Journey of Buying is not Static
Most of the processes that we design are based on the assumption that the users, wherever and how far they are, would end up on our site and follow the entire process with results that are to our liking. By the time they visit for the second or the third instance, we start acting like carefree shopkeepers and expect them to provide us with details about themselves.
However, the steps that a user goes through before making a purchase are not static at all. The journey is built in such a way that the users almost always bounce between physical and digital channels and yet we expect them to pick up where they left off.
Let’s assume you have a real estate website and unless it has a search saving property, it always greets you with “What are you looking for?” So you perform the same search on the same device with the same parameters for your 2 days to 8 weeks journey of house hunting. If the site could greet you with “There are 43 new houses that fit your criteria!” instead of asking you what you would like for the umpteenth time, it would then be the kind of site that has gotten to know you, rather than a dementia-ridden online real-estate agent.
The same goes for job hunting. We are able to predict that if someone has performed a search with the keywords “UX Designer” won’t be performing another with the keywords “Mining Engineer” anytime soon. If you are able to provide your users with a “What happened while you were gone” type of feature, you will be able to smooth out the rather bumpy and not-static user journey. What’s even better is the fact that today’s marketing automation tools are very suitable for “if this, then that” type of scenarios.
Data Goes in, Ego Comes Out!
Where there is a lack of data and a battle of opinions, the ones to have the last word are usually the HIPPOs (Highest Paid Person’s Opinion). After the process of optimisation becomes a part of the product development in companies, the question “did we test this?” become the norm. So the process begins with data, but ends with egoism and “we’ll do it my way” type of approaches.
