4 Effective Ways to Validate B2B Products: Experts Insights that Work
Most of us are accustomed to validating products, services and experiences in a B2C setting. But what about a B2B setting? How can you validate products, services and experiences with B2B customers?
Here are four different ways to validate in a B2B setting:
- A company employee uses the product
- Directly with end users
- Through experts
- Through company employees
1. A company employee uses the product
There is little difference between someone using a product in a B2C or B2B context. Furthermore, your employees or co-workers will expect the internal CRM or logistics planning tool to have exactly the same UX patterns as their weather or social media apps.
The same applies to physical tools (e.g. a power drill), services (e.g. internal ordering tool) or experiences (e.g. employee onboarding). In such cases, you can validate the B2B product with the same methods and manner as other B2C products.
2. Directly with end users
A B2B setting is sometimes a bit more complex, so simply having a company employee use a product may not be sufficient. In this case, you can seek out end users or even stakeholders to test the product with.
This approach can also be a unique selling proposition (USP) for clients who offer B2B2C products. It enables them to approach their clients with end user and stakeholder validation, which facilitates their selling process.
3. Through experts
What if something is radically new or disruptive to a market? In such cases, having a prototype may not be concrete enough for validation with end users. This is especially the case if you're designing a vision or strategy. In addition, when designing a vision or strategy, the elements that require validation differ from a physical product. In this case, the best solution is to look for experts who can help you with validation.
A key consideration is to find experts that are familiar with the vision, strategy or product you are seeking to validate. On the other hand, it's also necessary to look beyond the obvious and search for experts that can help to push you beyond the boundaries of what is already out there. With radically new products in particular, going to the obvious choice of experts may actually invalidate your product. Always bear in mind that most people, even the ones that are innovators, are change-averse.
4. Through company employees
You can tap into a wealth of potential users directly through your employees. This can come from a variety of settings: sales people that go out on a daily basis to interact with (potential) clients, business managers who oversee a specific department, C-suite roundtables, close networks, etc.
By reaching out to these people directly, the quality of input for your validation efforts will increase dramatically since you’ll be tapping directly into the minds of those who'll be buying the product.
