Forrester’s fifth B2B Summit APAC will be held in Singapore on 14 and 15 September 2021 through a live virtual experience. It will provide best practice research developed to address the unique challenges APAC B2B marketers face in these challenging and evolving times we live and work in. It will also provide a great opportunity for B2B sales, marketing, and product leaders to network virtually.

We will also introduce the latest results from our 2021 B2B Buying Survey, highlighting key insights and providing actionable guidance for B2B marketers.

Attendees will discover APAC buyer preferences they can use to shape the development of global campaigns delivered in region and create locally relevant campaigns. Vendors in APAC are faced with an increasing number of interactions with buyers, and external influencers are playing a more important role. Faced with limited time, people, and budget, this puts pressure on APAC marketers to make the right decisions when engaging buyers in a more intense buying journey.

Our analysis of the B2B Buying Survey results highlights evolving buyer trends over time. We discovered some nuances in APAC that leaders need to pay attention to when considering how to give the best possible engagement experience to buyers in Asian markets.

We discovered one such trend by asking survey participants to “Please rank the phases in the decision-making process from most amount of time spent to least amount of time spent.” Fifty-nine percent of APAC buyers answered that they spent the most time in the education phase compared to 41% of respondents in the rest of the world. Fifty percent of APAC buyers indicated that they spent the second most amount of time in the solution phase compared to 40% in the rest of the world.

APAC buyers think it is more important to better understand the problem or need through research. They need to be convinced that now is the right time to take action to address the problem or need. They also spend more effort researching possible solutions prior to selecting the vendor of choice. Marketers should think about giving APAC buyers the right information through the right interactions to help them make informed decisions far quicker.

Perhaps our most significant finding came from buyers’ answers to “How long the purchase process took.” In 2015, only 14% of purchases took longer than four months in APAC. Our 2021 study has shown that this has increased to 45% of purchases. Building trust has always been an important component for B2B buyers in APAC — buyers must trust the vendor of choice and trust in the buying group to make the right decision. This trust factor has been reinforced in APAC for years.

Summit track sessions will show how regional B2B marketing leaders can achieve greater impact through better alignment — e.g., how to build bolder plans for emerging growth and make bolder bets in channel marketing.

We will also showcase our customers in APAC who have won Forrester Return on Integration Honours and Programmes of the Year (POY) awards. These are organizations demonstrating best-in-class marketing and business alignment.

We look forward to seeing you at B2B Summit APAC 2021! Register here.