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1- Consumer Behaviour. One of the most challenging concept in marketing deals with understanding why consumers behave in a certain way or do what they do (or don’t do). Two major psychological concepts are often used to explain and understand the consumer’s behaviour. The first is the so called in psychology the cognitive psychology in which the focus of the study is the mental behaviour i. e. the internal influence such as perception, memory, attention, attitude, beliefs, values, personality and buying motives.
The second psychological concept is the social psychology in which the phenomenon of consumer behaviour is completely influenced by the external forces, i. e. social and referenced groups. There is no doubt that the consumer behaviour is extremely complex due to the nature of human beings differences in all the levels. Nevertheless, a common definition of consumer behaviour is the study of individuals, groups, or organizations and the processes of the buying units and the exchange processes involved in acquiring, consuming, and disposing of goods, services, experiences, and ideas.
But such knowledge is critical for marketers since having a strong understanding of buyer behaviour will help shed light on what is important to the customer and also suggest the important influences on customer decision-making. Using this information, marketers can create marketing programs that they believe will be of interest to customers. 2- Consumer Decision making Consumer decision making is explained and viewed as a complex process that is conducted in steps in which consumers identify their needs, collect information, evaluate alternatives, and make the purchase decision. Some refer this process as problem solving phenomena.
These actions are determined by psychological and economical factors, and are influenced by environmental factors such as cultural, group, and social values. Consumer’s decision making differ in many ways, just as problem solving to certain issues is done; the same is in the case of consumer buying decision. For example some buying results from the consumer’s need for fun, to create fantasies, obtain emotions, and feelings. Some others are because of strong environmental forces that propel consumers to make purchases without necessarily first developing strong feelings or beliefs about the product.
Some buying is done on the basis of innovation, some on the basis of the so called impulse purchase, some of the basis of discount purchase or sale purchase. As you can see there is huge variety of examples that reflect buyer’s decision other than necessity. Thus, mmarketers have successfully influenced the consumer’s decision making by understating the consumer behaviour and adapting and improving their marketing strategies and hence creating attractive messages through smart and effective advertising propagandas that effectively reached the consumers. -What influences purchases There are many factors that can affect this process as a person works through the purchase decision. The number of potential influences on consumer behaviour is limitless. However, marketers are well served to understand the Key influences. By doing so they may be in a position to tailor their marketing efforts to take advantage of these influences in a way that will satisfy the consumer and the marketer (this is a key part of the definition of marketing).
There are three main factors that influence purchasing: Internal, External and Marketing. The internal factors consist of attitude, life-style, knowledge, personality, role, involvement and perception. The external factors consist of culture, groups, and situations. The Marketing factors embrace the following: product, price, promotions, distribution and service. For the most part the influences are not mutually exclusive. Instead, they are all interconnected and work together to form who we are and how we behave and what influence our purchases.