CHIN2500 Chap.7 Vocabulary for Buyers, Sellers and Clients
Vocabulary for Buyers, Sellers and Clients
Vocabulary for Buyers, Sellers and Clients covers the first half of the Week 2 lecture. It sorts market vocabulary into buyer-side terms such as customer, client, consumer, end user and purchaser, and seller-side terms such as vendor, wholesaler, retailer and service provider.
It separates customer base, client base and clientele, explains firm and company, and adds two grammar points the lecture uses in translation: reduced relative clauses and in contrast to followed by a noun. New example sentences, not the lecture's own, show each term in a business context, so you can test whether you can choose it unaided.
What this chapter covers
- 01
Customer, client and consumer
- 02
End user and purchaser
- 03
Customer base and client base
- 04
Clientele as a collective noun
- 05
Seller-side terms
- 06
Firm and company
Worked example · free
Explain why a consumer may not be a customer
- 1The use is correct: a customer buys products or services, while a consumer uses up the product and may not buy it, so the owner buys and the dog consumes.
- 1A further example: in a school canteen funded by parents' accounts, the children are consumers and the parents are customers.
Key terms
- Customer base
- A customer base is the group of people or organisations who are, or could become, a business's customers.
- Purchaser
- A purchaser is an individual or organisation that buys goods or services, often through a purchasing manager.
- Vendor
- A vendor is a general term for a supplier of goods, including a person selling a property.
- Service provider
- A service provider is a business or person that supplies a service rather than goods.
- Firm
- A firm is usually a small or medium private business offering professional services, such as an accounting practice.
- Tradie
- Tradie is Australian informal English for a trade worker such as a plumber, electrician, carpenter or bricklayer.
Vocabulary for Buyers, Sellers and Clients FAQ
What is the difference between a customer and a client?
In the lecture's summary, a customer usually makes a one-off, immediate purchase of standard goods, and the relationship ends with the sale. A client buys professional services over time, often customised, and the relationship needs ongoing care. Law, accounting and architecture firms therefore speak of clients rather than customers.
When should I use clientele instead of client base?
Use clientele to describe the type, character or class of a business's clients, often for a high-end service, as in an upmarket clientele. Use client base for the number, scale and reach of those clients, a data-driven term. Clientele is a collective noun: singular in form but plural in meaning.
What does in contrast to need after it?
In in contrast to, the word to is a preposition, so a noun, noun phrase or -ing form must follow, as in in contrast to office work or in contrast to working in an office. The lecture uses examples about study patterns and working from home to practise this pattern.
What is the difference between a firm and a company?
The lecture explains that firm usually refers to a small or medium private business offering professional services, such as an accounting or law practice. Company is the broader word for any registered commercial organisation that operates for profit. A supermarket chain is therefore a company, while a partnership of solicitors is normally called a firm.
Why might a property seller be called a vendor?
In Australian property sales, the person selling a house is usually referred to as the vendor, a general term for anyone supplying goods. The same word appears in street vendor, someone selling food or small goods outdoors. Seller is the widest term and covers anyone who sells something to a buyer or purchaser.
Assessment move
Draw the buyer and seller tree from memory and write one original sentence for each term. Make flash cards for the four group nouns, with the defining question on one side: one-off or ongoing, type or number. Practise the payer-or-user test on five new products. Then write three sentences using reduced relative clauses and three using in contrast to with a noun or -ing form, and check them against the rules.
Finally, translate five short business sentences from your class materials into English, choosing each buyer term deliberately. Revisit the list after the e-commerce and marketing weeks, because those later topics reuse the same buyer and seller words in new contexts.
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