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Belch: Advertising and
Promotion, Sixth Edition
II. Integrated Marketing
Program Situation Analysis
4. Perspectives on
Consumer Behavior
A challenge faced by all marketers is
how to influence the purchase behavior
of consumers in favor of the product or
service they offer. For companies like American Express, this means getting consumers
to charge more purchases on their AmEx cards. For BMW, it means getting
them to purchase or lease a car; for business-to-business marketers like Canon or
Ricoh, it means getting organizational buyers to purchase more of their copiers or
fax machines. While their ultimate goal is to influence consumers’ purchase behavior,
most marketers understand that the actual purchase is only part of an overall
process.
Consumer behavior can be defined as the process and activities people engage in
when searching for, selecting, purchasing, using, evaluating, and disposing of products
and services so as to satisfy their needs and desires. For many products and services,
purchase decisions are the result of a long, detailed process that may include an
extensive information search, brand comparisons and
evaluations, and other activities. Other purchase decisions
are more incidental and may result from little more
than seeing a product prominently displayed at a discount
price in a store. Think of how many times you have made
impulse purchases in stores.
Marketers’ success in influencing purchase behavior
depends in large part on how well they understand consumer
behavior. Marketers need to know the specific
needs customers are attempting to satisfy and how they
translate into purchase criteria. They need to understand
how consumers gather information regarding various
alternatives and use this information to select among
competing brands. They need to understand how customers
make purchase decisions. Where do they prefer to
buy a product? How are they influenced by marketing
stimuli at the point of purchase? Marketers also need to
understand how the consumer decision process and reasons
for purchase vary among different types of customers.
For example, purchase decisions may be
influenced by the personality or lifestyle of the consumer.
1 Notice how the ad shown in Exhibit 4-1 reflects
the various roles in the life of the target audience members.
IMC Perspective 4-1 describes how marketers target
specific demographic and lifestyle groups.
The conceptual model in Figure 4-1 will be used as a
framework for analyzing the consumer decision process.
We will discuss what occurs at the various stages of this
model and how advertising and promotion can be used to
influence decision making. We will also examine the
influence of various psychological concepts, such as motivation, perception, attitudes,
and integration processes. Variations in the consumer decision-making process will be
Figure 4-1 A basic model of consumer decision making
A. Stages in the Consumer Decision-Making Process
Problem
recognition
Information
search
B. Relevant Internal Psychological Processes
Motivation
Perception
© The McGraw−Hill
Companies, 2003
An Overview of Consumer Behavior
Alternative
evaluation
Attitude
formation
Purchase
decision
Exhibit 4-1 Ashworth
appeals to the active
lifestyle
Postpurchase
evaluation
Integration Learning
105
Chapter Four Perspectives on Consumer Behavior