Time Pressure

There are three factors which influence the degree of active reasoning that is undertaken by the consumer in his process of decision-making. There are:

1. involvement,
2. alternative differentiation, and
3. time pressure.


We talked about Involvement and Alternative Differentiation in our previous talk. Let’s talk about Time Pressure Today.

When you are under pressure to make a decision quickly, you connot afford to spend a long time finding out about the various products or brands. You would probably buy whatever is readily available. When you are planning to buy a term life insurance, user can go on net and find out different available options. While traveling in you car to a hill station you car tyre bursts and you need to new one. At that time you would buy the brand that is available at whatever price without giving it too much thought. But under a different situation, when you need to buy new tyres, you would certainly like to find the features of nylon and radial tyres and evaluate various brands e.g. Modi, MRF, Dunlop and Apollo etc. on their individual advantages and disadvantages.

Process of decision making-2

In our last post we have discussed on important factor of decision making and that is involvement. Involvement is always reflected in production or productivity. We can take example for an instant life insurance rates company who is providing life insurance quotes online, if their agents more involve in the businesses they can have more business. More involvement reflected in more productivity. Today we are going to discuss one another important factor Differentiation.

Differentiation: When the consumer perceives that the various alternatives which are available are very different from one another in terms of their features and benefits offered, he is likely to spend more time in gathering information about and evaluating these different features. On the other hand, in case of products which are not very different from one another either in terms of their features or benefits offered, the consumer is bound to perceive them as being almost the same and buy the first available product/brand which satisfies his minimum expectation. He will not like to spend much time in evaluating the various alternatives. The various brands of washing powder available in the market today are an excellent example of low level of differentiation with the consumer perceiving the different brands to be offering almost identical benefits. All the brands, such as Nirma, Vimal, Vijay, etc. look similar with identical packing and carry almost the same price tag.

Process of Decision Making-1

Making a decision is a rational and conscious process in which the consumer evaluates each of the available alternatives to select the best amongst them. Each decision you make involves an elaborate mental thought process, a degree of active reasoning, though on the surface it may not always seem to be so.

There are three factors which influence the degree of active reasoning that is undertaken by the consumer in his process of decision-making. There are:
1. involvement,
2. alternative differentiation, and
3. time pressure.

Involvement: When a product is perceived to be of great personal importance to the customer, such as personal clothing, or its purchase involves a great deal of money or risk such as jewellery, car, house, company shares, the level of involvement in making the decision is likely to be very high. The consumer is likely to spend a great deal of time before arriving at the final decision. In contrast, when buying items which do not reflect much on the consumer’s personality or their purchase involves small amounts of money or the risk associated with them is not high, the degree of involvement of the consumer is likely to be low. Product such as shoes, polish, toilet soap, toothpaste, biscuits etc. would fall in this category.

PROCESS OF DECISION-MAKING

This may be because over a period of time you have taken certain decisions so many times that they now seem to be made almost automatically but that is not true at all. Even your daily decision of buying o loaf of bread involves the element of active reasoning as buying a new sofa set for your drawing room. However, in the former case, the extent and intensity of active reasoning may be much less as compared to the latter case. Decision making is more important part when it comes to online business. Owner of online blinds store who are selling vertical blinds and roman shades online, says that for them decision making is more important than anything else.

In the case of bread, the only decision variables may be which brand, quantity and retail outlet. But in case of buying a sofa set the decision variables are far more in number.
These may be:
· ready-made or made to order
· from a furniture shop or to be built at home
· type of material for frame: blinds, vertical blinds, roman shades
· type of material for cushion: cloth, rexine, leather,
· design: with or without arm-rests, height, depth of seat, seating capacity, loose or fixed cushion.

Thus, depending on the type of decision being made, the degree and strength of active reasoning will vary.

MODELS OF CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR-1

LEVELS OF CONSUMER DECISIONS
As a buyer or consumer you are all the time making decisions such as what product to buy (a book or a shirt as a birthday present for your friend), which brand (Lux, Liril, Hamam, Rexona or OK toilet soap) from where (Super Bazar, nearby corner shop, chemist), etc.

PROCESS OF DECISION-MAKING
The most basic and important requirement for the marketer is to understand how consumers make choices. Ajzen and Fishbein have attempted to explain human choice behaviour in their theory of reasoned action which states that:

“Generally speaking-human beings are usually quite rational and make systematic use of information available to them. People consider the implications of their actions before they decide to engage or not to engage in a given behaviour.”

Thus, making a decision is a rational and conscious process in which the consumer evaluates each of the available alternatives to select the best amongst them. Each decision you make involves an elaborate mental thought process, a degree of active reasoning, though on the surface it may not always seem to be so.

MODELS OF CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR

We shall examine how a consumer actually arrives at the decision to purchase a specific product or brand out of the so many available in the market. Or, in other words, we shall study the process of consumer decision-making.

In the precious init we had discussed a simple model of consumer decision-making, comprising an input, process and an output. A consumer receives stimuli from the environment and the specifics of the marketing strategies of different products and services, and responds o these stimuli in terms of either buying or not buying the product. In between the stage of receiving the stimuli and responding to it, the consumer goes through the process of making his decision. For example, home décor products blinds are there in the market. Consumer behavior is directly affected by environment. Ruler areas people love to have curtains as window treatment while city consumer love to have vertical blinds or roman shades or faux wood blinds as their window treatment.

WHAT IS A DECISION?A decision is the selection of an alternative out of the several numbers of alternatives available. It is only when there are two or more alternatives available that there is the need to make a choice. There are many companies who are providing instant life insurance rates or life insurance quotes online. Consumer need to take decision from different options available online. We can take the example of Motels in California or California motels, there are many options and alterative available for California motels, consumer needs to take decision which they want to use or stay. In the field of consumer behavior, we are only concerned with situation in which the consumer has to take a purchase decision where there is a choice available.

Understanding Consumer Behavior-1

Consumers differ from one another in terms of their sex, age, education, income, family life-cycle stage, personality and life style, and other personal characteristics which influence their buying behavior. Man is social animal and is influenced by the people with whom he interacts. Each person interacts with and is a member of many groups. These groups provide a point of reference of comparison for the consumer and are known as reference groups such as family, friends, social organizations, professional associations; the strongest influence is exerted by the family.

Culture is the most pervasive influence on our lives and influences all aspects of our behavior; consumers operate within the cultural framework of their society and purchase only those products which fit in with their cultural norms. Within each culture there exist many sub-cultures comprising distinct nationality groups, religious groups, racial groups, geographic groups that have their own unique values and life-style. Social classes are group of people who have similar income, education, wealth, social status, value and beliefs. The marketer must understand that people with different cultural, sub-cultural and social class background have different product and brand preferences and need suitably modified products and marketing strategies.

Understanding Consumer Behavior

A consumer’s decision to purchase a product influenced by a number of variables which can be classified into four categories, namely psychological, personal, social, and cultural. Consumer Behavior effect demand of product with the area also. For example consumer in city area preferred to use vertical blinds, roller shades or faux wood blinds. Which villages or rural area consumer preferred to buy curtains.

Man is a many faceted, complex psychological being. His consumer behavior is influenced by his motives, perceptions, attitudes and learning. Each of these psychological factors provides a unique mental framework for each consumer within which he makes his purchase decisions. For the marketer it is essential to associate his product with the motives and positive perceptions of his consumers. Also he must ensure that the product concept fits in with the consumer’s existing attitudes and beliefs. Owner of lifequotecenter.com says that they are provider of instant life insurance rates and life insurance quotes online, it is easy for them to sell their Term life insurance products to educated and literate consumer rather than uneducated and illiterates. Perceptions, attitudes and learning are most important of consumer behavior.

Consumers differ from one another in terms of their sex, age, education, income, family life-cycle stage, personality and life style, and other personal characteristics which influence their buying behavior. The needs of elderly consumers are different from those of young consumers. Newly married couple has needs which are totally different from older retired married couples. To successfully market to consumers with differing personal characteristics, the marketer must accordingly modify his marketing strategies.

Social Class-1

Social class is a complex variable which is determined by a persons’ income, occupation, education, personal performance and possession of different types of products. Social classes can be categorized on the basis of number of different bases such as blue collar workers and white collar workers, educated and uneducated and so on. Consumer behaviour is the study of why, how, what, when, where, and how often do consumers buy and consume different products and services.

Knowledge of consumer behaviour is helpful to the marketer in understanding the needs of his different consumer segments and developing appropriate marketing strategies for each. It is also useful for the marketer in developing and understanding of how consumers responds to the various marketing stimuli, which he provides in terms of the product, price, promotion and place. If the marketer can correctly identify those stimuli that evoke a positive response in the consumer he can very easily design effective marketing strategies using these stimuli.

The study of consumer behaviour also provides an insight into how consumers arrive at the purchase decision and the variable which influences their decision. Once the influencing variables have been identified, the marketer can manipulate them so as to induce in his consumers a positive purchase decision.

Social Class

In every society there is inequality in social status amongst different people and the people are categorized into different social classes. Social classes can be defined as relatively permanent and homogeneous divisions in a society in which individuals or families sharing similar value, life-styles, interests and behavior can be categorized.

Social class is a concept based on distribution of status and the categories are usually ranked in a hierarchical order ranging from low status to high status. People belonging to a particular class tend to restrict their interaction to people belonging to the same class, unless it is for a very specialized purpose. Within a social class there are shared values, attitudes and behavioral patterns of consumption of certain products and services. But if we compare different social classes, we would find differences in values, attitudes and behavior between each class, as also a pattern of consumption behavior unique to each class. For example, upper classes use vertical blinds and roman shades as window treatment, while lower class of society use curtains. So, when someone talked about blinds it’s having a label that it’s for upper class.

Social class is an ideal basis for segmenting the market, as different social classes exhibit distinct product and brand preferences. Within the same social class, there is sharing of information on different products and brands, while between the different social classes there is little communication. For example, social classes helps term life insurance companies to have their term life insurance policies as per the social class.