TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
A MODEL OF CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
Today’s marketplace has become very
competitive with thousands of hotels and
restaurants. In addition, in recent years the
hospitality and travel industries
have undergone globalization. Hotel companies
headquartered in nations as diverse
as Germany, the United States, and Hong Kong
compete aggressively in markets
with companies fighting for their share of
consumers. To win this battle, they
invest in research that will reveal what
customers want to buy, which locations they
prefer, which amenities are important to them,
how they buy, and why they buy.
On the left side of the figure, the marketing
stimuli consist of the four Ps: product, price,
place, and promotion. Other stimuli include
major forces and events in the buyer’s
environment: economic, technological, political,
and cultural.
All these stimuli enter the buyer’s black box,
where they are turned into a set of observable
buyer responses are shown on the right:
product choice, brand choice, dealer choice,
purchase timing, and purchase amount.
PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS AFFECTING
CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
Consumer purchases are strongly influenced by
cultural, social, personal, and psychological
characteristics. Below are the factors
influencing behavior.
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
1. CULTURAL FACTORS
-Culture
-Subculture
-Social Class
2. SOCIAL FACTORS
-Reference Groups
-Family
-Roles & Status
3. PERSONAL FACTORS
-Age & Life-Cycle Stage
-Occupation Economic Circumstances
-Lifestyle
-Personality & Self Concept
4. PSYCHOLOGICAL
-Motivation
-Perception
-Learning
-Beliefs & Attitudes
5. BUYER
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1. CULTURAL FACTORS
- Cultural factors exert the broadest and
deepest influence on consumer behavior. We
examine the role played by the buyer’s culture,
subculture, and social class. Culture is the most
basic determinant of a person’s wants and
behavior. It comprises the basic values,
perceptions, wants, and behaviors that a person
learns continuously in a society. Culture is
expressed through tangible items such as food,
architecture, clothing, and art. Culture is an
integral part of the hospitality and travel
business. It determines what we eat, how we
travel, where we travel, and where we stay.
Culture is dynamic, adapting to the
environment. Marketers try continuously to
identify cultural shifts in order to devise new
products and services that might find a
receptive market.
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
1.1 SUBCULTURE
-Each culture contains smaller subcultures, or
groups of people with shared value systems
based on common life experiences and
situations. Subcultures include 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.
Examples of three such important subculture
groups are Hispanic, African American, and
Asian consumers.
1.2 CROSS-CULTURAL MARKETING
-Cross-cultural marketing This is the practice of
including ethnic themes and cross-cultural
perspectives within the mainstream marketing
of the organization. Understanding consumer
behavior is difficult enough for companies
marketing within the borders of a single country
1.3 SOCIAL CLASS
-Social classes are relatively permanent and
ordered divisions in a society whose members
share similar values, interests, and behaviors.
Social scientists have identified the seven
American social classes: upper uppers, lower
uppers , upper middles , middle , working ,
upper lowers, and lower lowers . Social classes
show distinct product and brand preferences in
such areas as food, travel, and leisure activity.
There are also language differences between
social classes, which means advertisers must
compose copy and dialogue that will be familiar
to the social class being targeted.
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2. SOCIAL FACTORS
-Consumer behavior is also influenced by social
factors, including the consumers’ groups,
family, social roles, and status.
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
2.1 GROUPS & SOCIAL NETWORKS
-Many small groups influence a person’s
behavior. Groups that have a direct influence
and to which a person belongs are called
“membership groups.” In contrast, reference
groups serve as direct (face-to-face) or indirect
points of comparison or reference in forming a
person’s attitudes or behavior. People often are
influenced by reference groups to which they
do not belong.
Marketers try to identify the reference groups
of their target markets. Reference groups
influence consumers in at least three ways:
(1) They expose the person to new behaviors
and lifestyles;
(2) they influence the person’s attitudes and
self-concept; and
(3) they create pressures to conform that may
affect the person’s product, brand, and vendor
choices.
2.2 MEMBERSHIP GROUPS
-This includes primary groups, such as family,
friends, neighbors, and coworkers—specifically,
those with whom there is regular but informal
interaction. Secondary groups are more formal
and have less regular interaction; they include
religious groups, professional associations, and
trade unions. In some societies, secondary
groups may be membership groups. Members
of the Mormon faith, for example, are greatly
influenced by their religious affiliation.
Mormons do not drink alcoholic beverages and,
therefore, would not be buyers of wine at a fine
restaurant.
People can also be influenced by aspirational
groups to which they do not belong but would
like to. For example, a college freshman may
aspire to be part of Hyatt’s management team
and may identify with this group even though
not a member. The importance of group
influence varies by product and brand. It tends
to be strongest when the product is visible to
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
others whom the buyer respects. Purchases of
products that are used privately are not greatly
affected by group influence.
2.3 WORD-OF-MOUTH INFLUENCE &
BUZZ MARKETING
-Word-of-mouth influence can have a powerful
impact on consumer buying behavior. The
personal words and recommendations of
trusted friends, associates, and other
consumers tend to be more credible than those
coming from commercial sources, such as
advertisements or salespeople.
One recent study found that only 49 percent of
consumers reported that they trust or believe
advertising, while 72 percent said they trusted
family and friends and 72 percent said they
trust online reviews.
Marketers of brands subjected to strong group
influence must figure out how to reach opinion
leaders—people within a reference group who,
because of special skills, knowledge,
personality, or other characteristics, exert social
influence on others. Some experts call this
group the influential or leading adopters. When
these influentials talk, consumers listen.
Marketers try to identify opinion leaders for
their products and direct marketing efforts
toward them.
Buzz marketing involves enlisting or even
creating opinion leaders to serve as “brand
ambassadors,” who spread the word about a
company’s products. Many companies now
create brand ambassador programs in an
attempt to turn influential but everyday
customers into brand evangelists.
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
2.4 ONLINE SOCIAL NETWORKS
-Online social networks are online communities
where people socialize or exchange information
and opinions. Social networking communities
range from:
-Blogs (The Social Girl Traveler, The Wandering
Eater, Dan Flying Solo)
-Message boards (Craigslist)
-Social media sites (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube,
Instagram, Snapchat, LinkedIn) communal
-Shopping sites (Amazon.com, Shoppee, lazada).
Marketers are working to harness the power of
these new social networks and other “word-of-
web” opportunities to promote their products
and build closer customer relationships. Instead
of throwing more one-way commercial
messages at consumers, they hope to use the
internet and social networks to interact with
consumers and become a part of their
conversations and lives.
2.5 FAMILY
-Family members have a strong influence on
buyer behavior. The family remains the most
important consumer buying organization in
American society and has been researched
extensively. Marketers are interested in the
roles and influence of the husband, wife, and
children on the purchase of different products
and services. Children also have a strong
influence on family buying decisions., Children
all over the world are having an influence on
where the family dines when they go out to eat.
One of the most complex and challenging tasks
for a professional event planner is the wedding.
It often involves multiple family members from
not just one family but two families. The
wedding planner needs to determine the role of
the bride, the bride’s mother, and the groom’s
family in planning the wedding. In some cases,
the bride’s mother will have the dominant role
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR

and plan the wedding she always wanted for
her daughter. On other cases, the bride’s
mother will let her daughter plan her wedding.
Paying for the wedding can also get
complicated. For example, the bride’s family
will pay for the wedding reception, except for
the liquor which is paid by the groom’s family.
As a meeting planner, you will need to work
through who is covering the different costs of
the wedding, as well as create a balance
between the family members of both families.
2.6 ROLES & STATUS
-A person belongs to many groups: family,
clubs, and organizations. An individual’s
position in each group can be defined in terms
of role and status. A role consists of the
activities that a person is expected to perform
according to the persons around him or her.
Common roles include son or daughter, wife or
husband, and manager or worker. Each role
influences buying behavior.
Our roles are also influenced by our
surroundings. People dining at an elegant
restaurant behave differently than when they
dine at a fast-food restaurant. They also have
expectations about the roles that employees in
different establishments should play. Failure to
meet these role expectations creates
dissatisfaction.
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3. PERSONAL FACTORS
-A buyer’s decisions are also influenced by
personal characteristics, such as occupation,
age and life-cycle stage, economic situation,
lifestyle, personality, and self-concept.
3.1 OCCUPATION
-A person’s occupation affects the goods and
services bought. For example, construction
workers often buy their lunches from industrial
catering trucks that come out to the job site.
example: Business executives purchase meals
from a full-service restaurant, whereas clerical
employees may bring their lunch or purchase
lunch from a nearby quick-service restaurant
Employees of some consulting firms are not
allowed to eat in fast-food restaurants. The
managers of these companies do not think it
creates a proper image to have their clients see
a consultant they are billed $ 300 an hour for
their services eating in a fast-food restaurant.
Marketers try to identify occupational groups
that have an above-average interest in their
products.
3.2 AGE & LIFE CYCLE STAGE
-Family life cycle the stages through which
families might pass as they mature.
Successful marketing to various age segments
may require specialized and targeted strategies.
This will almost certainly require segmented
target publications and database marketing. It
may also require a marketing staff and
advertising agency with people of varying ages
and cultural backgrounds. Buying behavior is
also shaped by the family life-cycle stages.
3.3 ECONOMIC SITUATION
-A person’s economic situation greatly affects
product choice and the decision to purchase a
particular product. Marketers need to watch
trends in personal income, savings, and interest
rates. If economic indicators point to a
recession, they can redesign, reposition, and
reprice their products. Restaurants may need to
add lower-priced menu items that will still
appeal to their target markets.
3.4 LIFESTYLE
-People coming from the same subculture,
social class, and occupation may have quite
different lifestyles. A lifestyle is a person’s
pattern of living as expressed in his or her
activities, interests, and opinions. Lifestyle
portrays the “whole person” interacting with his
or her environment.

TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING

LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
3.5 PERSONALITY & SELF-CONCEPT
-Each person’s personality influences his or her
buying behavior.
By personality, we mean distinguishing
psychological characteristics that lead to
relatively consistent and enduring responses to
the environment. Personality can be useful in
analyzing consumer behavior for some product
or brand choices. For example, a beer company
may discover that heavy beer drinkers tend to
rank high in sociability and aggressiveness.
Many marketers use a concept related to
personality: a person’s self-concept (also called
“self-image”). Each of us has a complex mental
self-picture, and our behavior tends to be
consistent with that self-image.31 People who
perceive themselves as outgoing and active will
be unlikely to purchase a cruise vacation if their
perception of cruises is one of elderly persons
lying on lounge chairs. They would be more
likely to select a scuba-diving or skiing vacation.
The cruise line industry has been quite
successful in changing its “geriatric” image and
now attracts outgoing and active consumers.
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4. PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS
-A person’s buying choices are also influenced
by four major psychological factors: motivation,
perception, learning, and beliefs and attitudes.
4.1 MOTIVATION
-A person has many needs at any given time.
Some are biological, arising from hunger, thirst,
and discomfort. Others are psychological,
arising from states of tension, such as the need
for recognition, esteem, or belonging. Most of
these needs are not strong enough to motivate
a person to act at a given point in time. A need
becomes a motive when it is aroused to a
sufficient level of intensity.
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
4.2 PERCEPTION
-A motivated person is ready to act.
Why do people have different perceptions of
the same situation? All of us experience a
stimulus by the flow of information through our
five senses: sight, hearing, smell, touch, and
taste. However, each of us receives, organizes,
and interprets this sensory information in an
individual way.
4.3 LEARNING
-When people act, they learn. Learning
describes changes in an individual’s behavior
arising from experience. Most human behavior
is learned. Learning theorists say that learning
occurs through the interplay of drives, stimuli,
cues, responses, and reinforcement. When
consumers experience a product, they learn
about it.
4.4 BELIEFS & ATTITUDES
-Through acting and learning, people acquire
beliefs and attitudes, which, in turn, influence
their buying behavior.
A belief is a descriptive thought that a person
holds about something
People have attitudes about almost everything:
religion, politics, clothes, music, and food. An
attitude describes a person’s relatively
consistent evaluations, feelings, and tendencies
toward an object or an idea. Attitudes put
people into a frame of mind for liking or
disliking things and moving toward or away
from them.
Attitudes are very difficult to change. A person’s
attitudes fit into a pattern and changing one
attitude may require making many difficult
adjustments.
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
THE BUYER DECISION PROCESS
-NEED RECOGNITION
-INFORMATION SEARCH
-EVALUATION OF ALTERNATIVES
-PURCHASE DECISION
-POST-PURCHASE BEHAVIOR
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A. NEED RECOGNITION
-The buying process starts when the buyer
recognizes a problem or need. The buyer senses
a difference between his or her actual state and
a desired state. marketers must determine the
factors and situations that trigger consumer
problem recognition. They should research
consumers to find out what kinds of needs or
problems led them to purchase an item, what
brought these needs about, and how they led
consumers to choose this particular-product.
B. INFORMATION SEARCH
- An aroused consumer may or may not search
for more information. If the consumer’s drive is
strong and a satisfying product is near at hand,
the consumer is likely to buy it at that moment.
If not, the consumer may simply store the need
in memory and search for relevant information.
How much searching a consumer will depend
on the strength of the drive, the amount of
initial information, the ease of obtaining more
information, the value placed on additional
information, and the satisfaction one gets from
searching. The consumer can obtain
information from several sources.
These include the following:
Personal sources: Family, friends, neighbors,
acquaintances •
Commercial sources: Advertising, salespeople,
dealers, packaging, displays •
Public sources: Restaurant reviews, editorials in
the travel section, consumer organizations •
The Internet: The company’s Web site and
comments from previous guests.
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR
C. EVALUATION ALTERNATIVES
We have seen how the consumer uses
information to arrive at a set of final brand
choices. But how does the consumer choose
among the alternatives? How does the
consumer mentally sort and process
information to arrive at brand choices? There
are several evaluation processes.
First, we assume that each consumer sees a
product as a bundle of product attributes. For
restaurants, these attributes include food
quality, menu selection, quality of service,
atmosphere, location, and price. Consumers
vary as to which of these attributes they
consider relevant. The most attention is paid to
attributes connected with their needs.
Second, the consumer attaches different
degrees of importance to each attribute. That
is, each consumer attaches importance to each
attribute according to his or her unique needs
and wants.
Third, the consumer is likely to develop a set of
beliefs about where each brand stands on each
attribute. The set of beliefs held about a
particular brand is known as the “brand image.”
The consumer’s beliefs may vary from true
attributes because of the consumer’s
experience and the effects of selective
perception, selective distortion, and selective
retention. Fourth, the consumer is assumed to
have a utility function for each attribute.
D. PURCHASE DECISION
-In the evaluation stage, the consumer ranks
brands in the choice set and forms purchase
intentions. Generally, the consumer buys the
most preferred brand, but two factors can come
between the purchase intention and the
purchase decision.
TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING
LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR

The first factor is the attitudes of others. If

someone important to you thinks that you take
a vacation at a nice beach resort because you
have worked hard during the past year, that will
influence your decision in a positive way. The
more intense the other person’s attitude and
the closer that person is to the decision-maker,
the more influence the other person will have.

TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY MARKETING

LESSON 4 – CONSUMER MARKETS & CONSUMER BUYING BEHAVIOR