Best Consumer Behavior Marketing tips

Best Consumer Behaviour Marketing tips for you

Introduction

Understanding consumer behavior is important for any organization before launching a product. If the organization failed to analyze how a customer will respond to a particular product, the company will face losses. Consumer behavior is very complex because each consumer has a different mind and attitude towards the purchase, consumption, and disposal of the product (Solomon, 2009). Understanding the theories and concepts of consumer behavior helps to market the product or services successfully. Moreover, studying consumer behavior helps in many aspects. As there is constant change in the living standards, trend, fashion and change in technology; consumer’s attitude towards the purchase of product varies (Kumar, 2004). Understanding these factors is of utmost importance because the marketing of a product is largely dependent on these factors. Thus, consumer behavior serves as a successful tool for marketers in meeting their sales objectives.

This essay discusses the value to marketers of understanding the importance of and applying consumer behavior concepts and theories.

1. Consumer Behaviour or the Buyer Behaviour is referred to the behavior that is displayed by the individual while they are buying, consuming or disposing of any particular product or services. These behaviors can be affected by multiple factors. Moreover, it also involves a search for a product, evaluation of product where the consumer evaluates different features, purchase, and consumption of the product. Later the post-purchase behavior of the product is studied which shows consumer satisfaction or dissatisfaction where it involves the disposal of the product (Solomon, 2009).
2. The customers while buying a product goes through many steps. The study of consumer behavior helps to understand how the buying decision is made and how they look for a product. Moreover, understanding consumer behavior also helps marketers to know what, where, when, how and why of the consumption of product consumption (Kumar, 2004). These help marketers or organizations to know the reason behind the purchase of a product by consumers and how it satisfies them. Among other factors, the basic needs like shelter and hunger along with a craving for psychological fulfillment tends consumer to buy a certain product or services.

Importance of Consumer Behaviour to business managers

The main purpose of marketing a product is to satisfy the demands and wants of Consumers. The study of consumer behavior helps to achieve this purpose. As consumers are the most important person for marketers or salespeople, therefore it is important for them to consider the likes and dislikes of the consumers so that they can provide them with the goods and services accordingly (Solomon, 2009). The more careful analysis helps in more exact predictions about the behavior of consumers of any product or service. The study of consumer behaviors helps business managers, salespeople, and marketers in the following way.

• To design the best possible product or service that fully satisfies consumer’s needs and demands.
• To decide where the service or product would be made available for easy access to consumers.
• To decide the price at which the consumers would be ready to buy that product or service.
• To find out the best method of promotion that will prove to be effective to attract customers to buy a product.
• To understand why, when, how, what and other factors that influence the buying decisions of the consumers.

Importance of Consumer Behaviour to Marketers

It is important for marketers to study consumer behavior. It is important for them to know consumers as individuals or groups opt for, purchase, consumer or dispose of products and services and how they share their experience to satisfy their wants or needs (Solomon, 2009). This helps marketers to investigate and understand the way in which consumers behave so that they can position their products to a specific group of people or targeted individuals in regard to the marketer’s viewpoint, they assume that the basic purpose of marketing is to sell goods and services to more people so that more profit could be made. This principle of making profits is heavily applied by almost all marketers. Earlier, the marketers were successful in accomplishing their purpose. However, today, as consumers are more aware of the use of the product and other information about the product, it is not easy to sell or attract customers to buy the product (Kumar, 2004). Thus, in order to sell a product or service or to convince consumers to buy the product, the marketers have to undergo proper research to win them over.

The following are some of the points discussed that explains the value to marketers of understanding and applying consumer behavior concepts and theories.

1. To understand Buying Behaviour of consumers

The study of consumer behavior helps marketers to recognize and forecast the purchase behavior of the consumers while they are purchasing a product. The study of consumer behavior helps the marketers not only to understand what consumer’s purchase, but helps to understand why they purchase it (Kumar, 2004). Moreover, other questions like how, where and when they purchase it are also answered. The consumption and the reasons behind the disposition of that particular product or service help marketers to be fully aware of the product that is marketed. The consumer behavior studies also help marketers to understand the post-purchase behavior of the consumers. Thus, the marketers become fully aware of every phase of the consumption process i.e., pre-purchase behavior, behavior during purchase and post-purchase behavior. Many studies in the past show that each consumer behaves differently for a product i.e., they buy the product for different reasons, pays different prices, used the product differently and have different emotional attachments with the product (Solomon, 2009).

2. To create and retain customers through online stores

Professor Theodore Levitt says that consumer behaviour is of most importance to marketers in business studies as the main aim is to create and retain customers (Kumar, 2004). If the consumers are satisfied with the product, he or she will buy the same product again. Therefore, the product should be marketed by markers in such a way that convince customer to buy the product. Thus, creating customer and then retaining those customers are important. These can be done through understanding and paying close attention towards the consumer’s behaviour while making purchase decision or buying a product in market place. Moreover, the information published on the websites largely influences the customer’s buying behavior. Such information on published sources arouse consumer to buy a product or service. Moreover, updating such information will help the consumer to retain a product or retry the product if the product has dissatisfied them (Solomon, 2009).

3. To understand the factors influencing Consumer’s Buying Behaviour

It is important for marketers to consider the factors that affect the buying behavior of consumers before entering the market. There are many factors that can influence the purchase decision of consumers such as social influence, cultural influences, psychological factors and personal factors (Super Professeur, 2011). Understanding these factors helps marketers to market the product on right time to the right consumers. For example, if a marketer is marketing a product which is Halal. The marketers first consider all the factors that can influence consumers to buy Halal products, where they can target specific areas where Halal food is more sold.

The marketers need to pay attention to cultural influences such as religion, values, and norms of the people or societies targeted and the lifestyle of the targeted consumers. Marketers can propose different strategies that convince targeted consumers to buy marketed products or services.

Moreover, marketers should ascertain the factors that influence and affects the purchase decision of consumers (Solomon, 2009). If the marketers failed to understand the factors that might influence consumers, they will fail to convince the consumer to purchase that product or will fail to meet the demands of consumers. Some variables cannot be directly observed (Super Professeur, 2011). In such a case, a thorough understanding of concepts and theories of consumer behavior helps marketers to predict the consumer’s buying behavior to a reasonable extent. Thus, understanding consumer’s behavior to buy a product is complex and requires marketers to continuously understand and apply various concepts and theories for successful marketing.

4. To increase the knowledge of salesperson influence consumer to buy a product

All the products and services marketed revolve around the behavior of consumers that how they will respond to them. Effective marketing of a product by salespeople may help to deliver the right product to the right people. Consumer behavior deals with the knowledge of what the consumers need and want to buy and what goods and services are available to satisfy their needs. Thus, consumer behavior deals with particularly with the behavior of people i.e., consumers.  It is important for a salesperson to be fully aware of the customer’s requirements so that he or she could clearly communicate the benefits of the product to the customers. Moreover, the salesperson by understanding consumer’s demand and need for a product can sell goods that are most closely related to their requirement. Besides understanding consumer behavior, the salesperson should also have command over their spoken language. This is because any miscommunication could harm the brand reputation. Moreover, if the consumers have more knowledge about the product than the salesperson, the sales might fail to meet their targets. Thus, analyzing consumer’s behavior and knowledge for effective marketing of products by salespeople are important. The salespeople must be fully aware of the consumer’s behavior in different situations so that they could help them in meeting their demands and satisfaction (Solomon,2009).

5. To understand the consumer’s decision to dispose of a product or services

Disposal of the product involves throwing away of products by the consumers (Solomon, 2009). This behavior of the consumer is very complex and requires more importance by the marketers. Understanding the consumer’s behavior about how and when consumers dispose of a product, the marketers or the companies can position themselves so that this behavior could be limited (Raghavan, 2010).

If the product or services that have failed to deliver required or expected satisfaction by the consumers, the product is disposed of by the customers. For this, some marketers track the follow up from the consumers so that they can gauge the reason behind the failure of the product. Moreover, in order to retain customers, some marketers or organizations offer customers with services like an exchange of a product, money-back guarantee, etc. Although, these tools are helpful to influence the post-purchase behavior of consumers to some extent.

The method of disposition varies transversely from product to product. Some of the factors that lead to consumer’s behavior to dispose of a product include psychological characteristics, situational factors or the intrinsic factors of the product. The psychological characteristics include attitude, mood, emotion, social class, social conscience, perception etc. The situational factors such as urgency, functional use, fashion change, etc. and intrinsic factors such as product style, durability, reliability, adaptability, replacement cost, color, size, etc. can lead to consumer’s decision to dispose of a product (Rao, 2011).

For example, the personal computers sold previously were largely demanded by consumers. However, due to changes in size, advancing technology, affordability, convenience; most people have switched to laptops and mobiles with operating systems have disposed of personal computers to a greater extent.

6. To help marketers to optimize the sale of the product and create focused marketing strategies

The theories and concepts of Consumer behavior help marketers to optimize their sales and to create efficient marketing strategies. Moreover, these theories provide marketers with information on the consumer’s behavior to spend money, likely causes that incline them to spend more money on a product, and this two information help to plan strategies that should be practiced by the marketers for successful marketing of a product (Goessl, 2011). Studying different consumer behavior theories helps to understand the different choices that consumers make to buy a product. There are some factors that need to be carefully analyzed by the marketers which help them to increase their sales and develop effective marketing strategies. These factors are discussed as follows:

Consumer’s rational behavior: It is foremost important for a marketer to understand the situations where consumers behave rationally. Many consumer behavior theories suggest that consumers want to get maximum benefit and satisfaction from the product by spending a minimum amount of money. This shows that consumers do not spend all their money to buy a product and keeps a certain amount of money as their savings. However, on the other hand, the consumers having limited money spend all their money on the purchase of their basic needs such as shelter, food, and clothing. Thus, the marketer must carefully analyze these two situations of consumers before marketing a product or service (WiseGEEK, n.d.).

Consumer’s taste and preferences: Understanding consumer taste and preferences helps marketers to revamp their product so that they could meet customer satisfaction. These factors may change from time to time. The change in consumer behavior affecting these factors should be carefully monitored. The marketers need carefully understand the consumer’s interest in the products by breaking down the targeted consumers into demographics, like age, occupation, and location as they contribute to investigating information about consumer preferences.

Price of Products: Prices of products are a widely discussed factor in consumer behavior theories. The theories suggest that marketers should keep their prices low without affecting the quality to attract consumers. This is because consumers go mostly for products that are of low price but satisfy their demand (Open Learning World, 2011).

Features of Product: Increased number of features offered by the product tends to increase the price of products. In such a case, consumers go for added features in a product at affordable prices. Therefore, the markers design their products in such a way that the product gives maximum value or features to consumers at an affordable price (Goessl, 2011)

Consumer’s knowledge about a product: The marketer must know to what extent the consumers have knowledge about a product. Mostly, consumers select products with which they are familiar with. For example, if the consumers are aware of the health effects of eating high-fat food or fast food, marketing of such a product to the health-conscious consumers will end up in failure.

Conclusion

In a nutshell, consumer behavior theories and concepts are of most importance to the salespeople or the marketers. As products are made to cater to consumer’s needs and demands, therefore, the products should be carefully marketed for the successful achievements of organizational goals. The study of consumer behavior helps them in analyzing different factors that have an influence on the buying decision of the consumers. If the marketers failed to understand these factors, they would not meet their targets.