Understanding the Buyer’s Journey Posted June 3, 2019 in Business

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The Path to Purchase

Buyers in the 21st century are knowledgeable and independent. Online, in-store and through mobile, these buyers are shopping from vendors around the world, 24/7, 365.  Knowing your buyers and how they make their decisions allows you to create content that moves them through their journey.

The buyer’s journey can vary based on product, industry or location, but it has three basic steps:

Awareness > Consideration > Decision ⁽¹⁾

Step 1: Awareness

In this stage, buyers are experiencing a problem and want to understand how to solve it. ⁽¹⁾

What buyers are thinking:

• What are my challenges?
• What do I hope to achieve?
• Where should I look?
• Who should I ask?
• How much of a priority is it?

Where buyers in this stage seek answers: *

• 76% – Looking at infographics
• 65% – Reading news and media articles
• 64% – Listening to podcasts ⁽²⁾

Tips to reach buyers at this stage:

• Develop easily digestible educational content, like how-tos, quizzes and infographics
• Stay neutral and avoid high pressure sales pitches

Are you providing a resource, or are you giving a sales pitch? If your content doesn’t offer value, it won’t reach your buyer.

Step 2: Consideration

By now, buyers have clarified their problem and are researching possible solutions. ⁽¹⁾

What buyers are thinking:

• What features do I need?
• What can I live without?
• What do the top-rated lists say?
• How have others solved this problem?
• What solutions are out there?

Where buyers in this stage seek answers:

• 48% – Reading industry or trend reports
• 48% – Watching webinars
• 43% – Viewing interactive content ⁽²⁾

Tips for businesses and brands to reach buyers at this stage:

• Create content that outlines your features and advantages so that it’s easy to do comparisons
• Go live or interactive to engage buyers

Most important evaluation variables for buyers

1. Time to deploy and ease of use
2. Features and functionality
3. Pain point resolution
4. Reviews
5. Sales team demonstrated knowledge of company and insights into problems ⁽²⁾

Step 3: Decision

Now is the time for buyers to do their due diligence on a short list of vendors. ⁽¹⁾

What buyers are thinking:

• I’ve narrowed it down. Which one has the best price, customer service, ratings and recommendations?
• Have these solutions worked for other people?

Where buyers in this stage seek answers:

• 48% – Using ROI calculators
• 42% – Reading case studies
• 40% – Analyzing assessments ⁽²⁾

Tips for businesses and brands to reach buyers at this stage:

• Make available in-depth documentation with specifics about price, features, implementation, etc.
• Monitor reviews and recommendations
• Provide prompt and informative customer service

Based on all the knowledge they’ve gathered, their interactions with vendors and their allocated resources, buyers can now make an informed decision.

 Top five reasons B2B buyers go with their chosen vendor:

• 73% – Demonstrated the strongest knowledge of my company and my needs
• 66% – Stronger knowledge of the solution area and my business landscape
• 66% – Prompt vendor response to inquiries
• 65% – Easily consumable and informational content
• 61% – Higher quality content ⁽²⁾

Businesses and brands who know who their buyers are, what they need and how they make decisions can craft messages and content to help buyers say “yes!”

Tip! Creating a buyer persona can help determine:

• Sales and marketing content
• Where to publish content
• What areas to develop to meet buyers’ needs

Buyer personas typically include:

• Demographic information (age, income, geographic location)
• Key purchase drivers (price, convenience, brand preference)
• The pain points that need to be solved ⁽¹⁾

Tip! Define your buyer’s journey by considering:

• How are your buyers describing their challenges or goals?
• What else are they looking at and why?
• What is their evaluation criteria?
• When buyers investigate your product, what are the differentiators? What do they like about it compared to competitors? What concerns do they have? ⁽¹⁾

Advance Your Business Career

The online MBA at Fairleigh Dickinson equips you with the skill set you need to become a leader in your profession. Designed to help students attain leadership positions in various industries, the program uses a fully engaged learning process that prepares graduates to develop a career in nearly any field imaginable.

SOURCES

1. hubspot.com
2. demandgenreport.com

*All statistics were gathered from a survey of marketing and sales professionals