If you're relying on your sales force to bring new customers to the table, you might find yourself sitting alone.

Today's IT buyers have evolved to behave more like consumers, and technology vendors and solution providers need to reevaluate their marketing, sales and lead generation strategies to keep pace. That's the path Hewlett-Packard has taken in its efforts to understand how businesses buy technology today, said Lynn Anderson, senior vice president of demand generation and channel marketing at HP during a keynote session Wednesday at the Women of The Channel Winter Workshop in New York, hosted by CRN publisher The Channel Company.

"In North America, 80 percent of IT buyers do not engage sales prior to making a short list [of technology vendors to buy from]. How hard is it to unhook a buyer if you're not even on the short list? Very hard," Anderson said, citing a recent survey.

HP has modified some of its marketing strategies to adapt to new buying habits, Anderson said.

"We've changed how we market, what we market and the emotional content of what we market," she said.

One major change is that the IT buyer typically is no longer a single person, Anderson said.

"In marketing, you're always marketing to a persona. If you look at the statistics now, the average buying group is between two and four people. No single person is the decision maker, and each of these might or might not be in IT," she said.

Another major difference is that technology companies need to forge an emotional connection with potential buyers in order to even get their attention.

"The average person has 3,000 messages a day, and you have to find a way to break through," Anderson said. For example, viral videos are one way to reach customers who are satisfied with their current technology and aren't really looking for anything new.

"[Viral videos] happen in the B-to-B environment. As we've learned over last few years, the B-to-B buyer is not that different from a consumer," she said.

Jill Donohue, director of marketing at MoreDirect, the enterprise-focused subsidiary of PC Connection, said Anderson's message rings true with what she's seeing in the market.

"For me it's all about the client touch plan and making sure you're able to nurture leads all the way through the process," Donohue said.

MoreDirect relies on content from a variety of sources to help create those client touch points, including its technology vendor partners, industry analysts and its own in-house services experts.

She said companies need to fight the urge to rush the planning of their marketing strategies.

"Marketing yourself and your value as a whole needs to be very thoughtful. You need to think through what you're trying to get out and when," she said.