How People Decide
It would be nice to think that we live in a land of rational decision-makers. In this land, people would never make an emotional decision. They would only purchase what they need and would actively seek out all necessary information to allow them to make an optimal decision. If they were all rational, they would always choose your product or service. Right?
Maybe some people do that for every decision, but it would take a week to buy groceries. Although we aren’t always thorough, we do go through a fairly predictable approach to making decisions. The time required for some ‘low involvement’ decisions is just significantly shorter than the time required for ‘high involvement’ decisions.
Decision Making Steps
- Recognition of a Want or Need
Whether it is spur of the moment or long and drawn-out, the first step is development of tension between ‘not having’ and ‘having’. That tension motivates us to move to the next step in the decision-making process. - Information Search
If it is a ‘high involvement’ decision, the information search could be long and exhaustive. It could involve purchasing reports, talking to friends, or simply scanning the store shelf to look for alternatives. - Alternatives Evaluation
This is the trade-off process of determining which of the alternatives will best meet our need. Is price most important? What about packaging or convenience? Don’t forget about novelty. A ‘new and improved’ alternative will almost always factor into a decision. - Purchase Decision
This is the moment of truth. Which car will you start negotiating on? Which eBay item will you place a bid on? Which brand of mustard will you throw into your cart? - Post-Purchase Behavior
This aspect is frequently over-looked at the peril of the merchant. After a consumer makes a decision, they crave validation that they made the right decision. Help them validate their decision by actively addressing any questions they might have in putting the product or service to use.
How do your customers make their purchasing decisions? Do they seek out information before the buying decision or is it spur-of-the-moment? To help your customers choose you, you need to first understand how they choose.
Chris McPhee, MBA
Email: Chris.McPhee@Marketing-Matters.org
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