Essay: Consumer Behavior

This is the study of the habit connected to consumers and the aspect of their desires as far as the products they want are concerned. The consumer behavior is blends of various theories which are follow the three hierarchies of effects. They are Affects, the Behavior and Cognition. It is commonly called the ABC model which really describes the behavior concerned with consumers. The Affects can be commonly known to be the feeling the consumers have while the behavior also combined in the aspect of the normal interactions the people or the consumers have with others and finally the cognitive model of the ABC is the thought segment where the it is connected to the way the consumers think about the products. These theories are very important in the social psychology in terms of business and are very much used in the events where consumers are concerned. In order for the consumers to relate well with each other, social psychology describes the idea clearly that the use of the ABC model is very important. For them to relate these basic factors have to apply which is the best model for the consumers to use during their interactions. According to consumer behavior and relations, the hierarchy of effects applies in most occasions due to the relation the ABC model explains and thus these basic human capabilities have to apply. The ABC model is explained below; (Hewings, 2002).
Affects
In the ABC model the “A” stands for the Affects. This is clearly explained to the feelings the consumer or any individual has towards each other. This explains further about how the consumers feel about a certain object he she likes. According to social psychology, the consumer has to develop some feeling towards an object to make her or he attracted to it. This can be a general feeling to liking the object or of disliking the same object. The sense of feeling towards the object clearly determines the kind of relation the consumer will have with the object. The hierarchy of effects is explained by affect as the first in the listing. The development of feeling is the common explanation as to why a certain consumer goes to the object in which he or she has feeling for hence effecting and furthering the relationship. The hierarchy of effects model suggests that consumers use different methods to view a product advert before they can purchase the product. The work of the advertiser is to encourage the customer to go through all the six steps so that they can be able to purchase the product of their choice. These six steps include awareness, whereby customers are made aware of a product through the advert although the marketer will not be sure if the customer will learn enough about the product from the advert because there are very many adverts everyday that customers come across. Knowledge is gained through the social media platforms and retail packaging. Linking is all about ensuring that customers like the product through the advertisement. A consumer may like more than just the product and could end up buying a product out of the prevalence. Conviction and purchase are also important to the consumer behavior. This clearly explains the effect of affect or feeling which a consumer develops towards a certain object and gets the feeling of buying the object (Wright, 2006)
Behavior
The intention of the consumer after developing the feeling towards a certain object is the second in the hierarchy of effects and is known to as behavior. This is interaction and the relationship the consumer will develop and action to take after the feeling. The consumer can decide to act on the object to either go ahead or purchase it or either ignores the fact that he or she wanted to purchase the same object. According to the hierarchy of effects and the ABC model, the abbreviation “B” stands for Behavior. These are clearly explained by the fact that the consumer actions towards an object are straight forward. Generally, the corresponding side of consumer behavior is the marketing behavior or the marketing activity; in this case, marketing activity is the activity of creating, communicating and delivering services that have value for customers. According to business strategies a company should not concentrate on what the company provides but rather what the customers need. This is why it is important for marketers to identify and understand all their customer needs and create better solutions for their needs so that they can be satisfied. All the market activities are designed in such a way that they correspond with the consumer behaviors and look into different consumer behaviors like motivation, and self-identity. All these aspects have an influence in the marketing activities of a commodity in the markets. It is important to note that most consumer acts are based on the information they receive regarding a particular product. In the commercial environment, the information could come from the products, the packaging color, and design and so on. There are very many aspects in a commodity that consumers look into before they buy a commodity and their perceptions are can never be ignored. According to the ABC model the word behavior generally defines the actions the consumer has to take after developing the feeling towards an object. In social psychology, the behavior can be defined to be the act of interaction and co relationship between the consumer and the object (Mackie, 2003).
Cognition
According to the hierarchy of effects, the cognition model comes third in the list and is explained to be the thought the consumer has towards a certain object. The purpose of the thought is to make a decision on the action to take. In the ABC model, a consumer has to develop a certain feeling then advance to the level of action and finally end up in the level where the object in concern should be thought about through the mind of the consumer. This is what the consumer beliefs about the object and develops the attitude towards the object in study. The attitude is created through the thoughts of the consumer. Attitude can explain the way a consumer thinks or feels about certain aspects of his or her environment. Attitude is simply the manifestation of a person’s frame of mind and intentions. It is very difficult to change a consumer’s attitude towards a certain thing once it is formed. Attitude has three main aspects to look at namely, cognition affects and conation. In this same scenario, knowledge, beliefs and expectations associated with a certain brand will form the cognitive component of the individual’s attitude. The consumer’s emotions and impression constitute an individual’s image regarding a product or a service. Emotions and feelings both positive and negative towards a brand or product will influence the attitude towards the product (O’Donohue, 2012).
According to the ABC model, the cognition clearly explains the attitude developed by the consumer after the action he or she took towards an object. The hierarchy of effects model suggests that consumers use different methods to view a product advert before they can purchase the product. The work of the advertiser is to encourage the customer to go through all the six steps so that they can be able to purchase the product of their choice. These six steps include awareness, whereby customers are made aware of a product through the advert although the marketer will not be sure if the customer will learn enough about the product from the advert because there are very many adverts everyday that customers come across. Knowledge is gained through the social media platforms and retail packaging. Linking is all about ensuring that customers like the product through the advertisement. A consumer may like more than just the product and could end up buying a product out of the prevalence. Conviction and purchase are also important to the consumer behavior. The hierarchy of effects also ranges from three distinctive models (Ajzen, 2007)
The standard learning hierarchy (think-feel-do)
This level of effects concerns the consumer in the manner that, it is the attitude formation and also the formation and combination of beliefs towards a certain object. A consumer approaches a certain product and makes a decision as a problem solving analysis. There are the steps concerned with this level model which the consumer has to take before making a decision.
• The consumer first has to form a belief concerning a certain object and gather information which is relevant to the object.
• The consumer has to do evaluation of the products or object in concern and develop a feeling towards it.
• The consumer finally engages in the behavior or action concerning the object after the feeling he had developed (McQuail, 2004)
In other words after these steps the third one is always the kind of action he or she has to take, to either purchase the product or leave it. Consumers tend to purchase products that they believe in and identify with or those that they believe will solve or improve their situation. There are several theories of consumer behavior analyzing the concept of personality like the individual personality theory. This theory considers the human character traits formed when one is still young and they are deemed not change as a person grows up. However, individual personality theory does not affect the external environment of circumstance the consumer is in. The single trait theory states that a person’s characteristic is important and is usually dominant; multiple trait theory on the other hand considers the different characteristics that form a substantial portion of a person’s personality (Aguilar, 2010).
The low involvement hierarchy (do-feel-think)
This can be explained as the process in which attitude formation for the products and services in concern are evaluated and which are little risk. These is also connected to the social psychology where the consumers do what they want or belief is best for them, then later develops the feeling of the belief and finally do the cognitive aspect which is thinking. Many consumers do not think first about little risk objects for example, a consumer goes on to buy a bath towel of poor quality then later he or she will develop the feeling and thought that he made a mistake of not evaluating what he or she wanted. Social learning theories also attempt to analyze the concept of personality by explains that as a person’s situation changes, their reaction is also bound to change. It is therefore explains that it is very hard for marketers to predict the future behaviors of the buyers from a single situation of personality behavior. An individual is also bound to purchase a product that associates with their norm which is usually referred to as the social value. Emotional satisfaction from a product can be achieved if a product is purchased on the basis of the emotional values. This is why marketers need to conduct a thorough assessing at the values to be able to understand how an individual is likely to look for the product. Lifestyle is because of cultural values and resources that symbolize the sanctions of a person. From the marketing perspective, the type of products a consumer purchases and the manner in which they live reflects the society’s lifestyle. Communication in marketing will only be effective if marketers are able to analyze the lifestyles of consumers reasonably. This level of effect model is for the products which are of little risk and the consumer behavior is the do-feel-think model (Olson, 2001).
The experiential hierarchy (feel-think-do)
This is where the attitude formation is based on the issues of emotional reactions. This follows some steps in which the consumer has to initiate before acting on something.
• The consumer first acts on the aspect of emotional kind of reaction towards the product.
• The idea of intangible products like advertising, environment, brand names and other form of products which shape the emotions of the consumers and drive him or her in the way forward.
• Hedonic motivations are other forms of reactions which can trigger a consumer to act upon a product. Can be explained by the fact that whether using the product in question is exciting or not.
• Finally the mood a consumer or a person is in will clearly affect the advertising aspect of the product and hence the behavior will be different (Sitton, 2006).
This is the third level of the hierarchy of effects and the way they affect the consumer behavior. The final aspect of this behavior is the attitude of the consumer towards a certain product. Attitude can explain the way a consumer thinks or feels about certain aspects of his or her environment. Attitude is simply the manifestation of a person’s frame of mind and intentions. It is very difficult to change a consumer’s attitude towards a certain thing once it is formed. Attitude has three main aspects to look at namely, cognition affects and conation. In this same scenario, knowledge, beliefs and expectations associated with a certain brand will form the cognitive component of the individual’s attitude. The consumer’s emotions and impression constitute an individual’s image regarding a product or a service. Emotions and feelings both positive and negative towards a brand or product will influence the attitude towards the product. This concludes the aspect of consumer emotional reaction towards a certain product (Baars, 2007)
Theory of planned behavior
In social psychology, this is the kind of theory which is attributed to the linking of consumer beliefs and their behavior. It has been applied in many studies concerning the relations between beliefs, behavioral intentions, attitude and other attributes in the various fields like the advertising segment, public relations part, and health care and in different advertising campaigns. The TPB is defined as the attitude of a consumer towards behavior, perceived kind of behavioral control and subjective norm in which combine together help in shaping of an individual’s intentions and behavior. Like the social and lifestyles of a consumer can be used to describe and shape the consumer and his or her behaviors. Social learning theories also attempt to analyze the concept of personality by explains that as a person’s situation changes, their reaction is also bound to change. It is therefore explains that it is very hard for marketers to predict the future behaviors of the buyers from a single situation of personality behavior. An individual is also bound to purchase a product that associates with their norm which is usually referred to as the social value (Busemeyer, 2005).
Emotional satisfaction from a product can be achieved if a product is purchased on the basis of the emotional values. This is why marketers need to conduct a thorough assessing at the values to be able to understand how an individual is likely to look for the product. Lifestyle is because of cultural values and resources that symbolize the sanctions of a person. From the marketing perspective, the type of products a consumer purchases and the manner in which they live reflects the society’s lifestyle. Communication in marketing will only be effective if marketers are able to analyze the lifestyles of consumers reasonably. This theory helps in the analyzing the behavioral intentions of the consumer and finally his behavior (Reed, 2007).
Theory of reasoned action
The theory which is of reasoned action explains how an added element for a consumer during persuasion can change the behavioral intentions of the consumer. This theory is concerned with the behavior or the behavioral intentions of the consumer towards a certain product. Also the theory recognizes that the other several factors which kind of limit the supposed influence in concern with attitude in the consumer behavior. The theory also explains the fact that the consumer has to be equipped with the formation of the feeling or attitude in order for him or her to act as perceived by his or her intentions (Spillman, 1976). .
Therefore the reasoned action depends mostly on the intentions of the behavior by the consumer towards a certain action. Personal impact is the influence other people have on a persons’ life and how they influence his or her behavior. A person may behave in a certain way which they believe is the best and what is expected of them by the society. However when a person is forced to act in a certain manner so that they can be allowed to join a group, then we say they have applied normative compliance. Another influence that requires an individual to be psychologically involved with a group and so they are forced to acquire the values of the system as the other group members and one may be expected to change their image and respect. All these aspects are bound to change an individual’s decision when it comes to products and services and the decision made depends on the group that one engages with (Smith, 2003).
This theory explains the method whereby an individual would divide all his resources based on the purchases he has to make depending on the basis of increment and price satisfaction. Today we can use economic resources like the income assets and credit facilities to determine the measure of expenditure. However temporal perspectives can also be used as situational characteristics to explain the effects of time on consumer behavior. In this aspect we can say that the amount of time available for a consumer to make the decision on what to buy has significant impact on the decision they take. If there is more time pressure then it is likely that the consumer will have shorter time to make decision leading to suboptimal purchasing (Cohen, 2004).
We can conclude that, a consumer’s attention is can either be gained voluntarily or provocatively. For instance, voluntary attention is gained when the consumer is free to search for information although marketers can influence the decision by controlling the stimuli to influence the attention of the customer. Also the ABC model theory which clearly defines the mode of effects a consumer behavior is based on is the best model in the study of the customer behavior in behavioral intentions. In social psychology, all these theories are broadly discussed as far as the consumer behavior is concerned (Bandura, 1986).