Author Bio: Callum is the head of marketing at Warble Media. They are a boutique website design agency in Dubbo, NSW, Australia. He is passionate about helping local small businesses achieve success with their marketing.

In the first part of this blog, I talked about the history of the AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire and Action) customer journey model, its highlights and its current limitations as applied to the modern buyer. Now, much like its predecessor, the CDJ (customer decision journey) model also consists of four stages, but, as you will notice below, these stages are highly relevant to the buying behaviour of contemporary consumers – something that could not be said about AIDA.

The four stages are:

• Consider

In this stage, a consumer takes into consideration a selection of brands and/ or products. Usually, the journey begins when the customer is introduced to a particular product through a peer. If the customer decides that this product might solve an existing pain point or uncovers a pain point that he or she was not aware of before, the customer goes online to search more about this product.

In this quest for the product’s specs and relevant testimonials, the consumer finds other, similar products.

So, the modern marketing funnel starts with one product, and then it widens as the consumer gathers more information and starts taking other products into consideration as well.

If you are someone who has used AIDA before, you would probably find the ‘consider’ phase to be a combination between the ‘awareness’ and ‘interest’ phases of the AIDA model.

• Evaluate

After creating a pool of possible products of interest, the next stage is understanding which product best fits one’s needs. To do this, the customer uses a couple of evaluation criteria.

First, the customer will typically compare the specs of the product models he or she is considering and makes a rough selection based on the perceived price-to-value ratio.

Then, the customer takes a step further and researches user reviews and testimonials. Even the best specs mean nothing if the customer is not reassured by a positive review of someone who has already used the product.

Another usual situation is for the customer to go to a physical store that sells the products and ask the sellers for advice.

• Purchase

After weighing their options, people can purchase the product online or in a physical store.

Brands secure the sale through various means, usually sending abandoned cart emails to people who left items in the cart and did not go through with the purchase or show targeted ads to people who were previously researching a particular product.

Today’s technology makes it easy to analyse customer behaviour and use the findings to develop more compelling offers.

• Advocate

So far, the first three stages of the CDJ model were similar to the AIDA model, the most significant difference being the fact that the modern marketing funnel widens as it gets to the middle of the customer journey. The last stage of the CDJ model, however, is something that the AIDA model does not take into consideration: what happens after the customer purchases the product.

You might be wondering: why do we talk about what happens after the purchase, when the customer journey ends when the customer buys the product, right?

Wrong.

Modern buyers continue researching the product long after the purchase, to assure themselves that they have made the right decision and to leave reviews of their experience. So, it is in this stage that companies should make an effort and turn customers into their brand’s advocates.

How does a company turn a one-time buyer into a raving fan?

Simple: by offering first-class customer service and support.

How to Capitalize on the CDJ Model?

If there is one thing you should take away from the above, it is that the CDJ model is highly customer-centric, so it varies depending on the industry and the type of customer. So, to build a successful marketing funnel, companies need to research the market and understand their customers.

That said, there are a couple of things you could do to ensure that your offers appeal more to modern consumers.

Relocate Your Investments

It is typical to see that companies that are still hung up on the traditional funnel tend to invest heavily into the ‘Consideration and ‘Buy’ phases.

The problem with this is the fact that not many consumers will buy, or even consider a product, just because they saw a banner ad. Usually, it is word of mouth marketing that sparks up the customer interest.

With that in mind, we can argue that it is the ‘Evaluation’ stage and the ‘Advocate’ stage that provide the biggest marketing opportunities to companies. This is the part of the funnel where consumers actively engage with your brand.

And when someone engages with you, what do you do? Make effort to respond to your customers and nurture and grow your relationship, of course!

Note: Do not confuse the ads we just spoke about with remarketing and abandoned cart emails. Remarketing usually sits further down the marketing funnel, and it is a powerful way to further fuel the customer’s interest in a product.

Gather Social Proof

No one believes companies more than they believe other people. Your ads will never be as powerful as customer reviews and testimonials.

Most people read user reviews before making the decision to purchase a product, as reviews make it easier to compare and evaluate their shortlist of products. Reviews can be found everywhere: be it on comparison sites, personal review vlogs, the Amazon review section and so on.

To make the most out of this typical buying behaviour, companies should invest heavily in setting up a process to entice customers to leave reviews. Of course, there will be a negative comment here and there (you can’t escape haters) so use social monitoring tools to always keep on top of unsatisfied users that decided to spread the word about their negative experience.

Pick a couple of great reviews and add them to your site, or even create ads around them.

Look Where No One Else is Looking

Most companies believe that their marketing efforts end once the purchase has been made. As we already mentioned before, this couldn’t be further from the truth.

After purchasing a product, users will likely spend some time around the site, trying to figure out the product’s features and comparing it to other products. This is when you get the opportunity to provide great customer support and unparalleled service.

Great products are everywhere. But great service is rare.

Make this your point of difference and use it to drive a competitive edge. Invest in developing a chatbot or improve support chats, create support articles, add a FAQ… the opportunities are endless. The most important thing is to show your customer that you care about them even after they have already given you their money.

This way, you will build customer loyalty, turn your one-time buyers into repeat customers, and set the scene for powerful word of mouth marketing that will take your brand to a whole new level.