Is there an explanation behind why I took the time to sell my products and services?
Many of us have asked this question, and why there are delaying in sales. The answer to these queries is concentrated on the “customer buying cycle”. That term refers to the customer behavior when he up to do shopping.
Customer buying decision it’s not something easy to make, but he must go through 5 stages to reach his final decision of purchase.
Here are the 5 stages of the consumer buying decision process, which also called “The buyer’s journey”.
- Identify needs
- Collecting information
- Compare alternatives
- Final decision
- Post-Purchase Evaluation
First: Identify needs
This stage also called the awareness stage of the customer buying cycle. The main characteristic of this stage is people get more understanding about their needs and what they actually want at this particular moment, whether it is a problem they want to solve or a gap they want to fill. Somehow the needs could be created by other factors, for instance, internal stimuli [pain, thirst or fatigue] & external stimuli [Advertising].
But this stage is not responsible for satisfying their needs, it’s just for needs recognition and if they have a glance at how will get it.
Second: Collecting information
After identifying their needs, customers move to the second stage of their buying decision process that will enable them to make a good decision. Information search stage help customers to gather lots of information that may help in solving problems.
After collecting this information they will get a better view of the term that will help in satisfying their needs. But, they did not settle on the final selection, to settle on one they need to evaluate alternatives which is the next stage
Third: Compare alternatives
Many information, many thoughts, puzzled which term should I choose to solve my problems and have what I miss. This stage of customer buying behavior is responsible to evaluate alternatives to find out the best solution for you.
At this point, customers get themselves ready to make the final decision by defining the most reliable solution to choose, reasonable prices, high-quality materials and manufacturing. All of that will extract a good combination to make the decision at the next stage of the buying cycle.
Fourth: Final decision
It’s time for taking a decision about buying. Customers have reached the final stage of the buying decision process, now they are ready to purchase after exceeding many options. They have already decided which product, service, brand, or solution will satisfy their needs and solve problems.
To facilitate your customer’s buying process, also for the success of your sale process and attracting many customers, you need to make the purchase requirements as easy as possible.
Help your customers to reach the delight stage by giving them “discounts, offers, new features, etc” that’ll help you to avoid negative feedback because that could lead your business to failure.
Fifth: Post-Purchase Evaluation
The last step of the customers’ buying cycle and the most important one. This stage will guarantee if your customers have become permanent customers or not. So, when a customer buys something, he begins to use it, test it, and discover whether it got his needs and what if he made the wrong decision.
Now, if the customer finds that product or service cover all his needs, that’ll lead him to come back again and again to buy your product, also will give a recommendation for others to purchase that product. Otherwise, if your client become disappointed and the product didn’t reach his expectations, that’ll bring up a huge problem for you because he will release bad reputation (word of mouse) that affect negatively on your service.
Conclusion
After all, to have loyal customers isn’t something easy to get nowadays, it cost lots of efforts “commitment, hard-working, advertising”. A little advice, watch out from customers’ word of mouse, it’s the key that enables you to move forward or backward in the market, so, keep your promise to customers.
