According to a recent piece in the Wall Street Journal, one of the most neglected trends out there is around information-based shopping and purchasing – giving rise to the Info Shopper.

They are suspicious of advertising and search online for virtually everything to get the information they need. 92% of the people surveyed said that they have more confidence in the information they found this way then being spoon fed it. Even for products like vacuum cleaner, 58% of people said they would research it online first and are asking questions such as “how much does this hold before empyting it?” or “is this light enough for someone small to carry it up the stairs?” 70% say they consult reviews and ratings before making any buying decisions.

Looking at this data, you can see that brands and websites need to think of different ways to get people the information and the confidence they need to make their own buying decisions. The WSJ goes on to say that information aggregation sites will become increasingly more important and especially so for helping weave the story and fit into the customer buying decision process.

This is a huge shift going on… think where it could lead!