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For years, B2B marketers have chased a familiar formula: more leads equal more opportunities. Build the list, blast the message, and chase the pipeline. Yet despite better data, smarter tools, and growing investment in performance marketing, many organizations are still challenged when it comes to driving measurable revenue impact. The problem isnt reachits relevance. Most performance strategies were built for individuals, not buying groups. Modern B2B decisions are made by large, diverse groups of stakeholders spanning departments, seniority levels, priorities, and generations. And while most marketers now acknowledge this reality in theory, their engagement strategies havent yet evolved to match it. Instead of orchestrating personalized, multi-channel experiences across the entire buying group, too many organizations still treat demand generation like a numbers gameemailing long lists of contacts with one-size-fits-all messaging and hoping something sticks. But it rarely does, and its quietly undermining performance marketing results. Buying groups are bigger and more diverse The rapid evolution of enterprise technology, from AI-driven platforms to automated systems and cloud-based infrastructures, has increased both the cost and complexity of purchasing decisions. As solutions become more strategic and more integrated across the business, leaders are bringing more voices into the room. According to Gartner, B2B purchases now involve five to 16 people across as many as four functions all coming to the table with different perspectives, needs, and pain points. Finance evaluates risk and ROI. IT scrutinizes security and integrations. Operations focuses on implementation. Executives assess strategic impact. End users care about usability and experience. There is no single buying group member with unilateral authority. And the more expensive and transformative the purchase, the larger the committee and the longer the sales cycle. Research consistently shows that consensus-driven buying is the norm and that deals stall when buying groups cant align internally. Yet many campaigns still revolve around a single decision maker persona, as if everyone else is merely observing. When marketers ignore the diversity of stakeholders, their individual behaviors, and group alignment needed, they dont simplify the journey; they create friction. Next generation decision-makers are changing the game Layer in generational change and buying group complexity multiplies. Millennials and Generation Z now account for the majority of B2B buyers. Forrester research indicates that together they make up 71% of the buying group. While this generational transition has always been inevitable, its impact on B2B purchasing is now impossible to ignore. These buyers were raised in a fully digital environment and approach evaluation, trust, and decision-making differently than their predecessors. Technology is part of the equation, but the shift runs deeper than platform preference; its about mindset. Unlike previous generations who relied heavily on analyst briefings and direct sales interactions, Millennial and Gen Z buyers gather information across streaming platforms, podcasts, online communities, Slack groups, review sites, and AI-powered tools. These less obvious channels are increasingly shaping decisions long before buyers ever visit a brand site or fill out a form. Millennials and Gen Zers are also more collaborative. Decisions are rarely top-down mandates, but instead consensus-driven conversations happening across group chats, internal threads, and cross-functional working sessions. For marketers, this fundamentally changes performance strategy. You cant rely on gated content and outbound email alone or optimize solely for qualified lead volume. You can no longer assume that the economic buyer is the only one shaping the outcome. Modern account-based marketing (ABM) strategies must reflect the way professionals now discover, validate, and champion solutions. You must meet them across channels, deliver value without friction, and build credibility long before a sales conversation begins. Performance marketing must orchestrate, not blast In this current reality of expanded buying committees and invisible influence networks, performance marketing can no longer afford to optimize for isolated lead capture. It must optimize for buying group momentum. This requires a fundamental shift from channel execution to orchestration, from campaign bursts to sustained, coordinated engagement, and from single-touch attribution to account-level impact. Orchestrating personalized, synchronized experiences across entire accounts means aligning messaging by role, channel, and stage to ensure every stakeholder receives the information they need, when they need it. A modern, multi-channel performance strategy blends intent data-driven targeting across known stakeholders, always-on digital engagement that sustains visibility, emerging ABM channels like connected TV and audio to reach decision-makers beyond traditional feeds, role-specific content journeys tailored to stakeholder priorities, and real-time optimization informed by account-level buying signals. This coordinated presence ensures that influence spreads across the buying groupnot just to one contactaccelerating alignment and reducing deal friction. Stakeholders dont just see your brand; they experience it as relevant, credible, and aligned to their specific role in the decision. This is how performance marketing evolves from chasing contacts to driving consensus. Success is no longer measured by how many leads enter the funnel, but by how effectively engagement spreads across the buying group. The question performance marketers must answer As B2B purchases are further shaped by cross-functional committees, digitally native stakeholders, and influence networks, the real question is whether your strategies have adapted. If your focus still revolves around generating as many individual leads as possible, youre optimizing for a version of the buyer that no longer exists and measuring activity at the edges of a decision while ignoring the group dynamics that determine whether a deal moves forward. Buying groups dont convert because one person clicked. They convert when multiple stakeholders build shared confidence. The shift B2B performance marketers must make isnt tacticalits philosophical. Driving that kind of momentum demands coordinated relevance across roles, sustained presence in the channels where influence takes shape long before a sales conversation, and measurement models built around how consensus formsnot simply how many forms are completed. The brands that outperform in this environment wont have the largest databases or the lowest cost per lead. Thell understand a simple truth: Performance isnt driven by individuals. Its driven by buying group alignment that only happens when you create clarity and confidence across the entire ecosystem of decision-makers shaping a deal. Keith Turco is CEO of Madison Logic.
Category:
E-Commerce
Calling all pizza loversso, yes, everyoneyour dream job awaits. Pizza Hut is hiring someone to eat free pizza for an entire year. Not only that, but the company will pay you $31,415.92 to do so. Math aficionados might notice that the Pizza Hut salary is actually the first seven digits of pi. Pizza Huts hiring of a Hut Crust Connoisseur comes ahead of Pi Day on March 14. The $31,415.92 is a significant jump from the 5,000 ($6,700) that Pizza Hut Delivery offered for a UK-based Chief Crust Taster in 2021. But then it pales in comparison to Wendys $100,000 offer for a similar job last week. Still, its not a bad deal. Heres everything you need to know about Pizza Huts new Hut Crust Connoisseur role. What does being the Hut Crust Connoisseur entail? Pizza Hut announced the Hut Crust Connoisseur position alongside a new platform called, fittingly, Hut Crust, celebrating the chains recognizable crusts. Its also launching a new crust, the Garlic-Parm Hut Blend. The company is pitching the Hut Crust Connoisseurs role as guardian of the Hut Crust platform. This isnt a role where you need to know what synergy means, you just need to love Pizza Hut. Youll taste, test, and review our crust innovations, Pizza Hut states. Be prepared to create content, though. According to the fine print, Pizza Hut will pay you the $31,415.92 and provide two $260 Pizza Hut gift cards upon making a specified number of videos/posts and other deliverables as set forth in a contract. How do you apply to be the Hut Crust Connoisseur? Interested in being the companys Hut Crust Connoisseur? There are a few steps youll have to take: Purchase and try Pizza Huts new Hand Tossed with the Garlic-Parm Hut Blend crust finisher Film a video reviewing the new Hand Tossed with the Garlic-Parm Hut Blend crust finisher Go to www.pizzahutcrust.com and complete the online entry form Answer two application questions Follow the prompts to submit your entry Pizza Hut also has specific guidelines for the entry video, such as being in English and under 60 seconds, with the applicant appearing on camera and saying Hut Crust Connoisseur. The company will judge all entries based on: Creativity & Originality (35%) Food Passion & Personality (50%) Social Presence & Comfort with Sharing (10%) Practical Fit (5%) Entry is available to any resident of the United States aged 21 or over. However, individuals living in Colorado, Connecticut, Maryland, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. territories and possessions are not eligible. You can apply for the position from now until Wednesday, March 25, at 5:00 p.m. ET. The contests full rules are available here (including a notable class action waiver). Judging will likely occur around Friday, April 10. Pizza Hut is facing hurdles Like many restaurant chains, Pizza Hut has struggled in the face of reduced consumer spending and rising operating costs. In February, the chain announced that it would close about 250 underperforming U.S. locations in the first half of 2026. That figure represents about 3% of its locations nationwide.
Category:
E-Commerce
In 1960, 72% of adults were married, and over 90% would go on to marry. HR policies and management practices back then catered to nuclear families with a lone, male breadwinner. Today, dual-career couples and working mothers are common, largely due to the growth of women in the workforce in the second half of the 20th century. To recruit and retain talent, businesses have expanded family-friendly policies by offering flexible work hours, paid parental leave and subsidized child care. These are much-needed improvements, though many employers still lag in offering them. Today, another demographic shift also demands employers attention: the growing share of the workforce that is single particularly those without dependents. About 1 in 3 American adults havent gotten married by midlife. More adults arent married The workplace has always included recent grads, never-married professionals, divorced empty nesters and widowed retirees. But these categories now represent a far larger share of the labor force than they did a generation ago and people move in and out of them throughout their lives. As a behavioral economist and business school professor, I study what I call the Solo Economy how institutions and markets are adapting, or failing to adapt, to this shift. Workplace policy is one area where the gap is especially wide. A growing mismatch Today, 46% of U.S. adults are unmarried. Half of these unmarried Americans arent interested in dating. Population forecasters project that about 25% of millennials and 33% of Gen Z will never marry. Around 29% of U.S. adults live alone the most common household type in the country. Compare that to 1960, when the median age of first marriage was 20 for women and 22 for men, and single-person households were relatively rare. The average age of getting hitched for the first or only time has risen by nearly a decade since then to 28.4 for women and 30.8 for men. And yet, many HR policies have not adjusted to this new normal. Of course, theres a word for this: amatonormativity. Its the assumption that marriage and family are the ideal relationship model. Amatonormativity underpins more than 1,000 legal benefits for married people, from tax breaks to Social Security payments. These disparities extend into the workplace when family-friendly policies dont take the needs of the family of one into account. In one survey, 62% of single workers reported feeling treated differently from married colleagues with children and 30% said the disparity reinforced the message that their lives mattered less. I believe that employers can do better by singles with no kids at home without putting anyone at a disadvantage. Scheduling can seem unfair Workers with spouses or who are raising children have real obligations that deserve support. But too often, single employees without dependents are expected to pick up the slack by working on holidays, traveling more for their jobs and taking vacations at less desirable times. My manager asked me to take on an extra responsibility, saying she couldnt ask the teacher who handled it before because she has four boys, Sarah Brock, founder of Sarah Bee Talent, posted on Linkedin. I felt like my life didnt have the same value because I wasnt raising a family. Brock received hundreds of similar stories in response to her post. Researchers have found evidence that confirms these patterns: Single, childless employees are more often expected to travel, work longer hours and take less desirable vacation times than their married colleagues. Krystal Wilkinson, a British human resource management professor, has written about finding that children and child care are considered far more legitimate reasons for placing boundaries on work than engaging in hobbies, fitness or dating. Even with policies such as unlimited paid time off, singles may hesitate to take vacations, fearing that their managers will see their reasons for taking time off as illegitimate. Better benefits for married employees Employee benefits often favor married workers not by design, but by default. The total compensation package is typically worth more for a married employee dong the same job as a single one. A 2021 Kaiser Family Foundation survey found that 95% of large employers extend health coverage to employees spouses, with employers subsidizing part of the cost. This is entirely reasonable but single employees typically receive no equivalent value in return. This gap extends to many life insurance policies, retirement plan features, wellness programs and employee assistance programs. Leave policies reflect a similar pattern. The Family and Medical Leave Act grants up to 12 weeks of unpaid leave to care for a parent, child or spouse. Bereavement leave is typically limited to deaths of members of your immediate family. Yet singles without kids at home often have broader support networks that include their close friends and members of their chosen family whom current policies dont recognize. This tends to be especially true within the LGBTQ+ community. The issue isnt that married employees receive too many benefits. Its that the system was built for one kind of lifestyle and hasnt kept pace with how many people live today. What employers can do Employers can close these gaps without taking anything away from married employees and in many cases, benefit everyone with these approaches. Flexible benefits: A cafeteria-style model lets employees allocate a budget based on their own needs, covering everything from child care to gym memberships to pet insurance. Netflix already does this by offering up to US$16,000 per employee yearly to cover medical, dental and vision premiums regardless of marital status with unused portions partially refundable. Broader leave policies: Bereavement leave could cover close friends. Employees might exchange one type of leave for another, based on need. Fair scheduling: Rather than assuming single employees are more available, companies can adopt first-come, first-served vacation systems with seniority breaking ties. Or companies could adopt a points-based system, giving every employee an equal budget to bid on preferred time slots ensuring those who value certain dates most get priority, regardless of relationship status. Inclusive language and culture: Small changes signal who belongs. When employers use wording like you and your loved ones instead of you and your family in their communications with their staff, it acknowledges relationships beyond traditional structures. Organizational values: Just as companies affirm diversity in age, gender, sexual orientation and ethnicity, they can explicitly commit to valuing employees regardless of relationship status. A simple test If employers want to see whether any of their personnel policies could put their married or single employees at a disadvantage, I suggest they use this litmus test: Would this policy harm a married employee who gets divorced? If so, the policy needs to change. Many people shift between singlehood and partnership throughout their lives due to breakups, divorce and the death of their spouses or partners. A workplace built for a family of one is built for everyone wherever they happen to be in their life journey. Peter McGraw is a professor of marketing and psychology at the University of Colorado Boulder. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Category:
E-Commerce
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