Final Customer Purchasing from an Intermediary of the Product

Acquire Steps: Acquire steps include all activities the customer completes preceding the purchase of the product. These steps include the customer's efforts needed to identify and evaluate Intermediaries and travel to the Intermediary location.

B.
Resources: Reduce resources required for the use of the product

2.
Time: Reduce the time the customer must spend with the product

A. Reduce steps the customer must use with the product.

Reduce customer steps in the product process

Complete some of customer's steps with the product

No. Year SIC Note
1 1986 2086 Margins on retail water sales about the same as on other beverages – less than 5%. But home and office delivery, which accounts for more than 80% of the water business, allows sellers to tack on $15 to $30 in monthly charges for dispensing machines.
2 2005 4141 Chinese bus lines have Web sites modeled after Expedia that offer tickets for several carriers, and sells no more than the empty seats left in inventory.
3 2002 4800 Microsoft is launching a new advertising campaign to persuade America Online customers to switch to their Internet service, Microsoft Network. It is touting a new service that makes it easier to switch over a customer's address book and calendar, once AOL is cancelled.
4 2001 5731 Large high end electronics retailer chains are beginning to offer home installations for their goods, a practice previously only done by smaller stores.
5 2004 5900 For online retailers, for every dollar spent in electronic stores, $4.10 is left in abandoned shopping carts, orders not completed to checkout for one reason or another. To reduce possible wasted sales, some electronic-commerce website are rolling out new software that streamlines and speeds up the checkout process.
6 2003 5999 While Amazon does well with their support of internet retail sites for major brands like Lands' End and Target, they face competition for independent sellers. Ebay can keep costs low and profits high because it doesn't handle the goods. New programs are being developed by Google and Microsoft to connect merchants and shoppers.

<< Return to Acquire Steps