Why and how people buy things is a subject of fascination for me. The motivations, the decisions, and what author Brian Solis calls the moments of truth. It’s all a complex mix of psychology, creativity, emotion, reason, luck, and many other things.
It’s been especially interesting over the course of this last decade. The biggest thing to happen in business in a century is the way that buying has changed in the last decade. To understand this, the first thing to examine is the buyer journey.
The Buyer Journey
There are many models of the buyer journey and some are very complex, but they all boil down to three fundamental stages.
First, there’s an awareness stage. This is when we become aware that there is some kind of itch that we need to scratch. There’s a problem that we need to solve. Something we need to do that’s ultimately going to lead to some kind of decision to purchase or sign up or something like that.
We then move to the consideration stage. This is where we consider the options available to us, and whether to act or not. And if we have to act, how will we decide what to do?
Finally we get to decision stage. We shortlist, we make a decision, and we purchase, or we sign up; we take action.
This is true of every single thing we buy, and sometimes we do it without realising. It can be as simple as you’re in the pub with some friends and you just reached the end of a round of drinks; awareness stage, we’ve finished our drinks. Then there’s a conversation around whose turn is it to go to the bar? Are we going to have another drink? Are we going home now? Consideration stage. Finally, the decision is made, and somebody goes to the bar and orders the drinks. That buyer journey all happens in a few seconds without really anyone being conscious of it, but we do go through that process.
At the other end of the scale, consider the buyer journey for a house move. The awareness stage might be that the kids are getting a little bit bigger, so the house is feeling small. Now we’ve got to think about putting an extension on, or do we move house? We go through all that stuff around what are the schools like in this area, what are the prices like in that area, and all the considerations around house moving. Finally, you make a decision, you buy a house and you move house. So whatever we do, whether we’re conscious of it or not, we always walk through this buyer journey process.
What’s Changed?
The buyer journey hasn’t changed. What has radically changed in the last few years is that we now do most of the first half of that buyer journey online.
In 2019, 87% of buyers began product searches online.
Source: Retaildive.
The first thing you do now is go Google stuff. Ten years ago, if you were looking for a house, you might go into an estate agent. You might talk to the agent about what’s available. You pick up brochures, you look at house details, you go and look around the houses and you might make a decision. Now? Rightmove.com.
Ten years ago, if you were buying a car, you might go into a car dealership or a car auction, looked at the options, pick something. Now you search online, maybe you even configure the options on your new car online.
If we look at an industry like travel ten years ago, if you were thinking about a holiday, you might have gone to a travel agent and talked to them about the options available. Now, you might not even go and buy a holiday online. You might buy the components. So now you might say we’ll book the flight here, the accommodation there, and so on. We’ll do it ourselves.
“Customers are anything up to 70% of the way through the sales cycle before they speak to a sales person.”
Brian Halligan
So most buyer journeys start online and lots of them complete online. Brian Halligan’s 70% is one of a range of figures – from 55% to 80% – that I’ve seen quoted. Whichever number we pick, we can agree buyers are some distance through the buyer journey before they want to engage.
The Big Implication
This has a big implication. If the way people buy has changed, then the way we market and sell must change too. Sales and marketing tactics that have worked for years will no longer be the best way to go to market. A new approach is needed.
If people spend the first part of the buyer journey online, before they talk to anyone, our online presence has to be top notch, and provide what the potential buyer with what they need. Otherwise, somebody else will, and we’re not even going to reach the point where we’d be considered as an option. So we have to work out how to make sure our digital presence – our website, our social media – accurately reflects our business, allows us to be found online, and gives us the best possible chance of being part of the buyer journey. That is our big marketing challenge.*
One last thing, as we address this big challenge, we find that digital activity creates an associated big opportunity. That will be the subject of another blog.
~ Jonathan.
*There are ways to make sure that your digital activity is creating interest, leads, and customers. Helping you work out which is the right approach for you to achieve this is what we do at Growva. Contact us here to discuss your digital challenges and how we might help.
