How can we win new customers - make them find and buy us?
- duboislukas
- Mar 27, 2022
- 5 min read
A great product or service is worth nothing, if people don’t find it and don’t buy it. You might have the best offering in town, but without a successful search and purchase journey, nobody will become your customer in the first place. No-one finds you, no-one buys you. The Customer Journey ends before a purchase is made and before a delightful usage experience with your product or service can even begin.
There are many potential shortcomings and missed opportunities during the Search & Purchase Phases. They all can prevent people from becoming your happy customers. But what is more, there is great potential for unique, surprising and delightful experiences for your customers in their Search and Purchase Phases. Sometimes these even make the real difference against your competition. Especially, if it is not so easy to clearly differentiate yourself in the product or service you are offering.
In this article I show you how to design effective and convincing Search & Purchase experiences for your business that will win you all these customers to experience what you have to offer. It’s a continuation of the Customer Journey Innovation I started in my last article, there with a focus on product or service improvements.
No-one finds you, no-one buys you.
Creating successful search & purchase experiences
Take our fictive dentist “Doctor D.”. You could argue that the actual treatment does not differ greatly from other dentists. (After reading my last article - How to improve our offering to customers - we know that also dentist services can indeed be improved and differentiated greatly. But especially new customers do not know this before having experienced it.)
So what does a customer have to experience, to actually become a new customer for "Doctor D." in the first place? He needs to find "Doctor D." easily online or in local medical service registers. He needs to get recommendations or good reviews from existing customers. He needs to easily reach "Doctor D." and get all relevant information. He needs to get a trustworthy first impression on the website or when calling there. He needs transparency over prices and insurance reimbursements. He needs to get an appointment quick and easy or understand quickly how to find the office. And so on, and so on.
To be clear, your business can only succeed in the long run if your product or service satisfies or even WOWs your customers. So the offering itself should always be your first priority for improvements, as discussed in my last article. But then you need to think about how to win customers for this offering – by designing effective and convincing search and purchase experiences. This you can do in a separate workshop.
Customer Journey Workshop
The way you do this workshop is exactly the same as described in the previous article: How to improve our offering to customers. Please revisit this article for more details on the step-by-step guidance for a Customer Journey Innovation Workshop: 1) Customer Needs, 2) Touchpoints and 3) Activities. Only this time you focus on the Search and Purchase Phases of the Journey.
Again, you start by deconstructing you customers’ journey in sub-phases. There could be a first orientation, in which potential customers seek a basic understanding of the product or service category. What are the basic alternatives, key providers, price ranges, etc.? Afterwards could come a phase in which customers search for more detailed information or consultation. Maybe then there is even a test or tryout phase before final purchase considerations are done. Of course, these sub-phases with their specific consumer needs and touchpoints differ greatly from industry to industry.
In the case of our fictive “Nature Toys” company, parents might first search broadly for types of toys adequate for their kids’ age. For this orientation phase, they might consult kids magazines, specialized parenting websites or browse social media channels. Then, once they found an interesting toy type, they start comparing concrete products, brands and prices. This could be done on brand websites, comparison platforms, online shops or high-street stores.
These sub-phases and touchpoints above are examples for a specific industry– toys. You will find your own. Remember how important it is to observe your customers and understand them well, to define the right customer needs and touchpoints. Remember also the big difference your chosen target group can make. Different age groups, social groups or special-interest groups can mean very different customer needs and touchpoints, also in the Search and Purchase Phases.
I really urge you to think through your customers’ journey in this order: 1) Sub-phases, 2) Customer Needs, 3) Touchpoints and then 4) Activities. Your activity ideas need to come last. After all, they need to address your customers’ most important needs and touchpoints.
Let’s stay with the fictive “Nature Toys” company to think of some concrete activities that would create WOW-experiences in customers’ search & purchase journey, and eventually create new customers for “Nature Toys. Again, this would depend a lot on the specific products that “Nature Toys” has, possibly addressing a specific target group.
But for the sake of examples, “Nature Toys” could produce informational content such as articles or videos around the subject of nature-oriented playing of kids at various ages. Such content might be done in cooperation with relevant magazines or Social Media personalities that parents would consult. For the more detailed information phase of parents, “Nature Toys” could provide engaging video content or educational guidance of how to use their toys – on their website or at retail partners. Maybe this could focus on typical playing situations with parents or siblings. Such helpful content could make a convincing difference in deciding for “Nature Toys” products in the end.
For the final purchase decision, additional and unexpected service offers like individualization of toys, extra fast delivery or generous return policies could make the final difference for customers.
I recommend my previous article - How to improve our offering to customers – for tips to brainstorm such activities, who to involve, how to get inspiration. You will certainly come up with a long list of potential activities and it is absolutely necessary to prioritize them. You cannot do everything and need to decide what activities to start with. In my last article, I describe an easy way to do this. It works just the same here: rate your ideas along (1) Customer relevance, (2) Feasibility and (3) Differentiation.
To sum up my last two articles: Improving your Customer Journey like this with innovative ideas on various touchpoints along all journey phases is a never-ending challenge. It’s not a one-shot. You should do such workshops on a regular basis, maybe twice a year, constantly developing your Customer Journey Map and thereby improving your customers’ experiences. Make no mistake: this is not a nice-to-have, bling-bling marketing exercise. Working on your Customer Journey is working on the core of your business. You improve your offering and the way you bring it to customers successfully. That should be the main concern for every business, large and small. I hope you see the beauty and the power of this approach, for you to gain and maintain a competitive edge for your business.
Working on your Customer Journey is working on the core of your business.
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