But these days the employees who work in HR, finance, accounts receivable spend their downtime locked into very sophisticated, mobile-friendly apps with user interfaces we could only dream of in past - even while slumped in front of the TV.
They know what good software looks like.
Yes, sometimes the suits making the decisions will just go from form and mandate SAP.
But I can assure you that much of the time, turning up to demo your product will go badly for you if it looks like a drab table-based web site from the 90s.
Conversely a single magnificent d3 animation will move you straight to the short list.
I've seen multi-million dollar software deals where the "make or break" feature is themeing it to corporate colors. I've also seen some terrible software bought because the sales team takes the manager out to a nice lunch.
I don't think I've ever seen software sold on a purely cost/savings basis.
The mistake those people make is focusing on the user and end result for the enterprise using it. The customer isn't either of these -- it's the exec.
Businesses make lots of emotional decisions... the continued, although diminished, existence of IBM is proof of that. It's just harder to divine whose emotions matter and what moves them. You also need the capital to survive that learning experience.
Consumers and businesses are very different as customers. Every consumer product/service is fundamentally an experience; even the design of Apple's packaging is carefully engineered so that you feel a certain way as you open the box. That's because consumers are buying your product (or sitting through your advertisements, or giving you their personal data) because you gratify some emotional need they have; why else would they use it?
Businesses have only two fundamental needs: save money or make money (where time=money, if you can point to a wage rate). Every B2B business model is based around those. Many failed entrepreneurs have looked at the sucky user-experience of most enterprise software, said "I can do better than that", promptly done better than that...and found out that they didn't make any money, because the person doing the purchasing didn't give a damn what the "experience" is like, the whole reason they pay their employees is so that they'll sit through tasks that they hate. If you can't frame your B2B company's value propositions as "This will save $X" or "This will make $X", you won't sell.