Trigger more sales: Tap into buyer behavior to sell more
In this blog post, you’ll discover how to:
Identify the exact moment your customer decides to buy
Use this information in your marketing
Trigger sales consistently for yourself
If you’re wondering what to put on your homepage or updating your website copy, it’s critical to understand why your customer hits the buy button.
Before you even write a single word, you need answers to questions like:
–What’s the tipping point where your ideal client finally decides to buy?
–What leads up to the exact moment a customer commits to buying?
In this post, you’ll discover how to:
Identify the exact moment your customer decides to buy
Use this information in your marketing
Trigger sales consistently for yourself
Let’s get started with a specific example of what a sales trigger looks like in real time!
(And don’t worry if you’re not selling a product, I’ll show you how this works in other businesses, including mine.)
If you like this post, you might also like:
What specifically triggers your customer to buy something?
When a customer decides to buy from, it doesn’t happen suddenly.
There are other events that happen leading up to the moment they hand over the credit card.
Passive looking leads to discovering something you want - Event #1
Imagine this:
You've gone to the mall to grab some things from Target. On your way out, you pass by DSW (the shoe store).
There's a cute pair of pink wedges that catch your eye. They look comfy and they're neutral enough to go with everything.
But...
it's April in New York City.
Still too cold for wedges. You walk by.
Event #1 - You have a reason to buy, but can’t decide (behavior your competition often misses)
Fast forward a few weeks.
It's June. The trees are green again, the humidity's rising, and you can smell long summer days in the air.
It's a great time to get a new pair of shoes for the season. So the next time you're passing by DSW, you pop in to take a look at the selection.
The pink wedges are still there. You try them on. They are indeed as comfy as they look and go with everything.
But...
They're a little too nice just to wear to work and you can't think of anywhere else you'd wear them to right away. So you leave them there.
Event #2: The precise moment you decide to buy
Fast forward another few weeks.
It's July.
You realize you've got a week until you fly out to California for the wedding that's been on your calendar for months.
And you don't know what you're going to wear yet.
Rats!
(Why do you always leave these things until the last minute?!)
As you look through your closet, you can repurpose a work dress for the wedding...but you can't wear your chewed-up-by-NYC-concrete flats with it.
So you high-tail it back to DSW.
The pink wedges are still there, in your size. Thank God for small favors.
This time, you don't hesitate.
You pick them up and go straight to the counter.
You hand your credit card over to the cashier with confidence.
These are absolutely the right shoes to go with your dress for the wedding.
Shoe shopping = Success!
(Shoutout to the DSW at Atlantic Terminal mall in Brooklyn--and the pink wedges I bought there--for the story inspo.)
What’s happening here? What triggers your customer to buy?
We need to talk more about trigger events.
But first, let's back up a little bit.
The story above illustrates a concept called the "Jobs-to-be-Done timeline."
(Jobs-to-be-Done, or JTBD, refers to a group of concepts about why people buy. Because it delves into deeper reasons behind buyer psychology, it's THE most handy resource a business owner can have in their belt.
The Christensen Institute bases their entire approach on the Jobs-to-be-Done methodology. As mentioned in this article about their approach, “Everyone has jobs to be done.” )
The JTBD timeline looks like this:
Can you see how the story above maps onto the timeline?
The first scene describes passive looking. You're just becoming aware of the wedges and there's no real intent to buy yet.
The second scene is Event 1. There's a concrete reason to buy (it's summer) and you're actively looking at the wedges. But actively looking doesn't mean you're ready to hand over your credit card.
The “magical” sales trigger. The tipping point decision to buy happens HERE
The third scene is Event 2.
This is the tipping point.
The moment you realize you need the shoes.
The moment you commit to them in your mind--which is what makes you go out and fork over your cash for them.
My friend--we need to talk more about Event 2.
Because Event 2 here is the "trigger event" or the final push that makes someone buy.
If you can figure out Event 2, you can feature that trigger in your marketing knowing it resonates with potential buyers.
But, Mimi, exactly how do you find Event #2? (An example)
It's simple.
You ask the buyer.
(As David Ogilvy said, “Advertising people who ignore research are as dangerous as generals who ignore decodes of enemy signals.”)
For example, when you signed up for this newsletter, there was a one-question survey on the thank you page:
The basic question this survey asks is:
"What was going on in your life that brought you to sign up for [your product or service] today?"
(I credit my training from Copyhackers as the source of this question.)
You can ask it anywhere--after an opt-in, after someone hops on a sales call with you, after someone purchases from you.
This ONE question gives you insight into Event 2--because Event 2 has just happened for your prospect.
So, how do you use the answers to trigger more sales for yourself?
In this case, the most popular answer I have for sign-ups is this:
>> people are re-writing their website.
And they're doing that because there's a desire for sales from their website--or more sales from their website if it's doing OK already.
So I make sure to tie customer research back to sales, every time. I know you're not reading just for the sake of reading.
You’ll see this all throughout my website.
Here is my headline on my homepage, where I address your copy working for you to make sales:
You can see it here in my copy. I talk about every thought that flashes through your mind when your trigger event happens.
Using your website to sell using premium copy (as a “lever”, “shortcutting your sales cycle”)
Spending hours on copy (I say “making it to Friday night dinner” or “on another part of your business”)
Here is a bullet point on my homepage that addresses that you might be finding other options:
Sales are important!
Whatever your product or service's Event 2 is--keep it at the forefront of your marketing.
Build your sales trigger “muscle”
The anxieties of the new need to be neutralized before any purchase.
With your prospects, yes.
But look out for it in your own life too.
In fact, the more you identify trigger events in your own life, the better you get at spotting them for your prospects.
Every time you buy something, think about what happened right before.
When you're always looking out for Event 2, you train yourself to do the same kind of research that customer research requires.
It's like building muscles.
And more customer research muscles mean you'll get more customer insights that you can feature as client-attractive content in your marketing...which means more sales.
(See how I tied Event 2 to sales in the last two paragraphs? 👀)
If you’d like my research-driven,
conversion-focused eyes on your copy…
The easiest ways for us to get started are:
💥 The Small Start, Big Wins™ Copy Polish, where I optimize your webpages for sales
💥 The Quick Clicks Email Polish, where I optimize your emails for opens and engagements
💥 The Messaging Playbook, where I hone in on messaging that attracts the right clients
Here’s what clients have said about our work together in my Small Start, Big Win™ packages:
Questions? Want to chat?
