Two of the leading intent data vendors, Bombora and G2 (FKA G2 Crowd), announced a partnership to provide an integrated data set to Pro, Power, Activate, and Accelerate G2 customers from within my.G2. The combined offering mixes G2’s technology research intelligence with Bombora’s third-party intent data set gathered from dozens of B2B media companies spanning over 4,000 sites. Thus, software vendors can determine both which companies are exploring solutions in their category and which topics are of interest.
Once activated, My.G2 customers will see Bombora’s topic scores next to G2 Buyer Intent accounts. Admins configure the relevant Bombora topics for display. Based on the product, the number of topics is capped at either ten or twenty-five, which should be sufficient for most technology companies.
The partnership is part of Bombora’s freemium strategy, where they license a subset of their content into partner workflows. In the G2 partnership, they are “double verifying” the intent data for accounts showing activity in G2. “The customers are not seeing new accounts that we see as showing intent if they are not also coming to the customer’s G2 page. The goal would be to help prioritize the intent they are receiving in G2 in a light way,” said Bombora Partnerships VP Charles Crnoevich. “In layman’s terms, they have been to your G2 crowd page or category page (similar to a company coming to your website) and Bombora sees them showing elevated levels of intent around the B2B web – our cooperative of B2B websites. This data overlay is also only in G2 crowd, so if you wanted a big infusion of Company Surge data in SFDC, Terminus, RollWorks, Marketo, HubSpot, Outreach, etc., you would need a premium license of Company Surge data with us.”
Crnoevich said that there are only a limited number of “compliant and reliable intent data sources” on the market, including G2 and TechTarget, ”so we’re excited to form a partnership with them [G2] from a thought leadership perspective in the intent data community.”
G2’s intent data set complements Bombora’s and is sourced differently. “G2 shows data across their network on a number of interactions and user level,” stated Crnoevich. “Our data is across a huge network of sites and we normalize it against normal traffic to give a propensity score instead of a count of interactions.” Users are shown both the number of relevant topics that are surging at an account and the specific topics and surge scores with surging intent.
Having both topic counts and individual topic surge scores are valuable. One or two surging topics may be anomalous (particularly at SMBs), but a broad set of related topics that are surging indicate a significant growth in research. Likewise, high scores above the baseline (50 is the baseline average, and 60 is used as the minimum surge score indicating increased intent), demonstrate a significant spike in interest as well as help shape a sales rep’s positioning.
Bombora’s surge data validate target buyer’s research behavior on G2, helping sales and marketing teams ”craft hyper-personalized outreach covering the products and topics they’re most interested in.” Intent data from the two firms also assist in sales outreach timing and prioritization.
“Understanding the buyer’s journey so you can help them make informed decisions is one of the most important focus areas for every tech business. This collaboration allows us to combine the power of G2 Buyer Intent data with Bombora’s Intent topics giving vendors a thorough and enhanced view of their buyers’ research behavior across G2 and the B2B web. G2 customers will now not only have access to more insights but more context, too. We’re excited to give businesses the opportunity to experience the value of Bombora’s Intent topics and scores right from within their my.G2 admin panel.”
G2 CRO Mike Weir
While intent data should not be used for defining Ideal Customer Profiles (ICPs) and ABM lists as it is ephemeral, it is quite valuable for determining which of your ABM firms are currently in-market for technology solutions. Thus, intent helps decide which accounts should be nurtured by marketing and which should be actively targeted by sales reps. Surging intent does not answer who, but it addresses “who now?”
“The integration of Bombora with G2 allows revenue teams to see valuable prospects’ activity across both G2.com and the greater B2B web,” said Mike Burton, SVP of Sales at Bombora. “Combining these powerful intent signals provides a huge validation for account-based activities, arming folks with the information they need to have successful sales and marketing interactions.”
G2 intent data also identifies competitors being researched, which assists with both new opportunity messaging and churn reduction.
G2 has over five million unique monthly visitors researching software solutions. Half are North American viewers, 20% European, and 20% Asian.
G2 displays both product profiles and user reviews, with products categorized. Purchasers can even build side-by-side comparisons of software product reviews.
The pandemic has increased the demand for third-party product insights and reviews. The loss of face-to-face meetings at tradeshows and in the office has moved most product research to the Internet. The trend of independent purchasing research, which goes back at least a decade, has accelerated. However, digital research is now being accompanied by intent datasets that are helping level the playing field and provide vendors with early, actionable intelligence about which firms are in-market.
“Seemingly overnight, the ‘digital first’ world [that] sellers once knew has evolved into a “digital-only” world – a world where the same marketers, compete for the same buyers, against the same solutions — across the same channels,” explained G2 Director of Product Marketing Yoni Solomon. “That’s why incorporating intent data on buyer research, behavior, and online activity has never been more important for the success of B2B sales and marketing.”