Internet Marketing – Do you know the steps of the buying process?
Knowing the steps of the purchase process is very important. Unless you understand where your site fits in the buyer’s mind, no amount of copywriting, graphics, or A/B testing will help you achieve your goals.
There are three basic steps in the buying process.
The first step of the buying process
The first step is the education phase. That’s the phase a site like Benefits-of-Resveratrol.com talks about. Any time you are learning the benefits or features of something, you are in the first phase. Calling the site Resveratrol Benefits speaks directly to that first phase desire – this is where you can learn about resveratrol.
If you just googled “Buy resveratrol supplement,” your first inclination would be to click on GNC.com/HealthSupplements.com or another e-commerce-sounding link before going to the benefits/wikipedia-style site. If you have an informative benefits/features site, you need to recognize that you’re marketing to Phase I consumers. Don’t worry, sales can be made, but you may need to add some Phase II pages.
The second step of the buying process
The second step is what Consumer Reports also offers. Now that you know the benefits of the digital camera you want, you’re ready to compare cameras to see which ones offer those benefits. Perhaps you could call this the comparison phase. Whether you’re comparing website features, benefits, price, delivery speed, or return information, you’re in the second phase.
If you have a comparison site (where you feature 4 stars for your top-rated product, for example), then you’re definitely catering to the Phase 2 crowd, but you’re probably looking at some of the “buy stage” customers as well. It’s important to recognize that much of your customer base isn’t on your site to buy. They can buy, but they are there to compare. Grab That. Market that need so well that they feel compelled to buy from you, too.
The final step of the buying process
The third and final step is the “purchase phase”. You may still be shopping around a bit, but if you do, you’re probably comparing the price of a specific microwave on one site to another site. Downstream customers know what they want—they need a place to buy it.
This is the phase that 1800Flowers.com or GNC.com serve directly. They pay for ads for specific products that direct you to the Order Now page for that product. If your customer is there to buy, you don’t need to be ‘sold’ again on how much dirt your vacuum picks up. Please also take this into account for your order page.