How much time do you need to make a good purchasing decision?

Many of us know what it is like to want and aspire to the latest product or gadget because we think it looks cool and stylish and because it is the latest ‘in’ thing to buy, but how far do we weigh up how usable it is or how well it fits in with our intuition and schema. It goes without saying that all products involve an element of learning and the subsequent development of new schema. However, in the time it takes to make a purchasing decision, how likely are we to identify the potential issues that could arise and evaluate whether or not we can overcome them? We may purchase something because we fall in love with it but our feelings can soon turn to hate if it subsequently falls short of our expectations.

Some mobile phone providers try to accommodate the shortfall between purchasing with the heart as opposed to purchasing with the head, giving us time to decide whether or not we want to keep a handset. A weeks grace allows us to use the phone in different contexts; to assess its functionality and ease of use; and ultimately, to decide whether or not it compliments the way we think and act. Yet for the most part, we are not given the time to base our purchasing decisions on our own experiences and so are more likely to base them on things such as initial impression, kudos, hearsay, recommendation and pure gut feeling.

I will use the example of one of our most expensive purchases i.e. a car. Our experience of using and interacting with a new car mainly consists of a test drive together with sitting inside it in the showroom. We don’t usually get to take it away and use it in our own environments and contexts before deciding whether or not we want to keep it.

This concept was brought to the forefront of my mind by a recent trip to the States when I was given the opportunity to drive a Hummer. Although it is a big car, it was surprisingly compact inside and I had no quibbles jumping into the driving seat. I was initially confused by the location and operation of some of the controls such as the automatic gear shift, but such obstacles were quickly overcome and I learnt and developed new schema with subsequent use.

There were some major issues however, that I would have been unlikely to have foreseen but after experiencing them, I knew they would not get better in time:
• I didn’t feel comfortable reversing the car due to its limited rear view.
• It was virtually impossible for me to put a ticket into a parking machine due to the cars height off the ground.
• I was constantly confused when releasing the hand brake as a similar lever was located in the same area. The other lever popped the bonnet and you can probably guess what I kept doing! I got sick and tired in the end of having to get out of the car to slam the bonnet shut and of feeling like an idiot.

I acknowledge that I would have had similar difficulties getting used to any new car. However, it only became apparent to me after parking the car, driving it in the dark, operating ticket machines and consistently popping the bonnet, that I decided that this would not be the car for me.

This left me thinking about the long term factors that should be considered whilst investigating users’ behaviour when purchasing new products:
• The necessity to track and measure ‘learnability’ and understand whether it overrides initial impressions and goes on to influence purchasing decisions.
• The lengths users will go to overcome problems and learn to use a new product.
• Whether the consumer is interested in contemplating how and where they would be using a product and what would prompt them to do this.

Originally written by Amanda Roach