I Just Lived The Customer Purchase Life Cycle!
I Just Bought A Product Online!
No, It wasn't my first one. Wasn't even my second one. I've bought lots of things online over the years, like most of us have. I've even written a post or two about it since I joined WA.
This time was no different, except that this time I actually thought about what I did afterwards, in terms of the customer life cycle that Kyle teaches us about.
Here's The Backstory:A couple of weeks ago, our laptop computer bit the dust. It was living a rickety existence anyway, because one of my granddaughters accidentally dropped it about a year ago and messed up the top right corner of the screen. It was a pretty large section, about a fifth of the whole screen, but the rest of the screen was fine and so was the rest of the machine.
It was a pain in the a** to use, but we still had the desktop computer, which is a top-of-the line iMac, or it was 3 or 4 years ago when we bought it. It's still working great.
The laptop was a Macbook Pro and was newer than the desktop. Not a cheap machine. We took it to Best Buy, but the Geeks told us that it would cost more to fix than to buy a new one.
Sigh.
Well, we got along pretty well without it until recently. What happened recently to change things is that my wife got interested in Family History, and she can spend hours online doing research. That cuts into my time working on my WA business.
So, a couple of weeks ago, I decided it was time to replace the broken laptop.
First, I Had To Do Some Research.
What to buy? I wanted another Apple product, but they aren't cheap. I didn't have the budget for a new one, but there were refurbished machines available. I started by looking at them.
Most of the refurbished Macbooks in my range ($300-400) were of the 2009 vintage, or thereabouts. They had upgrades and such, and I'm sure they're good machines, but I was turned off by the possibility of cracks, scratches, and dents.
I shouldn't have been influenced by cosmetic things but I was.
A couple of days later I checked to see if there were even any decent new laptops in the price range I wanted. There turned out to be dozens.
Second, I Had To Decide To Buy
I still hadn't decided to buy, but over the last weekend Cathy (the wife) and I went out of town for an early anniversary trip and I broached the subject of a new laptop with her, and she was supportive. I decided to go for it when I got back home.
The buying decision was made, but WHICH machine in my price range should I get? Just what did I want? And, who did I want to buy it from? It was going to be an online purchase for sure, because I wanted to use PayPal for payment.
Time to refine my research.
HP, Dell, ASUS, Lenovo, Acer, those were some of the brands I looked at.
Regular laptop? Chromebook?
What size screen? 15.5 inches? Smaller? I decided to go with the bigger size because I'm an old coot and my eyes aren't what they used to be.
How much RAM? What size hard drive? HDD or SSD? Lots of choices.
Finally, after going back and forth, reading reviews and blogs about the "Top Ten Laptops under $400," I narrowed my choice down to 4; a Dell, an Acer, A Lenovo, and an ASUS. Sorry, HP.
Now, there's nothing wrong with HP computers, and there were some really good ones that I looked at, especially with touch screens, but I ended up going a different way.
Finally, late last night I realized that I was going back and forth looking at specs and such and not really learning anything new. It was time to pick one.
So I did. I ordered it right then and there. From Newegg.
I bought an ASUS. I can't wait for it to get here so I can check it out and start using it.
One thing for sure, my grandkids don't get to use it for at least a year.
My customer purchase life cycle ended up with me making a purchase. I was influenced by the reviews I read, and by the posts. I'm not enough of a geek to know which processor is better and which isn't as good.
Quad core processors sounded good, and I do know that more RAM and a good sized hard drive are important too, although the memory storage isn't so critical now that we have the cloud.
I hope I didn't bore you guys. The next time you buy online, think back about the process you went through. I bet it'll fit the cycle Kyle teaches.
What's your opinion?
Have a great one!
I'm Grant.
Recent Comments
10
Great personal lesson learnt and now it will stick the next time you do a review!
By the way, there are two different storage places - I use that as that is what you used.
1/ Hard Disk drive storage space
2/ Memory storage space
The first is WHAT you put on the hard drive.
The second is HOW fast the hard drive and processing units are driven by the quantity of memory in the computer.
Hope that helps to clear up a few things.
Thanks. I knew that. What got me thinking was how much hard drive space t needed since I could store most of, if not all, of my data online. I also wondered if a 128GB SSD would be enough, or if I should go with a 1TB HDD. I went with the bigger drive. I guess that for around $350 total price I can get another one in a couple of years if I want.
Speed is 2.7GH and 4GB RAM. That should work for WA. I’m not a gamer so I don’t think I need more power than that.
The Internet is open to everyone. When we don't have a neighbor, a friend who is knowledgeable about what we need we just open our computer and search. The opinions and ideas of whom we read are just like a friend talking and suggesting to us about that certain thing.
That’s true. There’s so much info and data available online that you can’t go through it all when doing research. Just be careful to sift the true from the not-so-true. There’s a lot of opinion out there and some of it’s mine. Cone to think of it, isn’t that what a review is? Someone’s opinion?
I agree there are misleading opinions so we have to be careful. However, expressed experiences are valid if it is an honest one.
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Excellent way you demonstrate the customer purchase life cycle through your own experience, it will help many people to grasp this important concept. Thanks Grant!
And thank you for commenting. I appreciate it.