The Buying Process and its Interaction with Pay per Click

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September 26th, 2007 by Nick

The way consumers make buying decisions depends on the complexity of the problem they are trying to solve and the complexity of each step in the decision process. This will affect how they manage the sale. Regardless of the complexity of the process for the consumer you must always be relevant to their search with every click.

If the consumer’s needs in the buying process are simple all you need is to make your potential buyers aware of you, build confidence, and differentiate yourself. Demonstrate value and guide them through a very simple shopping and buying process. This is why lower end, branded products sell so well, like for example buying a book on Amazon.com.

If the needs are complex then you need to make people aware of you build relationships, educate them, show sensitivity to the different decision makers, influencers and groups and resolve the conflicting needs, so you can then customise your solutions and make the buying process as painless and positive as possible.

It helps if you understand and incorporate how people think about buying what you offer. Are they going to compare similar models in different brands? Are they looking for the range offered? Do they think of the purchase in terms of some benefits being more important that others? Is the best way to showcase your product or service to compare it with someone else’s stuff? Tell them what they need to know before they can take that action, and use the dialogue on your site to target the kind of buyers that you have and therefore influence their decisions.

There are four types of traffic online and each level is primed with a different level of motivation and preparation. You don’t know where your visitors are in the buying process when they land on your site or when they type in a search query so ad texts and landing pages must reflect every possibility. You have to help users who know exactly what they want get it quickly, if you make them jump through too many hoops they will leave, however you still have to help the one’s mulling it over by offering relevant information where and when they are most likely to need it, as well as helping them to realise that you are a viable business choice. You have to be engaging and appealing to the window shopper.

Choose your keywords and landing pages based on an understanding of the buying process for your product or service. Fredrick Marckini CEO of iProspect said:

“If all online marketing were based on the immediate post click conversion, no body would spend a dollar. The reality of good marketing strategy is clear: People enter a market for most products or services at a variety of stages in their personal buying cycle. If you target only those people who have done their research and are ready to buy, right now, you will miss the majority of your market”

Your landing page has to put the buyer in the driving seat so they can imagine themselves enjoying the product making the emotional side of the decision easier. Cater on the landing pages for the analytical buyer and the emotional buyer some will be more comfortable with a pretty heavily branded page where as others will seek more comfort in the specifications and facts of their potential purchase.

You have to gather trust from the customer, remember they can not see you and so will need to have more emotional attachment to the messages on your webpage, than they would do if they brought from a real person in a shop. Consumers buy when they feel comfortable, when they feel like they can trust you, when the process feels natural and reassuring, and when they believe what they are buying will make them feel good. If you ignore this buyers will bail out, because at the end of the day its emotion that sets users on the path to a purchase with you not facts.

The buying process starts with a need, on the internet consumers will gather information and refine and evaluate all the buying criteria that will affect their decision to purchase and narrow the field of play for you. Once they have made a decision to purchase, they then re-evaluate the product, so after sale service is just as important as the buying process itself.

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