The Marketer's Handbook: Reassessing Marketing Techniques for Modern Business

POST PURCHASE DISTRESS

Application: Marketing Communication, Sales Methods

The Concept

If the purchase of any item is emotionally challenging or if it is expensive, buyers experience post purchase distress. This is worry or anxiety caused by the purchase. However, it can be allayed by the buyer admiring the product or showing it to others. Some buyers of new cars, for example, return to the showroom to collect the brochure of the car they bought. It is also helped by good quality collateral. So, marketers should think through the moments of anxiety that their customer might experience and create physical devices to allay this discomfort. A marketing manager anticipates and obviates such concern.

It also occurs in business-to-business markets. Business buyers may be concerned about the effect of a purchase on their budgets, the effort to justify the item to others, damage to their credibility, or risk to their political capital. If this anxiety is not managed, then problems occur. It can cause them to re-examine the deal and query value. The “tombstones” routinely created after mergers or acquisitions epitomize the achievement of a well completed, possibly worrisome project. They are a tangible embodiment of “post purchase distress”.

History, Context, Criticism, and Development

It is hard to find any substantial theory or marketing programmes around this concept prior to the mid 20th ...