Forrester State of Business Buying 2024 — avg B2B purchase involves 13 stakeholders; 89% of decisions cross multiple departments; Amy Hayes named lead

Claim: Forrester's State of Business Buying, 2024 — for which Amy Hayes, vice president and research director at Forrester, is the named research lead — found that the average B2B purchase now involves 13 stakeholders, with 89% of buying decisions crossing multiple departments. Hayes summarized the implications: "As buyers reevaluate how they engage with organizations, providers must ignite action and put buyers first to create meaningful experiences."

Forrester's 2025 update extended the figure to 13 internal stakeholders + 9 external influencers. Gartner's parallel research puts typical buying-committee size at 6–10 stakeholders, with members each conducting independent research before group discussion.

Sources:

• Forrester, The State of Business Buying, 2024.
• Forrester 2025 update.
• Gartner buying-committee research (B2B Marketing Practice).

Confidence: Verified.

For Candid — important caveat: These figures are not realistic for a $3M residential GC, where the committee is more often two to four people (owner, spouse/office manager, sometimes a GM, sometimes a trusted subcontractor or peer). But the structural dynamic — multi-stakeholder consensus, looping deliberation, the "86% of B2B purchases stall" pattern Forrester documents — applies even at the small-firm scale. Marketing-vendor engagements at $3M GCs commonly stall not because the owner says no but because the spouse or office manager has unresolved concerns that the owner has not surfaced.

Operationalizes: [[rule-recognize-spouse-office-manager-as-primary-buyer]].