Consumers’ Product

Knowledge and
Involvement

4-1
Levels of Product Knowledge
Consumers use different levels of product knowledge
to interpret new information and make purchase choices.
Product knowledge can be at four levels:
Product class
Product form
Brands
Model/features

4-2
Levels of Product Knowledge

4-3
Consumers’ Product Knowledge
Consumers can have three types of product knowledge:
Knowledge about the attributes or characteristics of products.
The positive consequences or benefits of using products.
The values the product helps consumers satisfy or achieve.

4-4
Products as Bundles of Attributes
Consumers often think about products and brands as
bundles of attributes.
Marketers need to know:
Which product attributes are most important to consumers.
What those attributes mean to consumers.
How consumers use this knowledge in cognitive processes.

4-5
Products as Bundles of Attributes
(cont.)
Types of product attributes:
Concrete attributes
Abstract attributes

4-6
Products as Bundles of Benefits
Consumers think about products and brands in terms of
consequences.
Functional consequences are tangible outcomes of using a
product that consumers experience rather directly.
Psychosocial consequences refer to the psychological and
social outcomes of product use.

4-7
Products as Bundles of Benefits
(cont.)
Consumers think about products and brands as
bundles of benefits.
Benefits are the desirable consequences consumers seek
when buying and using products and brands.
Consumers can be divided through a process called benefit
segmentation.

4-8
Products as Bundles of Benefits
(cont.)
Perceived risks concern the undesirable consequences
that consumers want to avoid when they buy and use
products.
Risks can be:
Physical
Financial
Functional
Psychosocial

4-9
Products as Bundles of Benefits
(cont.)
Amount of perceived risk is influenced by:
Degree of unpleasantness of the negative consequences.
Likelihood that these negative consequences will occur.

4-10
Products as Value Satisfiers
Values are people’s broad life goals.
Types of values:
Instrumental
Terminal
Core
 Form key elements in a self-schema.
Satisfying a value usually elicits positive affect, whereas
blocking a value produces negative affect.

4-11
Instrumental Values &Terminal
Values
Instrumental Values Terminal Values
Ex. Personal
Ex. Competence gratification
social recognition
ambitious (hard-working) comfortable life
independent (self-reliant) pleasure (enjoyable
imaginative (creative) life)

capable (competent) Sense of

accomplishment
courageous
4-12
 Types of Product Knowledge

Bundle of Attributes
Style Abstract

Nike Comfort Abstract

running
shoes
$169.94 Concrete

Air Lock Concrete

4-13
 Types of Product Knowledge

Bundle of Benefits

“I will look cool” Psychosocial

Nike
running
“run longer” Functional
shoes

Benefits: Anticipated positive consequences

Risks: Potential negative consequences; functional, financial, psychosocial,

physical risks.
4-14
 Types of Product Knowledge

Values: Broad goals in life

Be physically
fit
Nike
running Have good
shoes health

Live a long
life
4-15
Means-End Chains of Product
Knowledge
A means-ends chain links consumers’ knowledge about
product attributes with their knowledge about
consequences and values.
Four levels of means-end chain:
Attributes
Functional consequences
Psychosocial consequences
Values

4-16
A Means-End Chain Model of
Consumers’ Product Knowledge

4-17
Examples of Means-End Chains

4-18
 Means-End Chain Example:
Gillette Sensor Razor

BRAND ATTRIBUTES CONSEQUENCES VALUES

Spring
Be well
suspension Close shave groomed
for twin
blades
Sensor
Razor
Lubricating Smooth, soft Be
strip shave comfortable

Laddering is the technique used for uncovering means-ends chains; it

involves asking Why brand? What attribute? Why attribute? Why
consequence? What value? Etc.
4-19
Means-End Chain
Some product attributes can have more
than one means-end chain

Spend Have less to Waste

too spend on of Be well
much other things money groomed

High
Price
Good Last a long Good Be
quality time value comfortable

4-20
 Identifying Consumers’ Means-
End Chains
Measured by one-on-one personal interviews.
Involves two steps:
Researcher must identify/elicit the product attributes most
important to each consumer.
Laddering - interview process designed to reveal how the
consumer links product attributes to more abstract
consequences and values.

4-21
Identification Key Attributes
Considered by Consumers

4-22
 Means-End Chains - Marketing
Implications
Provide a deeper understanding of consumers’ product
knowledge.
Identify the basic ends consumers seek when they buy
and use certain products and brands; gives insight into
consumers’ deeper purchase motivations.
Identify the consumer-product relationship.

4-23
 Digging for Deeper Consumer
Understanding
Use of qualitative research methods:
 Focus groups
 Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique (ZMET)
 Elicits metaphors from consumers that reveal their deep meanings
(both cognitive and affective) about a topic.

4-24
The ZMET Interview
 The ZMET interview involves the following steps:
The pre-interview instruction
Storytelling
Expand the frame
Sensory images
Vignette
Digital image

4-25
ZMET - Marketing Implications
Can stimulate managers’ imaginations and guide their
strategic thinking about a variety of marketing problems.

http://www.slideshare.net/Ok99/the-zmet-technique#

4-26
 Involvement
Involvement refers to consumers’ perceptions of
importance or personal relevance for an object, event, or
activity.
A motivational state that energizes and directs consumers’
cognitive and affective processes and behaviors as decisions are
made.
Felt involvement emphasizes that involvement is a
psychological state that consumers experience only at certain
times.

4-27
 Focus of Involvement
Products and brands
Physical objects
People
Activities or behaviors

4-28
 The Means-End Basis for
Involvement
A consumers’ level of involvement or self-relevance
depends on two aspects of the means-end chains that are
activated:
Importance of self-relevance of the ends.
Strength of connections between the product knowledge level
and the self-knowledge level.

4-29
Factors Influencing Involvement
Intrinsic self-relevance is based on consumers’ means–
end knowledge stored in memory.
Acquired through past experience with a product.
Situational self-relevance is determined by aspects of
the immediate physical/social environment.
Activates important consequences and values, thus making
products and brands seem self-relevant.

4-30
Factors Influencing Involvement
(cont.)
What marketers need to understand:
Focus of consumers’ involvement.
Sources that create it.

4-31
A Basic Model of Consumer
Product Involvement

4-32
 Involvement - Marketing
Implications
Understanding consumers’ product knowledge and
involvement can help marketers:
Understand the critical consumer–product relationship.
Develop more effective marketing strategies.

4-33
Understanding the key Reasons
for Purchase
Marketers can use means–end analyses to:
Identify the key attributes and consequences underlying a
product purchase decision.
Understand the meaning of those concepts to consumers.

4-34
 Understanding the Consumer-
Product Relationship
Marketers need to understand the cognitive and
affective aspects of consumer–product relationships.
Four market segments with different levels of intrinsic
self-relevance for a product category and brand are:
Brand loyalists
Routine brand buyers
Information seekers and brand switchers

4-35
 Influencing Intrinsic Self-
Relevance
If marketers can understand the means–end knowledge
that makes up consumers’ intrinsic self-relevance:
They are better able to design product attributes that consumers
will connect to important consequences and values.
Over longer periods consumers’ means–end knowledge
can be influenced by various marketing strategies.

4-36
 Influencing Situational Self-
Relevance
Strategies to create, modify, or maintain consumers’
situational self-relevance, usually with the goal of
encouraging a purchase, include:
Semiannual clearance sales
Premiums
Special pricing strategies
Linking a product to a social cause

4-37