Marketing Management, Millenium Edition - epiheirimatikotita.gr

AnalyzingConsumer Marketsand BuyerBehaviorWe will address the following questions:■ How do cultural, social, personal, and psychological factors influence consumer buyingbehavior?■ How does the consumer make a purchasing decision?The aim of marketing is to meet and satisfy target customers’ needs and wants. Thefield of consumer behavior studies how individuals, groups, and organizationsselect, buy, use, and dispose of goods, services, ideas, or experiences to satisfy theirneeds and desires. Understanding consumer behavior is never simple, because customersmay say one thing but do another. They may not be in touch with their deepermotivations, and they may respond to influences and change their minds at the lastminute.Still, all marketers can profit from understanding how and why consumers buy.For example, Whirlpool’s staff anthropologists go into people’s homes, observe howthey use appliances, and talk with household members. Whirlpool has found that inbusy families, women are not the only ones doing the laundry. Knowing this, the company’sengineers developed color-coded washer and dryer controls to make it easierfor kids and men to pitch in. 1In fact, not understanding your customer’s motivations, needs, and preferencescan lead to major mistakes. This is what happened when Kodak introduced its Advantacamera—a costly bust. The company proudly touted it as a high-tech product, but themarketplace was dominated by middle-aged baby-boomers. In midlife, fancy new technologygenerally loses its appeal, and simplicity begins to edge out complexity in consumerpreferences, so Advanta sales did not skyrocket.Such examples show why successful marketers use both rigorous scientific proceduresand more intuitive methods to study customers and uncover clues for developingnew products, product features, prices, channels, messages, and other marketing-87