GB530 Unit 3 Buyer Behavior Research Example

Who Calls, Who Specifies, Who Signs: A Unit 3 Buyer Behavior Research Paper on Roof Survey Purchases

[Student Name]

Purdue University Global

GB530: Marketing Management

Unit 3 Buyer Behavior Research

[Instructor Name]

[Date]

The firm, the interviews, the survey and every figure are composite and illustrative; the research methods and sources cited are real.

Part 1: Research Design

# The Management Decision Problem

Scioto Thermal Imaging must decide whether to move its selling effort from roofing contractors, who order most of its surveys today, to the owners of commercial buildings. That decision depends on knowing how owners buy: who in an ownership firm notices the need, who decides what kind of survey to buy, and who approves the money.

# The Research Problem

The research problem is to identify the roles involved in buying roof condition services within firms that own several commercial buildings, the criteria each role applies, and the point at which spending is approved.

# Research Questions

1. Who first recognizes the need for a roof survey?

2. Who decides what kind of evidence is required, such as a visual inspection, cores or a thermal survey?

3. Who approves the spending, and at what amount does approval move up the organization?

4. How much do buyers value evidence from a source independent of repair contractors?

# Hypotheses

H1: In multi-building ownership firms, approval for roof survey spending above a modest amount rests with asset managers rather than facility managers.

H2: Buyers rate evidence from independent sources as more trustworthy than evidence provided by roofing contractors.

# Method

The study combined qualitative and quantitative methods. Eighteen semi-structured interviews were held with six asset managers, seven facility managers and five property managers at ownership firms in Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky. Each interview lasted about forty-five minutes and followed a guide covering a recent roof problem, how it was handled and who was involved at each step. A twelve-question online survey was then sent to 240 members of a regional facility management association, with 71 responses, a rate of about 30 percent.

Exploring a question through interviews and then testing what emerges with a survey is known as an exploratory sequential design (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2018). The interviews were used to write the survey questions in buyers' own terms. Interview notes were coded for roles, decisions and criteria, following the systematic approach Patton (2015) recommends for qualitative analysis.

# Limits of the Design

The interview sample is small and was recruited through the firm's own contacts, which may favor buyers already open to thermal surveys. The survey reached facility managers more than asset managers, because the association's members are mostly facility staff. Results should therefore be read as indications, not estimates for the whole market.

Part 2: Findings

# Who Initiates

Facility managers initiated the response to roof problems in almost every case described. Fifteen of the eighteen interviewees said that the first action after a leak was a call from a facility manager to a roofing contractor already known to the building. In the survey, 83 percent of respondents said facility staff usually make the first contact with an outside firm.

# Who Specifies

Specification, the decision about what kind of evidence to obtain, was shared. Facility managers often accepted whatever the contractor proposed. Asset managers became involved when the contractor recommended replacement, at which point they frequently asked for a second opinion or for core samples. Property managers in multi-tenant buildings played a coordinating role, arranging access and informing tenants.

# Who Approves

Approval rested with asset managers above a modest threshold. In the survey, 78 percent said that spending above about $5,000 on a single roof required an asset manager's or owner's approval. A typical thermal survey of a large distribution roof costs about $5,000, so it sits right at the threshold, and an annual program across several buildings is well above it. H1 is supported.

The person who makes the first call cannot approve the purchase, and the person who approves it is rarely the one who makes the first call.

# What Buyers Value

Respondents rated how much they trust roof condition evidence from different sources on a five-point scale. Evidence from independent consultants averaged about 4.3; evidence from the owner's own staff about 3.4; evidence provided by roofing contractors about 2.9. H2 is supported. Several asset managers said that they had approved replacements they later suspected were unnecessary and now wanted evidence they could show to lenders and insurers.

Interpreting the Findings: The Buying Center

Webster and Wind (1972) described organizational buying as a process involving several roles: users, influencers, buyers, deciders and gatekeepers. The findings map onto that model. Facility managers act as users and gatekeepers: they experience the problem and decide whom to call. Roofing contractors act as influencers, often the most powerful ones, because they shape what the owner believes is wrong. Asset managers are deciders for larger spending. Property managers coordinate.

The model explains why Scioto's current sales pattern favors contractors. The contractor sits between the facility manager's first call and the asset manager's approval, and it controls what evidence reaches the decider. If Scioto wants owners as customers, it must reach both the gatekeeper and the decider directly.

Implications for Selling

Sell the program to asset managers. Because approval sits with asset managers and an annual program exceeds the approval threshold, the program's value case should be built for them: portfolio-wide evidence, insurer documentation and avoided replacements.

Make the facility manager's first call easy. Facility managers will keep calling someone when a roof leaks. A program that gives them a direct line to Scioto for leak-response flights would make Scioto the first call instead of the contractor.

Lead with independence. Buyers' lower trust in contractor-provided evidence is the firm's strongest argument, and it is only credible if the firm stops selling through contractors.

What Surprised the Firm

Two findings were unexpected. First, several facility managers said they would welcome a regular survey program because it would give them evidence to take to their own managers when asking for repair budgets. The firm had assumed facility managers would see an outside survey as a judgment on their own work. Second, insurers came up in eleven of the eighteen interviews without being asked about, usually as the reason an asset manager had recently become interested in roof condition. That suggests insurer requirements may be a stronger trigger than leaks for program purchases.

Next Steps

A larger survey reaching more asset managers, perhaps through a real estate investment association, would test whether the approval threshold and trust ratings hold beyond the association's facility managers. The firm should also track, for its next fifty owner inquiries, who made first contact and who signed, to confirm the pattern with its own sales data.

References

Creswell, J. W., & Plano Clark, V. L. (2018). Designing and conducting mixed methods research (3rd ed.). Sage.

Patton, M. Q. (2015). Qualitative research and evaluation methods (4th ed.). Sage.

Webster, F. E., & Wind, Y. (1972). A general model for understanding organizational buying behavior. Journal of Marketing, 36(2), 12-19. https://doi.org/10.1177/002224297203600204