How to Create Content for Every Stage of the Buyer’s Journey

Want a robust content strategy that addresses the needs of your entire audience, from their initial contact up to the point where they’re ready to make a purchase decision? Then you need to create content strategy that addresses every stage of the buyer’s journey.

So let’s look at the buyer’s journey and see how you can craft content that speaks to your audience’s needs at each stage of this process.

But first…

What is the Buyer’s Journey?

The buyer’s journey, sometimes referred to as the purchase journey, is the process that your audience goes through from their initial contact with your brand to the time when they actually purchase your product or service.

This process has three unique stages:

The Awareness Stage
The Consideration Stage
The Decision Stage

Let’s take each stage of this journey one by one…

Awareness Stage - At this stage, buyers are aware that they have a problem and are doing research to learn more about it and see if there even is a solution. During this process, they’re seeking general information.

Consideration Stage - At this stage, buyers are adding to their initial research by looking at specific solutions. They’re looking at various products and services from a wide range of companies and investigating the advantages and disadvantages of each one.

Decision Stage - At this stage, buyers have a particular product or service in mind and are ready to make a decision. This is the stage where they want to get into the weeds in order to make a decision for or against your company. To do this, they’ll look at reviews, testimonials, and videos on how your product works.

These stages are often illustrated with a funnel – at the top, where you see the widest part, you have the greatest number of people who are at the awareness stage of the buyer’s journey.

The funnel then narrows as the number of people who are ready for the consideration stage dwindles. This is completely natural. After all, some of those in the awareness stage will decide against seeking a solution, while others may continue to the next stage with your competitors.

And finally, there’s the decision stage, the narrowest part of the funnel. It’s narrow because the amount of people who get to this stage are small in number. But they make up for it with their eagerness to buy and their potential loyalty to your brand.

B2B vs. B2C

Of course, this buyer’s journey is going to be different from B2B to B2C brands. Even within B2B or B2C, it may look different depending whether you have a product, service, or a subscription model.

What’s the basic difference between these two?

B2B brands notoriously have a longer buyer’s journey – which makes sense, since their products are often more complex and come with a higher price tag.

For B2C brands, on the other hand, the process is usually much shorter and dependent on emotion. Think make-up, skincare, video games, or furniture.

But, for both sides of this process, every part of your buyer’s journey is valuable – even the initial phase, when buyers are just doing research.

But how do you create content that fits the needs of each of these stages? Let’s look at what you should consider at every stage of the buyer’s journey and what content works best in each one.

How to Create a Content Strategy That Addresses Every Segment of the Buyer’s Journey

Awareness Stage Content

At this stage, you want to focus on educating your audience. Think about their pain points – what is leading them to seek a solution? Are they frustrated? Are they logical or is there some emotion behind their inquiries? What do they most likely know about their problem – and what don’t they know that may help them?

Let’s go with an example of a B2C beauty brand. Perhaps they are looking for a solution to their dry skin. You’ll probably create content that answers their initial question – why does dry skin happen? What factors worsen dry skin? Which ingredients are best for dry skin and why?

The best content for this stage will include:

Blogs
Articles
Infographics
Simple videos

Remember, while this content is helping to move a prospect through the buyer’s journey, it’s also serving another important purpose. It’s establishing your brand as an expert in the industry – every content is showcasing your knowledge and expertise. Plus, if you do it right, prospects will be drawn to the tone of your content.

Consideration Stage Content

Remember, at this stage, your audience is still gathering information – but it’s more specific information. They want to know about your various products, services, and what makes you different from other brands.

They’re basically comparison shopping.

Let’s take the example of a home security company. Prospects have already done their initial research about what security issues exist and they know they want a comprehensive system to protect their house and family members.

During the consideration stage, they want to learn about your specific products – what makes one different from another, what all the individual features mean, and how

The best content for this stage will be…

Product pages and descriptions
Competitor comparisons
Research papers with relevant statistics
Articles and blogs about specific features

Decision Stage Content

At this stage, your audience is ready to make a purchase – woohoo!

But don’t celebrate just yet. There are plenty of things that can go wrong at this stage. So you want to make sure there are no holes in your strategy. Check your strategy for missing content,, hard-to-find content, or a lack of information.

For this stage, let’s use the example of a B2B accounting software. At this stage, buyers want to see evidence that your brand is trustworthy and your product is sound – after all, they’re not just spending a butt-load of money. They’re also going to be relying on your software throughout the year for various crucial tasks.

The best content for this stage will be…

Product reviews
Testimonials
Case studies
Long-form guides
Frequently-asked questions
Videos that show how to use the product/service

And don’t forget that as part of this stage, you want to create a frictionless buying experience. This process might include talking to someone on your sales team, downloading a product, or signing up for a subscription. Whatever process you choose, you want to create a blueprint that moves them along at a steady clip without overwhelming them.

Concluding Thoughts on Your Buyer’s Journey & Content Strategy

Whether you’re in the B2B or B2C space, I have no doubt that you have a killer product. But if you don’t give attention to the needs of your audience at every stage of the buyer’s journey, you risk them jumping out of your funnel and into someone else’s – eek!

I hope this article has helped you to create a better and more solid content strategy that drives success in all segments of your audience.

Can’t wait to see the content you create!

You May Also Enjoy Reading…