People will find your corporate website through many different methods and not all of them will be prospective customers for your company. But the visitors who have a need for your product or services will arrive with specific and unique goals, and often times they will not be ready to make a buying decision.
My study of the millions of visitors to my various websites has allowed me to categorize these visitors into three distinct groups, which I have categorized as the three stages of the Internet Buyer. They are information seekers, comparison shoppers, and ready buyers.
First - Information Seekers
Information seekers consist of the people who have just started the process of buying your product or service as well as people who need to know something about your industry or organization. This is a very broad group of people and not all are real prospective leads for your organization.
These people are drawn to large, highly advertized sites that offer basic information about the process of buying a product or service similar to yours. In real estate, the information seekers end up at sites like realtor.com, zillow.com, trulia.com, etc. They want to see lots of pictures of houses (even if the houses are in markets where they will not be buying).
Second - Comparison Shoppers
Comparison shoppers have consumed enough "knowledge" to complete the information gathering stage of the buying process and are ready to narrow their focus. They have learned enough from reading information from your site (and others) to allow them to have some specific needs identified and a rudimentary budget established.
Much like the information seeker, the comparison shopper is not likely to be making a purchase decision during this visit to your website, so it is important that you have the tools and resources that will keep this future buyer engaged on your site in order to develop familiarity with your company. This is the stage in which a customer "relationship" can be forged.
The Ready Buyer
The last stage of the buying process occurs when the comparison shopper has identified what they plan on buying and all they are lacking is an emotional trigger that will cause them to make a purchase decision immediately. This stage of the cycle could be minutes, or many months after the onset, depending upon the nature of your industry.
I have found that on average, the entire buying cycle (all 3 stages) for the real estate consumer is just over nine months. Your industry could observe all 3 stages in just a half an hour. The most important thing to understand about selling on the internet buyer is that you absolutely must know the length of each of these stages for buyers of your product or service, and to have a plan for each stage that you intend to target.
My study of the millions of visitors to my various websites has allowed me to categorize these visitors into three distinct groups, which I have categorized as the three stages of the Internet Buyer. They are information seekers, comparison shoppers, and ready buyers.
First - Information Seekers
Information seekers consist of the people who have just started the process of buying your product or service as well as people who need to know something about your industry or organization. This is a very broad group of people and not all are real prospective leads for your organization.
These people are drawn to large, highly advertized sites that offer basic information about the process of buying a product or service similar to yours. In real estate, the information seekers end up at sites like realtor.com, zillow.com, trulia.com, etc. They want to see lots of pictures of houses (even if the houses are in markets where they will not be buying).
Second - Comparison Shoppers
Comparison shoppers have consumed enough "knowledge" to complete the information gathering stage of the buying process and are ready to narrow their focus. They have learned enough from reading information from your site (and others) to allow them to have some specific needs identified and a rudimentary budget established.
Much like the information seeker, the comparison shopper is not likely to be making a purchase decision during this visit to your website, so it is important that you have the tools and resources that will keep this future buyer engaged on your site in order to develop familiarity with your company. This is the stage in which a customer "relationship" can be forged.
The Ready Buyer
The last stage of the buying process occurs when the comparison shopper has identified what they plan on buying and all they are lacking is an emotional trigger that will cause them to make a purchase decision immediately. This stage of the cycle could be minutes, or many months after the onset, depending upon the nature of your industry.
I have found that on average, the entire buying cycle (all 3 stages) for the real estate consumer is just over nine months. Your industry could observe all 3 stages in just a half an hour. The most important thing to understand about selling on the internet buyer is that you absolutely must know the length of each of these stages for buyers of your product or service, and to have a plan for each stage that you intend to target.
About the Author:
Joe Manausa, MBA writes about internet marketing, showing how to generate real sustainable business from consumers on the internet. He is a consultant for reaching buyers in each stage of the internet buying cycle and using list marketing systems to develop profitable relationships with consumers online.. This article, The 3 Critical Conditions Regarding Your Website Customers is released under a creative commons attribution license.
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