Chapter 04 – Understanding Consumer Behavior
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CHAPTER CONTENTS
PAGE
POWERPOINT RESOURCES TO USE WITH LECTURES ……………………………………. 4-2
LEARNING OBJECTIVES (LO) …………………………………………………………………………….. 4-3
KEY TERMS …………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 4-3
LECTURE NOTES
• Chapter Opener: Enlightened Carmakers Know What Custom(h)ers and Influenc(h)ers
Value …………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. 4-4
APPLYING MARKETING KNOWLEDGE ……………………………………………………………. 4-30
BUILDING YOUR MARKETING PLAN ……………………………………………………………….. 4-32
VIDEO CASE (VC)
• VC-4: Coppertone: Creating the Leading Sun Care Brand …………………………………. 4-33
IN-CLASS ACTIVITY (ICA)
• ICA 4-1: Buying Process for Starbucks Via™ Refreshers Instant Coffee……………….. 4-38
CONNECT EXERCISES …………………………………………………….…………… 4-42
• Psychological Influences Click and Drag*
• Purchase Decision Process Click and Drag*
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POWERPOINT RESOURCES TO USE WITH LECTURES
PowerPoint
Textbook Figures Slide
Figure 4-1 Purchase decision process consists of five stages ………………………………………………….. 4-4
Figure 4-2 Common consumer selection criteria for evaluation of smartphones ……………………….. 4-7
Marketing Matters, Making Responsible Decisions, and Marketing Insights
Marketing Matters—Customer Value: How Much Is a Satisfied Customer Worth?……………………. 4-11
Videos
4-2: Dove Video ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 4-31
4-4: Coppertone Video Case ……………………………………………………………………………………………….. 4-40
In-Class Activity (ICA)
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LEARNING OBJECTIVES (LO)
After reading this chapter students should be able to:
LO 4-1: Describe the stages in the consumer purchase decision process.
LO 4-3: Identify the major psychological influences on consumer behavior.
KEY TERMS
attitude
motivation
beliefs
opinion leaders
brand community
perceived risk
brand loyalty
perception
consumer behavior
personality
family life cycle
purchase decision process
involvement
reference groups
learning
social class
subcultures
word of mouth
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LECTURE NOTES
ENLIGHTENED CARMAKERS KNOW WHAT CUSTOM(H)ERS AND
INFLUENC(H)ERS VALUE
• Women are a driving force in the U.S. automobile industry. Women:
a. Make 60 percent of new-car buying decisions and influence 87 percent of new-car
• Women think and feel differently about key elements of the new-car-buying process
than men.
a. The sense of styling.
• Men are concerned about a car’s exterior lines and accents or “curb appeal.”
• Women are concerned about a car’s interior design and finishes, which:
b. The need for speed.
• Men think about how many seconds it takes to go from 0 to 60 miles per hour.
c. The substance of safety.
d. The shopping experience.
• Men decide upfront what car they want and set out alone to find it.
• Before making a purchase decision, women:
– Visit auto-buying websites.
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• Women:
• Consumer behavior:
a. Consists of the actions a person takes in purchasing and using products and
services.
• The behavioral sciences answer questions such as:
a. Why people choose one product or brand over another?
I. CONSUMER PURCHASE DECISION PROCESS
AND EXPERIENCE [LO 4-1]
[Figure 4-1] The purchase decision process is the five stages a buyer passes through in
making choices about which products and services to buy:
1. Problem recognition. 4. Purchase decision.
[ICA 4-1: Buying Process for Starbucks Via™ Ready Brew Instant Coffee]
A. Problem Recognition: Perceiving a Need
• Problem recognition perceives a difference between a person’s ideal and actual
situations big enough to trigger a decision.
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B. Information Search: Seeking Value
After recognizing a problem, a consumer begins to search for information about
which product or service might satisfy the newly discovered need.
• An internal search:
a. Involves scanning one’s memory for previous experiences with products or
brands.
• An external search:
a. May be necessary when past experience or knowledge is insufficient.
b. The risk of making a wrong decision is high.
• The primary sources of external information are:
a. Personal sources, such as relatives and friends whom the consumer trusts.
b. [Figure 4-2] Public sources, including:
• Product-rating organizations like Consumer Reports.
c. Marketer-dominated sources, such as information from sellers that include:
C. Alternative Evaluation: Assessing Value
• The information stage clarifies the problem for consumers by:
a. Suggesting criteria to use for the purchase.
• A consumer’s evaluative criteria are:
a. Factors that represent both the objective attributes of a brand and the
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• Consumers often have several criteria for evaluating brands.
a. This establishes the consideration set—the group of brands that a consumer
b. Consumers can change their evaluative criteria to create a different
consideration set of models and brands if the alternatives are unsatisfactory.
c. Example: Figure 4-2.
• Evaluative criteria:
– A retail price of $700 or less.
• Resulting consideration set:
D. Purchase Decision: Buying Value
• Having examined the alternatives in the consideration set, two choices remain:
a. From whom to buy is determined by an evaluation of:
• The seller’s terms of sale.
b. When to buy is determined by:
• Whether the product/preferred brand is on sale.
• Whether the manufacturer offers a coupon/rebate.
• The Internet allows consumers to:
a. Gather information.
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• Example: 45 percent of consumers with price comparison smartphone apps:
a. Routinely compare prices for identical products across different sellers…
E. Postpurchase Behavior: Realizing Value
• After buying a product, the consumer:
• If the consumer is dissatisfied, marketers must determine whether:
a. The product was deficient.
b. Consumer expectations were too high. If expectations are too high:
• A company’s advertising or the salesperson…
c. Product deficiency may require a design change.
• Customers’ satisfaction or dissatisfaction with the consumption or use experience
affects consumer communication and repeat-purchase behavior.
a. Satisfied buyers:
b. Dissatisfied buyers:
c. The financial impact of repeat-purchase behavior can be significant.
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MARKETING MATTERS
Customer Value: How Much is a Satisfied Customer Worth?
What is the financial value of a loyal customer over time?
• Marketers attempt to calculate this figure to demonstrate how much a satisfied
customer is worth. Some examples:
a. Frito-Lay. Loyal customers in the southwestern United States buy 21 pounds of
• These calculations have focused marketer attention on the buying experience,
customer satisfaction, and retention. Example: General Motors estimates that
customer retention is worth $276,000 over a lifetime of buying cars.
a. GM increased retention to 69%.
• Research shows that:
a. A 5 percent improvement in customer retention…
• The goal of many firms is to focus on postpurchase behavior to:
a. Maximize customer satisfaction, which…
b. Can lead to increased retention.
c. Tools to do this include:
• Provide toll-free telephone numbers.
• Offer liberalized return and refund policies.
Chapter 04 – Understanding Consumer Behavior
d. Such efforts:
• Consumers are often faced with two or more highly attractive alternatives when
making a purchase.
a. After purchasing a product, they may have second thoughts and ask the
question, “Should I have purchased this?”
b. Cognitive dissonance is the feeling of postpurchase psychological tension or
F. Consumer Involvement Affects Problem-Solving [LO 4-2]
• Sometimes consumers don’t engage in the five-stage purchase decision process
depending on their level of involvement.
• Level of involvement.
a. The personal, social, and economic significance of the purchase to the
consumer.
c. High-involvement purchases have at least one of three characteristics:
• Is expensive.
• With high involvement purchases, consumers are:
• Engaged in extensive information search.
• Low-involvement purchases barely involve any thought.
• [Figure 4-3] There are three general problem-solving variations in the consumer
purchase decision process.
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1. Extended Problem Solving.
a. Each of the five stages of the consumer purchase decision process is used.
b. Exists in high-involvement purchases (autos, audio systems, etc.).
2. Limited Problem Solving.
a. Consumers seek some information or rely on friends to evaluate alternative
3. Routine Problem Solving.
a. Consumers spend little effort seeking external information and evaluating
alternatives.
4. Consumer Involvement and Marketing Strategy.
a. For low-involvement products whose brands are market share leaders,
marketers should:
• Maintain product quality.
b. For low-involvement products whose brands are market challengers,
marketers should break consumer habits by:
• Using free samples, coupons, and rebates to encourage trial of their brand.
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c. For high-involvement products whose brands are market share leaders,
marketers should use:
d. For high-involvement products whose brands are market challengers,
marketers should use:
• Comparative advertising that focus on existing product attributes.
G. Situational Influences that Affect Purchase Decisions
• Five situational influences impact the consumer’s purchase decision process:
a. Purchase task. The reason for engaging in the decision.
H. Putting the Purchase Decision Process into Practice: Consumer Touch Points
and Consumer Journey Maps.
• “Moments of truth” are:
• The times and places that most influence what, when, where, and how
purchase decisions are triggered;
• Marketers view the purchase decision process and consumer experience through
the lens of consumer touch points and consumer journey maps.
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• [Figure 4-4] Consumer journey map is a visual of all touch points a consumer
• [Figure 4-5] shows the many influences that affect the consumer purchase
decision process.
LEARNING REVIEW
4-1. What is the first stage in the consumer purchase decision process?
4-2. The brands a consumer considers buying out of the set of brands in a product
class of which the consumer is aware are collectively called the __________.
4-3. What is the term for postpurchase anxiety?
II. PSYCHOLOGICAL INFLUENCES ON
CONSUMER BEHAVIOR [LO 4-3]
• Psychology helps marketers understand why and how consumers behave as they do.
A. Consumer Motivation and Personality
Motivation and personality explain why people do some things and not others.
1. Motivation.
a. Motivation is the energizing force that stimulates behavior to satisfy a need.
c. [Figure 4-6] These needs are hierarchical, ranging from basic to learned
needs:
• Physiological needs, such as water, food, and shelter, are basic to survival
and must be satisfied first.
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• Safety needs involve self-preservation, such as physical and financial well-
being.
• Social needs are concerned with love and friendship.
2. Personality.
a. Personality refers to a person’s consistent behaviors or responses to recurring
situations.
b. Key personality traits:
• Are enduring characteristics within a person or in his or her relationship
with others.
c. A person’s self-concept is the way:
d. People:
• Have an actual self-concept (how they see themselves).
B. Consumer Perception
Perception is the process by which an individual selects, organizes, and interprets
information to create a meaningful picture of the world.
1. Selective Perception.
a. Is the filtering process of exposure, comprehension, and retention by the
b. Consists of:
• Selective exposure.
– Occurs when people:
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* Ignore messages that are inconsistent with them.
– Assures buyers that they made the right choice.
• Selective comprehension.
– Involves interpreting information so that it is consistent with a
• Selective retention.
– Means that consumers do not remember all the information they see,
• Subliminal perception.
– Means that people see or hear messages without being aware of them.
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MAKING RESPONSIBLE DECISIONS
Ethics: The Ethics of Subliminal Messages
Embedded messages and images have been a controversial topic for over 50 years.
• The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has denounced subliminal
messages as deceptive.
• Consumers:
a. Spend $50 million a year for subliminal messages designed to help them raise
their self-esteem, stop compulsive buying, quit smoking, or lose weight.
• Subliminal messages are not illegal in the United States.
2. Perceived Risk.
a. Represents the anxiety felt because the consumer cannot anticipate the
outcomes of a purchase but believes that there may be negative consequences.
b. Negative consequences of perceived risk include the:
• Size of the financial outlay required to buy the product.
c. Perceived risk affects a consumer’s information search because the greater the
perceived risk, the more extensive the external search is likely to be.
d. Marketers try to reduce a consumer’s perceived risk and encourage purchases
by using one or more strategies:
• Obtaining seals of approval—Fresh Step’s Good Housekeeping seal.
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• Providing warranties and guarantees—Kia Motor’s warranty.
C. Consumer Learning.
• Much consumer behavior is learned, such as:
a. Information sources to consult about products.
• Learning: Those behaviors that result from repeated experience and reasoning.
1. Behavioral Learning.
a. Is the process of developing automatic responses to a type of situation built up
through repeated exposure to it.
b. Four variables are key to how consumers learn from repeated experience:
• A drive is a need that moves an individual to action.
c. Marketers use two concepts from behavioral learning theory:
• Stimulus generalization occurs when a response elicited by one stimulus
2. Cognitive Learning.
a. Occurs through thinking, reasoning, and mental problem solving without
b. Involves:
• Making connections between two or more ideas.
c. Firms influence this type of learning by:
• Using repetitive advertising messages.
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3. Brand Loyalty.
a. Is a favorable attitude toward and consistent purchase of a single brand over
time.
b. Relates to habit formation—the basis for routine problem solving.
D. Consumer Values, Beliefs, and Attitudes
These play a central role in consumer decision making and related marketing actions.
1. Attitude Formation.
a. An attitude is a learned predisposition to respond to an object or class of
objects in a consistently favorable or unfavorable way.
• Attitudes shaped by our values and beliefs, which are learned.
• Values vary by level of specificity and include:
b. Beliefs are a consumer’s subjective perception of how a product or brand
performs on different attributes.
• Beliefs are based on personal experience, advertising, and discussions
with other people.
2. Attitude Change.
Marketers use three approaches to try to change consumer attitudes toward
products and brands:
a. Changing beliefs about the extent to which a brand has certain attributes—
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E. Consumer Lifestyle
[DICA 4-1: Using VALS to Understand Consumer Behavior]
• Lifestyle is a mode of living that is identified by:
a. How people spend their time and resources.
• Psychographics:
a. Combines consumer psychology, lifestyle, and demographics to uncover
• [Figure 4-7] VALS is a psychographic system that identifies eight consumer
segments based on their:
• According to VALS researchers, consumers buy products and services and seek
experiences that give shape, substance, and satisfaction to their lives.
a. Consumers are inspired by one of three primary motivations—ideals,
achievement, and self-expression—that give meaning to them or the world
d. VALS explains why and how consumers make purchase decisions.
• Ideals-motivated groups. Consumers motivated by ideals are guided by
knowledge and principles. They are divided into two segments:
– Thinkers:
* Are mature, reflective, and educated who value order, knowledge,
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* Value durability and functionality in products over style and
newness.
– Believers:
* Have fewer resources.
• Achievement-motivated groups. Consumers motivated by achievement
look for products and services that demonstrate success to their peers or to
a peer group they aspire to. These include:
– Achievers:
* Are busy, goal-directed, and have a deep commitment to career
and family.
– Strivers:
* Are trendy, fun-loving, and less self-confident than achievers.
• Self-expression-motivated groups. Consumers motivated by self-
expression desire social or physical activity, variety, and risk. These
include:
– Experiencers:
* Are young, enthusiastic, and impulsive consumers who become
* Spend income on fashion items, entertainment, socializing, looking
good, and having the latest things.
– Makers: