Newsletter - 6 Marketing Insights for the Considered Purchase

Performance Marketing Newsletter
January 2010
6 Marketing Insights for the Considered Purchase

Dear Reader,

Happy New Year! Welcome to Performance Marketing, the monthly newsletter for online marketers looking for results.

It's a great pleasure to announce LSFinteractive's acquisition of ClearGauge, a B2B online marketing services and consulting firm based in Chicago, Illinois.

For over 10 years, ClearGauge has delivered sophisticated approaches to interactive marketing and analytics to companies in the technology, business services, healthcare, and manufacturing industries.

I am excited to bring you the focused B2B expertise of the ClearGauge team, led by Karen Breen Vogel, former CEO of ClearGauge and our new B2B thought leader and vice president of business development.

This expertise significantly strengthens LSFinteractive's B2B offering and enables us to expand our integrated performance marketing services for B2C and B2B companies around the globe.

To kick off our new partnership, in this issue we define the "considered purchase" - products and services that require longer sales cycles, more complex decision-making, and higher risk. I hope these insights will help your results whether you're a B2B or B2C marketer.

All the Best,
Daniel Laury
Founder, President and CEO
LSFinteractive

Feature Article: 6 Marketing Insights for the Considered Purchase

We typically think of the difference between B2B and B2C as a difference in purchaser: businesses versus consumers. But instead of this distinction, most businesses today operate on a continuum. At one end are companies selling low-priced, low-risk products to individuals (lipstick for example) and at the other end are organizations selling high-ticket, high-risk offerings to organizations (enterprise software for instance). Many businesses fall at one end or the other of the spectrum, but some have both types of offerings.

The high-ticket, high-risk end of this continuum can be called a "considered purchase." This refers to the number of people involved in the decision; the nature of the product or service being considered; the degree of complexity in making a decision; and the risk associated with a poor decision.

Most B2B sales are "considered purchases" although there are exceptions. Some B2B sales, such as repeat or commodity purchases, are motivated by price or availability alone, and there are B2C scenarios - like car sales -- that are clearly highly considered purchases.

Instead of simply designing your marketing strategy and initiatives based on whether your business is B2B or B2C, you may get better results by incorporating the elements of a considered purchase. Here are 6 insights for marketing the considered purchase.

1.Complex Buying Decision
The considered purchase is typically a long, complicated process. Take a closer look at how complex your customers' decision-making process is. For example, how many people are involved? What kind of budget cycle do you need to take into consideration? The level of complexity will determine your marketing and sales approach. Avoid "one-size fits all" campaigns by crafting offers and messages that are relevant to each step of the process.

2. Educated Buyers
All types of consumers do research online and considered purchase buying groups are no exception. A good marketer will take advantage of this with online strategies that meet the information needs of each member of the decision process at every point along the way and create conversion opportunities.

3. Multiple Decision Makers
Considered purchases are typically made by teams composed of a variety of individuals with different levels of influence and different needs. Create a list of who is involved in the purchasing decision – either by title or functional area. Then list the steps that the buyer group goes through in order to make a decision to purchase your offering. Be sure to gather insights from experienced sales people, recently acquired customers, and your customer service personnel.

4. Long Sales Cycle
A considered purchase requires an extended decision-making process -- from 3 to 12 months or more. Marketing efforts for considered purchases typically start well before that with campaigns to increase awareness, build demand and generate leads. Sales will then nurture qualified leads through the pipeline to purchase. Make sure you're taking this extended cycle into consideration.

5. High Cost-Per-Acquisition
In most considered purchase situations, sales budgets, including personnel, sales tools, and expenses, are large to take into account longer sales cycles, and marketers usually pay a higher CPM, CPC, or CPL. This higher cost of customer acquisition is balanced by greater revenue downstream.

6. Granular Online Strategies
Because of the variety of individuals involved and the complexity of the buying process, the Internet -- and performance marketing in particular -- are powerful tools for companies on all points of the considered purchase spectrum. Leveraging the web enables marketers to implement their marketing strategies at an efficient granular level and capitalize on active, educated buyers for customer acquisition and long-term growth.

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