Saqib Siddik

Today in class, I lectured on the four stages of consumer behavior that are necessary to understand if you want to craft effective advertising. The four stages are:

1. Pre-contemplation: This is where the consumer doesn’t even know your product exists. This challenge is faced by all new companies and products.
2. Contemplation: Here, the consumer knows about your product, what its benefits are, and is thinking about buying.
3. Action: The consumer buys your product. This is the major goal for all advertisers.
4. Maintenance: The consumer keeps buying new iterations of your product (ie. software upgrades, new models, etc)

Now think about how this applies to you if you are, for example, searching for a job. The consumer is your potential employer, and YOU ARE THE PRODUCT. If you are new to the market, then the employer has no idea who you are and likely won’t give you much consideration. Therefore, you have to work really hard to get on the radar (ie. Stage 2). This would involve various techniques such as referrals, cold calls, letters, resumes, emails, etc. You also MUST have a professionally designed website if you want to be taken seriously, because employers WILL search for you online.

At this point, if you’ve done everything you are supposed to do, the potential employer will be fully aware of who you are and what you can do for him. All he has to do now is take Action and hire you. Now he has bought your product – YOU. And if your contract keeps getting renewed and your salary keeps increasing as time goes on, you can bask in the glory of Stage 4.

Thinking of yourself as a product can be an effective way to take stressful emotions out of the job hunting process.