The Consumer Buying Process

1. Introduction

How life feels like in an era of Internet? The modern era has been very advanced and well-developed which helps individuals to make daily routines easier. This modern era has been tiring and physically demanding, specifically, for people’s fingertips. The internet has changed the lifestyle of people. During leisure time, nowadays, instead of grabbing a magazine or newspaper, most people would grab their laptops, tablets or smartphones to access to real-time updates on trends from anywhere around the world. Even videos from various news channels can be accessed through the Internet; a clear indication that Internet can overpower other forms of media.

1.1. Overview of Social Media

Social media is a common phrase that can be

Consumer Buying Process

In any business, traditional or online, the trading situation is important for planning business and marketing and business objectives. Due to drastic changes in technology, the attitude of consumers towards the Internet has changed drastically too. In an online marketplace, the number of people buying comfortably is increasing (Palmer, 2007). Digital technologies have been enabling consumers to be more informed when making purchasing decisions (Chaffey & Ellis-Chadwick, 2012). According to (Doherty & Ellis-Chadwick, 2010), as the consumers get more informed, the more they become demanding.

Nowadays, consumers are very powerful due to various technological advancements. According to (Chaffey & Ellis-Chadwick, 2012), consumer behaviour analysis in an online market can be considered from two perspectives; which are:

1. Demand analysis which involves understanding the potential and actual visitors to an online presence. It is also important to project what percentage of the visitors will be customers.

2. Digital consumer behaviour which involves understanding the needs, characteristics and digital experiences or behaviours of target consumers. Customer insight must be detected in order to grasp a better analysis of consumers. This analysis will be able to help form customer segments to develop targeting approaches as part of strategy and

Social Media on Identification of Needs or Wants

The first stage of the buying process is recognition of needs or wants because an individual would not make any purchase unless he knows what he wants or needs. This occurs when there is a gap between the current situation of the consumer and his desired situation (Mikoluk, 2013). Usually, an internal stimuli triggers a need of a consumer, for instance when hunger is experienced, to feel a need or want of a certain product.

However, external stimulus can also affect need recognition. This occurs when consumer is influenced by outside factors like opinions of other people (Jones, 2014). One of the tactics that social media marketing has been implying is documenting a scenario wherein an individual is having a hard time doing a daily chore. After explaining the problem, there comes then their product or service that can solve the current problem. This video or photo will be then posted in their social media platforms. Through this, it can be expected that an awareness of a need or want will then arise from the mind of the audience.

2.4.2. Social Media on Information