How Online Buyer Behavior Has Changed in 2012

We observed some significant new buying behaviors at the end of 2011 that are set to continue in 2012, and will impact online and offline commerce. It’s a blend of: online, mobile, social, multi-channel, discount seeking, and connected customer behavior.

Sounds complicated.

To simplify, we’ve developed three customer  types (personas) based on the new behaviors:

• The Connected Customer
• The Discount Seeker
• The Social Butterfly

Each of these is a behavioral trend and not a unique segment of customers. The point here is that many customers will exhibit one or more of these three behavioral characteristics. For example, Connected Customers are inherently social, and Discount Seekers often use multiple devices to research purchases like Connected Customers will.

Identifying these personas is useful because it allows us to think about the marketing tactics we should be deploying to address evolving buyer behavior.

Below is a Prezi (a dynamic infographic) highlighting each of the above personas, their characteristics and what ecommerce teams should be thinking about in relation to each group. If you’ve not used Prezi before, it’s a really cool interactive tool. Start by clicking the grey arrow at the bottom.

If you’d like to learn more about these three behavior types, watch this recording of a Conversion Academy webcast recorded 10 days ago. It’s about 30 minutes of presentation followed by Q&A:

Let us know what you think about these personas and what you’re seeing in your ecommerce world! Are there any other new behaviors that you’ve spotted? Which one of these personas is most like you?