A popular study by Mckenzie classifys Internet surfers into 6 categories. Its essential for all emarketers to understand them before initiating any efforts on marketing. 1) Simplifiers “End-to-End†Convenience seeking people. They spend on an average 7 hours per month but have the longest tenure online(49% have been online for over 5 years). Therefore if an internet marketer wants to have sustained sales from this segment, they must provide end-to-end convenience such as ease of access, availability of information etc. 2) Surfers Logs in with a specific purpose in mind- buying gifts for example. According to the study, they constitute 8% of the active user population but account for 32% of the online time.To attract and keep Surfers, a site needs cutting-edge design and features, constant updates, a strong online brand, and an assortment of products and services. 3) Connectors As the name implies,they use the internet to connect with people through different means like email, chat etc. Although Connectors account for 36% of the active user population, 40% of them have been online less than two years, and just 42% have made purchases online (versus an average of 61%). Connectors may count on offline brands they trust to lead them to appealing content and hence Companies with strong offline presences will have the advantage in reaching these beginners. 4) Bargainers These people are driven by quest for deals. 52% of eBay visitors is constituted by this category. To extract sales from this segment, the site must not only appeal to them on rational level but also on emotional level, satisfying their need for competitive pricing, the excitement of the “search,†and the desire for community. 5) Routiners They primarily go to internet for information. As the name implies these folks are routine visitors who are suckers for news. These people visit fewer domains but spend almost twice the time per page than others do. Routiners want superior content and the sense they are getting “something special.†6) Sportsters Uses internet mainly for sports and entertainment related information. They spend on an average of 7.1 hours( versus 9.8 average). The challenge for companies is to turn this use into revenue, usually by moving visitors from “free†content to a paid subscription.As it is clear from the study that each consumer has different needs and usage pattern thereby giving rise to a different behavior. And therefore the knowledge of these behaviors provide an advantage to online marketers to target their customers in a much better optimized manner. Source - My own blog - http://FlyOnI.com
Great post, and it's very interesting to know about the categories, in order to get more sales and how to understand what people are doing online. I think I can fit in all the categories It's very hard to fit into one of the categories, and I agree it should be a category for webmasters - Jens
Pretty interesting. But the desire to segment audiences into nice little labels often leads to people targeting the wrong people. At some point or another, most of us will cross over into any of those groups, so labels like those are largely irrelevant.
Its precisely the opposite, i would say. Not knowing your customer's inherent nature,habits (does not necessarily be this classification terms,but broad idea remains the same) leads to people targeting the wrong people.
You left out the "webmaster" category: Webmaster: Spends a minimum of 10 hours daily on the internet. May edit Wikipedia obsessively, engage in massive blogging, and have more friends on forums than in real life. Having the longest tenure, they have been using the internet for 7+ years. Many of them are from Pacific Rim countries.