Understanding the Buyer’s Journey

What is the Buyer’s Journey?

Modern marketers have learned that the purchase process is a journey, and consumers advance through a process the industry has called ‘the buyer’s journey.’ The buyer’s journey is a framework that acknowledges a buyer’s progression through a research and decision process ultimately culminating in a purchase.  The first thing to know about a buyer’s journey is, that although it can vary from one industry to the next, it only really varies in the speed that the buyer progresses through each of the stages.

The buyer’s journey stages

Step 1. Future Buyers.

Future buyers are looking for reasons to buy. The buyer becomes aware that they have a problem that they need a solution for or desire that is unfulfilled. Imagine this scenario, you’ve woken up and opened up the blinds and there stood on the drive is your old car, as you look at the car you begin to dream about owning a ‘new car’, at this point you’re now a future buyer. You’ve seen all the Ads from the car companies, you quite like the look of the new Ford, or that fantastic BWM, but perhaps the family is growing and you need something a little bigger, 4 doors perhaps or even a SUV.  You start to think about all the benefits of ownership. Such as ‘the new car smell’, the prestige that owning a new car brings, economic benefits, such as greater fuel economy and lower running costs.

Future buyers are looking for the benefits that ownership can bring, in the case of a new car it’s fairly obvious, what are the benefits of owning your product or using your service?

As a business owner, your job at this stage is to create awareness of your product, service, or company, so that your buyers begin to understand what you do, and how you can help them. Your information should be focused on your buyer’s pain points — not your product or brand.

Step 2. Soon to buy buyers.

Once your prospect has passed through the future buyer’s stage, they then progress to being a ‘Soon to buy buyer’. Soon to buy buyers are looking for reasons not to buy. They are looking at objections to ownership.  Their thought processes are:-

1)   Do nothing

This first part of the ‘soon to buy’ stage is all about your buyer’s competing priorities. At this point, your real competition is not necessarily other companies—it is other things on your prospect’s to-do list.  What they care about is what else is competing for their attention or their resources.

Like everyone else, your prospects are extremely busy. If someone has tried to shift their thinking towards solving a particular problem, the first thing they do is think ‘where is this on my list of priorities? Right now I have five urgent things to get done…..and when they are complete, there are another 50 things that I need to get done.’  So unless what you’re offering is going to knock out at least one of those top five urgent tasks, then your buyer will decide that it is not top priority—and will therefore decide not to do anything.

This is where most buyers stall. They may have some interest in your product or service—but they don’t want it yet.  To move them onwards, you need to help them re-prioritise their to-do list.

2) DIY (Do it themselves)

This has nothing to do with step ladders, Polyfilla or breaking a drill that you borrowed from your neighbour. Your prospects will usually try to work out if they can fix things by themselves first. They would almost always prefer to solve problems in house, with existing resources.

However, it is likely that (in relation to what you’re trying to sell) they don’t have the skills, time or resources to do it themselves. What you need to do is to build a picture of exactly what would be required for them to do a good job of it by themselves.

Spell out that to really do a good job, they would need a comprehensive selection of skills and resources. If they don’t have all those things, then logically, they will have to ask for help from someone else.

Step 3.   Now Buyers.

Once your prospect has been through the previous two stages and has decided that they are going to buy, the next question they need to answer is, Who do I buy from or vendor selection. It’s important to note that at any one time only 1-5% of prospects who will eventually go on and purchase your product or service are ‘Now Buyers’. This means that somewhere between 95 and 99 percent of all buyers of your product or service are not ready to purchase yet.

At this stage, it’s your job as a business owner to communicate the advantages of buying from you, highlighting your MDP (Market Dominating Position) which comprises your USP and business process model, as opposed to your competition.

What fuels the Buyers on their Journey?

The driving force behind the ‘buyer’s journey’ is information, at each stage, the buyer is searching for information that will provide certainty and evidence that they are on the right track. So for example:-

• ‘Future Buyers’ are looking for information on the problem that they have and how to solve that problem.
• ‘Soon to Buy Buyers’ are looking for information that provides evidence that they are making the right decision. Not a decision on who to buy from that is in the next stage, but evidence that the solution they seek will solve the problem they have.
• ‘Now Buyers’ are looking for information on who to buy from. This means that they are looking for a vendor who meets their buying criteria, whether that be price based or value based.

So if you’ve thought about this and implemented a marketing system that walks your prospect through the buyer’s journey, when they come to the final step as ‘Now Buyers’ it should be obvious who to buy from, the person or business that has taken you on the journey.