This document provides an overview and agenda for a consumer behavior course. It introduces the instructor, Sandra Laporte, and outlines her areas of expertise. The document then reviews the course objectives, which are to understand how consumer behavior insights can benefit managers and develop analytical skills. It outlines the group project, where students will create a consumer profile for a brand. Finally, it introduces the topic of consumer behavior, defining it and outlining some of the key influences on consumer decision-making that will be covered throughout the course.

1. Consumer Behavior
Session 1
Sandra Laporte
Sandra.laporte@hec.ca

2. Agenda
• Session outline:
– A little about me, a little about you
– Evaluations
• The team project
– Logistics
– Example
– Introduction: What is Consumer Behavior?
• Course outline
• Research in consumer behavior
2

3. A Little About Me
• Ph.D. from HEC Paris
• Expertise
– Consumer Behavior
– Consumer Decision-Making under Uncertainty:
Sweepstakes, lotteries
– The relationship between money and food
– The impact of regret on consumer behavior
– The antecedents of donating behavior
• Where to find me?
– Room 4.507 (Marketing Dept., Red Zone, 4th floor) 3
– Office hours: By appointment

4. Course Objectives
• Understand how managers’ decision making benefits
from a refined understanding of consumers
• Better appreciation for the complexity of consumer
behavior
– Understand theoretical principles
– Develop your analytical skills within the concrete context
of creating a consumer profile
• Complete a group project that consists of studying
consumer behavior for a company of your choice.
– In-depth description of the typical consumer in terms of
lifestyle and psychographics.
– Propose some recommendations on product positioning

5. Course Materials
• Textbook:
– 5th Canadian edition of the textbook Consumer
Behaviour: Buying, Having, and Being, by
Solomon, Zaichowsky, and Polegato published in
2011 by Pearson Prentice Hall.

6. Evaluation
1. Consumer Profile Project: 70
Group evaluation
Assignment 1: Presentation of the brand / product / service 10
Assignment 2: Manager’s insights (including interview recording) 10
Assignment 3: Consumers’ insights 10
Assignment 4 : Final report 10
Oral presentation 10
Individualevaluation
Participation in session 7 5
Participation in session 9 5
Recording and summary of a consumer interview 5
Evaluation of the other groups’ final presentations 5
2. Final cumulative exam: 30

8. Logistics: ZoneCours2
• All writtenassignments and recordings must
beturned in electronicallythroughZoneCours 2,
in « Remise de Travaux » section
• For eachassignment, requirements are
specified in terms of:
– Contents
– Format
• Be verycareful to the deadlines!

10. First step: Team Allocation
• For next week, Jan. 16th, in Zone Cours,
‘Team Allocation’
– Name of your team: pick the company/brand
you will work on if you already have an idea
– Names of the team members: 3 to 5
• Start thinking about a company: Assignment
1 due on Jan. 30th
– Portrait of the company
– Name and contact details of the manager to be
interviewed
10

11. Example: listeners’ profile of radio
station Energie
French-Canadian men between 25 and 34 yearsold. 50% bluecollar / 50% white collar (sales & services).
They are teenagers withresponsibilities. In betweentwoages, theyhold on to teenage values
(risk, game, sexualpermissiveness, impertinence), while living an adult life (house, car, girlfriend, kids).
They are whattheyown: my BBQ, my TV, my car, mygirlfriend. Theylike sport, they practice and watchit.
It is for them, likesex, violent videogames or nights out withbuddies, a way to escape
fromresponsibilities of daily life. Theylike to revive theirchildhood and teenage brands: Converse, Passe-
Partout, PlayStation, Adidas, etc. Theytry to betheirownheroes, theirown stars. Theywatch reality TV a
lot and follow pop culture. Friends are necessary to theiridentity: I have my gang, therefore I am.
Withtheir pals, theyshareproblems and experiences, they compare themselves to
eachother, theyapprove of eachother. Theywentthrough the major revolution of men’srole in society
and the hyperfeminizationera. Nowthattheyreach the age of
responsibilities, theywonderwhichroletheyshouldplay as men. Together, theyrebelagainst concepts of
‘pink man’ or ‘metrosexual’, celebratevirility and champion masculinity.

12. Whythisproject…
• What types of information compose the
consumer profile?
• How these information canbeuseful for
marketers?
– You will have to give one
managerialrecommendationbased on the
consumer profile youwillget

13. Introduction
Whatis Consumer Behavior?

14. Definition
The study of the
processesinvolvedwhenindividuals or groups
select, purchase, use, or dispose of
products, services, ideas, or experiences to
satisfyneeds and desires

15. Evolution of Consumer Status
Business orientation
ManufacturingConsumers buy what is available
SellingConsumers can be coaxed into buying
MarketingConsumers buy superior value

16. Marketing Management Process
Information System
Data: 1
Internal
Secondary Market
Firm
Primary
Analysis Consumers
Planification Needs
Implementation Demand
Control Segments
Marketing Mix
Product
Price
Customer Service
Promotion
Retailing

17. Marketing Management Process
Assignment 2:
Manager’s Insights Information System
Data:
Final report:
Internal Consumer Behavior
Must includesecondary data
Secondary
Assignment 3: Primary
Consumer interviews

18. Influences on Consumer Behavior
Marketing mix influences
• Product
• Price
• Place
• Promotion
Personal /
Psychological influences
• Age/lifecycle stage Sociocultural influences
• Occupation • Family
• Economic status • Reference groups Session 6
• Lifestyle • Roles & status
• Personality Session 2 • Subculture
Session 3
• Motivation • Social class
• Beliefs • Culture Session 10
Session 4
• Attitudes
• Perception Session 5 Situational influences
• Purchase task
• Social surroundings
• Physical surroundings
• Temporal effects
18
• Antecedent states

19. Consumer Behaviour is a “Process”
(session 3)
Need recognition: Perceiving need for value
Search for information: Searching for value
Pre-purchase evaluation: Assessing value
Purchase decision: Buying value
Post-purchase behavior: Consuming & disposing
of value 19

20. Consumer Behaviour is a “Process”
CONSUMER’S MARKETER’S
PERSPECTIVE PERSPECTIVE
PREPURCHASE How does a consumer How are consumer
ISSUES decide about needing attitudes
a product? formed/changed?
PURCHASE Is product acquisition How do situational
ISSUES a stressful or pleasant factors affect
experience? purchase decision?
POSTPURCHASE Does product provide What determines
ISSUES pleasure or perform customer satisfaction
function? How is and repurchase?
product disposed of?

21. Why do businesses care about CB?
• Understanding what people buy
– Benefits/Value vs. Attributes vs. Products
• Understanding why people buy
• Understanding how to connect with people
– Relationship marketing

22. Influencing the consumer: a reality
IMPROVED!
2 for the
price of 1!
Now in handy
snack size!
Diamonds
are forever
For a
Don’t drink younger look!
and drive!
22

23. Influencing the consumer: a myth
• It is much easier to understand consumer behavior
than to manipulate it
• It is legitimate for businesses to try to appeal
consumers to their products and services
• Consumerist movements
23

24. Understanding CB is good for you!
• When we understand why we do the things
we do, we can change undesirable behaviors!
– Understanding consequences
– How emotions impact decisions
– How social interactions impact decisions
– How the environment impacts decisions
• Effects at a societal level

25. Research in Consumer Behavior

26. Interdisciplinarity
Economics Psychology
Sociology Anthropology
26

27. Different perspectives
MICRO CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
(INDIVIDUAL FOCUS)
Experimental Psych
Clinical Psychology
Developmental Psych
Human Ecology
Microeconomics
Social Psychology
Sociology
Macroeconomics
Semiotics/Literary Criticism
MACRO CONSUMER Demography
BEHAVIOR History
(SOCIAL FOCUS) Cultural Anthropology

28. Two main perspectives
Assumptions Positivist Approach Interpretativist Approach
Nature of Objective, tangible Socially constructed
reality Single Multiple
Goal Prediction Understanding
Knowledge Time free Time-bound
generated Context-independent Contest dependent
View of Existence of real causes Multiple, simultaneous
causality shaping events
Research Separation between Interactive, cooperative
relationship researcher and subject with researcher being
part of phenomenon
under study

29. Experimentalapproach
Consumer Consumer
Group A Group B
>
=
<
L’Oréal awareness
Attitude towards L’Oréal
Purchase intention

30. Ethnographicapproach

31. New methodologies in consumer
behaviorresearch
• Eyetracking
• RFID (Radio-Frequency Identification)
• fMRI(functionalMagneticResonance Imaging)

32. Eye-tracking

33. RFID and shopping paths

34. New approach: Neuroscience

35. Nextweek
• Motivations, Values, Personality&Lifestyles
• Team composition