PlusOne - Musings of a marketer » What is buyer remorse and seven ways to turn it your advantage

There is an interesting psycholgical event that takes place when many people make a sale. This event is often linked to when that person has bought something that is expensive, difficult to research, quickly outdated, or that they perhaps donâ€™t truly need. The feeling they have can range from a twinge of regret or doubt about your decision to a full blown anxienty attack that can cause ongoing self doubt on aspects like “did I really get the best deal? Was this the correct product for me? Will I need to buy the new model soon? Could I have done without this?and total lack of purchase satisfaction.

These weird psychological event is called buyerâ€™s remorse.

Traditionally it was most commonly cited in literature is relation to large purchases, such as cars and houses. It has even been applied to getting married!!

With changes in technology however, the range of situations where buyer remorse is felt is now much more likely to affect more and more people. This is because many purchases made today are subject to being out of date or supersceded by a better model almost as soon as you unwrap it.

Think about it - you most recent computer purchase most likely came with a tinge of anxiety about the choice of hard drive size or processor speed or RAM. “Should I have gone to the next model up?”

The same applies to almost any electronic purchase, or in the case of the internet, any purchase at all.

Over at Marketing Magic, there are examples of steps taken by auto dealers to overcome car buyers remorse (too good to be true - teaching you to drive a manual car just because you bought one!).

But what about your web site?

All too often websites are lonely experiences of a customer, generally sitting alone, dealing with a computer based database. Sure database driven websites are a great way of organising information, but all through the process it is devoid of humanity - right the way through to perhaps the autoreply message you get when you have made the purchase.

Think about that human being, feeling alone (even if there are others in the vicinity), making what for many is still an unfamiliar and potentially stressful process.

Buyer remorse associated with online purchases is further exacerbated buy the interval between purchase and delivery. There can be several days of emotion till the purchase arrives. Once it has arrived, the period of putting expectaion of the product’s performance to the test begins. This means the period of buyer remorse can be significantly extended.

This is a serious aspect for website owners selling online. It is important to take steps that help reduce buyer anxiety, and in the process provide an opportunity to build customer relationships that will bring customers back again and again.

Seven tips to reduce buyer remorse and build customer relationships

1. Talk TO the customer in product descriptions. Remember, describing the product should not be restricted to the product itself but should also include words on what the product will do for the customer - make them feel better, work more efficiently, make them the envy of their friends etc.

2. Reassure even before the sale is finalised. All through the checkout, provide reassurance that they are at the right step, that their CC details will be safe, that vthey can easily contact you to have questions answered.

3. Don’t rely on auto replies to customers when they place an order. Make a personal reply, even if this cannot be done straight away either instead of, or in addition to an auto reply.

4. In your first post-purchase response, reconfirm their purchase decision. People like to be assured that they have made a good choice of a popular product (unless it is a custom or unique product!). Take the opportunity to reassure them that the product will meet their needs, and if it does not you have your returns waranty if the product proves to be defective (or if you have a 100% guarantee of satisfaction).

5. Advise the customer on shipping. From experience I know that as a customer I really appreciate receiving an email that says ‘your product is on its way‘ - and if possible a tracking number as well. It adds some excitement and expectation which provides a feeling of euphoria. So tell your customers when the product shipped, and if possible provide a tracking number.

6. Followup a week or so after the product has been delivered. Reconfirm that they have made a good choice and that you have received positive feedback from others who have bought the product. You may even wish to prompt for some feedback or product review.

7. Take the opportunity to mention that you sell allied products. If your cart system allows it, offer them a ‘repeat customer discount’ code. This is a clear demonstration that their decision to purchase from you was the right choice! We offer periodic customer dicounts through our Caricature King website.

Customer remorse is a real emotion. By meeting consumer doubts proactively is another way to differentiate your website (or bricks and mortar business by doing similar things) from your competitors.

Remember, it is humans we are dealing with, not order numbers or email addresses on our databases.

Have you had a great experience with an online (or offline) business? Share it via comments!