Harris Unveils 'Pathways to Purchase'

In the UK, Harris Interactive has launched a new approach to analysing the way people make purchase decisions across a wide range of products and service categories.

The firm's new 'Pathways to Purchase' defines the series of steps taken by a purchaser; from the moment they first consider an idea, to the final moment when they make a decision to buy.

These steps comprise touchpoints - such as speaking to advisors or searching for information - and can begin with a consumer spending time and effort exploring options, or with knowing from the outset exactly what brand, product or service they intend to buy.

Harris has identified six 'pathways', each exploring a person's overall strategy, their feelings about the process, the steps they took along the way, and their satisfaction with the result. The approach has been developed using a combination of qual depth interviews and feedback from a large scale quant study covering 20 categories and 6,700 purchase decisions.

'The Pathway to Purchase framework provides our clients with the insight into their target audience that is crucial for effective marketing,' states Kevin Ford, Global Co-Director, Brands and Communications Consulting.

'If you know how your potential customers approach the challenge of making a purchase decision, then you can gear your marketing activity accordingly.'

Web site: www.harrisinteractive.com .