Marketing Report: Cisco's B2B Target Market and E-commerce Influence

This report provides an analysis of Cisco's marketing strategies, particularly focusing on its B2B (business-to-business) target market. It examines the buying process of Cisco's customers, which includes stages like problem recognition, information research, evaluation of alternatives, purchase decisions, and post-purchase evaluation. The report also explores the impact of online shopping on the B2B market, highlighting how e-commerce platforms have changed consumer behavior and how companies like Cisco, IBM, and General Electric utilize online channels to sell their products. It concludes that online shopping has significantly influenced the way businesses purchase products, with e-commerce expected to grow significantly in the future. The report also includes references to relevant academic sources.

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Cisco target market
Cisco is an American multinational company headquartered in California. The company
operates in both the segments that are B2C and B2B. The target market for B2B segment is
large organizations, government, and commercial institution (Capon, 2016). The buying
process of B2B target market of Cisco is given below;
Stages of Buyer decision process
The buying decision process that the company can consider and used by customers of Cisco
includes following steps that are:
1. Problem Recognition: At this stage the customer tries to satisfy its needs by
identifying the products or services that are available in the market. Cisco customers
try to identify various software and technology that they think are suitable for their
business. This stage helps large organizations or government or commercial
institution to identify their needs (Pawlowski & Pastuszak,2017).
2. Information research: Consumers focus on collecting information from various
sources such as from friends, family. Dealers, online sites and mass media.
3. Evaluation of different Alternatives: After collecting information, next step is to
evaluate different alternatives available. Cisco customers are big market players so
they try many alternatives or big five in order to select the best option. Mainly cisco
customers evaluate different alternatives on the basis of some attributes that customer
is looking for or that can help to solve their problem (Woodside,2016).
4. Purchase Decision: This is important stage where customer decides which alternative
is better. Cisco target market is business class people their decisions affect or
influenced by many situational factors.

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5. Post purchase evaluation: The final stage includes post purchase behaviour of
customers. As after purchase consumer identify whether their problem that is
recognised in stage one is solved or not.
Online shopping impact on business to business market
Consumer shopping habits have changed over the last few years because of online shopping.
Where shopping earlier was an in store activity, online shopping changed the customer
perception and way they buy product. The companies can use online shopping sites for
buying products. Nowadays, business to business market opts for online modes to sell their
products so that transaction can take place speedily (Shahzad,Jamil, Gul & Javed,2019). IBM
and General Electric also operate in business to business marketing that offer different
software to their clients, and these companies sell their products through online platform.
For instance, IBM offers range of services to companies such as cloud computing for
enterprises. These cloud computing software are sold by IBM also through online platform
such as by registration of users on website so that customers can download trial and can make
purchase decision by analysing the benefits that product offers. As 46.6% of companies in
business to business market shift to online channels for purchasing and store purchases
become old things (Shahzad,Jamil, Gul & Javed,2019). Due to that in near future e commerce
will take the lead. Hence, online shopping or platforms changed the way consumer buy
products and this also impact on business to business market.

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References
Capon, N., & Go, F. (2016). Frameworks for Market Strategy: European Edition. Routledge.
Pawłowski, M., & Pastuszak, Z. (2017). B2B customers buying behavior. International
Journal of Synergy and Research, 5, 19.
Shahzad, M. A., Jamil, K., Gul, R. F., & Javed, H. (2019). Effects of Online Shopping Trends
on Consumer-Buying Behavior. International Journal of Research, 6(3), 271-282.
Woodside, A. G. (2016). Constructing Thick Descriptions of Marketers’ and Buyers’
Decision Processes in Business-to-Business Exchange Relationships', Case Study
Research.