Understanding Buyers Intentions the Easy Way

One classic mistake business owners make is not taking the time to research who their buying audience actually are. What I mean by this is marketing materials get created based on what the business owner believes are the features of a product, its perceived benefits, and a unique selling proposition.

The internet has changed how our customers buy products and services. As customers have become computer literate and more experienced at surfing the internet, their buying patterns and behaviours have changed drastically. Understanding how customers buy has now become the essential ingredient to fully understand in order to determine how to market and sell to them.

Taking the time to research how customers behave during their buying thought processes can lead to some interesting ideas on how to market to them. Getting this right can put you streets ahead of your competitors and gain you some very loyal customers.

As a large majority of the buying public turn to the internet to find the products and services they are looking for it makes sense for us to use this medium to get an insight into what they do to find what they are looking for. This includes looking at where they go to do their research, what words they use to describe the problem they are trying to solve, and where they end up buying the solution to their problem.

Even though customers use the internet to find the answers, they do not necessarily end up buying the solution on the internet. I don’t want you to go away with the impression that the research process I am going to describe to you in this article is only applicable to companies selling online. There are still products that sell well offline but the buyers of those products will have started their search for them online.

The Buying Cycle

The behaviour of a person looking for a product to solve an issue they have can be broken down into the following distinct steps:

1. Browse

2. Comparison shop

3. Buy

Remember these steps as you read through the rest of this article it will help you to fully understand the process.

As you research the words and phrases that people type into the various search engines (the main one being Google) it is important to understand which step in the buying cycle they are in. Understanding this helps you to determine what information to put in front of them and also the content that they are expecting to find at that point.

This is very powerful when done correctly and all will become clear as we go through this.

So here are the steps you should follow to work out your buyer’s intentions when they are searching for your product or service.

Step 1 – Find the keywords and phrases they are using

The first thing you should do is make use of a Google keyword tool that you will find at https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Before you do anything else make sure you set the language and country you are targeting by clicking on the edit link as seen in the picture below

Normally it will be set to the country where you are based so you may not need to change this unless you are targeting a country other than your own.

Next enter the word or phrase that best describes your product, market or niche.

For the purposes of walking you through this process I will use the example of a person looking to buy a digital camera. If I am selling digital cameras the keyword phrase I would use as my starting point would be “digital camera”. If you are selling ladies tights you would probably enter the word “tights”. Hopefully you get the idea.

In the Google keyword tool make sure you have selected the descriptive words or phrases option, enter your keyword or phrase in the box, leave use synonyms selected, enter the captcha code into the box and click on “Get keywords”

You will now get a list of keywords that have been searched on Google. Below is part of the list I get when I search for “digital camera”

You will notice that there are millions of searches for “digital cameras” and “slr digital camera” and I may get really excited and go and start trying to sell them. But before I rush off we need to understand a bit more about the buyers intention and what was going on in their mind when they typed in “digital cameras”or “slr digital camera”.

We can get an insight into this by working out where they are in the buying cycle.

Step 2 – determine where they are in the buying cycle

Let’s take the phrase “digital cameras”. If you were to guess at what stage in the buying cycle this person is at would you choose browser, comparison shopping, or buyer?

Let’s determine if they are a buyer first of all. We can do this by looking at the content in the keyword phrase. In fact I can tell you that this phrase is not a buyer keyword phrase so sending them directly to a buy page will be futile. The reason for this is that there are certain elements missing from the keyword phrase that tells us the visitor that enters this phrase into a search engine is in browsing mode and is some way away from actually whipping out their credit card!

What is missing are the specifics such as:

• what make of camera do they want – canon, nikon?
• what model – EOS, coolpix
• what model number – EOS 450D, coolpix 6000

it is these specifics that will appear in a keyword phrase once the customer has decided what they want.

So what about the phrase that appeared in our digital camera results on the Google keyword tool “slr digital camera”? This searcher is still not ready to buy – why?

Even though the keyword phrase is more specific, because they are now searching for slr cameras, slr being a specific type of digital camera, the other elements are still missing ie. make, model, colour etc. However the searcher who uses the “slr digital camera” keyword has moved from browsing to comparison shopping. They have decided they are interested in slr digital cameras and want to compare makes, models, features, and functions.

This is also true for someone who uses “canon digital camera”, “nikon digital camera” and so on. They have decided on the make of camera they are interested in but they are not sure what model to buy yet.

The same is true for “cheapest digital camera”. Even though no make is specified, the comparison shopper just wants to know the cheapest model and from there may then next decide on the make and model to buy.

So what about the buyers, what do they type into a search engine?

How about “buy nikon coolpix p6000 digital camera” no guesses there which part of the buying cycle they are in. Someone entering any of the following phrases are also in the buy part of the cycle:

• nikon coolpix p6000 digital camera
• nikon coolpix p6000 digital camera cheapest
• nikon coolpix p6000 digital camera discount
• where can i get a nikon coolpix p6000 digital camera

and so on.

How about someone entering “nikon coolpix digital camera” into a search engine?

Well if you are following along successfully you would say they are in the comparison shopping part of the cycle because the actual coolpix model number is missing. There are several models of coolpix digital cameras so the missing model number is a clue as to why they are not buying yet (but they are close )

Step 3 – develop content for each step

So, armed with the knowledge of which part of the buying cycle someone is in, based on the keyword phrases they enter, you can then decide for each phrase you want to target the type of content to provide them with.

If I was targeting my digital camera buyers I would consider using the following types of content on my website based on the keywords they found my website with as follows:

• “digital cameras” – explanation of the various manufacturers in the digital camera market, the common functions of digital cameras and their benefits, advice on the features every digital camera owner should have, picture quality of the various models and so on.
• “slr digital camera” – similar to above but purely focusing on the slr type cameras.
• “nikon coolpix digital camera” – comparison of the coolpix range, point out the most popular model in the range and the reasons why, make a recommendation as to which model to buy (you could convert them from a comparison shopper into a buyer by doing this)
• “nikon coolpix P6000 digital camera” – a sales page selling the P6000 for a competitive price with a big buy button! Also provide an incentive for them to buy ie. free camera bag, extra memory card etc.

There we have it. How to understand which part of the buying cycle a searcher is in can help you to target your products and services more precisely, provide searchers with more relevant information based on which part of the buying cycle they are in, and encourage them to buy from you.

I hope you see the benefits of doing this for your business. By taking the time to do this research you will rise head and shoulders above your competition.