Download CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR MODEL and more Lecture notes Management Theory in PDF only on Docsity!
Volume 1, Issue 5 (May, 2014) Online ISSN-2347-
Available online on www.saiompublications.com 34
Published by: Sai Om Publications
Sai Om Journal of Commerce & Management
A Peer Reviewed National Journal
CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR MODELS: AN OVERVIEW
Jisana T. K. Research Scholar, PSMO College Tirurangadi, Malappuram (University of Calicut), Kerala, India Email: jisanatk@gmail.com
ABSTRACT
Any person engaged in the consumption process is a consumer. Consumers are the individuals who buy for personal consumption or to meet the collective needs of the family and households needs. Consumer behavior means how individuals make decisions to spend their available resources like time, money, effort on consumption of different products and services. It includes what they buy, why they buy it, when they buy it, where they buy it, how often they buy it, and how often they use it. This paper presents a review of theory of consumer behavior models. Besides this factors influencing consumer behavior and are discussed in this paper.
Keywords: Consumer Behaviour; Consumer Behavior Model; Buying Decision Behavior
INTRODUCTION
Any person engaged in the consumption process is a consumer. Consumers are the individuals who buy for personal consumption or to meet the collective needs of the family and households needs. Consumer behavior means how individuals make decisions to spend their available resources like time, money, effort on consumption of different products and services. It includes what they buy, why they buy it, when they buy it, where they buy it, how often they buy it, and how often they use it. Consumer behavior is the actions a person takes in purchasing and using products and services, including the mental and social processes that precede and follow these actions. Leon G.Schiffman and Leslie lazar Kanuk defined consumer behavior “as the behavior that consumers display in searching for, purchasing.using, evaluating and disposing of products, services and ideas which they expect will satisfy their needs”. Consumer behavior is the way an individual acts while obtaining and using goods and services. This act involves a decision process and the individual, in turn, is influenced by his personal characteristics and environmental factors. Consumer behaviour is a vast and complex subject. Understanding consumer behaviour and “knowing consumers’ are not that simple. It is almost impossible to predict with accuracy, how consumers will behave in a given situation. The efforts of all marketers are to influence the behaviour of consumers in a desired manner. The success or failure in this pursuit determines the difference between success and failure of marketing efforts or even the business itself. Need of studying Consumer Behaviour Marketers must have access to data concerning consumers,buying habits and which kinds of media they favour, in order to develop convincing communication programs. Who makes the buying decision?
Who influences the buying decision? What motivates the buyers and people to take action?
A Peer Reviewed National Journal
Factors Influencing Consumer Behaviour
Consumer purchases are influenced strongly by cultural, social, personal and psychological characteristics.
I. Cultural factors
Culture: Culture is the set of basic values, perceptions, wants and behaviours learned by a member of society from family and other important institutions. Basically, culture is the part of every society and is the important cause of individual wants and behavior. The influence of culture on buying behavior varies from country to country therefore marketers have to be very careful in analyzing the culture of different groups, regions or even countries.
Subculture: Each culture contains different subcultures such as religions, nationalities, geographic regions, racial groups etc. Marketers can use these groups by segmenting the market into various small portions. Marketers can design products according to the needs of a particular geographic group.
Social class: Social class refers to the hierarchical arrangement of the society into various divisions, each of which signifies social status or standing. Social class is an important determinant of consumer behavior as it affects consumption patterns, lifestyle, media patterns, activities and interests of consumers.
II. Social factors
Social factors also impact the buying behavior of consumers. The important social factors are: reference groups, family, role and status.
Reference Groups: persons reference group are those groups that have a direct or indirect influence on the person’s attitudes or behavior. Individuals use these groups as reference points for learning attitudes, beliefs and behavior, and adapt these in their life. Family and close friends are considered to be primary reference groups in an individual’s life due to their frequency of interaction with the individual and primacy of these significant others in an individual’s life. Schoolmates, neighborhood, colleagues, other acquaintances are a part of the secondary reference groups of an individual.
Family: Buyer behavior is strongly influenced by the member of a family. Therefore marketers are trying to find the roles and influence of the husband, wife and children. If the buying decision of a particular product is influenced by wife then the marketers will try to target the women in their advertisement. Here we should note that buying roles change with change in consumer lifestyles.
Roles and Status: Each person possesses different roles and status in the society depending upon the groups, clubs, family, organization etc. to which he belongs. The social role and status profoundly influences the consumer behavior and his purchasing decisions.
III. Personal Factors
Personal factors can also affect the consumer behavior. Some of the important personal factors that influence the buying behavior are: lifestyle, economic situation, occupation, age, personality and self concept.
Age: Age and life-cycle have potential impact on the consumer buying behavior. Consumers change the purchase of goods and services with the passage of time. Family life-cycle consists of different stages such as childhood, bachelorhood, newly married couple, parenthood etc. which help marketers to develop appropriate products for each stage.
Occupation: The occupation of a person has significant impact on his buying behavior. For example a marketing manager of an organization will try to purchase business suits, whereas a low level worker in the same organization will purchase rugged work clothes.
A Peer Reviewed National Journal
Beliefs and Attitudes: Customer possesses specific beliefs and attitudes towards various products. Since such beliefs and attitudes make up brand image and affect consumer buying behavior, therefore, marketers are interested in them. Marketers can change the beliefs and attitudes of customers by launching special campaigns in this regard.
A Conceptual Model for Consumer Buying Decision Process & Consumer Behaviour
This model explains consumers buying decision process and consumer behavior.The first step is to identify an unsatisfied need .After that information can be searched from different sources like personal,commercial,public and experiential sources.After completing the search process consumer will get a lot of alterntive choices and from that he will select the best one.Consumer evaluate the available choices be using certain evaluation criteria.They are price,quality,advertisement,brand etc.After evaluation the actual purchase will take pace.At last the important stage is post purchase decision ie if the consumer is satisfied with the product he will continue purchasing it otherwise he will shift to another product.Consmer buying decision process is a continous process.
Models of Consumer Buying Behaviour
I. Traditional models
Economic model: The economic model of consumer behavior focuses on the idea that a consumer's buying pattern is based on the idea of getting the most benefits while minimizing costs. Thus, one can predict consumer behavior based on economic indicators such as the consumer's purchasing power and the price of competitive products. For instance, a consumer will buy a similar product that is being offered at a lower price to maximize the benefits; an increase in a consumer's purchasing power will allow him to increase the quantity of the products he is purchasing.
Learning model: This model is based on the idea that consumer behavior is governed by the need to satisfy basic and learned needs. Basic needs include food, clothing and shelter, while learned needs include fear and guilt. Thus, a consumer will have a tendency to buy things that will satisfy their needs and provide satisfaction. A hungry customer may pass up on buying a
A Peer Reviewed National Journal
nice piece of jewelry to buy some food, but will later go back to purchase the jewelry once her hunger is satisfied. Psychoanalytic model: The psychoanalytical model takes into consideration the fact that consumer behavior is influenced by both the conscious and the subconscious mind. The three levels of consciousness discussed by Sigmund Freud (id, ego and superego) all work to influence one's buying decisions and behaviors. A hidden symbol in a company's name or logo may have an effect on a person's subconscious mind and may influence him to buy that product instead of a similar product from another company.
Sociological model: The sociological model primarily considers the idea that a consumer's buying pattern is based on his role and influence in the society. A consumer's behavior may also be influenced by the people she associates with and the culture that her society exhibits. For instance, a manager and an employee may have different buying behaviors given their respective roles in the company they work for, but if they live in the same community or attend the same church, they may buy products from the same company or brand.
II. Contemporary models
Howard-Sheth Model Engel-Kollat-Blackwell Model
Nicosia Model Stimulus-Response Model
Howard-Sheth model (1969)
It is one of the most comprehensive models of consumer buying behavior and it uses the concept of stimulus-response in order to explain buyer’s brand choice behavior over a period of time.
Source: S Jayachandran, Marketing management, Excel Books, 2004
The four major components of the model are
Input variables Output variables
Hypothetical constructs-Perceptual constructs and Learning constructs
A Peer Reviewed National Journal
Source: S Jayachandran, Marketing management, Excel Books, 2004
Problem recognition: the consumer will recognize a difference between his or her actual state and what the ideal state should be. This may occur on account of external stimuli.
Information search: Initially the information available with the consumer may be consistent to other beliefs and attitudes held by him or her. While being involved in an information seeking or search stage, the consumer will try to gather more information from various sources. The individual gets exposure of the stimuli which may catch his or her attention, be received and stored or retained in memory. This method of information is selective in nature and the consumer will accept the information, which is conclusive to what is perceived by them.
Alternative evaluation: Now the individual will evaluate the alternate brands. The methods used for evaluating the various products will depend on the consumer’s underlying goals, motives and personality. The consumer also has certain predetermined beliefs about the various brands in terms of the characteristics associated with the different brands.
Choice: the consumer’s choice will depend on his or her intention and attitude. The choice will depend on normative compliance and anticipated circumstances. Normative compliance relates to the extent to which the consumer is influenced by other people like friends, family members etc.
Outcome: The outcome may either be positive or negative.
Apart from these 5 steps the model also includes a number of other related variables grouped into five categories.
- Information input
- Information processing
- Product-brand evaluation
- General motivating influences
- Internalized environmental influences
A Peer Reviewed National Journal
Nicosia model
This model was developed in 1966, by Francesco Nicosia, an expert in consumer motivation and behavior. The Nicosia model tries to explain buyer behavior by establishing a link between the organization and its (prospective) consumer. The model suggests that messages from the firm first influences the predisposition of the consumer towards the product or service. Based on the situation, the consumer will have a certain attitude towards the product. This may result in a search for the product or an evaluation of the product attributes by the consumer. If the above step satisfies the consumer, it may result in a positive response, with a decision to buy the product otherwise the reverse may occur.
The Nicosia model groups the above activity explanation into four basic areas-fields one has two sub areas–the consumers attribute and firms attributes. Depending on the way, the message is received by the consumer, a certain attribute may develop. This newly developed attribute becomes the input for area two. The second area or area two is related to the search and evaluation, undertaken by the consumer, of the advertised product and also to verify if other alternatives are available. In case the above step results in a motivation to buy the product /service, it becomes the input for third area. The third area explains how the consumer actually buys the product. And area four is related to the uses of the purchased items. This fourth area can also be used as an output to receive feedback on sales results to the firm.
Stimulus-Response model
Marketing and other stimuli enter the buyer’s “black box” and produce certain choice/purchase responses. Marketers must figure out what is inside of the buyer’s “black box” and how stimuli are changed to responses. Marketing stimuli consist of the four Ps: product, price, place, and promotion. Other stimuli include major forces and events in the buyer's environment: economic, technological, political, and cultural. All these inputs enter the buyer's black box, where they are turned into a set of observable buyer responses: product choice, brand choice, dealer choice, purchase timing, and purchase amount. The marketer wants to understand how the stimuli are changed into responses inside the consumer's black box, which has two parts. First, the buyer's characteristics influence how he or she perceives and reacts to the stimuli. Second, the buyer's decision process itself affects the buyer's behaviour.
A Peer Reviewed National Journal
- P. C. Jain, Monika Bhatt (2003), “Consumer Behaviour in Indian Context”, S.Chand&Company LTD, New Delhi.
- Shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in
- S. Jayachandran (2004), “Marketing Management”, Excel Books, New Delhi.
- Shodhganga.inflibnet.ac.in
- _www.nptel.iitm.ac.in/courses/.../pdf%20sahany/Module5.(10)doc.pdf
- www.aipmm.com/html/newsletter/archives/000434.php
- www.ehow.com
- www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~renglish/370/notes/chapt05/
