Consumer pre-purchase Flashcards
Need Recognition
An opportunity exists for marketing if there is a gap between the perceived actual
state and a plausible desire state
Definition of needs
Needs occur when consumers’ real condition decline (acutal state) but desired
remains stable
Definition of wants
Wants occur when consumers perceive an increase in their desired state while
actual state remains constant
How can marketing inflence needs?
- Influencing the actual state (American Dairy Association)
* Influencing the desired state (Victoria’s Secret)
How can unfulfilled needs be recognised
- Monitoring changes in needs (Tesla, Uber, Small cars)
* Identifying unfulfilled needs (my twin, apple, red bull)
Exposure
Exposure occurs when there is a physical proximity to a stimulus that allows one or more of a person’s five senses the
opportunity to be activated
− Vision
− Smell
− Sound
− Touch
− Taste
• This activation happens when a stimulus meets or exceeds the lower threshold
• Customers are exposed to firsthand experience and secondary information
Attention
Attention is the amount of cognitive resources or mental activity that
we focus in a particular direction, towards a particular stimulus
Perception
Perception is the process of developing an interpretation of a
stimulus
Comprehension
Comprehension occurs in the consumers mind and the consumer
belief a certain message
(and might later “unbelieve” the message)
When do customers detect a stimulus?
• Only when the stimulus meets or exceeds the lower threshold
• Does “subliminal advertising” already exceed the lower threshold?
− Original research of James Vicary in New Jersey movie theater in 1957 proved to be fake
− After that: subliminal messaging became popular through audio (e.g. antistealing messages in stores, self-help tapes, backmasking) or visual (e.g. TV, cinema)
− Research shows hardly any effect
When do customers detect a difference?
• Just noticeable difference (JND)
- Weber’s Law: k = ΔI/I
“I=initial stimulus intensity” and “ΔI=change of the stimulus” are a
constant term k
- That means: the higher the initial stimulus (l), the greater the change must
be for the customer to notice
- k is 1-2% for light, 10-20% for taste, ~2% for price
- Most of the times marketers want to exceed the JND, but sometimes they want to stay below (Betty Crocker, Persil)
Selective exposure
• Consumers decide what they will be exposed to and also try to
avoid exposure, e.g.
- Internet: pop-ups, spam filters, …
- TV: zapping, zipping
Overexposure
• Mere exposure effect, i.e., more exposure
leads to more affect through familiarity (positive habituation)
• But at a certain point: abituation/boredom
comes in (negative habituation)
• Overexposure of products/brands needs to be avoided (esp. advertising wear-out)
Definition of Attention
Attention is the amount of cognitive resources or mental activity that we focus in a particular direction, towards a particular stimulus. Two things are important when thinking about attention
> Focus (the direction of attention)
> Intensity (the degree of attention)
Limits of attention
• Limited Attention Span
- 7 +/- 2 (Miller 1956): short-term memory span dults is around seven elements
(plus or minus 2), called “chunks” (digits, letters, words or other units); latest
findings suggest 3-4 are ideal for retrieval
- Test: Counting balls
- Depends on several factors, like length of chunks, knowledge, etc.
How to promote voluntary attention?
- Connect with consumers’ needs
- Permission marketing: Pay consumers to pay attention
How to promote involuntary attention?
- Make it move (VW)
- Surprise/shock (adidas, Vim)
- Incomplete stimuli (“Zeigarnik effect”, or principle of closure) > “don’t drink and drive”
- Make it bigger, more intense, more colorful, use other senses (absolut)
- Be novel, different, creative (bud light, lego, nike)
- Make it funny (diet pepsi, rowenta, amazon alexa)
- Use sex appeal (H&M, Calvin Klein, V’sS)
- Choose the right place
- Tell a story
Problems regarding attention
Potential reaction can be:
- Rejection
- Shock Advertising: Lack of positive activation through so called “shock advertising”
- “Vampire-Effect”: Loss of attention towards the product due to distraction (e.g., by humor, by sex, by celebrity)
- “Bumerang-Effect”: Negative activation due to disliking (e.g., Lance Rmstrong, Maria Sharapova)
Defenition of Perceprtion
• Perception is the process of developing an interpretation of a stimulus
• Important to understand how perception works because
-What is perceived is not necessarily what is “true”
-What customers perceive is what affects their actions
• Several factors influence perception
STUDY BY ALLISON & UHL (1964)
“Blind vs Aware” Beer Tasting test
What affects people’s interpretation?
- Goals and motives (people see what they want to see)
- Expectations (people see what they expect to see)
What is Positioning?
“Positioning is the act of designing the company’s offering and image to occupy a distinctive place in the target market’s mind”
Philip Kotler
What is perceptional map used for?
• Understand the market structure as perceived by customers
-Who is your competition?
-What segments are being served?
• Plan marketing actions and predict consequences
-If you developed a new product, what segment would be best?
-If you modified a (perception of a) product, whom you would take share from?
• Represent customers’ perceptions and preferences to aid communication and discussion within the organization
Definition of comprehention
Comprehension occurs in the consumers mind – the consumer belief a certain message (and might later “unbelieve” the message)
Basic components of comprehension
- Comprehension = Belief
* It is easier to believe than to unbelieve; unbelieving is effortful
How do people comprehend?
• Comprehension can be increased by repetition
- Repetition increases familiarity
- If it feels more familiar, it’s more likely to be true
• Comprehension is influenced by distraction
- Distraction reduces the ability to identify statements as false and increases the recognition of false statements as being true (e.g. Gilbert et al. 1993) experiment)
• Miscomprehension is used in Marketing, but should be carefully considered if really appropriate
Types of miscomprehension (misleading)
- Literal vs. Figurative Meanings (brand X may relieve your pain)
- Comparison Omission (500 doctors recommend brand X)
- Piecemeal Comparisons (Brand X works fadter than Y and longer than Z)
- Wrongfully Inferring Causality (Active people take brand X)
- Misleading Visuals (Milky way)
- Misleading Definitions (SweetZone > Fat Free, while the actual problem is the amount of sugar)
- Demonstrations (Waterproof garbage ba > any garbage bag is supposed to be waterproof)
Background on opinion formation
• The Elaboration Likelihood Model
• When will consumers use the central or peripheral route?
• The moderating role of involvement on central/peripheral route
– Petty, Cacioppo, and Schumann (1983)
Learning theories
• Behavioral learning theories - Classical conditioning - Instrumental conditioning • Cognitive learning theories - Observational learning - Cognitive processes • Opinion change
Central vs Peripheral Route
There are two ways consumers elaborate upon a message and form an opinion based on the message:
the central route and the peripheral route
- Using the central route, consumers focus on rational, important, conscious diagnostic information/facts/evidence/logical reasoning provided by high effort and high elaboration
- Using the peripheral route, consumers focus on liking, emotions and feelings of an attractive source/expertise by low effort and low elaboration
• Central versus peripheral route is a choice between
- Facts vs. emotions
- Informational appeal vs. entertainment
- Direct comparisons vs. drama
- Functional vs. image
Whn will consumers follow the central route?
only when motivation and ability is high.
Behavioural Learning
• Classical Conditioning
- A stimulus that elicits a response is paired with another stimulus that initially does not elicit a response on its own > Pavlov’s Dog: exiting association, stimulus pairing, conditioned association
• Instrumental conditioning (or operant conditioning)
- Behaviors are performed that produce a positive outcome; behaviors are avoided that yield a negative outcomes
How to ensure successful classical conditioning?
- Contiguity of CS and UCS
- Conditioned stimulus should occur before unconditioned stimulus (more effective than „backward conditioning“)
- The stronger the link between UCS and UCR is, the better
- Usage of „new, neutral“ stimuli (no associations learned yet)
- Continuous repetition (high pressure marketing)
How to ensure successful instrumental conditioning?
• Ensuring product contact or trial through
- Appealing product design
- Promotion people, trial samples, samples in magazines
• Ensuring consequent control of customer satisfaction
- Only satisfaction leads to repurchase and customer loyalty
Cognitive Learning
• Observational learning
- Copying (successful) behavior of others
• Cognitive processes
- Learning through cognitive reflection/thinking
Observational learning
• Observational learning is also called vicarious learning or social
learning or modeling
• Is learned through observing, retaining and replicating novel behavior
executed by others
• Observational learning is not necessarily imitation!
• In Marketing, observational learning is important since
- Classical advertising can not show direct positive consequences
- Only „learning by trying out“ would be very inefficient
- Only requirement is, that consumer expects the same positive
consequence
How to ensure successful observational Learning?
- Attention
- Remembrance
- Motivation
- Identification
Cognitive processes
• Cognitive learning processes do not occur automatically or
accidentally, but considered and deliberate
• Examples: planned shopping occasions or extensive buying
• Underlying theories include:
- Imagery theory
- Interference theory of forgetting
- Mere Exposure
- Generalization of a stimulus
Imagery theory
• The mental emergence, processing and storage of inner pictures is called “imagery”
• Information can be coded verbally but also visually
- External verbal information can be transformed into inner visual pictures (and vice versa)
- Often abstract words are coded verbally, more “tangible” words are coded verbally and visually
Interference theory of forgetting
- Generally, something once learned is stored in memory long-term
- Forgetting results from problems to retrieve stored information due to the fact that newly stored information overlays previous stored information
Mere exposure
• A stimulus which has been processed before, will be processed in a more simple manner, and this leads to the fact that it will be graded more positively (than a stimulus appearing for the first time)
Generalization of Stimuli
• Consumers often apply what they have learned about the associations related to
one stimulus to another stimulus just because they are similar
• This can be used for:
1. Image transfer (Nivea > Balea)
2. Brand extension (CAT)
Difficulty in opinion change
• Change the Product -“New and improved” • Change the Positioning -Target a different segment/ create a more cool/upscale image
Memory structure and multi-memorymodel
- Background information
* Atkinson-Shiffrin-Model or Multi-Memory-Model
Long-term memory
• Long-term memory
- Associative network
- Categorization
- Prototype in a category
- Spreading activation: fan effect and lateral inhibition
External versus internal information reception
• External information gathering (=current experience)
- What we see, hear, smell and feel at this moment
- E.g., logo, packaging, etc.
• Internal information gathering (=past experience, remembrance/memory)
- Thoughts, inner pictures, feelings that come to ones mind
- E.g., remembering a commercial, past experiences with a brand
Active versus passive information reception
• Active information reception
- Conscious, deliberate search for information
- E.g., looking for product information on packaging, reading price
• Passive information reception
- Unconscious, spontaneous, impulsive, accidental
- E.g. spontaneous comprehension of packaging
Long-term Memory Categorization
Subordinate > Basic > Superordinate
Logt-term Memory Prototype
• Category member which
- is most easily recalled
- becomes standard of comparison for category
- has the most associations with other
members of the category and very few associations outside the category
Long-term Memory:
Spreading Activation - The Fan Affect (Anderson 1974)
probability (item retrieval) = association strength / Σ association strengths
Long-term Memory:
Spreading Activation - Lateral Inhibition
•In neurobiology, lateral inhibition is the capacity of an excited neuron (nerve cell) to reduce the activity of its neighbours
• Shampoo experiment of Alba and Chattopadhyay (1986)
- Mentioning of brand names decreases memory performance
• Linked with tip of the tongue (TOT) phenomenon: an instance of knowing something that cannot immediately be recalled
• Usage in Marketing
- Influencing choice-set by mentioning unimportant competit
Consumer evaluation: Atittudes
Attitudes
• are evaluative judgments (about products, people, …)
• have direction and strength
• are learned
• are enduring
• are retrieved or constructed on the spot
Forming Attitudes
- Piecemeal: Attitude is based on liking of product’s single attributes - Feeling-based: mood and emotins - Catgory-based: Transfer of attitude toward the category onto product (e.g. brand extensions)
ABC Model of Attitudes
An attitude has three components
− Affect (consumer‘s feelings)
− Behaviour (consumer‘s intentions)
− Cognition (consumer‘s beliefs)
Hierarchies of effect
Standard learning hierarchies
− Think – feel – do (standard learning)
− Do – feel – think (low involvement)
− Feel – do – think (experiental)
Functions of attitudes
- Instrumental function: helps to gain satisfaction from the object
- Ego-defensive function: protects against internal conflicts and external dangers
- Value-expressive function: is a form of self-expression
- Knowledge function: helps to seek clarity and order
Problems with predicting consumer bahvior
•Important to forecast consumer behavior - What will people buy? - How much will they consume? - How much will they complain? - How will they react to changes? • Hard to forecast Consumer Behavior - Sudden fads - High new product failure rate
Predicting consumer behavior through past behavior
Measuring past behavior
• Trend in sales
• Trend in buying behavior
Predicting consumer behavior through intentions
Measure intentions
• Problems with intention measures
- New information/unanticipated circumstances
- General self-report problems: Insight in own motivations; Social desirability
- Measurement problems depend on: When you measure & Type of behavior
Does Behavior influence attitudes?
Balance Theory
• Theory developed by Austrian psychologist Fritz Heider (1958)
• Attitude changes result from striving for “psychological balance”
> Gillette
Does Behavior influence attitudes?
Cognitive dissonance
• Theory developed by psychologist Festinger (1957)
• Dissonance: The unpleasant state of psychological arousal resulting from an
inconsistency between attitudes and behavior
• Four options to reduce the dissonance
- Change the attitude
- Change the behavior
- Selective perception (ignoring inconsistent, searching for consistent inform.)
- Oppression of inconsistence
Does Behavior influence attitudes?
Self-perception theory
• Theory developed by psychologist Daryl Bem (1965)
• Attitude changes result from observing our own behavior and
conclude what attitudes must have caused them
• Example:
- Head nodding (ear phones)
- Racing hearts (Valins-Effect)
