Chapter 5
CONSUMER MARKETS AND
BUYER BEHAVIOR
MARKETING STARTER: CHAPTER 5
HARLEY-DAVIDSON: Selling Freedom, Independence, Power, and Authenticity
Synopsis
Even if you’ve never ridden a motorcycle, you’re likely familiar with Harley-Davidson. The company recently
celebrated its 110th anniversary and enjoys selling more than 50 percent of all U.S. heavyweight motorcycles. In the
past four years, sales have grown more than 30 percent and profits are up almost sevenfold. Harley riders are
fanatically loyal to the brand. They meet at events, such as the anniversary parade where over 100,000 people
attended the parade and nearly 7,000 riders rode in the parade. They get Harley-Davidson tattoos. Why? While the
image of a Harley rider is that of the outlaw bad-boy, the reality is that the bikers are older, more affluent, and better
educated. And more are women than ever before. The Harley Owners Group (H.O.G.) has over a million members.
While Harley owners themselves may not be able to explain why the connection to the bike is so deep, the company
has worked hard to study and understand what makes their customers tick.
Discussion Objective
A focused 10-minute discussion of the Harley-Davidson story will help students appreciate the various factors that
affect how customers feel about, buy, and consume products. The goal is to explore the reasons why customers buy
Harley-Davidson motorcycles, and what the product adds to their lives. Beyond making an iconic motorcycle,
Harley-Davidson has fostered an almost fanatically loyal fan base. It is likely that some of your students will know
about motorcycles, and specifically Harley-Davidson motorcycles, and a few may have their own stories to share
with the class. You will want to capitalize on these students’ testimonials as you explore the Harley-Davidson brand
together.
Starting the Discussion
Start this discussion by asking students what Harley-Davidson is really selling its customers. What are the unique
customer insights that have fueled Harley-Davidson’s continued growth? What does Harley-Davidson understand
about its customers better than the competition? Tour the Harley-Davidson website at
http://www.harley-davidson.com/. Peruse the tabs across the top; note how many are truly customer-focused. The
goal is to show that Harley-Davidson’s allure results from much more than the functional attributes of its product—
it’s all about the customers and how they belong to a community. Look at the events, customization, and community
tabs to see how the company works to draw its riders together.
Discussion Questions
1. Beyond a motorcycle, what is Harley-Davidson really selling its customers? How does this product enable
users to highlight the experiences of their life and where they want to go in life? (Ultimately, the
Harley-Davidson bikes enable its fans to experience adventures that touch and thrill them. It lets them
experience themselves and their lives “differently,” if only for a while.)
2. What is it about the Harley-Davidson experience that engenders such loyalty from Harley-Davidson owners?
(A Harley is much more than a machine. It’s a part of who they are and where they want to go in life. It
renews spirits and announces freedom and independence. It fires the imagination. It makes one a part of
something bigger, a member of the Harley-Davidson family.)
3. How does the chapter-opening Harley-Davidson story relate to the major concepts in the consumer behavior
chapter? (The Harley-Davidson story highlights the depth of factors that affect how consumers think, feel,
and act toward brands. Harley-Davidson really understands what makes consumers tick and, as a result,
delivers an exceptional brand experience to loyal consumers. Keep the Harley-Davidson example active as
Copyright© 2018 Pearson Education
you discuss characteristics affecting consumer behavior, types of buying decision behavior, the buyer
decision process, and other chapter topics.)
CHAPTER OVERVIEW
Use Power Point Slide 5-1 Here
In this chapter, we continue our marketing journey with a closer look at the most important
element of the marketplace—customers.
The goal of marketing is to affect how customers think about and behave toward the organization
and its market offerings. But to affect the whats, whens, and hows of buying behavior, marketers
must first understand the whys.
We look first at final consumer buying influences and processes and then at the buying behavior
of business customers.
CHAPTER OBJECTIVES
Use Power Point Slide 5-2 here
1. Define the consumer market and construct a simple model of consumer buyer behavior.
2. Name the four major factors that influence consumer buyer behavior.
3. List and define the major types of buying decision behavior and stages in the buyer decision
process.
4. Describe the adoption and diffusion process for new products.
CHAPTER OUTLINE
p. 132 INTRODUCTION
Even if you’ve never ridden a motorcycle, you’re likely
familiar with Harley-Davidson.
In the past four years, sales have grown more than 30
percent, and profits are up almost sevenfold. Harley riders
are fanatically loyal to the brand.
They meet at events, such as the anniversary parade which
had over 100,000 people in attendance and nearly 7,000
riders. They also get Harley-Davidson tattoos.
While Harley owners themselves may not be able to explain
why the connection to the bike is so deep, the company has
worked hard to study and understand what makes their
customers tick.
p. 133
Photo:
Harley-Davidson
Opening Vignette Questions
1. How does Harley-Davidson successfully
differentiate itself from its competitors in today’s
crowded motorcycle marketplace?
2. What does it mean to be a H.O.G.?
Copyright© 2018 Pearson Education
3. How has Harley-Davidson successfully used
marketing research to understand its customers
and expand the appeal of its products?
p. 134
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Define the consumer market and construct a simple
model of consumer buyer behavior.
Consumer buyer behavior refers to the buying behavior of
final consumers—individuals and households who buy
goods and services for personal consumption.
All of these consumers combine to make up the consumer
market.
The American consumer market consists of more than 323
million people.
Learning Objective
1
p. 134
Key Terms:
Consumer buyer
behavior, Consumer
market
Assignments, Resources
Use Critical Thinking Exercise 5-6 here
Use Small Group Assignment 1 here
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Model of Consumer Behavior
The central question for marketers is: How do consumers
respond to various marketing efforts the company might use?
The starting point is the stimulus-response model of buyer
behavior shown in Figure 5.1.
Marketing stimuli consist of the four Ps: product, price,
place, promotion.
Other stimuli include major forces and events in the buyer’s
environment: economic, technological, social, and cultural.
The marketer wants to understand how the stimuli are
changed into responses inside the consumer’s “black box,”
which has two parts.
1. The buyer’s characteristics influence how he or she
perceives and reacts to the stimuli.
2.
3. The buyer’s decision process itself affects the buyer’s
behavior.
4.
p. 135
Figure 5.1: Model
of Buyer Behavior
Review Learning Objective 1: Define the consumer market
Copyright© 2018 Pearson Education
and construct a simple model of consumer buyer behavior.
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Name the four major factors that influence consumer
buyer behavior.
Characteristics Affecting Consumer Behavior
Cultural Factors
Culture is the most basic cause of a person’s wants and
behavior.
Marketers are always trying to spot cultural shifts.
Subcultures are groups of people with shared value systems
based on common life experiences and situations.
The U.S. Hispanic market consists of more than 55 million
consumers.
More than 44 million African-American consumers wield
nearly $1.3 trillion in annual buying power.
Asian Americans are the most affluent U.S. demographic
segment.
Many marketers now embrace a total market strategy—the
practice of including ethnic themes and cross-cultural
perspectives within their mainstream marketing.
Social classes are society’s relatively permanent and ordered
divisions whose members share similar values, interests, and
behaviors.
Social class is not determined by a single factor but is
measured as a combination of occupation, income,
education, wealth, and other variables.
Major American social classes:
Upper Class
Middle Class
Working Class
Lower Class
Social classes show distinct product and brand preferences in
areas such as clothing, home furnishings, travel and leisure
Learning Objective
2
p. 135
Figure 5.2: Factors
Influencing
Consumer Behavior
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Key Term: Culture
p. 136
Key Term:
Subculture
p. 136
Photo: Toyota
p. 137
Ad: U.S. Forest
Service
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Photo:
Bloomingdale’s
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Key Term: Total
market strategy
p. 138
Key Term: Social
Class
Copyright© 2018 Pearson Education
activities, financial services, and automobiles.
Assignments, Resources
Use Discussion Question 5-3 here
Use Additional Project 1 and 2 here
Use Think-Pair-Share 1 to 3 here
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Social Factors
Groups and Social Networks. A person’s behavior is
influenced by many small groups, including membership
groups, aspirational groups, and reference groups.
Marketers use word-of-mouth influence and buzz
marketing to spread the word about their brands.
Opinion leaders are people within a reference group who,
because of special skills, knowledge, personality, or other
characteristics, exert social influence on others.
This small percentage of Americans is referred to as the
influentials or leading adopters.
Online social networks are online communities where
people socialize or exchange information and opinions.
Family. The family is the most important consumer buying
organization in society.
Forty-one percent of men identify themselves as
primary grocery shoppers in their households, and 39
percent handle most of their household’s laundry.
Women account for 60 percent of all new technology
purchases and influence more than 80 percent of all
new car purchases.
The nation’s kids and tweens influence an estimated
$1.2 trillion of spending annually.
Roles and Status. A role consists of the activities people are
expected to perform. Each role carries a status reflecting the
general esteem given to it by society.
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Key Term: Group
p. 139
Key Term:
Word-of-mouth
influence, Opinion
leader
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Key Term: Online
social networks
p. 140
Photo: Dunkin’
Donuts
p. 141
Photo: Disney
p. 142
Photo: Family
buying influences
Assignments, Resources
Use Real Marketing 5.1 here
Use Additional Project 3 here
Use Think-Pair-Share 4 here
Copyright© 2018 Pearson Education
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Personal Factors
Age and Life Stage. People change the goods and services
they buy over their lifetimes.
Tastes in food, clothes, furniture, and recreation are often
age-related. Buying is also shaped by the stage of the family
life cycle.
Marketers often define their targets in terms of life-cycle
stage and develop appropriate products and marketing plans
for each stage.
Consumer information giant Nielsen’s PRIZM Lifestage
Groups system places U.S. households into one of 66
consumer segments and 11 life-stage groups based on
affluence, age, and family characteristics.
Life-stage segmentation provides a powerful marketing tool
for marketers in all industries to better find, understand, and
engage consumers.
Occupation. A person’s occupation affects the goods and
services they purchase.
Economic Situation. A person’s economic situation will
affect store and product choice. Marketers watch trends in
spending, personal income, savings, and interest rates.
Lifestyle is a person’s pattern of living as expressed in his or
her psychographics.
This involves measuring major AIO dimensions such as
activities (work, hobbies, shopping, sports, social events),
interests (food, fashion, family, recreation), and opinions
(about themselves, social issues, business, products). It
profiles a person’s whole patters of acting and interacting in
the world.
Personality and Self-Concept
Personality refers to the unique psychological character-
istics that distinguish a person or group.
A brand personality is the specific mix of human traits that
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Photo: Red Kap
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Key Term: Lifestyle
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Ad: Title Nine
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Key Term:
Personality
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Ad: MINI
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may be attributed to a particular brand. One researcher
identified five brand personality traits:
1. Sincerity (down-to-earth, honest, wholesome, and
cheerful)
2. Excitement (daring, spirited, imaginative, and up-to-date)
3. Competence (reliable, intelligent, and successful)
4. Sophistication (upper class and charming)
5. Ruggedness (outdoorsy and tough)
The basic self-concept premise is that people’s possessions
contribute to and reflect their identities; that is, “we are what
we have.”
Psychological Factors
Motivation
A motive (or drive) is a need that is sufficiently pressing to
direct the person to seek satisfaction.
Psychoanalyst Sigmund Freud suggested that a person’s
buying decisions are affected by subconscious motives that
even the buyer may not fully understand.
Motivation research refers to qualitative research designed to
probe consumers’ hidden, subconscious motivations.
Abraham Maslow sought to explain why people are driven
by particular needs at particular times. He determined that
human needs are arranged in a hierarchal fashion.
Perception is the process by which people select, organize,
and interpret information to form a meaningful picture of the
world.
Selective attention is the tendency for people to screen out
most of the information to which they are exposed.
Selective distortion describes the tendency of people to
interpret information in a way that will support what they
already believe.
Selective retention involves retaining information that
supports personal attitudes and beliefs.
Learning describes changes in an individual’s behavior
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Key Term:
Motive (Drive)
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Figure 5.3:
Maslow’s Hierarchy
of Needs
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Key Term:
Perception
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Ad: American
Association of
Advertising
Agencies
Copyright© 2018 Pearson Education
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arising from experience.
A drive is a strong internal stimulus that calls for action.
A drive becomes a motive when it is directed toward a
particular stimulus object.
Cues are minor stimuli that determine when, where, and how
the person responds.
Beliefs and Attitudes
A belief is a descriptive thought that a person has about
something.
An attitude is a person’s relatively consistent evaluations,
feelings, and tendencies toward an object or idea. Attitudes
are difficult to change.
Review Learning Objective 2: Name the four major factors
that influence consumer buyer behavior.
p. 149
Key Term: Learning
p. 149
Key Terms:
Belief, Attitude
Assignments, Resources
Use Real Marketing 5.2 here
Use Marketing Ethics here
Use Discussion Questions 5-1, 5-2 and 5-4 here
Use Video Case here
Use Outside Example 1 here
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p. 150
List and define the major types of buying decision
behavior and the stages in the buyer decision process.
Buying Decision Behavior and the Buyer Decision
Process
Types of Buying Decision Behavior
Figure 5.4 shows types of consumer buying behavior based
on the degree of buyer involvement and the degree of
differences among brands.
Complex Buying Behavior
Consumers undertake complex buying behavior when they
are highly involved in a purchase and perceive significant
differences among brands.
Learning Objective
3
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Figure 5.4: Four
Types of Buying
Behavior
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Key Term: Complex
buying behavior
Copyright© 2018 Pearson Education
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Consumers may be highly involved when the product is
expensive, risky, purchased infrequently, and highly
self-expressive.
Typically, the consumer has much to learn about the product
category.
Marketers of high-involvement products must understand the
information-gathering and evaluation behavior of
high-involvement consumers.
Dissonance-Reducing Buying Behavior
Dissonance-reducing buying behavior occurs when
consumers are highly involved with an expensive,
infrequent, or risky purchase, but see little difference among
brands.
After the purchase, consumers might experience
postpurchase dissonance (after-sale discomfort) when they
notice certain disadvantages of the purchased brand or hear
favorable things about brands not purchased.
To counter such dissonance, the marketer’s after-sale
communications should provide evidence and support to help
consumers feel good about their brand choices.
Habitual Buying Behavior
Habitual buying behavior occurs under conditions of low
consumer involvement and little significant brand difference.
Consumer behavior does not pass through the usual
belief-attitude-behavior sequence.
Consumers do not search extensively for information about
the brands, evaluate brand characteristics, and make weighty
decisions about which brands to buy.
They passively receive information as they watch television
or read magazines.
Because buyers are not highly committed to any brands,
marketers of low-involvement products with few brand
differences often use price and sales promotions to stimulate
variety-seeking buying behavior.
p. 150
Key Terms:
Dissonance-reducin
g buying behavior,
Habitual buying
behavior
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Ad: Bob’s Red Mill
p. 151
Key Term:
Variety-seeking
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Consumers undertake variety-seeking buying behavior in
situations characterized by low consumer involvement but
significant perceived brand differences.
In such cases, consumers often do a lot of brand switching.
buying behavior
Assignments, Resources
Use Critical Thinking Exercise 5-6 here
Use Individual Assignment 1 here
Troubleshooting Tip
By and large, students have not been exposed to the
consumer behavior concepts in this chapter before. If
they have taken a sociology or human behavior
course, chances are very high that the concepts were
not presented in a way that allowed the students to
understand them as they apply to business in general
and marketing in particular. After presenting the
concepts of consumer behavior, have the students
discuss the concepts in terms of their own buying
habits, their backgrounds, and how they differ from
others in the class.
Copyright© 2018 Pearson Education
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The Buyer Decision Process
The buyer decision process consists of five stages:
1. Need recognition
2. Information search
3. Evaluation of alternatives
4. Purchase decision
5. Postpurchase behavior
Need Recognition
The buyer recognizes a problem or need triggered by either
internal stimuli or external stimuli.
Information Search
Information search may or may not occur.
Consumers can obtain information from any of several
sources.
Personal sources (family, friends, neighbors,
acquaintances)
Commercial sources (advertising, salespeople, Web
sites, dealers, packaging, displays)
Public sources (mass media, consumer-rating
organizations, Internet searches)
Experiential sources (handling, examining, using the
product)
Commercial sources inform the buyer.
Personal sources legitimize or evaluate products for the
buyer.
Evaluation of Alternatives
Alternative evaluation is how the consumer processes
information to arrive at brand choices.
How consumers go about evaluating purchase alternatives
depends on the individual consumer and the specific buying
situation.
In some cases, consumers use careful calculations and
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Figure 5.5: Buyer
Decision Process
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Key Term: Need
recognition
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Ad: Yelp
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Key Term:
Information search
p. 153
Key Term:
Alternative
evaluation
Copyright© 2018 Pearson Education
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logical thinking.
At other times, the same consumers do little or no
evaluating; instead, they buy on impulse and rely on
intuition.
Purchase Decision
Generally, the consumer’s purchase decision will be to buy
the most preferred brand.
Two factors can come between the purchase intention and
the purchase decision.
1. Attitudes of others
2. Unexpected situational factors
Postpurchase Behavior
The difference between the consumer’s expectations and the
perceived performance of the item purchased determines the
degree of consumer satisfaction.
If the product falls short of expectations, the consumer is
disappointed; if it meets expectations, the consumer is
satisfied; if it exceeds expectations, the consumer is said to
be delighted.
Cognitive dissonance, or discomfort caused by
postpurchase conflict, occurs in most major purchases.
Review Learning Objective 3: List and define the major
types of buying decision behavior and the stages in the buyer
decision process.
p. 153
Key Terms:
Purchase decision,
Postpurchase
behavior
p. 154
Key Term:
Cognitive
dissonance
p. 154
Photo: Customer
Satisfaction
Assignments, Resources
Use Online, Mobile, and Social Media Marketing
here
Use Marketing by the Numbers here
Use Outside Example 2 here
1.
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