Aug 01 2008
The mindset of a buyer
Even though people are more or less unpredictable, we can map people’s behaviour pretty well nowadays. We know for sure that evey buyer goes through stages before buying something.
The first step is to “identify the need” of something. For example: I have a pretty old cel phone and I start to notice all my work mates own smart-phones… and they actually become more productive. So I begin to consider the possibility of getting one.
I start to search the web looking for information on smartphones and best model for me. I use Google and Yahoo for this. Ok, I now know I will be getting either a iPhone or a BlackBerry. So I beging to read reviews online and what people are saying in the blogsphere.
Then I finally run into a big store like Amazon, E-Bay, Shopping.com etc. and start searching prices and payment conditions. If the store is kind to me I commit. Maybe the store has been nice to me in the past, so I just commit again… 
Some points I want to get accros:
- Every buyer has diferent mental stages in his process to buy something. More or less they all follow the same path: recognize the need, search for information, choose the model and, finally, buy it
- Every one has many diferent roles during a day. You can a mother a mother in the morning, a tech guy during the day and a drunk person at night. You get the point, whatever you are being influences your perception of the world and the way you are going to react to a product ad
- Knowing what to offer (and how) is pretty damm hard, but it sure pays off. You can rely on CRM technics, model your Y! and Google Ads, costumize your landing pages …
This is a small graph sowing the buying likeability during each phase.
Off course there are some quite important conclusions that can help you improve your results in your Google and Yahoo campaings, on your landing pages and even how you handle your costumers.
I shall go into details on the next post, stay tunned!