Buyers learn of online businesses through various means. They learn through retail sites, paid searches, brand sites, social networking sites, and mobile sites as well as through TV or local channels. They may even learn about the sites through family, friends, print media as well as actual physical stores.
However, there are 6 types of online buyers. These are:
- Basic digital consumers – these are consumers that are very comfortable in making online purchases. These use brand sites as well as use searches and retail sites. These are people who are not very mobile or social and they buy products much like how consumers used to buy from physical stores.
- Retail scouts are those that make purchase decisions really fast. These prefer either retail sites or searches and do not prefer brand sites. They usually use either tablets or mobile devices. These use digital coupons.
- Brand Scouts are those that make quick decisions and they also rely on paid searches but they have a preference for specific brand sites. These people are those that decide based on the price and features offered such as money back guarantees or free shipping.
- Digitally driven customers are social and mobile customers. They do not go to stores if they can help it and advertising has a great effect on them.
- Calculated shoppers are those that purchase after a lot of consideration of the various options. These compare prices before purchasing. They try different channels.
- Eternal shoppers are those that research on each and every channel before purchasing. These usually use paid search engines.
These are the basic types of online buyers. These are different to those customers that visit brick and mortar stores and the way of enticing these customers are different as well as the ways of luring them too.
