You will apply the buying stages and risks to a real decision of your own so the model sticks.
You have spent three lessons looking at buyers from the outside. This exercise turns the model on you, because you are the one buyer whose thoughts you can see in full. You remember the evening you got fed up, the forum thread you read on the train, and the salesperson who nearly lost you. Mapping that decision honestly takes about twenty minutes and will teach you more about your own buyers than any sales script.
You need a pen, the one-page buying map template below this lesson, and a purchase you can remember in some detail.
Choose something that cost more than S$200 and that you thought about for at least a week. Below that price, or with a quicker decision, there is not enough process to map. People often pick a laptop, a mattress, a course, a phone plan, a gym membership, an aircon replacement or a holiday package.
It helps if a seller was involved somewhere, even briefly, but it is not essential. A purchase made entirely online still has all five stages from lesson 1.2.
Work through the stages in order and write one or two lines for each.
When did you first notice the problem, and what triggered it? Try to name the day or the event. Where did you research: search, reviews, YouTube, a group chat, an AI assistant, a friend? What did you compare, and what was on the shortlist? What finally made you act, and was it the product, a deadline, a price change or something someone said? After you paid, what did you do to reassure yourself that it was the right call?
Be specific about time. Most people are surprised by how long the noticing stage lasted compared with the few days of comparing.
Write down every seller you dealt with, in a shop, on the phone, on chat or by email. For each one, note what they did that helped and what put you off. Be concrete. "Friendly" tells you nothing you can copy, while "asked how I'd use it before showing me anything" is a habit you can practise.
If no seller was involved at all, write down why. Sometimes the answer is that nobody gave you a reason to talk to them, which is a lesson in itself.
Almost every purchase has one point where you nearly walked away. Find it. What were you worried about, and which of the four risks from lesson 1.3 was it: paying too much, choosing wrongly, looking foolish or the effort of switching? Then note what resolved it. Your own buyers will reach the same moment, and what got you past it is a clue to what will get them past it.
Here is how one map looked. Daniel, 31, works in operations and lives in a resale flat in Clementi. He bought a mattress for S$1,400 (an example figure).
Noticing: he woke up with a stiff back most mornings for about three months before he connected it to the eight-year-old mattress. The trigger was a weekend away where he slept well on a hotel bed. Researching: two evenings on forum threads and review videos, plus a message to his sister, who had bought one the year before. He learned the words firm, medium and pocket spring. Comparing: two showrooms and one online-only brand that offered a long home trial. His budget was S$1,000 and all three were above it. Deciding: he bought the online one. The trial period and free collection if he returned it made the higher price feel safe. Justifying: he told two friends about it within a month and sent his sister a photo.
The sellers: the first showroom assistant opened with an offer that was "only valid today", which made Daniel leave within five minutes. The second asked how he slept and which side he lay on, then let him lie on two models for ten minutes without talking. Daniel nearly bought from her and still mentions her when friends ask.
The moment of doubt came at checkout. He was S$400 over budget and unsure about firmness, which is the risk of choosing wrongly. The written return policy resolved it.
Daniel's two lessons for his own work: pressure to decide today made him leave, and a way to undo the decision made him buy.
When you finish your own map, read it back and look for the gaps between what you needed and what sellers offered. The most common one is a seller pitching hard while you were still researching. The second is a seller who never asked what you were trying to fix.
Keep the map somewhere you can find it. In module 4 you will turn your own buyers' problems into value statements, and having felt the doubt yourself makes that much easier. Now open the template and fill it in for your purchase while the details are fresh.
Fill in the one-page buying map template for your purchase and write two lessons from it that you will use with your own buyers.
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