How do you think B2B marketers should balance focusing on end users vs. prospective buyers in their marketing?

It all depends on priorities and business goals.
User will be key in:

• working with product on features and how to communicate value, from launch to adoption

• product adoption: understand and drive adoption at the user level

• On acquisition/expansion, if they influence buying decisions, The biggest cost/inefficiency that buyers and CFOs are chasing is tools that have low or no usage, so end-user usage and endorsement can be key to driving acquisition, retention and expansion

Buyer will be key:

• when the buyer is not a user, they need to understand the value and how usage drives value

• they need to understand how to drive adoption and accelerate time to value

• you need to give them confidence with numbers and content that proves value.

You also need to match your go-to-market motion - are you selling top-down or bottom-up?
If you're doing top-down selling, then your focus is on buyers.

If you're relying on bottom-up, you start with the user and getting them to value, and then you should make it easy for the champion (a user) to build the case for the buyer.

Keeping this short and sweet - it should align with your company's (or at least your marketing team's) goals.

If the focus is to prevent churn, increase CSAT, and upsell to existing accounts >> your work should lean towards end users. You can do this via -

• enabling your Customer Success teams on product updates and roadmap

• creating best practices type of content

• create "value of your product" type of content for execs who may need validation to continue renewing your product

• enabling your sales teams to handle conversations about competitors that your existing customers may be evaluating

• working with product to make the in-product experience as seamless as possible

• building compelling pricing and packaging strategies to help with upsell

If the focus is to bring in net new logos and create pipeline >> your work should lean towards prospective buyers. You can do this via -

• launching net new products

• creating TOFU messaging and content

• enabling your sales teams to have business value oriented conversations

• building a strong web presence

• clearly articulating why you're different from your competitors

It really depends on the focus of your department and organization at the time. I think it's okay to have a primary focus on end-users/current customers if your current goal is solving churn, upsell, customer satisfaction, or adoption rate issues. Keep in mind that it costs more to gain a new customer than to keep an existing one.

Ultimately, think of them as two different audiences and start a content map to see what content you have for each audience at the different stages. Then, when building your content/marketing strategy, have a tag that shows if it's for the customer or buyer, and keep an eye on how that ratio aligns with the company goal.

SMB Markets:

Often, the end users and those making the purchase decisions are the same individuals, which simplifies the marketing approach.

Enterprise Markets:

In contrast, the enterprise presents a more intricate scenario. Purchase decisions are typically orchestrated by leadership teams, often seated at the VP or C-levels. While Directors and above may have influence—even if they don't control the budget—the focus of marketing efforts are best served for prospective buyers.

In parallel, product marketers can support their solution engineering team to ensure that a compelling user journey and story is shared during product demos.