One of my listeners on my podcast ‘The answer is brand’ asked this question…
‘What is one of the key influences in consumer decision making, when making a purchase’.
When simplified, this question becomes ‘Why do we buy things?’
This is essentially a sales & marketing question, which can be solved with your brand.
The main component around this is, how do we make decisions?
When we consider purchasing, it falls into two different aspects, that being logical or emotional.
Emotional aspect
When it’s on an emotional level, we’re looking for something that solves a problem.
Perhaps its because;
- The boiler is broken.
- Our pet isn’t very well.
- The business isn’t seeing the projected cash flow.
When you’re making the decision to purchase something, you’re trying to connect with it on an emotional level.
The way you do this through your branding, is with your message.
A couple of questions that you can ask yourself when in the purchasing process (to get insight into how you’re making decisions) are:
- What pain are you trying to move away from? (ideally, you’re looking to move someone from the pain they have to the result they need)
- What result do you need? (What do you need to achieve while doing this?)
- Has the seller/supplier helped people like me? (Have they solved my problem specifically in the past?)
These questions are critical in connecting on an emotional level.
So, the client/buyer has connected emotionally to the product. How then do we move someone towards the decision to actually buy something?
Logical aspect
What they’re thinking is whether to buy the product right now. This falls more into more tactical thoughts .
Think of pricing strategy, time limits, discounts, seasonal timings etc. (for instance something that’s only available this week/sale ends on this date).
Companies (usually retail) utilise this process.
I hope this answers the question and helps others out there with the same enquiry on their minds.
If you have a question about starting, growing, or scaling your business, head over to Dannyand.co/podcast to record and send your question in. It’s not only a great way to promote your business, it also helps other businesses who might be encountering a similar issue/question to you.
