CHAPTER 1 Consumer behavior the study of the processes involved when individuals or groups select purchase use or dispose of products services ideas or experiences to satisfy needs and desires Consumers are segmented by demographics and psychographics lifestyle and personality Brands target consumers using marketing segmentation strategies Consumer behavior is a process Three stages of consumer behavior Consumer o Prepurchase how does a consumer decide they need a product What are the best sources of information for researching the product o Purchase is acquiring the product stressful or pleasant What does the product say about the consumer o Postpurchase Does the product provide pleasure perform its intended purpose Marketer o Prepurchase How are consumer attitudes towards products formed changed What cues to consumers use to infer products are superior to others o Purchase How do situational factors such as time pressure or store displays affect the consumer s purchase decisions o Postpurchase What determines whether a consumer will be satisfied with a product and whether he she will buy it again Does this person tell others about his her experiences with the product and influence their purchase decisions Demographics Age Gender Family Structure Social Class Income Race Ethnicity Geography Marketers are able to influence popular culture Role theory consumers play several roles in society and tailor what they purchase as to what role they are playing in that moment Consumer Brand Relationships o Self Concept Attachment o Nostalgic Attachment o Interdependence o Love emotion helps establish a user s identity product serves as a link with past self part of user s daily routine the product elicits emotional bonds of warmth passion or other strong Global Consumer Culture When a product unites people around the world by their common devotion rise in global marketing Digital Marketing Digital Native born into the digital world Horizontal Revolution We now don t receive our info from gov ts And big companies we B2C Commerce businesses selling to consumers How it always was The cyberspace explosion created C2C e Commerce consumer to consumer activity communicate with millions of other people so now info flows across people as well Web 2 0 the rebirth of the Internet as social interactive medium from its original roots as a form of one way transmission from producers to consumers Marketing ethics and Public Policy Business Ethics are rules of conduct that guide actions in the marketplace standards against which most people in a culture judge what is right and what is wrong Some cultural differences in ethics Objective of Marketing create awareness that needs exist not to create needs Consumerspace new environment where individuals dictate to companies the types of products they want and how when and where they want to learn about those products Need a basic biological motive Want one way that society has taught us that the need can be satisfied Proof marketing doesn t create needs High failure rate of new products Does advertising foster materialism Products are designed for existing needs Advertising helps to communicate their availability Advertisers simply don t know enough about people to manipulate them Economics of Information emphasizes the economic cost of the time spent searching for products advertising is an important source of consumer information Public Policy and Consumerism beginning of 20th century rise in the concern and welfare of consumers Dept of agriculture federal trade commission food and drug administration securities and exchange commission environmental protection agency Social Marketing Strategies use the techniques that marketers normally employ to sell beer or detergent to encourage positive behaviors such as increased literacy and to discourage negative activities such as drunk driving Green Marketing philosophy firms choose to protect or enhance the environment as they go about their business activities Culture Jamming a strategy to disrupt efforts by the corporate world to dominate our cultural landscape Many specializations of consumer behavior Experimental psychology clinical psychology microeconomics human ecology social psychology sociology macroeconomics semiotics demography history cultural anthropology all range from microconsumer behavior individual focus experimental psychology to macroconsumer behavior social focus cultural anthropology 2 perspectives on consumer research slide 31 chap 1 helpful table Positivist Approach emphasizes that human reason is supreme and there is a single objective truth that science can discover Encourages us to stress the function of objects to celebrate technology and to regard the world as rational ordered place with a clearly defined past present and future Interpretivist Approach much and that this ordered rational view of behavior denies or ignores this complex social and cultural world in which we really live argues that our society emphasizes science and technology too CHAPTER 2 Perception is a three stage process that translates raw stimuli into meaning Occurs when a stimulus comes within the range of someone s sensory receptors 1 Exposure We may or may not notice the stimulus Interpretation 2 Attention 3 Marketer s challenge to break through the clutter Refers to the meaning we assign to sensory stimulus Sensation the immediate response of our sensory receptors eyes ears nose etc to basic stimulus light color sound etc Perception is the process by which sensations are selected organized and interpreted essentially what we add to sensations to give them meaning Sights eyes exposure attention interpretation Sounds ears exposure attention interpretation Each individual interprets the meaning of a stimulus in a manner consistent with his or her own unique biases needs and experiences Hedonic Consumption multisensory fantasy and emotional aspects of consumers interactions with products we want products that make us feel good Products and commercial messages often appeal to our senses but because of the profusion of these messages most products and commercial messages won t influence us Design of product is key Sensory Marketing where companies pay extra attention to the impact of sensations on our product experiences Marketers will pay attention to multiple sensory systems vision scent sound touch taste Exposure Sensory Thresholds Absolute Threshold refers to the minimum amount of stimulation a person can detect