Chapter 6: Consumer Behavior

1. CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
Lindsey Halsey

2. CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
• To understand consumer
behavior, we must ask
why people buy goods or
services.
• Using principles and
theories from sociology
and psychology,
marketers have been able
to decipher many
consumer choices and
develop basic strategies
for dealing with
consumers.

3. THE CONSUMER DECISION MODEL REPRESENTS THE STEPS THAT
CONSUMERS GO THROUGH BEFORE, DURING AND AFTER MAKING
PURCHASES.
NEED RECOGNITION INFORMATION
SEARCH
ALTERNATIVE
EVALUATION
PURCHASE AND
CONSUMPTION
POST-PURCHASE
CONSUMER DECISION PROCESS

4. FACTORS INFLUENCING THE
CONSUMER DECISION
PROCESS
• Motives: A need or want that is strong enough to
cause the person to seek satisfaction.
• Attitudes: A person’s enduring evaluation of his or
her feelings about an object or idea.
• Perceptions: Process by which we select, organize,
and interpret information.
• Learning and memory: A change in a person’s
thought process or behavior that arises from
experience.
• Lifestyle: Refers to the way consumers spend their
time and money to live.
PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS

5. SOCIAL FACTORS
• THE CONSUMER DECISION
PROCESS IS INFLUENCED FROM
WITHIN BY PSYCHOLOGICAL
FACTORS.
• IT IS ALSO INFLUENCED BY
EXTERNAL SOCIAL ENVIRONMENT,
WHICH CONSIST OF THE
CUSTOMER’S FAMILY, REFERENCE
GROUPS, AND CULTURE.

6. Psychological and social factors typically
influence the consumer decision process
the same way each time.
Purchase Situation: Consumers may be predisposed to
purchase certain products or services because of underlying
psychological trait or social factors may change in certain
purchase situations.
Sensory Situation: When a customer enters a store, various
sensory aspects influence their decisions.
Sensory situations
• Visual: Refers to the colors, lighting, brightness,
size, shape and setup.
• Auditory: Examples include music that plays in
their stores.
• Olfactory: The sense of smell.
• Tactile: Give customers something to interact
with the merchandise.
• Taste: Important in restaurants for food and
beverage retailers.
SITUATIONAL FACTORS

7. SITUATIONAL
FACTORS
• Our state of mind at any particular time
can alter our preconceived notions of
what we are going to purchase. For
example, some people are morning
people, whereas some function better at
night. A purchase situation may have
different appeal levels depending on
the time of day and the type of person
the consumer is.

8. INVOLVEMENT AND
CONSUMER BUYING DECISIONS
Consumers make two types of
buying decisions, extended
problem solving or limited
problem solving.
Involvement: is the consumer’s
degree of interest in the product
or service.
High Involvement
• Greater Attention
• Deeper Processing
Develops strong
attitudes and purchase
intentions
Low
Involvement
• Less attention
• Peripheral
Processing
Generates weak
attitudes and
increases use of cues.

9. The buying process begins when consumers
recognize that they have an unsatisfied need. This
process is an example of extended problem solving,
which is common when the consumer perceives
that the purchase decision entails a lot of risk.
• Occurs during a purchase decision that calls for,
at most, a moderate amount of effort and time.
Customers engage in this type of buying process
when they have had some prior experience with
the product or service and the perceived risk is
moderate.
• A common type of limited problem solving is
impulse buying, a buying decision made by
customers on the spot when they see the
merchandise.
• Habitual Decision making describes a purchase
decision process in which consumers engage in
little conscious effort.
LIMITED PROBLEM SOLVING
INVOLVEMENT AND CONSUMER BUYING
DECISIONS
EXTENDED PROBLEM SOLVING

10. SUMMARY
In chapter 6, I learned the process that
consumers go through when they buy
products and services. I also went over the
psychological, social, and situational factors
that influence this consumer decision
process.