Marketing Management, 16th Edition

Segmenting Business Markets

We can segment business markets with some of the same variables that we use in consumer markets—for example, geography, benefits sought, and usage rate—but business marketers also use other variables. Some of the common segmentation variables for business markets are as follows:32

• Demographic factors such as industry (e.g., Which industries should we serve?), company size (e.g., What size companies should we serve?), and location (e.g., What geographic areas should we serve?)

• Operating variables such as technology (e.g., What customer technologies should we focus on?), user or nonuser status (e.g., Should we serve heavy users, medium users, light users, or nonusers?), and customer capabilities (e.g., Should we serve ...