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The consumer decision journey
Consumers are moving outside the purchasing
funnel—changing the way they rearch
and buy your products. If your marketing hasn’t
changed in respon, it should.
David Court, Dave Elzinga, Susan Mulder, and Ole Jørgen Vetvik
If marketing has one goal, it’s to reach consumers at the moments
that most influence their decisions. That’s why consumer electronics
companies make sure not only that customers e their televisions in
农村劳动力stores but also that tho televisions display vivid high-definition
pictures. It’s , a decade ago, began offering targeted
product recommendations to consumers already logged in and ready
to buy. And it explains P&G’s decision, long ago, to produce radio and
then TV programs to reach the audiences most likely to buy its
products—hence, the term “soap opera.”
Marketing has always sought tho moments, or touch points, when consumers are open to influence. For years, touch points have been understood through the metaphor of a “funnel”—consumers start with a number of potential brands in mind (the wide end of the funnel), marketing is then directed at them as they methodically reduce that number and move through the funnel, and at the end they emerge with the one brand they cho to purcha (Exhibit 1). But today, the funnel concept fails to capture all the touch points and key buying factors resulting from the explosion of product choices and digital channels, coupled with the emergence of an increasingly discerning, well-informed consumer. A more sophisticated approach is required to help marketers navigate this environment, which is less linear
Marketing & Sales Practice
David Court is a director
in McKiny’s Dallas
office, Dave Elzinga is
a principal in the Chicago
office, Susie Mulder is
a principal in the Boston
office, and Ole Jørgen
Vetvik is a principal in the Oslo office.
McKiny Quarterly 2009 Number 3
2and more complicated than the funnel suggests. We call this approach
the consumer decision journey . Our thinking is applicable to any
geographic market that has different kinds of media, Internet access,
and wide product choice, including big cities in emerging markets
such as China and India.
We developed this approach by examining the purcha decisions of
almost 20,000 consumers across five industries and three continents.
Our rearch showed that the proliferation of media and products
requires marketers to find new ways to get their brands included in
the initial-consideration t that consumers develop as they begin
their decision journey. We also found that becau of the shift away
from one-way communication—from marketers to consumers—
toward a two-way conversation, marketers need a more systematic
way to satisfy customer demands and manage word-of-mouth. In
addition, the rearch identified two different types of customer loyalty,
challenging companies to reinvigorate their loyalty programs and
the way they manage the customer experience.
Finally, the rearch reinforced our belief in
报答妈妈
the importance not only of aligning all elements
of marketing—strategy, spending, channel man-
agement, and message—with the journey that con-
sumers undertake when they make purchasing
decisions but also of integrating tho elements
across the organization. When marketers under-
stand this journey and direct their spending and
水果宝宝去旅行
messaging to the moments of maximum influence,
they stand a much greater chance of reaching
consumers in the right place at the right time with
the right message.
Awareness Familiarity Consideration Purcha Loyalty
Exhibit 1
The traditional funnel
3The consumer decision journey How consumers make decisions
Every day, people form impressions of brands from touch points such举开头的成语
as advertiments, news reports, conversations with family and
friends, and product experiences. Unless consumers are actively
shopping, much of that exposure appears wasted. But what happens
when something triggers the impul to buy? Tho accumulated
impressions then become crucial becau they shape the initial-
consideration t: the small number of brands consumers regard
at the outt as potential purchasing options.
The funnel analogy suggests that consumers systematically narrow the
initial-consideration t as they weigh options, make decisions, and
buy products. Then, the postsale pha becomes a trial period deter-
mining consumer loyalty to brands and the likelihood of buying
their products again. Marketers have been taught to “push” marketing
toward consumers at each stage of the funnel process to influence
their behavior. But our qualitative and quantitative rearch in the auto-
mobile, skin care, insurance, consumer electronics, and mobile-
telecom industries shows that something quite different now occurs.
Actually, the decision-making process is a more circular journey, with four primary phas reprenting potential battlegrounds where
Q3 2009
CDJ
Exhibit 2 of 4Glance: The decision-making process is now a circular journey with four phas: initial consideration; active evaluation, or the process of rearching potential purchas; closure, when consumers buy brands; and postpurcha, when consumers experience them.
Exhibit title: The consumer decision journey
税目有哪些After purchasing a product or rvice,
the consumer builds expectations
bad on experience to inform the next
decision journey.
brands as they evaluate what
they want.
an initial t of brands,
山东的特色美食and exposure to recent
touch points.Exhibit 2The consumer decision journey
McKiny Quarterly 2009 Number 3
4marketers can win or lo: initial consideration; active evaluation, or
the process of rearching potential purchas; closure, when con-
sumers buy brands; and postpurcha, when consumers experience
them (Exhibit 2). The funnel metaphor does help a good deal—for
搭石课文example, by providing a way to understand the strength of a brand
compared with its competitors at different stages, highlighting the
bottlenecks that stall adoption, and making it possible to focus
on different aspects of the marketing challenge. Nonetheless, we found
that in three areas profound changes in the way consumers make交换你兄弟
buying decisions called for a new approach.
Brand consideration
Imagine that a consumer has decided to buy a car. As with most kinds
of products, the consumer will immediately be able to name an
initial-consideration t of brands to purcha. In our qualitative
rearch, consumers told us that the fragmenting of media and the
proliferation of products have actually made them reduce the number
of brands they consider at the outt. Faced with a plethora of
choices and communications, consumers tend to fall back on the
limited t of brands that have made it through the wilderness of
messages. Brand awareness matters: brands in the initial-consideration
t can be up to three times more likely to be purchad eventually
than brands that aren’t in it.
Not all is lost for brands excluded from this first stage, however.
Contrary to the funnel metaphor, the number of brands under
consideration during the active-evaluation pha may now actually
expand rather than narrow as consumers ek information and
Exhibit 3Adding brands Adding brands
Sector Initial consideration
Active evaluation Loyalty loop 1Personal computers 492427Skin care 38
3725Telecom carriers 38
2042Auto insurance
13978 1.71.51.53.2 1.0Autos 63
307 3.8 2.21.80.91.41 For skin care, includes consumers who purchad their current brand 2 or more times in past 3 months and for whom current
brand made up at least 70% of total category purchas in past 3 months; for all others, includes consumers who purchad same brand on current occasion as on previous occasion and did not co
nsider any other brands.
Source: McKiny consumer decision surveys: 2008 US auto and skin care, 2008 Germany mobile telecom, 2009 US auto insurance
Share of purchas, %
Average number of brands In initial-consideration t Added in active consideration
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The consumer decision journey shop a category. Brands may “interrupt” the decision-making process by entering into consideration and even force the exit of rivals.
The number of brands added in later stages differs by industry: our rearch showed that people actively evaluating personal computers
added an average of 1 brand to their initial-consideration t of 1.7, while automobile shoppers added 2.2 to their initial t of 3.8 (Exhibit 3). This change in behavior creates opportunities for marketers by adding touch points when brands can make an impact. Brands already under consideration can no longer take that status for granted.
Empowered consumers
The cond profound change is that outreach of consumers to marketers has become dramatically more important than marketers’ outreach to consumers. Marketing ud to be driven by companies; “pushed” on consumers through traditional advertising, direct marketing, spon- sorships, and other channels. At each point in the funnel, as consumers whittled down their brand options, marketers would attempt to sway their decisions. This impreci approach often failed to reach the right consumers at the right time.
In today’s decision journey, consumer-driven marketing is increasingly important as customers ize control of the process and actively “pull” information helpful to them. Our rearch found that two-thirds of the touch points during the active-evaluation pha involve consumer- driven marketing activities, such as Internet reviews and word-of-mouth recommen- dations from friends and family, as well as in-store interactions and recollections of past experi- ences. A third of the touch
points involve company-driven
marketing (Exhibit 4). Traditional
marketing remains important,
but the change in the way consumers make decisions means that mar- keters must move aggressively beyond purely push-style commu- nication and learn to influence consumer-driven touch points, such as word-of-mouth and Internet information sites.
The experience of US automobile manufacturers shows why marketers must master the new touch points. Companies like Chrysler and GM have long focud on using strong sales incentives and in-dealer programs to win during the active-evaluation and moment-of-
purcha phas. The companies have been fighting the wrong battle: the real challenges for them are the initial-consideration and post-
purcha phas, which Asian brands such as Toyota Motor and Honda Marketers must move aggres-
sively beyond purely push-style
communication and learn
to influence consumer-driven
touch points
