You’ve probably heard of a buyer’s journey, but have you ever stopped to consider what the ideal journey would look like for your print buyers?
The start of a new year brings a fresh perspective that allows you to reflect on the past and to imagine a new future. Now is the perfect time to ask yourself how you can set yourself up to gain and keep your print buyers on the path to doing business with you.
While there are so many nuances to creating the perfect buyers’ journey, there are some key steps you can take to ensure you’ve paved the way nicely for your buyers. Over the next six weeks, we’ll explore some common stages of your print buyers’ journey and how you can be prepared to meet them wherever they are with the content and online ordering capabilities they need and desire.
Here’s what to expect over the next six weeks:
- What does the typical buying path of a print buyer look like?
- What types of content will be the most impactful in every stage of the journey?
- How to capitalize on continuing the journey even after they’ve purchased
And more! If you want great content meant to serve you and help you win at selling more printing, then keep reading and stay tuned to your inbox.
What is a Buyer’s Journey?
To start, you’ll need to understand what a buyer’s journey is. A popular definition says it this way,
“The buyer’s journey is the process buyers go through to become aware of, consider and evaluate, and decide to purchase a new product or service.”
Within this journey, your print buyers will typically make their way through three different processes or stages. These include:
- The Awareness Stage
- The Consideration Stage
- The Decision Stage
It’s important to recognize and understand these different stages because then you can use them to cater to your print buyers more specifically, depending on the stage of the journey they’re in. Let’s break it down a little further.
The Three Stages of a Print Buyer’s Journey
1. Awareness Stage
This is the part of the buying journey where your print buyer starts to experience symptoms of a pain point or an opportunity. In the awareness stage, your print buyers haven’t yet been able to put their finger on their specific problem; they just know something is amiss.
Your print buyers’ goal in this stage is to recognize if they have a problem or opportunity that needs to be addressed.
Sometimes it helps to think of this medically. Imagine you’re sitting at your desk one afternoon, and all of a sudden you get this ringing in your ears that won’t go away. The symptom doesn’t feel urgent, just annoying. You’re not sure if it’s just a fluke or will go away on its own. So, what’s your next step? Most people will research their symptoms before jumping in and spending money going to a doctor. They hold off a bit because they want to define the problem and determine if the problem is big enough or painful enough to solve.
2. Consideration Stage
Your buyer reaches the next stage in their journey, or the consideration stage, after they’ve clearly defined what the problem or opportunity is. Remember, though, it doesn’t mean your print buyers are ready to buy yet.
Your print buyers’ goal in this stage is to define their problem and research ways to solve it.
For this one, let’s use a printing example. Let’s say a print buyer has recognized they have a problem: they own a small business, but no one knows about them yet. In the awareness stage, they recognized that their problem was they hadn’t done any advertising. Now that they know the problem, they’ve decided that they need to boost their brand recognition through print. In the consideration stage, this print buyer will spend their time researching different print options and providers that will eliminate their problem.
3. Decision Stage
It should be fairly easy to deduce what happens in the decision stage.
Your print buyers’ goal in this stage is to decide on a solution.
Now that your print buyer has been able to define their problem and has researched potential solutions, here your buyer will start to narrow down their list of solution providers and are the most likely to move forward and make a confident decision.
Why Does All This Matter?
They are several reasons that building content based on your buyers’ journey matters.
For one, you can make sure that your print buyers are getting content from you for each stage. By doing so, you’ll be able to meet their need whenever they might enter the journey with you. Here are some other key reasons to keep in mind:
- A buyer’s journey helps you increase the value of what you have to offer them. (Right content + right person + right time = success!)
- A buyer’s journey can help you better sell your products and services without actually “selling.”
- A buyer’s journey helps you create content that sells for you before a human interaction takes place. (Consider that 80% of the buying process will occur without direct human interaction.)
In the coming weeks, you’ll learn what types of content work best for each stage of your print buyers’ journey, how to ensure superior follow-up to keep buyers in the sales cycle, and how to move your print buyers from loving your content to placing an order with you. Don’t miss it!
