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"For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong." — name…
Articles by Kerry
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Kerry Cunningham reposted thisKerry Cunningham reposted thisGreat time at 6sense INSPIRE, and it was a pleasure to hear Kerry Cunningham research and Micki Howl ‘s view from the CRO seat alongside the customers in the room. The evidence on how buyers behave and the reality of running a revenue team made a better double act than most conference lineups manage. What I enjoyed most was watching the research meet what customers are already building. One CMO described agents doing deep research on each account, with custom signals feeding every one-to-one message. A marketer at another customer talked about helping junior reps know what to do with the signals they're handed. Both were after the same thing, and both had a clear view of where the SDR role is heading. Signals tell you which accounts are moving. Account intelligence tells you who they are and what they care about. Put the two together and agentic personalisation works for ten thousand accounts as well as ten. Context is what lets you scale the unscalable. Thanks to Stefano Iacono and the team for a brilliant day, and to the customers for being so generous with their time and their opinions.
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Kerry Cunningham shared thisGood to know they've worked out those pesky safety concerns so quickly! ;pKerry Cunningham shared thisScoop!! OpenAI is targeting $30 billion+ in a new fundraise. The ChatGPT maker is seeking a valuation of $1.4 trillion, which doesn't include the funding it would raise, people familiar with the matter told us. OpenAI is looking for more capital after delaying its plans to go public, amid market concerns about AI safety. My latest with Edward Ludlow and Shirin Ghaffary: https://lnkd.in/guhW5t7XOpenAI Targets $30 Billion in Funding at $1.4 Trillion ValueOpenAI Targets $30 Billion in Funding at $1.4 Trillion Value
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Kerry Cunningham reposted thisKerry Cunningham reposted thisKerry Cunningham is one of the people whose work on B2B buying I pay the closest attention to. (If you are a B2B marketer and don’t follow him, you should.) He wrote a post recently about the death of B2B discovery that I kept thinking about: are we doing enough for the 60% of our target market that isn’t in a buying process right now? The answer is not to try to drag them into the funnel early. And definitely not to treat every sign of interest as intent. And not assuming “brand awareness” fully addresses what those future buyers need now. Future buyers are already accumulating a mental map of solutions, vendors, ideas, examples, and people that may eventually matter to them. They aren’t buying, but they are paying attention. When a trigger creates a buying need, they don’t start from scratch. I call this the “pre-market”. And I think there is a real content strategy opportunity in that period: helping buyers see themselves in the situations we describe, recognize potential triggers, understand potential approaches, and start forming a view of what matters before an active buying journey begins. This pre-market content is the connective tissue between brand marketing and buyer-journey marketing. Brand helps people know and remember you. Buyer-journey content helps active buyers progress to a buying decision. Pre-market content helps future buyers understand when and why you may become relevant. Pre-market content isn't about generating leads. It's about earning a useful place in the mental map your future buyers are already building, so that when a trigger eventually makes your solution relevant, you're already part of the conversation. I wrote a full piece on Ignition Point (my Substack blog) about what pre-market content is for, how to build it, common pitfalls to avoid, and a practical way to start. The link is in the comments! #B2BMarketing #ContentStrategy #BuyerJourney #ThoughtLeadership #CMO
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Kerry Cunningham shared thisIf pronouns have secret lives ⬇️ , it should come as no surprise that B2B buyers do. In fact, they are so secret, people who are both buyers and marketers appear to keep their buyer sides a secret from their marketer sides. We are adding a ton of context to prior findings, and particularly around the role of #LLMs in b2b buying. I have my own promo code to register: https://lnkd.in/g_bQjKXq. KerryBT60 The Secret Life of Pronouns: https://lnkd.in/ezwG-kfC
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Kerry Cunningham shared thisB2B buying has changed a lot. We'll show exactly how... and when, because a lot of the real change happened a while ago... while England, and the rest of the B2B world, slept, as it were. There will be a lot of new findings to talk about, starting Thursday at Inspire! See below for link.Kerry Cunningham shared thisAnyone else feel like B2B buying changed overnight ... and we're all still catching up? Buyers are showing up differently. AI is reshaping the journey. And some of the old playbooks aren't working quite like they used to. That's why we're bringing together 50 marketing and revenue leaders in London on October 1 to compare notes, challenge assumptions, and talk honestly about what's next. We'll kick things off with an exclusive preview of the 2026 B2B Buyer Experience Report from Kerry Cunningham, before the findings are released publicly. Then, with Gemma Greaves leading curated roundtable discussions, we'll dig into what the data actually means for marketers today, from building buyer preference earlier to navigating an AI-driven buying journey. No panels or sales pitches. Just thoughtful conversations with people navigating the same challenges you are. More info in the comments ⤵️
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Kerry Cunningham reposted thisKerry Cunningham reposted thisIf someone's been to the same conference six times, it's worth your time. Breakthrough isn't just a keynote schedule, it's where 6sense customers and partners come to see what's next in agentic GTM. This year's product announcements are already shaping up to be BIG. Secure your spot 🔗 https://okt.to/xPAb7N
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Kerry Cunningham reposted thisDr. Marcus Collins, you are a gentleman and a scholar (literally). Mimi Turner and I loved working with you on this, and look forward to lots more fun times together. Congratulations on this great piece in MIT Sloan Management Review. cc Andrew Monu (he/him), Jessica Jensen, Davang Shah, Matthew Derella, Daniel Shapero, Alex Josephson, Amy Hawthorne, Caroline Couvillon, Miguel M. AvalosKerry Cunningham reposted thisB2B buying is NOT a rational decision. It's far more emotional, social, and cultural than we thought. Back in 2024, I partnered with my friends at LinkedIn, the brilliant Mimi Turner and Jann Schwarz, on a research project that engaged 750 senior B2B buyers about their purchasing behavior in the moment of truth. These buyers were responsible for large-scale, enterprise purchases. 43% were VP-level or above, and 41% were in organizations with over 10,000 employees engaged in big-ticket deals. Our exploration centered squarely on who gets purchased and why, once a shortlist of brands was narrowed down to a final consideration set. The findings were powerful. I wrote about our insights and their implications for MIT Sloan Management Review. Here's the skinny: https://lnkd.in/gYnGxePz Despite the ever-changing dynamism of the business world, B2B marketing has experienced surprisingly little change. Sure, the tactics have shifted to digital executions, and the use of data has made targeting B2B buyers more precise, yet the cognitive engine that powers this 20-trillion-dollar industry is still running on the same, out-of-date operating system. Here's the start to a new day! S/o to Elizabeth Heichler for the look and collaboration. This one is bittersweet.
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Kerry Cunningham shared thisI have ranted a fair bit in recent months about the epidemic of used-car lot claims on B2B home pages. You know the ones: We're the number one ______!, where the blank is the name of a category that is 100% discretionary for the companies they would target. And most of the home pages are stuck on exactly that theme - we're number one, without engaging at all on the topic of why the category of solution has value. I found this example of a home page through a job change announcement from my friend Jessica Fewless. I thought this was a really good example of how companies in discretionary solution categories should present what they do. The image and text put the solution in the buyer's context, and immediately make it clear what the benefits of the category are, including an ROI calculator link. Extra points for making the scenario one that probably helps address concerns for some grocery store chains -- that their more mature shoppers might be freaked out by the robots. Thoughts? I've never seen one of these in our local piggly wiggly (that's what I call all grocery stores).
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Kerry Cunningham shared thisI'm greedy about eyes on our research and especially so this year. I literally want everyone to hear about it. I want to hear everyone's questions, comments, challenges. The truth is that all of us are pummeled daily by a mix of fact, speculation, hyperbole, and no small portion of pure nonsense about what is going on with B2B buying and GTM. We're digging into it deeper than ever, and our working title for the report is The Secret Life of B2B Buyers. The absolute best thing about releasing this research at our Breakthrough event every year is getting to engage immediately with people as they take it in. Questions, comments, yeah but? How 'bout? What if? ... That's the fun part. I literally just hang around and talk with as many people as possible about it. Doing so meaningfully changes how I end up talking about it thereafter. So, I'd love as many of you as possible to join! Even more, I'm ecstatic to say that the research is at the heart of the agenda of Breakthrough like it has never been before. #6senseBreakthrough26 #b2b #b2bmarketing #AI #agentic https://lnkd.in/g_bQjKXqBreakthrough 2026: The Agentic GTM Conference | 6senseBreakthrough 2026: The Agentic GTM Conference | 6sense
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Kerry Cunningham liked thisKerry Cunningham liked thisYour website offers an “intelligent platform powering transformational outcomes.” Your MBA professor would be proud. Your buyer still has no idea what you do. So you add “next generation” and “AI powered.” Now you have confused everyone either further, but it sounds more expensive. Buyers ask real questions about real problems. AEO starts with answering those questions and showing why you’re qualified to help. “Delivering actionable intelligence” isn’t an answer to “How do I stop losing customers?” If your website reads like a group project from business school, hit me up, I know a guy.
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Kerry Cunningham liked thisKerry Cunningham liked thisGreat time at 6sense INSPIRE, and it was a pleasure to hear Kerry Cunningham research and Micki Howl ‘s view from the CRO seat alongside the customers in the room. The evidence on how buyers behave and the reality of running a revenue team made a better double act than most conference lineups manage. What I enjoyed most was watching the research meet what customers are already building. One CMO described agents doing deep research on each account, with custom signals feeding every one-to-one message. A marketer at another customer talked about helping junior reps know what to do with the signals they're handed. Both were after the same thing, and both had a clear view of where the SDR role is heading. Signals tell you which accounts are moving. Account intelligence tells you who they are and what they care about. Put the two together and agentic personalisation works for ten thousand accounts as well as ten. Context is what lets you scale the unscalable. Thanks to Stefano Iacono and the team for a brilliant day, and to the customers for being so generous with their time and their opinions.
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Kerry Cunningham liked thisKerry Cunningham liked thisKerry Cunningham reminding us of the things that matter when it comes to B2B buying behaviours and what we all need to do to ensure our GTM strategy is more successful - 96% of buyers stay connected with the category they buy, all the time even when not in an active buying cycle. Their experiences help to shape their opinions and perceptions before a buying cycle is triggered. But many organisations are not measuring or compensating their Field teams to act on how buyers shape perceptions and make decisions, resulting in a disconnect between vendor GTM motions and real buying journeys. Stay tuned for the next research release from Kerry and 6sense coming soon!
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Kerry Cunningham liked thisKerry Cunningham liked thisThe “AI is going to kill us” frenzy has officially hit circus status. The self-serving motivation of recent declarations from the frontier labs is too great to ignore, especially against a backdrop of IPOs. Toss in political agendas and a constant stream of hyperbolic media posts, and we have a proverbial three-ring circus. But the future of AI is a serious topic. It shouldn't be a clown show. It requires a foundation of truths. Here are two: 1. AI won't kill humanity. 2. The risk of AI will never be zero. Check out my blog for more specifics: https://forr.com/4rJMORw
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Kerry Cunningham reacted on thisKerry Cunningham reacted on thisWho’s looking forward to 2026 Forrester EMEA Forum starting today!?! I’m here and looking forward to seeing everyone!
Experience & Education
Courses
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ANOVA
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Employee Selection, including employment law
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Independent Research - Employee Selection and Assessment
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Independent Research - Human Factors Lab
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Independent Research - Personality & Wellbeing Lab
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Industrial Psychology, including selection and assessment techniques
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Master's Thesis - Individual Differences and Employee Selection
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Multivariate statistical techniques
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Organizational Behavior
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Organizational Change
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Research Methods and Techniques
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Seminar in Categorization/ Essentialism
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Seminar in Industrial-Organizational Psychology
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Seminar in Positive Psychology
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Training & Training Management
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Projects
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The Anti-MQL Coalition
The MQL-Industrial complex is the set of beliefs, practices, and measures that perpetuate the role of the MQL in B2B.
The beliefs are errant, the practices are inconsistent with how revenue is really produced, and the measures produce misinformation, not insights.
We must defeat the MQL-Industrial Complex, and we have the ideas, technologies, and the experience to do it.
Join our group and start changing our B2B world today. https://lnkd.in/gP_NdFJbOther creators -
Consumer Psychology Research, Personality & Wellbeing Lab
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See projectConducts marketing/ consumer behavior research using multiple research techniques, including literature reviews, survey collection and data analysis in consumer psychology and wellbeing; worked on numerous published research papers; first or 2nd author on two manuscripts in preparation; first author for handbook chapter; Developed innovative survey and experimental consumer behavior research program -- ongoing; cleans and integrates large data sets.
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Researcher, Future of Fish
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Qualitative and quantitative analysis of grant proposals and project reports; generated strategic recommendations for grant and proposal design & management, volunteer engagement and project management
* Grant proposal and report analysis
* Data collection
* Report generation
* Solution design/ ideationOther creators -
Community Manager
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See projectContributed a weekly blog interpreting the latest (or just most interesting) in consumer behavior research findings, mostly from an evolutionary perspective.
Languages
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English
Native or bilingual proficiency
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Spanish
Limited working proficiency
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French
Elementary proficiency
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