Need Recognition

Need recognition is the first important step in buying decision process. In order to solve an issue
or a problem, you need to define the problem or we call that problem recognition. The consumer
starts to recognize the problem when they have an unmet need that has to be fulfilled. According
to Lumen Learning (n.d.), “a need can be triggered by internal stimuli cush as a personal
perception and external stimuli which is the outside influence. For example, recently I have a
need to buy a new smartphone for myself. This is because of some problems that I discovered
which is it has small storage to support the apps and documents on my phone. Other than that,
my smartphone isn’t working well anymore since I could not update my apps from the google
apps. Therefore, due to this personal experience, I want to buy a new smartphone to satisfy my
need since it is an important device for me
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-marketing/chapter/the-consumer-decision-process/
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xternally.

Information Search

When the customers have recognized their need, they start to find information about the products
that could solve their problems. There are two categories for information search, whether internal
or external research. Internal research refers to customer personal experience and some pieces of
knowledge that they have acquired before. Then, external research refers to any research from
the website, commercial advertisement, word of mouth or from the opinion leaders. You could
also seek information from the person close to you such as your family members and friends. For
instance, after I decided to buy a new smartphone, I tend to choose other brands since I have a
bad experience with the brand that I currently used. Other than that, I will usually search the
information from the original website, first such as Samsung.com and Apple.com to find out
their value proposition and their price. I could also ask my family and friends’ opinions
regarding the smartphone that they used either worth it for me to buy that particular product or
not.
Evaluating Alternatives
Then, consumers started to reflect on what information they have acquired from trustworthy
sources either from internal or external research. At this point, consumers have developed their
decision criteria based on the problems that they faced. The decision criteria will help them to
evaluate all the alternatives effectively to choose the best product for them. For instance, I will
develop my decision criteria to evaluate between the brands of the smartphone that I choose
which are iPhone 11 and Samsung S21 5G. My decision criteria will consist of price, storage
capacity, performance, screen size.

Brands/ Decision iPhone 11 Samsung S21 5G Remarks

Criteria

Price (RM) 3599 3699 iPhone are slightly

cheaper than
Samsung

Storage capacity 256GB 256GB Samsung have a

bigger capacity than
iPhone

Performance 4GB Ram 8GB Ram Samsung S21 has a

great speed for
performance
compared to the
iPhone 11

Screen size 6.1-inch 6.2-inch The differences

between the size are
not too obvious.

Purchase Decision