Why Market Advisory Boards (MABs) Bring a Different Perspective to Customer Advisory Boards (CABs)

Customer Advisory Boards (CABs) are a familiar and valuable tool for many software vendors. They provide access to customer feedback, insight into real-world usage, and a forum for discussing roadmap priorities with organisations that are already invested in the product.

However, as markets become more crowded and buyer behaviour more complex, many vendors are realising that customer insight alone does not tell the full story. This is where Market Advisory Boards (MABs) bring a fundamentally different - and complementary -perspective.

Customer Advisory Boards tell you what customers think. Market Advisory Boards tell you what the market thinks.

The most important distinction between a CAB and a MAB is who is providing the input.

A Customer Advisory Board reflects the views of people who have already chosen your product. Their feedback is shaped by their own implementation, internal politics, budget constraints, and the need to justify past decisions. That insight is valuable, but it is also contextual and, inevitably, partial.

A Market Advisory Board is made up of senior buyers, former buyers, and industry professionals who are not your customers. They have no emotional or contractual investment in your success. Their role is not to validate your roadmap or confirm existing assumptions, but to represent how the wider market thinks, evaluates, and decides.

In practice, this means:

• CABs explain why customers stay, expand, or tolerate limitations

• MABs explain why the rest of the market hesitates, delays, or walks away

Both answers matter, but they are not the same.

Customer Advisory Boards focus on specific needs. Market Advisory Boards focus on market reality

Customer Advisory Boards naturally gravitate towards the needs of their own organisation. Discussions often centre on:

• Enhancements that would make life easier for them

• Gaps they encounter in day-to-day use

• Priorities driven by their internal roadmap and pressures

That is exactly what a CAB is designed to do.

Market Advisory Boards operate at a different level. They focus less on individual use cases and more on:

• How buyers define the problem before vendors are even considered

• What capabilities are table stakes versus true differentiators

• Where vendor messaging consistently misses the mark

• How categories are perceived from the outside, not the inside

• What the market will reasonably expect over the next two to three years

Because MAB members are independent, they tend to offer more direct and unfiltered views. They are able to articulate uncomfortable truths that customers often soften or rationalise, particularly around positioning, clarity, and relevance.

Market Advisory Boards are built around a specific question or challenge

At Viewpoint Analysis, Market Advisory Boards are not treated as a fixed, generic construct. They are designed around a clear understanding of what the vendor needs to learn.

An MAB might be formed to:

• Pressure-test a new product or capability before launch

• Sense-check a new brand, message, or market repositioning

• Understand how a specific segment or industry views a category

• Explore why deals stall or fail at a particular stage of the buying cycle

• Validate assumptions about where the market is heading next

The structure, composition, and discussion themes of the board are shaped by that objective. The goal is not to collect opinions for their own sake, but to provide decision-ready insight that can influence product, marketing, and go-to-market strategy.

Why this perspective matters more than ever

Many vendors listen closely to customers, yet still struggle to grow. Often, the issue is not product quality but misalignment - between how the vendor sees itself and how the market sees it.

Market Advisory Boards help expose that gap early.

They reduce the risk of:

• Over-optimising for existing customers at the expense of new buyers

• Building capabilities the market does not prioritise

• Using language that makes sense internally but not externally

• Reinforcing a category position the market does not recognise

Used alongside Customer Advisory Boards, they provide a far more complete and balanced view of buyer reality.

A complementary, not competing, approach

Market Advisory Boards are not a replacement for Customer Advisory Boards. Nor are they a substitute for detailed Voice of the Buyer research.

They are a complementary mechanism designed to answer a different set of questions, from a different vantage point, with fewer constraints.

Customer Advisory Boards help you improve what already exists. Market Advisory Boards help you understand whether you are building (and communicating) the right thing for the market you want to win.

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Want to understand more about how Viewpoint Analysis builds Market Advisory Boards for technology vendors across the world? Get in touch.