Factors influencing

consumer behaviour
Culture
• Culture is the most fundamental determinant of a person’s wants and
behaviour
• Customers consumer, purchase as per their cultural values
• For instance, Americans value ‘individualism’ highly and hence may
purchase products mostly independently, which help customers to express
their uniqueness. On the other hand, Indian and Chinese customers value
‘collectivism’ such that their purchases often are taken considering the
opinions of others and purchases that confirm with society’s rules and
expectations.
• Culture, subculture and social class are particularly important influences on
customer buying behaviour
India, like China has a culture that rates high on Collectivism. Consumers often take
decisions collectively, with family, friends, co-workers, etc. Indian customers consume
products that are approved by the community. For instance, Indian customers will dress in
a certain way, eat certain foods, to fit in as per social norms.
 Social Class
• Social classes are relatively homogeneous and
enduring divisions in Society , which are hierarchically
ordered and whose members share similar values,
interests and behaviour.
• E.g: In India:
• Lower middle class
• Middle class
• Upper class
• Social classes not only reflect income, but also other
indicators such as occupation and education.
• Social classes determine a customer’s preferences for
clothing, leisure activities, home furnishings and
automobiles.
• Marketers often focus their efforts on one social class.
For e.g.: Titan watches target the upper and elite class
of customers.
 Social Factors
• A consumer’s behaviour is influenced by social factors that include reference groups, family, roles and
statuses.
• Endorsers often serve as role models and subtly inspire people to emulate them (slender image of Katrina
and muscled up body of Salman)

• Celebrities and ‘super moms’ are used by

L’oreal and Surf Excel as consumers aspire
to be like them.
• Toothpaste marketers often show Dentists
as consumers like to conform to experts’
opinion.
• Reference groups include friends.
• Membership Groups are those groups which a
consumer wishes to be a part of.
• Jeans brands often show similar people-mostly young
stylish models which appeal to satisfying a sense of
belonging/fitting (in that group).
• Customers purchase those products and brands which
will help them to fit in well with reference groups of
friends.
• Reference groups: all groups that have a direct (face to face) or indirect influence on customer’s
attitudes and self concept. Reference groups create pressures for conformity that may affect
product and brand choices.
• Customers are also influenced by groups to which they do not belong but hope to join. These are
Aspirational groups.
• Dissociative groups are those whose values or behaviour an individual rejects. (My daughter
doesn’t buy some kinds of tops which she calls ‘Aunty tops’ !!!)
• An Opinion leader is the person who offers informal advice or information about a specific
product or product category. Opinion leaders are highly confident , socially active, and frequent
users of the category. Customers often follow opinion leaders and buy products suggested by
opinion leaders.
• Marketers must try to identify Opinion leaders and try to reach them by identifying their
demographic, and psychographic characteristics, identify the media they read and direct messages
to them.
• Family: the family is the most important consumer buying influencer organisation in society.
Family of orientation consist of parents and siblings.
• From parents, a person acquires an orientation towards religion, politics, economics, a sense
of personal ambition and self worth.
• Family of procreation consists a person’s spouse and children.
• The wife usually has acted as the family’s main purchasing agent, especially for food,
sundries, and staple clothing items.
• For expensive products, such as cars, vacations, or housing, the vast majority of husbands and
wives engage in joint decision making.
• By knowing who in the family takes purchase decisions, marketers are better equipped with
the knowledge of who to target in their communications. For instance, marketers of
detergents, like Surf Excel or Ariel mostly show the wife as the protagonist in Ads. Mothers
are shown in toothpaste ads and ads for Maggi, Tropicana.
Personal Factors

Consumers purchase products and brands as per

personal factors such as age, gender, occupation, income
1. Age and Life Cycle Stage:
• Taste in food, clothes, furniture, and recreation often are related to age
• Consumption is also shaped by family lifecycle – a single adult would
have different purchasing behaviour as compared to when he is married
with children.
• Marketer should consider critical life events or transitions such as
marriage, child birth, illness, relocation, divorce, first job, career change,
retirement, death of a spouse-as giving rise to new needs.
• The baby industry attracts many marketers , given the enormous
amount parents spend on their babies.
Purchase behaviour of Indian teenagers:
• A survey— reveals that while 84 per cent of Indian teens love shopping online, 67 per cent of
them continue to pay in cash and 52 per cent pay using their parents’ debit/credit card.
• it was also found that teenagers spend money on food, clothes and gadgets (in that order).
• While spending on food is the highest among both boys and girls, 64 per cent of boys spend
money on gadgets as compared to 21 per cent of girls. Among girls, 66 per cent prefer to
spend on clothes, compared to 49 per cent of boys.
• Also, teens have strong preferences when it comes to brands. Apple, Nike, H&M and Netflix
emerged as the most popular brands among this cohort in their respective categories, the
survey reveals.
• Nearly 50 per cent of the respondents confirmed they get money when they ask for it. While
only 23 per cent receive pocket money, 25 per cent said they typically receive money on their
birthdays or from relatives during festivals.
2. Occupation and Economic circumstances:
• Occupation also influences consumption patterns. Marketers try to
identify occupational groups that have above average interest in their
products and services. For instance, computers, laptops are preferred
by working professionals.
• Both product and brand choices are affected by economic
circumstances such as personal disposable income. Luxury marketers
such as Gucci, Burberry are sought after and purchased by high
income customers. Car sales depend on income of customers.
• In recent covid times, sale of cars have come down drastically.
3. Personality and Self Concept:
• Personality means a set of distinguishing human psychological traits that lead to relatively
consistent and enduring responses to environmental stimuli including buying behaviour.
• Personality is often described in traits such as confidence, sociability, dominance,
autonomy.
• Brands have personalities too and this is referred to as Brand Personality. Brand
personality is the specific mix of human traits that we can attribute to a particular brand.
For e.g: Pepsi and young, confident and aggressive.
• Consumers are likely to choose brands whose personalities match their own.
• Consumers also purchase products that help them exhibit their self concept.
• For e.g.: consumers who want to exhibit themselves as successful to others would
purchase expensive electronics, luxury watches, expensive branded apparels.
4. Lifestyle and Values
• A lifestyle is a person’s pattern of living in the world, expressed in
activities, interests and opinions.
• Customers buy products and brands which fit into their lifestyles.
• For instance, a customer may prefer to purchase suitable shoes such
as Woodland’s if he is an active, outdoorsy type of person who spends
most of his times in adventurous activities outdoors.
Psychological factors
• Four key psychological processes influence customer response
• These are:
Motivation
Perception
Learning
Memory
Motivation
• Customers have needs
• There are different types of needs
• A need becomes a motive when it is aroused to a sufficient level of
intensity to drive an individual to act.
• Consumer needs are broader than that of consumers simply buying necessary
items in which to survive.
• Consumers may “need” to buy for any variety of reasons, such as prestige and
esteem, safety and security or for love and affiliation reasons
• For example, women's perfume and men’s cologne advertisements very often
imply that the wearer will receive love/attention by using a certain scent.
• prestige products are often purchased as a way to ‘show-off’ to others, and
hence help in satisfying status needs or ego needs
• With luxury items, the higher the price, the more the prestige that is linked to
the product.
• Motivation: Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs:
Physiological needs: hunger,
thirst, rest.
Consumers buy products that help them feel safe against
circumstances they wish to avoid: Safety needs
Consumers are individuals who have Social needs: needs to belong , need for
friendships and acceptance.
Status needs: In India, especially, having one’s
own home shows you have ‘arrived’
Motivation to be one’s best: Self –
Actualisation need
Personality and Self Concept
• Personality is a set of distinguishing psychological traits that lead to relatively
consistent and enduring responses to environmental stimuli including buying
behaviour.
• Personality can be described in terms of traits such as self-confidence, dominance,
autonomy, sociability and adaptability
• Brands also have personalities and consumers are likely to choose brands whose
personality match their own.
• E.g.: Levi’s personality suggests traits of ruggedness, youthful, rebellious and
authentic.
• Consumers often choose and use brands with the brand personality consistent with
their actual self concept (how we view ourselves) , though the match may instead be
based on consumer’s ideal self concept (how we would like to view ourselves).
Perception
• Perception is the process by which individuals select, organise, and interpret information
inputs to create a meaningful picture of the world.
• Selective Attention:
Customers are more likely to notice stimuli that relate to current need
Customers are more likely to notice stimuli, the deviations of which are large in relationship
to the normal size of the stimuli: one would notice a 75% discount more than a 10% discount
Selective distortion: the tendency to interpret information in a way that fits an individual’s
preconception. “It wont happen to me as I don’t smoke much anyways” is an example of
distortion to cancer warnings that come with cigarettes.
Selective retention: Individuals remember information that supports their attitudes and
beliefs. Due to this, customers may remember good points of a brand he likes and forget the
good points of competition brands
• Absolute Vodka Ads uses the principles of perception in their Ads:
Individuals select and organize and interpret information inputs to
create meaning picture of the world. In the case of Absolute Ads,
cionsumers select and organize the visuals such that the Absolute
bottle is visible , be it as a mountain or an island
Lifestyle
• Customers purchase products that match their lifestyles
• Lifestyle is a person’s pattern of living in the world, expressed in activities,
interests and opinions.
• For instance, customers may be money constrained or time constrained.
• Big Bazaar tries to appeal to money constrained customers who are thrifty
• Processed food brands try to appeal to time constrained customers
Customer Lifestyles: Attitudes, Purchasers of the
latest technology,
Interests and Opinions high price products

A lot of information
search before
purchasing; value for
money importance
How resources and primary motivation affects
consumer behaviour as per the VALs typology
• Actualisers: Successful, sophisticate, active, “take-charge’ people. Purchases often reflect cultivated
tastes for relatively upscale, niche oriented products
• Fulfilled: Mature, satisfied, comfortable, reflective. Favour durability, functionality and value in
products
• Achievers: Successful, career and work oriented. Favour established prestige products that
demonstrate success to their peers.
• Experiencers: Young, vital, enthusiastic, impulsive and rebellious. Spend a comparatively high
proportion of their income on clothing, fast food, music, movies and videos
• Strivers: Uncertain, insecure. Approval-seeking, resource constrained. Favour stylish products that
emulate the purchases of those with greater material wealth.
• Makers: Practical, self –sufficient, traditional, family oriented. Favour products with traditional and
functional purpose such as tools, utility vehicles.
• Strugglers: Elderly, resigned, passive, concerned, resource constrained. Cautious consumers who are
loyal to favourite brands.
Recent factor influencing Consumer
Behaviour in India
• The COVID-19 pandemic has brought a major shift in consumption patterns among consumers as necessary purchases are
taking precedence over luxury spending,
• certain terms like quality, safety, nutrition and trust have gathered more prominence as consumers are preferring "tried
and tested" brands in these uncertain times.
• With the economic pandemic that has followed COVID-19, a re-calibration of the consumer wallets is taking place where
'essentials' are taking precedence over luxuries, however affordable they are
• Moreover, there will also be re-calibration of channels such as e-commerce, which has increased its penetration and
prominence among the customers post lockdown,
• Post-COVID-19, Nestle's entire innovation funnel is also undergoing a change to engage with the customers under a new
normal: "Every business is recalibrating in the context of newly relevant consumer behaviours that are coming in, that is,
what innovations we should go with, what innovation should be left out," Suresh Narayan, Nestle India chairman has said.
• Like others, Nestle has also witnessed a rise in its 'in-home indulgence' segment of products and introduced new products
under 'MAGGI- Cooking Made Simple' service.
• the company is also witnessing a surge in sales from e-commerce channels
• its "in-home consumption" was up and sales of Everyday Dairy Whitener, Nestle a+ Milk, another milk-based portfolio,
Nescafe performed well this quarter,
• Occupants – Who is the Consumer?: This questions makes it easier to know about the consumer’s overall profile in relation to geographic, psychographic,
demographic factors.The geographic factors state the particular area to which the consumer belongs, while psychographic factors lead to the
understanding of the consumer’s lifestyle often reflected in their interest, activities and opinion.
• Similarly, demographic factors enable the understanding of consumers age, income, sex, education, and occupation.
• Object – What does the Consumer Buy?: It determines the product proposition which the consumer purchases, i.e. the brand, product or product form.
Further, it will also identify the specification, colour, size, type, variant, etc which the customer seeks to buy.
• Objective – Why is Consumer Buying?: It gives reason for the purchase of the product by the customer, in terms of the needs satisfied or benefits expected
from the product.
• Occasion- When do they Buy?: It ascertains the buying frequency (how often) and the occasion on which the customer tend to buy the product or services.
• For Example, Item whose ticket size is high, such as television, air conditioner, are bought during Diwali or New Year.
• Outlet – Where do they Buy?: It identifies the outlet, be it a retail shop, online platform i.e. app or website, departmental store or any other location from
where the customer makes the buying decision.
• For example: Do customers buy a mobile phone from a retail outlet or online via Amazon or Flipkart?
• Operations – How do they Buy?: It determines the background information which the consumer collects from various sources, before making the
purchase.
• For example: Before buying a laptop consumers often look for the reviews of the latest laptops, as well as ask various questions from the company’s
representatives to get assured of the product quality.
• Organization – Who is Involved?: It determines the management of the sources of information which influence the buying decision of the consumer
example, Complan is expected to increase the height of the child.