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BAA 120
4. Consumer Behavior
In this chapter we will have a closer look at the most important element of the
market place - the customers.
One of the aims of marketing is to understand how customers think about, and
behave toward, an organization and its marketing offers.
Consumer markets and consumer behavior:
Consumer Market : consists of the final consumers - individuals and households
- who buy goods and services for personal consumption.
Consumers around the world vary greatly in age, income, education level, and
taste. They also buy a huge variety of goods and services.
So, it is important to know how they make their buying decision and what are the
factors that affect these decisions.
Many different factors affect consumer buying behavior. Buying behavior is
never simple, yet understanding it is the essential task of marketing
management.
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Model of Consumer Behavior
Consumers make many decisions every day. So, most marketing researchers try
to know:
95% of the thought, emotion, and learning which drives our purchases occurs in
the unconscious mind. It means without our awareness.
The important question for marketers is “How do consumers ‘respond’ to the
‘stimulus’ (‫ )حافز‬of various marketing efforts the company may use, and of what
they experience.”
The starting point is the ‘stimulus-response’ model of buyer behavior shown in
the figure below.
This figure shows that our marketing efforts (the 4Ps) and the environmental factors
enter the consumer’s “black box” where a consumer processes these stimuli, and this
processing influenced by the buyer characteristics and decision process, results in
buyer responses.
Therefore, we need to study the buyer characteristics, and the buyer decision
process, since they are the two elements that turn a company’s marketing efforts
(stimuli) into a set of observable buyer responses.
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1. Characteristics affecting Consumer Behavior:
Consumer purchases are influenced strongly by: cultural, social, personal, and
physiological characteristics.
Marketers cannot control such factors, but must take them into consideration.
Figure: Factors Influencing Consumer Behavior
A. CULTURAL FACTORS
1. CULTURE
Culture: the set of basic values, perceptions, wants, and behaviors learned by a
member of society from family and other important institutions.
Human behavior is largely learned. A child who grows up in USA will have different
wants and behaviors than the one growing up in China.
Culture is the most basic
cause of a person’s wants
and
behavior.
Therefore,
cultural influences on buying
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behavior may vary greatly from country to country. Failure to adjust
to these
differences can result in ineffective marketing or mistakes.
Activity 1:
Name three cultural differences for two different countries.
Two countries
Example: China v’s
Bahrain
Country 1
Giving gifts when visiting
somebody’s house
Country 2
Giving gifts to your
guests when they visit
your house.
1.
2.
3.
Some of the cultural attitudes may change, such as greater
concern about health and fitness. These changes are called
cultural shifts. Marketers are always trying to spot cultural
shifts to identify opportunities or threats, such as the need
for healthy food manufacturing, or sport and fitness
services.
2. SUBCULTURE
Subculture: A group of people with shared value systems based on common life
experiences and situations. They may include nationalities, religions, racial groups,
or geographic regions.
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People in each subculture have distinct characteristics, such as brand loyalty, family
shopping. So, marketers have to know the subcultures and their distinct
characteristics.
3. SOCIAL CLASS
Social class: Relatively permanent and ordered division in a society whose members
share similar values, interests, and behaviors.
Social classes are measured by many factors: occupation, income, education,
wealth and other variables. For example: Upper Class, Middle Class and Lower
Class.
People can move from social level to another, but in some country social classes are
fixed. Marketers study the social classes because people within a given social class
tend to show similar buying behavior; they show distinct product and brand
preferences in areas such as clothes, home furnishings, cars, and leisure activities.
B. SOCIAL FACTORS
1. SMALL GROUP
Groups: two or more people who interact to accomplish individual or mutual goals.
Reference groups influence the person’s attitudes and
behaviors. Manufacturers of products and brands subjected
to strong group influence must find out how to reach to
the opinion leaders. Example a specific football player
could be the opinion leader for which brand of sport shoes
young football fans would buy or doctors who recommend
certain medicines. Marketers try to identify the reference
groups of their target markets.
Opinion leader: Person within a reference group who, because of special skills,
knowledge, Personality or other characteristics has influence on others.
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2. FAMILY
The family is the most important buying organization in
society; family members can strongly influence buyer
Who makes the decision
in your family for the
purchasing of:
Cars?
Groceries?
Holidays?
behavior. Example: Mothers, fathers, husband, wife
and kids.
3. ROLE AND STATUS
Who makes the decision in family purchasing? Who
influences the decision maker?
C. PERSONAL FACTORS
1.
AGE AND LIFE-CYCLE STAGE
People change the goods and
services they buy over their lifecycle times. Tastes in food,
cloths, furniture, and recreation
are often changed with age.
Family life-cycle: the stages through which families might pass as they mature over
time. And buying is also shaped by these stages.
Marketers have to consider these changes over time.
2.
OCCUPATION
A person’s occupation affects the goods and services bought. Example: the cloths
required for “blue-collar” workers, or business suits for management occupations.
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3.
ECONOMIC SITUATION
A person’s economic situation will affect product choice. Marketers of incomesensitive goods watch the economic trends, such as personal income, savings,
and interest rate. Example: Rolex and Timex.
4. LIFESTYLE
Even people coming from the same subculture, social class, and occupation may have
quite different life styles.
Lifestyle: A person’s pattern of living as expressed in his or her activities, interest,
and opinions.
Activities (work, hobbies, sports, shopping and social events).
Interests in (food, fashion, family, recreation)
Opinions (about themselves, social issues, business and products)
Researchers have developed lifestyle classifications, where people are
classified according to how they spend their time and money.
5. PERSONALITY AND SELF-CONCEPT
Each person has a distinct personality that influences his or her buying behavior such
as his self-confidence, sociability, adaptability. Personality can be useful in
analyzing consumer behavior for certain product or brand choices. For example,
coffee marketers have discovered that heavy coffee drinkers have sociability. So
Starbucks create environment in which people can relax and socialize together.
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D.
PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS
1. MOTIVATION
A motive is: a need that is sufficiently pressing to direct the person to seek
satisfaction of the need.
Some are biological: such as hunger, thirst, or discomfort.
Some are psychological, comes from the need or recognition, esteem, or belonging.
The Maslow hierarchy of human need explain more about that. The most pressing
needs are at the bottom of the triangle, and the least pressing at the top. The role of
marketers is to satisfy these needs.
2. PERCEPTION
Perception (‫)اإلدراك‬: is the process by which people select, organize, and interpret
information to form a meaningful picture of the world.
A motivated person is ready to act, his acts is influenced by his or her own perception
on the situation. We all see, hear, smell, touch and taste objects, however each of us
receives, organize, and interprets these senses in an individual way. Thus, People
can form different perceptions of the same stimulus. This must be considered
in designing a marketing strategy.
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3. LEARNING
Learning: Changes in an individual’s behavior arising from experience.
Suppose the consumer buys a Nikon digital camera. If his experience is positive, then
the next time he shops for a camera or other similar product, the probability is greater
that he or she will buy a Nikon product. Customers learn through experience. The role
of marketing is to keep this experience positive to customers.
4. BELIEFS AND ATTITUDES
Marketers are interested in the beliefs that people formulate about product or service,
because these beliefs make up product and brand images that affect buying behavior.
(What is your belief in a subway sandwich comparing to McDonalds’ burgers?)
Attitudes are difficult to change. Thus, a company should usually try to fit its
products into existing attitudes rather than attempt to change attitudes. But
there are exceptions where the cost of trying to change attitudes may pay off well.
(Example: changing the attitude toward consuming milk).
1. The Buyer Decision Process:
The figure below shows all the considerations that arise when a consumer faces a
new and complex purchase situation.
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The buying process starts long before the actual purchase, and continues long after.
Marketers need to focus on the entire buying process rather than on just the
purchase decision.
The consumers pass the above 5 stages with every purchase. But in more routine
purchases, consumers often skip or reverse some of these stages.
1. NEED RECOGNITION
The buying process start with this stage of need recognition, the buyer recognizes
a problem or need.
The need can be triggered by:
a. Internal stimuli: when one of the person’s normal needs (hunger, thirst,
sleep..) rises to a level high enough to become a drive.
b. External stimuli: a need can be triggered by an advertisement or a discussion
with a friend might get you thinking about buying a new product.
Marketers should research consumers to find out what kind of needs or problems
arise.
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2. INFORMATION SEARCH
If the consumer’s drive is strong and a satisfying product is near at hand, the
consumer is likely to buy it then. If not, the consumer may store the need in
memory or undertake an information search related to that need or problem.
Information sources:
a. Personal sources: family, friends, neighbors, owners.
b. Commercial
sources:
advertising,
salespeople,
web
sites
dealers,
packaging, displays.
c. Public sources: mass media, consumer-rating organizations, internet
search.
d. Experiential sources: handling, examining, and using the product.
Generally, consumers receive the most information about a product from
commercial sources, and those controlled by the marketers. However, the
most effective source is the personal sources. Commercial sources inform the
buyers, while personal sources legitimize or evaluate products for the buyers.
3.
EVALUATION OF ALTERNATIVES
In this stage consumer choose among the alternative brands. Marketers need to
know about the consumer’s alternative evaluations, but consumers use several
evaluation processes in their evaluation.
Evaluating purchase alternatives depends on the individual consumer and
specific buying situation.
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Marketers should study buyers to find out how they actually evaluate brand
alternatives. If they manage to know what evaluative processes go on, marketers
can take steps to influence the buyer’s decision.
4.
PURCHASE DECISION
In the previous evaluation stage the consumer ranks brands and forms purchase
intentions. Then the consumer purchase decision is to buy the most preferred
brand,
Between the two stages of intention and decision come two factors affecting the
final purchase. These tow factors are:
a. Attitude of others: someone important for you have different opinion might
change your intention or decision. (your father tells you to buy a cheaper price
car).
b. Unexpected situational factors: unexpected events that might change the
purchase intention.(change in the economic situation, a competitor drop the
price..)
5. POSTPURCHASE BEHAVIOR
The marketer’s job does not end when the product is bought. After purchasing the
product, the consumer either is satisfied or dissatisfied with the product.
- Bad word of mouth often travels farther and faster than good word of mouth.
- Quickly damage consumer attitude about the company and its products.
- Most unhappy customers never tell the company about their problem.
The company duty is to measure customer satisfaction regularly.
Set up systems that encourage customer complain. (By Toll free number, website)
In this way the company will learn how well it is doing and how it can improve.
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