Decoding the hidden whys
Editor's note: Tracy Tuten is vice president of qualitative research at Illuminas. She can be reached at tracy.tuten@us.illuminas.com.
A 2022 study of business leaders in the U.K., profiled in the alan. report The Power of Provocation, found that a whopping 98% believe B2B brands fail to connect with buyers on an emotional level and 74% wish brands would connect with them in more meaningful ways.
What’s more, behavioral economics points to the value of considering how emotions affect rational decision-making. Richard Thaler’s seminal work on behavioral economics demonstrates that emotions, biases and heuristics play a role in decision-making. Daniel Kahneman, author of “Thinking, Fast and Slow,” expands on this principle, revealing that thinking can be thought of as System 1 and System 2. System 2 is rational, logical and cognitive – what marketers and market researchers generally assume about buyers and their purchase decision-making process, particularly in the B2B space. The problem? Kahneman says that System 2 is often a “slave” to System 1 – System 1 being the mode that uses fast, intuitive decision-making driven by emotions, gut instinct, heuristics or rules of thumb.
This represents a challenge to both marketers and market researchers. As Bayzle and Murray point out in their March 2023 Quirk’s article (“Linking the heart and the mind: How latent emotions drive decision-making”), people may not be consciously aware of their emotions, which limits their ability to articulate them; consequently, market researchers may miss part of the picture. And, in fact, we see this in our own research; it is typically a challenge to get businesspeople to articulate their emotions.
In addition, B2B buyers are different than consumers. Functional needs are paramount. Chuck Bean makes this point in his July 2023 Quirk’s article (“Art and science: Injecting emotion into business-to-business marketing”), warning market researchers to tie emotions to functionality when studying B2B buyers. B2C decisions may be entirely driven by emotion but for business buyers, the core functional requirements serve as a trigger to emotional responses.
Jobs to be done as qualitative method
With these points in mind, we chose to follow a modified jobs to be done (JTBD) method for a qualitative study designed to discover the emotions and motives of B2B buyers with the objective of informing the global ad campaign strategy for a leading technology brand.
Specifically, the study sought to 1) map jobs to be done to broadly understand what technology buyers are trying to accomplish, how they get there and their emotional experiences along the way; 2) understand the role of System 1 and System 2 thinking in technology purchases; 3) understand the role of emotion in purchase decisions; and 4) depict the emotional pathways reflecting the buyer experience – both related to the product and the decision process.
Picture this: Every time a customer – whether it’s an individual consumer or a business – reaches for their wallet, they're not just buying a product, they're hiring it to do a specific job – the product is just a means to an end. It helps the buyer get what they really want. That’s the basic premise of jobs to be done, which acknowledges that buyers have core functional jobs but also emotional and social jobs in mind for the products and services they are purchasing.
- The core job is the underlying process or objective that a customer wants to accomplish in a specific situation or circumstance.
- Functional jobs are the practical and objective outcomes that customers want to achieve. For example, a customer who buys a laptop wants to perform tasks such as browsing the web, writing documents or attending virtual meetings.
- Emotional jobs are the personal and subjective feelings that customers want to experience or avoid. For example, a customer who buys a laptop wants to feel productive, creative or prepared and they want to avoid fears about security.
- Social jobs are the external and interpersonal impressions that customers want to make or avoid. For example, a business buyer may want others to see him as a strategic leader or a consumer may want to be seen as fashionable.
JTBD has been the focus of many articles and books describing the theory (see, for instance, Christensen et al.) and a corresponding research methodology. However, the literature emphasizes the discovery of functional jobs and desired outcome statements through qualitative and quantitative research. Little guidance is provided for researchers seeking to reveal emotional and social jobs and their related desired outcomes.
To fill this gap, we modified the JTBD method to incorporate laddering – also known as means-end chaining (Gutman, 1982). Laddering is a technique used in IDIs to determine linkages between the product attributes people care about and the related latent emotions, perceived consequences and higher-order values. JTBD aligns well with laddering in that attributes relate to functional jobs, desired consequences relate to desired outcome statements and emotions and values relate to emotional and social jobs. Laddering is accomplished through the use of probes during in-depth interviews, most commonly “Why is that important to you?”
Incorporating laddering in JTBD IDIs
Integrating means-end laddering is a powerful approach to effectively elicit emotional jobs in a JTBD qualitative study. Laddering helps uncover the deeper emotional and social drivers behind functional jobs by probing the underlying reasons for the importance of specific attributes or outcomes.
Steps to incorporate laddering
1. Start with functional jobs: Begin by identifying the functional jobs that the product or service helps the buyer accomplish. Ask questions that explore the practical and objective outcomes the customer seeks.
Example question: "What tasks do you use this technology hardware to accomplish in your daily work?"
Follow-up probes: "Can you walk me through a typical day using this hardware?" "What specific features of this hardware are most important for these tasks?"
2. Introduce emotional probes: Once functional jobs are identified, introduce laddering to explore the emotional and social dimensions. Use open-ended probes to dig deeper into the reasons behind the functional needs.
Example probes: "Why is that feature important to you?" "How does using this hardware make you feel?" "What worries or concerns do you have when using this technology?"
3. Uncover emotional and social jobs: As respondents answer the probes, listen for mentions of emotions and social perceptions. These responses will reveal the emotional and social jobs that accompany the functional jobs.
Example dialogue:
Interviewer: "You mentioned that the security features are crucial. Why is that important to you?"
Respondent: "It ensures our company's data is safe, which gives me peace of mind."
Interviewer: "Why is peace of mind important in your role?"
Respondent: "Because it helps me focus on strategic tasks without worrying about potential breaches."
Interviewer: "You mentioned that focusing on strategic tasks is important. Why does that matter to you?"
Respondent: "It allows me to contribute more effectively to the company's growth, which aligns with my career goals of becoming a senior leader."
Analysis techniques
The conversations were analyzed using thematic content analysis, the jobs to be done framework and linguistic analytical software tools (specifically, LIWC). As a result, we were able to map the participants’ jobs to be done to broadly understand what technology buyers are trying to accomplish, how they get there and their emotional experiences along the way. The results produced job statements that reflect the participants’ functional, emotional and social jobs as they consider technology purchases, like the two examples below:
- Job statement: I want to align performance specifications in PCs so that I can enhance employee productivity, minimize employee complaints and maximize employee satisfaction. (functional job)
- Job statement: I want to choose PCs to demonstrate empathy for employees, reflecting care and concern for their work and user experience. (emotional/social job)
The LIWC software was useful for measuring the prevalence of rational, cognitive thought reflected in language versus that of more emotional drivers, providing insight into the respective roles of System 1 and System 2 thinking in technology purchases.
We visually depicted the emotional pathways identified, illustrating interrelated elements such as: stressors that can prevent decision makers from achieving their desired outcomes; the moderating factors that can impact the perceived risk; and the desired feelings that decision makers are seeking as their ultimate outcomes.
Emotions can be activated
While B2B buyers follow a decision-making pattern that is largely rational, with an emphasis on functional jobs, emotions do play a role to varying degrees and can be activated through marketing techniques.
High-involvement, complex technology purchases aren't entirely rational – emotions and mental shortcuts (heuristics) play a role (System 1 thinking). When marketers fail to recognize the emotions buyers feel and desire to feel, they miss an opportunity to move the brand beyond commodity-status to a more compelling position in the market.
By incorporating means-end laddering into JTBD qualitative studies, researchers can unlock the hidden emotional and social jobs that influence B2B technology buyers. This approach not only provides a more comprehensive understanding of buyer motivations but also equips marketers with insights to create emotionally resonant campaigns. Understanding that B2B buyers are not solely rational decision makers but are also influenced by emotions and social perceptions can transform the way technology brands connect with their audience.