(1:54 Q&A Video) “Customer Understanding Is a Core Business Discipline”
In this 1:54 video, Melanie Zmetek Naconecy de Souza explains why B2B customer understanding must begin with people. She shares how buyers bring priorities, challenges, and trust concerns into every decision. Her message reframes customer obsession as a business discipline, not a B2C practice.
B2B companies often define customers through industry, company size, job title, and commercial potential. Those details help, but they don’t fully explain what drives a decision. Behind every account is a person who must solve a problem, manage competing priorities, and own the outcome.
Melanie Zmetek Naconecy de Souza, Chief Marketing Officer at AERTEC, moved from consumer marketing to aerospace, reinforcing that customer understanding isn’t a B2C practice. It is a business discipline that helps commercial teams create stronger messages, build trust, and develop more relevant growth strategies.
“Whatever the business model is, we are always dealing with people. At the end of the day, it’s not B2C or B2B, it’s P2P. It’s person to person. There is always a person on the other side of the decision, someone that needs to solve a problem, someone that has priorities, someone that has to make a decision and trust the people that are making this decision with them.” – Melanie Zmetek Naconecy de Souza
To learn more, watch the video or read the article below.
To catch the full interview with Melanie at “Part Seventeen: The Revenue Logic of Customer Obsession.” CLICK HERE.
Article: "Customer Understanding Is a Core Business Discipline"
This article is based on an interview with Melanie Zmetek Naconecy de Souza, Chief Marketing Officer at AERTEC
Look Beyond B2B Labels
The term B2B can unintentionally make buyers feel distant. Teams can become focused on procurement processes, account structures, product specifications, and internal sales stages without considering the person making the decision. Melanie offers a more human perspective, saying, “Whatever the business model is, we are always dealing with people.” That truth applies whether the company sells consumer goods, specialized software, or aerospace technology. The product may be different, but the customer still has objectives, concerns, and personal accountability.
Melanie describes this simply when she says, “At the end of the day, it’s not B2C or B2B, it’s P2P. It’s person to person.” For leaders, this means customer profiles should extend beyond firmographics. They should include what the buyer needs to accomplish, what risks they are trying to avoid, and how they will evaluate confidence in a potential partner. That fuller understanding helps teams organize their communication around the customer’s reality instead of the company’s internal terminology or product structure.
Understand Buyer Motivation
Customer understanding starts with listening for more than a stated requirement. Buyers may ask for a feature, technical capability, or service, but their underlying reason may be to protect a deadline, reduce personal risk, improve a business result, or gain support from colleagues. Melanie explains that companies need to understand people’s choices, objectives, problems, and motivations. In her words, “You hear their objectives, you hear their problems, and you need to understand their motivations.”
This has practical implications for marketing, sales, and leadership. Customer research should inform the stories a company tells, the proof it shares, and the way subject matter experts describe their work. It should not remain in a presentation used by only one department. As Melanie says, “There is always a person on the other side of the decision, someone that needs to solve a problem.” When teams understand that person’s context, they can connect their expertise to a meaningful outcome rather than merely describing a capability.
Build Trust Around Decisions
Every B2B decision carries some risk because someone must stand behind it. In specialized or high-value purchases, that responsibility can be significant. Melanie points out that the decision-maker has priorities and must trust the people making the decision. Her perspective challenges companies to think beyond whether their message communicates capability. It must also demonstrate that the company understands what is at stake for the buyer and is prepared to be a credible partner.
Trust is built through clear communication, useful insight, and evidence that reduces uncertainty. Melanie captures the larger principle by saying, “Customer understanding isn’t a B2C discipline; it’s a business discipline whether you are selling toothpaste or aerospace technology.” Leaders can apply this by asking teams to identify what a customer needs to believe before moving forward. That might include confidence in the solution, confidence in the people delivering it, or confidence that the company understands the specific problem the customer needs to solve.
Conclusion
Customer understanding should not belong only to marketing. It is a company-wide growth discipline because it shapes how teams communicate value, develop solutions, and earn trust. When organizations see the person behind the account, they can build more relevant experiences and create a stronger connection between their expertise and the customer’s priorities.
The key question is not simply whether a company knows its target market. It is whether it understands the person who must solve the problem, manage the risk, and choose a partner. Companies that can answer that question with real clarity are better positioned to turn their knowledge into stronger relationships and sustainable growth.
ELEVATING CONTENT MARKETING STANDARDS RAISES A CRUCIAL QUESTION:
Why shouldn’t the very act of creating thought leadership content also spark new conversations with in-pipeline deals, top prospects, and high-priority customers for revenue expansion? Or serve as the cornerstone for learning and applying voice-of-customer strategies? That’s the power of ABM Podcasting—engaging B2B buyers and customers in meaningful conversations that uncover essential go-to-market insights, support long sales cycles, reinforce your market perspective, build peer-level trust, and dismantle objections that kill deals.
Steven MacDonald
Steven MacDonald is the founder of Content Strategies, CEO of a MarTech SaaS Company, fractional CMO consulting with leading B2B companies and former Director of Strategy and Client Service at top ten digital marketing agencies.
Steven MacDonald
Steven MacDonald is the founder of Content Strategies, CEO of a MarTech SaaS Company, fractional CMO consulting with leading B2B companies and former Director of Strategy and Client Service at top ten digital marketing agencies.
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