Consumer journeys: developing consumer-based strategy

Excerpt

Consumers undertake many journeys in pursuit of large and small life goals and in response to various opportunities, obstacles, and challenges. Consumer journeys may anticipate consumption experiences, such as when consumers take steps to choose products, brands, or technologies, engage in online or offline retail experiences, and use products and services. However, consumers take other journeys that don’t have consumption as their goal but nonetheless implicate brands, technologies, products, and services. For example, a cancer patient and family members undertake a traumatic emotional journey that involves a complex network of heath care brands, technologies, and services as patients and their families move from diagnosis, through treatment, to recovery, remission, or end-of-life care (Berry et al. 2015). An Uber driver may use his Toyota not only to take his own journeys but also to earn money by taking other people where they need to go. During some parts of these journeys, the consumer role may not be as prominent as other roles such as patient or producer or person. …