts that many buyers are gonna rotate across channels to basically. Avoid having to interact with salespeople and that salespeople need to be willing to engage via chat or via text message SMS, to reconnect with those buyers.

Also millennial B2B buyers want personalization and recommendations. The younger ones, so the youngest millennials and into Gen Z, which there are Gen ZA, a greatly increasing number of Gen Z B2B buyers now. They expect instant chatbot support and AI driven personalization and the vast majority of B2B brands I'm [00:10:00] talking to, y'all haven't even thought about chatbots and AI driven personalization yet.

So get ready. There is a lot of technology that has been deployed on the consumer side of e-commerce that is now becoming the expectation on the B2B side. So how are B2B brands adapting or what do B2B brands need to do if they're not adapting? They're investing in digital sales platforms. I will say that more than half of B2B brands this year are either building their own online marketplace or online e-commerce presence, or are beginning to sell through things like Amazon business.

And they're having to, they're being forced to because that's where millennials are shopping. Millennial buyers are over two times more likely than the older generations to purchase on something like Amazon Business. If you look at Fastenal an industrial supplier, they noticed this shift.

They developed a very robust e-commerce site and mobile app, but they didn't just launch an [00:11:00] e-commerce site. That's the basic thing that you have to do this year, like you should, if you don't already have an e-commerce site. Talk to me, let's get one live, because that's just table stakes for you to survive into next year.

But they didn't just do that. They also provided real time inventory and one to two day shipping on almost all of their items. And they're actually delivering a system almost like the Amazon lockers. They're delivering these pickup lockers and key. Areas where the, their contractors are located.

In some cases, if they have a buyer that's large enough, they're delivering a pickup locker to the job site so that they can make those deliveries unattended. And you can place an order for something you need on the job site same day or next day. They're gonna bring it to you. It's gonna be waiting for you in that package locker.

Curve. So that is really getting a lot of attention. And Grainger for instance, has said that now over 70% of their orders are coming through e-commerce through online channels [00:12:00] after they made a similar significant investment. So pretty much all the big players have moved to e-commerce and are investing in things beyond just the basics of e-commerce.

A lot of you, mid-size B2B brands, I'm talking to. Y'all are just now realizing you need to get on this and you absolutely need to get on this. Another change that really has little to do with technology but is just as important is the sales role has to evolve. I. Your salespeople have to be consultants, not salespeople.

And millennials often only engage a salesperson late in the process when they basically are ready to negotiate or just have one or two remaining questions. And so sales teams really are shifting from cold calling to consultative experts that are ready to step in at the right moment. And this is where you can.

Kind of marry the shift and the training of your salespeople with technology so that the technology can alert your sales team. Hey, this person's been on our website a lot, and they're going back and forth. They seem to be trying to figure something out, and they [00:13:00] can't quite figure it out. You should send them an email.

You should send them a text message. We should pop up a proactive chat window and you should consult with them and help them through this purchase process. Now, if you don't train your sales team. And they say, Ooh, this is a hot lead. I'm gonna call 'em. It won't work. It. If they answer their phone, they will probably just be frustrated with that kind of approach.

Again, they want someone to consult with them, provide them information, meet them in the communication style and the rhythm of their life where they are. So that's a big shift and requires some re-skilling and retraining. But the brands that are making that shift are seeing really incredible results.

Also you need to be creating content. There are a few of y'all that I talked to that have started doing YouTube videos, podcasts, things like that. But you absolutely, you need a marketing team. You need a digital marketing team. That is creating online content. Millennials consume lots of information before buying comparison [00:14:00] guides, videos, especially peer reviews and peer case studies are so crucial.

So you have to have someone on your team or a team of people at your company developing that content, making it available to these buyers. Also, used to, you could get away with, if you launch a B2B e-commerce site, if you just had a site that people could purchase from, that was enough. Now it has to have a great, smooth, mobile friendly user experience.

Or those buyers will go somewhere else just like they do when they're shopping on consumer site. And this is a really sad thing. Actually the B2B E-Commerce Association did a survey and 93%. A B2B buyers reported having issues at checkout on their suppliers websites. So we're, as an industry, B2B, e-commerce, we are not doing a good job providing a solid experience.

We absolutely have to improve these systems and provide this great buying experience. Also millennials actually a side [00:15:00] effect of all of this is they're shortening the B2B sales cycle. I actually have a a friend and consultant that I follow on LinkedIn, Darren McGee, and he was recently posting, he was saying, Hey salespeople, stop telling people you have a long sales cycle.

Stop telling your buyers, Hey, our sales cycle is usually six months. Just don't say anything and just. Move at their pace if they wanna meet the next day, if they request some information, get it back to 'em as quickly as you can, and you'll actually discover in many cases, the reason you have a long sales cycle is because you tell people you have a long sales cycle, millennials and Gen Z, they want to move faster than the traditional old processes would move.

So you can actually see your sales cycles speed up through some of these changes. Overall though, I would just recommend meet people where they're at. It doesn't matter if they're millennial, gen Z, gen x, boomer, whatever we want to call 'em. Who knows? Maybe Gen Alpha, which I think is what they're calling the youngest kids.

They'll probably be buying online before we know it. I'm sure [00:16:00] some of them already are, and that scares me a little bit. But it's all about meeting people where they are using this technology that we have. To make it easier for people to buy and sell things. That's it. That's e-commerce. And I think sometimes we get wrapped up around overcomplicating.

It overcomplicating the process. We we don't pay enough attention to how important the process is, that sort of thing. But when it comes down to it, meet people where they are and realize that your buyer's expectations have shifted and where a lot of them are now is online. It is digital, it is, they are not gonna be.

Sitting in an office from nine to five waiting for you to your sales rep to drop by and talk to 'em about their next order. They might be after the kids go to bed, getting their phone out and saying, oh yeah, I needed to order some parts for that job we're doing next week, and doing it then and there.

And your sales team is nowhere to be found because they're at home possibly even doing the exact same thing. So just realize that buying [00:17:00] expectations absolutely have shifted. You have to make your tool, self-service again. These orders aren't coming nine to five sometimes. So if you have a process where a person has to review every step before an order can be placed, or if an account has to be approved, like any sort of friction that makes things not be truly self-serving online.

You're gonna lose sales to that. So again, I understand in a lot of the industries in the B2B world that I've worked with and talked with there are certain requirements. You can't sell these products to just anybody. You have to make sure they're an authorized buyer at a specific company. I. Put some checks in place for that.

But there are so many ways to automate that. There are so many ways that if you do the work up front, you can take as much friction and as many manual steps outta the process as possible. And every time you do that you will make more money because those people that then can up and go to Amazon Business will instead stay with you, stay with your website.

Big step [00:18:00] with that too is speed up your response times. If someone does reach out to you during business hours, don't make it days to get a response. You want to respond faster than your competitors. This could be automated emails. This could be leveraging generative ai, had to mention it in order to provide faster responses.

This could be changing your staffing to where you have more people focused on responding to customer inquiries. But, just to have a a way that you are responding first, there's actually surveys that have shown that up to 50% of sales goes with the vendor who responds first. And I think that millennials are going to shift that even higher.

So I hope this is helpful. Millennial B2B buyers have definitely consumerized the B2B buying process. We have raised the expectations. We want to see self-serve information, transparent pricing. We want to be able to purchase through very fast, intuitive digital channels and get really quick fulfillment with frequent updates.

I [00:19:00] know that sounds like a lot. Review what you provide right now, what your online buying experience looks like for your B2B brand. Work through that one step at a time and you will get there and it will absolutely be worth it. Again, 73% of B2B buyers are millennials now, and 80% of B2B interactions will be digital by next year, by 2026.

So absolutely get your digital transformation project. Started and done this year. And if that sounds a little bit scary, if you're not sure where to start find me on LinkedIn. I'm Joshua Warren, CEO of creativity. I have a creativity gold background behind my headshot. So go find me. I have a button on my profile that says book an appointment.

I. We'll actually show you my calendar and you can put a 30 minute meeting on there absolutely free, no sales pitch. And I help you with whatever e-commerce problem or challenge you wanna brainstorm. So if you're a B2B brand and you're not sure what you need to be doing with your e-commerce experience, definitely take advantage of that.[00:20:00] 

Would love to talk with you and share my knowledge and experience and what I've seen other B2B brands be successful with. In the meantime, I hope you're all doing great and I will see you next week for the next episode of Commerce Today.