Technographics Data - A Guide

Using Technographics Data In Marketing

Technographics data has become very popular in the last 15 years. It is as important and sought after as intent data. When it comes to lead generation and demand generation, some vendors and marketers claim that technographics data is more accurate and useful than intent data for your marketing efforts. However, both technographics and Intent data have their separate uses and importance in marketing.

Technographics data is used in:

Earlier, vendors like DemandMatrix and HGinsights, were leading vendors for this. However, over a period of time, other competent vendors have also pitched in.

Technographics Data and Its Types

Technographics data is the data we provide when a company is using a particular software like X, Y, or Z and:

Another way of defining technographics data is by seeing what all technologies are being used by a company, how long have they been using it and what is their technology percent.

The Three Methods To Get Technographics Data

1. Front end/web based technologies: These technologies are available on the websites of these companies. That is why they are called front end technographics.

2. Back end based technologies: These technologies are enterprise software that are not available on the website, but are still being used by the company. These are generally costlier with cost varying from 5000> and they need manpower to support them.

3. Software behind firewalls: These technologies cannot be detected easily. Sometimes you can ping the firewalls and servers to get this information about them but not always.

Is Technographics Data Useful For All?

Technographics data is not necessarily for everyone. Similarly, every marketer does not need to qualify their customers based on the technologies they are using. For instance, if you are going to target Human Resources or Talent Acquisition folks, you do need highly intense data but not necessarily technographics.

• You must target them based on the number of hirings that they are doing.

• You do not need to know the software they are using.

• You should know the software they are using, only when you are selling the technology that is sitting on another technology they are using.

• The technology that they have, indicates their purchasing power or digital maturity.

These Are 4 Cases When You Need Technographics:

1. Your software is on a platform (for example, slack, AWS, Azure, SAP) and you want to target all the customers on it.

2. Users of particular software are suitable customers for you.

3. Users of particular software help you qualify the company as your prospect.

4. You vary your messaging based on the software they use.

What Are The Companies Using Technographics data?

• Talent Acquisition Platform using SAP Success Factors users.

• Learning and Development platform using Linkedin Learning software users.

• Giant enterprise developing cloud infrastructure identifying customers using AWS, GCP, Azure, Open Sources.

• Giant NoSQL database company using Cassandra users.

• AWS cloud management platform identifying companies using AWS EC2, and AWS Lambda as indicators of heavy cloud users.

What Are Use Cases Where People Have Gone Wrong with Technographics Data ?

• A people and culture platform builds apps on slack and they start targeting companies using it. This is not the right approach as everyone that is on slack is not focused on people and culture. This turned out not to be the first marketing channel.

• There are millions of apps on slack. The cost of one installment is only 5 USD per employee so one has to focus on large ticket sizes.

Technographics Data and Technology Resellers

One way to use technographics data in marketing is to utilize it to determine technology resellers. Several technology resellers and channel partners include system integrators, independent software vendors, technology resellers, cloud providers, original equipment manufacturers, device manufacturers, and management service providers. These are our channel partners, and they can be identified using technographics data too.

How To Choose A Technographics Vendor?

You must answer these questions first:

• Do you need international or USA technographics data?

• Is the expiration date a must for you?

• Can the vendor remove the noise from the data?

For instance, you are presented with a list of companies using software X. You have to judge the quality of data and decide. Here are some ways to check if technographics data is good or not.

1. Does this list have recruiter/career websites or HR agencies?

For example, you would see Randstad using Oracle Netsuite, CareerNet using Linkedin Learning, and Naukri.com using Snowflake. This indicates that data cleansing can be performed better.

Say NO.

2. Is there a date column given? This can be the date when technology use was captured. The spread of dates bodes well for the quality of data.

When dates are spread, it tells us two things:

• This vendor has been tracing this technology for a while.

• This vendor has the best practices established yet.

Say YES.

3. Separate out IT outsourcing companies using these software for their clients.

For example, I observed that Accenture would have every software being used if data is not cleansed.

Say YES if # of outsourcing companies is not high.

4. You would see more data behavior that might look suspicious but is okay.

For example, banks use many cloud environments such as AWS, GCP, and Azure. That might be surprising, but it has become the trend now. Multi-cloud, cross-cloud is here to stay.

How to identify the expiration date of technology use at your prospect?

Technographics vendors provide the latest tracking date in the last 1 year. Assuming that most of the contracts are for 1 year, you can calculate the time frame when the contract will be renewed. For example, if the software was being used in April 2021, it will be up for renewal in the second quarter of 2022.

You can say yes/no based on these parameters. Remember, segmenting by technographics can increase or reduce your pipeline depending on data quality. Before you check the quality, make sure that your need is a must. Buy technographics data only when it helps you qualify the customer or when it helps in messaging.

How To Judge The Data Quality?

Here’s how you can judge the quality of data:

• Presence of recruiters in technographics data indicates bad data.

• Presence of IT outsourcing companies indicates that data requires cleansing.

• Missing or mismatched date columns/date spread indicates bad data.

Technographics data is not customer data

Marketers look for data to identify their potential customers. Not every software is traceable. Henceforth, one should ask the source of information, processing performed to get to the delivery stage.

Technology Reseller Data

Reseller data might be quite valuable for channel partners or marketers. Channel partners on SaaS market helps you know the following:

1. How do i increase my revenue using channel marketing

2. Can i equip my sales team with technographics data for better prospecting.

What are the primary methods to measure the impact of technographics data on sales and marketing performance?

Measuring the impact of technographic data on your sales and marketing performance is essential to understand the effectiveness of your strategies and make informed decisions.

Below are key metrics that can help you assess the impact of technographic insights on your business:

1. Conversion Rates:

Compare the percentage of leads that converted into customers before and after incorporating technographic insights. Analyze if there’s a noticeable increase in conversion rates.

2. Lead Quality:

Assess the quality of leads generated using technographic segmentation. Determine if leads with specific technology preferences are more likely to convert into paying customers.

3. Customer Acquisition Costs (CAC):

Calculate CAC for leads identified through technographic data compared to leads acquired through other methods. Determine if leveraging technographic insights reduces acquisition costs.

4. Sales Cycle Length:

Measure the time it takes to close deals with and without the use of technographic data. A shorter sales cycle indicates that technographic insights are expediting the decision-making process.

5. Customer Retention:

Examine if customers whose technographic profiles were considered during acquisition exhibit higher retention rates. This can indicate that targeting specific technologies leads to more satisfied and loyal customers.

6. Personalization Effectiveness:

Analyze the performance of marketing campaigns tailored using technographic insights. Compare engagement, click-through rates, and conversion rates with campaigns that lack this personalization.

7. Competitive Analysis:

Evaluate the success rates of deals won or lost where technographic data played a role. Understanding why deals were won or lost provides insights into the impact of technographic information on competitive positioning.

Additionally, you can gather feedback from the sales team regarding the usefulness of technographic data. Assess whether the data aids them in understanding customer needs better and if it contributes to successful sales pitches. Monitor how well technographic data integrates into your existing CRM system. Lastly, include questions in customer surveys about how well your products or services align with their technology preferences. Use this feedback to correlate technographic data with customer satisfaction.