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or not to purchase a product and, if so, which brand and where), interpret information, make
plans, and implement these plans (e.g., by engaging in comparison shopping or actually
purchasing a product).
Before defining the consumer behavior, we have to understand who the consumer is. Consumer
buyer is the buyer who buys goods or services for his or her own consumption. Consumer buyer
behavior is the buying behavior of final consumers-individuals and households that buy goods
and services for his or her personal consumption. Consumer behavior is very important for a
marketer before developing the marketing strategies and policies. In short, we can say that
consumer behavior is the behavior whatever the consumers do before, after and during
purchasing the products. Consumer behavior is defined as the behavior that consumers display in
searching for, purchasing, using, evaluating, disposing of products, services and ideas that they
expect will satisfy their needs and wants. Consumer behavior involves the purchasing and other
consumption related activities of people engaging in the exchange process. In short, we can say
that consumer behavior is the behavior that is related to consumption. Consumer behavior is a
part of human behavior.
field
Whatofdoes
the customer
buy?
What
must
satisfied?
The
consumer
behavior
tries
to needs
find out
thebeanswers
to the following questions
For instances, if you intend to produce a new variety of tooth paste, you should analyze the
nature of
individual consumer behavior as to;
Why consumer uses toothpaste (say to whiten teeth or prevent tooth decay)
Which brand of toothpaste he buys (say close-up or aromatic, Meril, Colgate)
Why he buys the close-up (because he believes that it will whiten his teeth better than competing
brands)
How he buys it (cash or credit) when he buys it (Monthly or weekly)
Where he buys it (from retail or supermarket, drug store etc.)
How often he buys it (frequency of buying, say every fortnight) and how much he buys it (100
grams or 200 grams or 400 grams).
It must also be noted that the behavior is likely to show variation from individual to individual,
from product to product and from an individual of one region to individual of another region.
Thus, analyzing consumer behavior is a prerequisite though the process is highly complicated. At
the same time, a firms ability to establish and maintain a satisfying exchange relationship
depends on the level of understanding of buying behavior of the consumer. Consumer behavior
field explores the decision process and acts of people involved in buying and using products in
the marketplace.
Fourth, consumer is the principal, a priority of the business. The efficiency with which a free
market system enterprise operates, depends upon the extent of consumer understanding
possessed by the business community.
Under the marketing concept, consumers are treated as kings and queens. In order to survive in
the face of todays external competition; you must serve and satisfy your consumers in a way
better than your competitors do. To do this successfully you must know who your consumers are
and how they behave. By studying consumer behavior, you can easily get the answer to these
questions and act accordingly.
As consumers, we benefit from insight into our own consumption related decisions: what we
buy, why we buy, how we buy, and the promotional influences that persuade us to buy. The study
of consumer behavior enables us to become better and wiser consumers.
As students of human behavior, we are concerned with understanding consumer behavior with
gaining insights into why individuals act in certain consumption related ways and with learning
what internal and external influences impel them to act as they do. Indeed, the desire for
understanding consumption related human behavior has led to a diversity of theoretical
approaches to its study.
Input stage
stage
Marketing
Stimuli
Product
Price
Place
Promotion
People
Process
Physical evidence
Process
Output
Other Stimuli
Buyer responses
Economic
Technological
Political
Cultural
Natural
Demographical
Buyer characteristics
&
The buyer decision process
Product choice
Brand choice
Dealer choice
Purchase timing
Purchase amount
Cultural
Social
Culture
Subculture
Social class
Referenc
e groups
Groups
Family
Roles and
status
Religion
Personal
Psychological
Motivation
Perception
Learning
Beliefs and
attitudes
Culture
Buyer
Culture is the set of basic values, perceptions, wants and behavior learned by a member of
society from family and other important institutions. Culture plays an important role in
purchasing the product. Culture is the most basic cause of a persons wants and behavior. Culture
is the fundamental determinant of a persons wants and behavior. Understanding the culture of a
market segment is pre-requisite for successful marketing program implementation. Cultural
factors exert a broad and deep influence on consumer behavior. The marketers need to
understand the role played by the buyers culture. Every group or society has a culture and
cultural influences on buying behavior may vary greatly from country to country. International
marketers must understand the culture in each international market and adapt their marketing
strategies accordingly. Marketers are always trying to spot cultural shifts in order to discover
new products that might be wanted.
Subculture
Each culture contains smaller subculture that provides more specific identification and
socialization for their members. Subculture means culture within the culture. Subculture is a
group of people with shared value systems based on common life experiences and situations.
Subculture includes nationalities, religions, racial groups and geographic regions. Many
subcultures make up important market segments and marketers often design products and
marketing programs tailored to their needs and wants. For example, in the United States, four
important subculture include Hispanic, African American, Asian and Mature consumers etc
Social class
Almost every society has some form of social class structure. Social classes are societys
relatively permanent and ordered divisions whose members share similar values, interests,
behaviors and same demographic characteristics. The social classes consumers belong strongly
affect their buying behavior. Social class is not determined by a single factor, such as income, but
is measured as a combination of occupation, income, education, wealth and other variables.
There are different types of social classes such as are;
i)
Upper upper class
ii)
Upper lower class
iii)
Middle class
iv)
Lower middle class
v)
Lower upper class
vi)
Lower lower class
Marketers are interested in social class because people within a given social class tend to exhibit
similar buying behavior. Social classes show distinct product and brand preferences in many
areas. By conducting a survey, it is found that there are close relationship between
Social class and shopping behavior;
Social classes and leisure time activities;
Social classes and media usage;
Social classes and responding to promotion activities;
Social classes and buying decisions
Social factors
A consumers behavior also is influenced by social factors. Such as are;
Family
When two or more people live together related by marriage or adoption are called family. Family
members can strongly influence buyer behavior. Marketers are interested in the roles and
influence of the husband, wife and children on the purchase of different products and services.
Husband-wife involvement varies widely by product category and by stage in the buying
process.
Religion
Religion is one of the most important factors that affect the buying behavior. The types of
clothes, the types of food we eat and the way to eat are affected by religion. There are many
religions in the world such as Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist and Christian etc. the beliefs and
attitudes vary from follower of one religion to another religion.
Personal factors
A buyers decisions are also influenced by personal characteristics such as
Occupation
A persons occupation affects the goods and services bought. For example, computer software
companies will design different products for brand managers, accountants, engineers, lawyers
and doctors etc. Marketers try to identify the occupational groups that have an above average
interest in their products and services.
Economic situation
A persons economic situation will affect product choice. A person can buy an expensive item if
one has enough spendable income, savings, or borrowing power. Purchasing power affects the
brand a person will choose.
Lifestyles
Lifestyle is a persons pattern of living as expressed in his or her activities, interests and
opinions. It involves measuring consumers major AIO dimensions-activities (work, hobbies,
shopping, sports, social events), interests (food, fashion, family, recreation) and opinions (about
themselves, social issues, business, products). Lifestyle captures something more than the
persons social class or personality. It profiles a persons whole pattern of acting and interacting
in the world.
Work holism
Compulsiveness
Self confidence
Friendliness
Adaptability
Ambitiousness
o
o
o
o
o
o
Dogmatism
Authoritarianism
Introversion
Extroversion
Aggressiveness
Competitiveness.
Traits affect the way people behave. Marketers try to match the store image to the perceived
image of their customers. Each persons distinct personality influences his or her buying
behavior. Personality refers to the unique psychological characteristics that lead to relatively
consistent and lasting responses to ones own environment. Personality is usually described in
terms of traits such as self-confidence, dominance, sociability, autonomy, defensiveness,
adaptability and aggressiveness. As a marketer, we have to concern about the personality of
consumers.
Psychological Factors
A persons buying choices are further influenced by some major psychological factors, such as
are;
Motivation
Motivation is the driving force within the individuals that impels them to action. This driving
force is produced by a state of tension which exists as the result of an unfulfilled need or want.
Perception
Perception is the process of selecting, organizing and interpreting information inputs to produce
meaning. Perception varies from person to person. Perception means how you see the world. A
motivated person is ready to act. How the person acts is influenced by his or her own perception
of the situation. All of us learn by the flow of information through our five senses: sight, hearing,
smell, touch and taste. Perception is the process by which people select, organize and interpret
information to form a meaningful picture of the world.
Learning
Learning is the process through which a relatively permanent change in behavior results from the
consequences of past behavior. Learning describes changes in an individuals behavior arising
from experience. Learning theorist say that most human behavior is learned. Learning occurs
through the interplay of drives, stimuli, cues, responses and reinforcement. Learning strongly
affects the consumer buyer behavior. Previous buying experiences strongly influence whether we
will buy again or not.
Personal risk
Social risk
Economic risk
Financial risk
Psychological risk
Decision processes may be classified in different ways. One possibility is developed by Engel
and Black Will (1930), the classification into high and low involvement products.
High Involvement Products: Bear a high risk of a wrong decision because of high prices,
high importance for the self image. This lead to extended problem solving like active search and
use of information, careful evaluation of alternatives and careful choice.
Low Involvement Products: Bear a low risk of wrong decision because of low price, not
very different product alternatives, and low importance for the self-image. This leads to simple
problem solving, when the information is stored in the memory, choice is made on the basis of
existing information.
Buying decision behavior varies from product to product. Consumer buying behavior differs for
a tube of toothpaste, tennis racket, digital camera and automobiles etc. Consumer behavior also
varies from time to time and from product to product.
There are four types of consumer buying decision behavior based on the degree of buyer
involvement and the degree of differences among the brands.
Degree of involvement means that buyers need to spend a lot of time, money and energy in
purchasing the products. Degree of differences among the brand indicates that there are
significant differences between the brands.
Few differences
between the brands
i)
ii)
iii)
iv)
v)
Need Recognition
Information search
Evaluation of alternatives
Purchase decision
Post purchase behavior
Pre-purchase
stage
Need
Recognition
Information
Search
Purchase
Evaluation of
alternatives
Purchase
Decision
Post-purchase
Post-purchase
behavior
Clearly, the buying process starts long before actual purchase and continues long after. Marketers
need
to focus on the entire buying process rather than on just the purchase decision. The figure
implies that the consumer pass through all five stages with every purchase. But in more
routine purchases, consumers often skip or reverse some of these stages. The model shows
all the considerations that arise when a consumer faces a new and complex purchase
situation.
Need Recognition
The first stage of the buyer decision process in which the consumer recognizes a problem or
need. This need can be triggered by the internal stimuli such as hunger, thirst or various other
biological cues.
A need can also be triggered by external stimuli- such as commercial cues, social cues.
Here the consumer examines whether a need or want truly exists for the product. The need may
be based on a shortage or an unfulfilled desire or want. If the consumer does not recognize a
shortage or unfulfilled desire, the decision process stops at this point.
At this the marketers should research consumers to find out what kinds of needs or problem
arise, what brought them about and how they led the consumer to this particular product
category.
Information search
The stage of the buyer decision process in which the consumer is aroused to search for more
information; the consumer may simply have heightened attention or may go into active
information search. The amount of information search depends on the strength of the drive, the
amount of information starts with, the ease of obtaining more information, the values consumer
places on additional information and the satisfaction the consumer gets from searching. The
consumer can obtain information from any of several sources. These include
Personal sources (Family, friends, neighbors, acquaintances,
Commercial sources (advertising, salespeople, dealers, packaging, displays)
Public sources (mass media, consumer rating-organizations)
Experiential sources (handling, examining, using the product)
The relative influence of these information sources varies with the product and the buyer.
Generally. The consumer receives the most important information about a product from
commercial sourcesThe most effective sources tend to be personal. A person often asks others-friends, relatives,
acquaintances, professionals-for recommendations concerning a product or service. Thus,
companies have a strong interest in building such word of mouth sources.
Evaluation of alternatives
The stage of the buyer decision process in which the consumer uses information to evaluate
alternative brands in the choice set. The marketer needs to know about alternative
evaluation-that is how the consumer processes information to arrive at brand choices. It may
involve a systematic evaluation technique such as multiattribute model. Such systematic
models utilize a set of formalized steps to arrive at a decision. This process of choice
narrowing can be illustrated for Mr. Bob Jones. Bob Jones decides to attend a Private
University.
Total set
Cornell
Duke
Northern
Tulane
Dartmouth
Yale
Stanford
Harvard
De Paul
Lawrence
.
.
.
.
Awareness set
Cornell
Duke
Northern
Tulane
Dartmouth
Yale
Stanford
Harvard
Unawareness
set
De Paul
Lawrence
Consideration set
Cornell
Northern
Duke
Tulane
Dartmouth
Infeasible set
Yale
Stanford
Harvard
Choice set
Cornell
Duke
Northern
Tulane
Decision
Cornell
Nonchoice set
Dartmouth
evaluation of the alternatives in the final choice set. Suppose that Bob Jones has four criteria for
choosing among Universities.
Such as class size, cost, friendship opportunities and the quality of teachers.
A high school students beliefs about four colleges
Alternative
Small classes
Costs
Many lifelong friends
Excellent teachers
Cornell
+2
-3
+1
+1
Duke
+1
-3
+2
+1
Northern
-1
-1
0
+3
Tulane
-3
+1
0
-3
Bob Jones has revealed his beliefs about the likelihood that his University alternatives will yield
Weightings
+3
+1
+2
+1
the consequences he considers important as indicated in table. This table also portrays johns
+3=extremely likely
judgments about the goodness and badness of the four basic criteria. How then might he use
-3= extremely unlikely
these beliefs and values to reach a decision about which University to attend?
In the case of weightings, +3= very likely and -3=very unlikely
John may attempt to mentally combine the information to yield a single overall score for each
candidate and choose the one with the highest score. While there are a number of alternative
formulas that consumer behavior theorist postulate are used, the most widely accepted is what is
called formally the linear additive expectancy- value model.
This is a systematic model that proposes that the consumer creates a global score for each brand
by multiplying the ratings of the brand on each attribute by the importance attached to the
attribute and adding the scores together.
Here the consumer combines and then adds the beliefs and weightings data for each alternative
into a variable that is formally labeled the individuals attitude toward the act. In this approach,
each expectation about a consequence from choosing an alternative is weighted by the value of
the consequence. All weighted consequences for a given alternative are then added to yield an
overall score for that alternative.
The weighted sum is then considered to be a mathematical representation of an attitude toward
an act. In the case of Bob Jones we could have;
Cornell= +3 (+2) +1(-3) +2(+1) +1(+1) =6
Duke=+3(+1) +1(-3) +2(+2) +1(+1) =5
Northern= +3(-1) +1(-1) +2(0) +1(3) = -1
Tulane=+3(-3) +1(+1) +2(0) +1(-3) = -11
As a result of choice computations. Mr. Bob Jones would be most likely to choose Cornell,
followed by Duke, Northern, and Tulane in that order.
Attitudes of others
Unexpected situations
Attitudes of others may affect the final purchase decision, for example, attitudes of husband may
strongly affect the wifes decisions. Unexpected situation may also affect the final purchase
decisions. Such as accidents, great discounts of other competitors also affect the final purchase
decision.
Awareness: The consumer becomes aware of the new product, but lacks information about
it.
Evaluation: The consumer considers whether trying the new product makes sense.
Trial: The consumer tries the new product on a small scale to improve his or her estimate of
its value.
Adoption: The consumer decides to make full and regular use of the new product.
This model suggests that the new product marketer should think about how to help consumers
move through these stages.
and adopt new ideas early but carefully. The early majority are deliberate-although they rarely
are leaders, they adopt new ideas before the average person. The late majorities are skepticalthey adopt an innovation only after a majority of people have tried it. Finally, laggards are
tradition bound- they are suspicious of changes and adopt the innovation only when it has
become something of a tradition itself. This adopter classification suggests that an innovating
firm should research the characteristics of innovators and early adopters and should direct
marketing efforts toward them. In general, innovators tend to be relatively younger, better
educated and higher in income than later adopters and nonadopters. They are more receptive to
unfamiliar things, rely more on their own values and judgment and are more willing to take risks.
They are fewer brands loyal and more likely to take advantage of special promotions such as
discounts, coupons and samples etc.
Relative advantage: It shows the degree to which the innovation appears superior to existing
products. Wheel soap of Unilever is now available in a plastic transparent package that may
convince the people that its quality is now more protected by plastic pack.
Compatibility: The degree to which the innovation fits the values and experiences of
potential consumers. HDTV, for example, is highly compatible with the lifestyles of the TVwatching public. However, many programs and channels are still not yet available in HD, and
this has slowed HDTV adoption.
Divisibility: The degree to which the innovation may be tried on a limited basis.
Communicability: The degree to which the results of using the innovation can be observed
or described to others.
Other characteristics influence the rate of adoption, such as initial and ongoing costs, risk and
uncertainty and social approval. The new product marketer must research all these factors
when developing the new product and its marketing program and plans.