When it comes to B2B products, there is a big difference between a “customer” and a “user”. Minimal understanding or connection to users can lead to lack of user-friendly features and products in the long run. Knowing the right customer is key for a company to sell its unique selling proposition to the right audience and positioning. A thorough understanding of user personas/behaviors helps in creating a compelling product and succeeding in the market.
Customer vs. User
Customers: These are the entities with whom the business transaction takes place and are usually involved in the initial product sale or contact. Customers care about the entire sales cycle. Users: These people use the product every day and have a direct impact on its success or failure.
Examples:
1. In cloud platforms like Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud, Amazon Web Services (AWS), the users are developers, DevOps professionals, cloud architects and the customer is the head of engineering or CTO.
2. In Revlitix, the users are primarily marketing and sales professionals and analysts and the customer is the CMO, CRO or Revops leader.
Apart from the above ideal customers, the rest of the team members like finance, IT etc. are also involved in the decision making. It is important to note that customers can also be users.
Examples:
1. Cloud Platforms – CTOs/Heads of Technology also use these products as administrators.
2. Revlitix – CMOs/CROs use Revlitix products as administrators and have their own dedicated modules. The Importance of Understanding User Needs
To develop a successful product, it is important to understand the needs of your direct and indirect users, as well as your customer requirements. Here are some ways to achieve this:
1. Dogfooding
Dogfooding is the practice of using your own product internally to identify pain points and opportunities for improvement before releasing it to customers. This approach helps you understand key needs of your users and acts as a kind of beta test. For Figma and other B2C products, this method is relatively easy. B2C products are often generic and widely available, making it easier to identify user needs. A notable example is Deepinder Goyal, who worked as a delivery man and understood the pain points and needs of delivery men. Large companies like Microsoft can benefit from their scale, as they can use their own products such as MS Teams and Azure in their daily work, which leads to better user testing. In contrast, B2B products can be difficult to test in-house at a small scale, as you often have to wait for feedback after launch. At Revlitix, we perform testing within our marketing and sales teams, as they serve the same user personas. However, due to our small scale, it can be difficult to gain deep insight into users’ needs. Here are some ways to get around this drawback:
2. Your first customers as beta testers
To create a better user experience through rapid feature reviews, it’s important to involve early customers as beta testers. Working at a large scale and having customers who involve users in testing can provide valuable insights early in the development process. 3. Indirectly Identify User Needs
Proactively identifying user needs and proposing solutions builds user trust, leading to a more user-friendly product in the long run. For example, if users repeatedly report issues or suggest improvements, this indicates a demand for these features. Prioritizing these requests and monitoring their usage by power users can result in a more polished product. At Revlitix, we often receive requests for product improvements from our users. Observing repeated requests from multiple users highlights important features and allows us to focus on current user needs instead of simply introducing new features. It is important to validate these requirements to ensure they align with your unique selling proposition (USP), long-term business goals, and overall user value. We may decline requests that do not fit our product vision or are targeted only at certain users, as explained in the following ways:
4. User-specific requirements
When it comes to B2B products, users often request specific features tailored to their needs. Even when serving a defined set of business personas, requirements can vary significantly across industries. Example: Some Revlitix users requested metrics related to video ads when running campaigns across different channels. Similarly, CRM platforms like Salesforce are frequently customized, resulting in requests for additional objects beyond standard categories like “leads” and “opportunities.”
Meet the following requirements:
In the B2B space, it is important to meet the specific needs of companies. Dynamically adding user data allows companies to access information according to their needs, making products more robust and attractive to a wider customer base in the long run. After all, understanding the specific needs of your customers and users is key to succeeding in the market and achieving product-market fit (PMF).
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