Who's actually ready to buy (and how to tell)

Your website gets traffic. Good traffic, even. But 98% of it is window-shopping — researching, comparing, killing time. The remaining 2% are ready to buy. Your entire job is finding those 2% and closing them before they leave the page.

Here's how to spot them.

What "buyer intent" actually means

Buyer intent signals are behaviours that separate the merely curious from the actually ready. Think of it like this: a dozen people browse the menu. One asks the waiter what the chef recommends. That one is hungry.

Signals to watch for:

• Visited your pricing page (they want to know cost)
• Came back to your site 3+ times (you're on the shortlist)
• Spent 3+ minutes reading (genuine interest)
• Viewed a case study (they want proof)
• Started filling out a form (even if they didn't finish)
• Clicked "contact" (the tell)
• Watched a full product demo (deeper interest)
• Searched "your brand + review" (comparing you)

Why most Newcastle businesses miss the buyers

Here's the typical story. Someone reads your pricing page for 4 minutes. They leave. You never knew they visited. They Google a competitor, get a call within an hour, sign up. You lost a sale you didn't even know was on the table.

Or worse: they fill out your contact form. You reply 48 hours later. By then they've already signed with someone else. Their intent was real. Your speed was not.

The free tools you already have

Google Analytics

Check which pages have the longest time-on-page. The pricing page staying visitors is your highest-intent traffic. Track it.

Google Search Console

Which queries bring people to your site? "Your brand + pricing" = high intent. "Your brand + reviews" = comparison shopping. "Your brand + alternative" = about to leave you for someone else.

Email tracking

Who's opening every email? Who's clicking the pricing link? That's your warm list. Those are the people who should get a direct outreach.

Form abandonment

Someone clicked your contact form but didn't submit. Why? Was it too long? Too many fields? Is there friction? Fix the form, capture the lead.

Heatmaps (Hotjar, Microsoft Clarity)

Free or cheap. Shows you exactly where people click, scroll, and get stuck. You'll find bugs and intent patterns you didn't know existed.

Acting on intent signals

Signal: Someone reads your pricing page and leaves.

Move: Retarget them on Meta with a "Still thinking it over?" ad for 7 days.

Signal: Someone visits 3+ times in a week.

Move: If they're on your email list, trigger a "We noticed you're interested" sequence.

Signal: Someone starts filling the contact form but stops.

Move: Ship a simpler form. Two fields: email, quick message. Friction kills conversion.

Signal: Someone watched your full explainer video.

Move: That's the warmest lead you'll ever see. Follow up within an hour if possible.

The speed rule

Reply within 5 minutes of a contact form submission and you're 9x more likely to close the sale than if you reply in an hour. An hour is the difference between "hot lead" and "cold body."

Set up notifications. Reply same-day at minimum. Same-hour if possible.

This week's assignment

Open Google Analytics. Find your top 5 pages by time-on-page. Those are your highest-intent pages. Make sure every one of them has a clear, obvious call to action. That's it. You just doubled your conversion rate.