UNIT IV

CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR
 LEARNING OBJECTIVE
• To introduce students the dynamics of
consumer behaviour and consumer markets.
• The unit also focuses on industrial buyer
behaviour.
• Introduces students to emerging industry of
services
 What is CB
• Study of how consumers spend their available
resources (time, money, effort) on consumption
related items
• Behaviour consumers display in the market place
• Study of what people buy, how they buy, why they
buy, where they buy, how often they buy, how
often they use it, how they dispose it
 NEED FOR STUDYING CB
• 1. To satisfy need of customers
• 2. Helps to understand consumer psychology
• 3. Helps to understand consumer motives
• 4. Helps to understand consumer choices
• 5. Helps to understand consumer preferences
 TYPES OF BUYING BEHAVIOUR
 Complex Buying Behaviour
 Variety Seeking Buying Behaviour
 Dissonance Reducing Buying Behaviour
 Habitual Buying Behaviour
 TYPES OF BUYING BEHAVIOUR
 Complex Buying Behaviour
 Habitual Buying Behaviour
 Variety Seeking Buying Behaviour
 Dissonance Reducing Buying Behaviour
 INDUSTRIAL BUYING BEHAVIOUR
• A complex decision making process involving
selection and procurement of products and
services by organizational buyers.
• Three types of buying behaviour:
• Straight Rebuy
• Modified Rebuy
• New Task buying
 STRAIGHT REBUY
• A straight rebuy is a situation in which a
purchaser buys the same product in the same
quantities from the same vendor.
• Nothing changes, in other words. Post
purchase evaluations are often skipped,
unless the buyer notices an unexpected
change in the offering such as a deterioration
of its quality or delivery time.
 MODIFIED REBUY
• A modified rebuy occurs when a company
wants to buy the same type of product it has
in the past but make some modifications to it.
Maybe the buyer wants different quantities,
packaging, or delivery, or the product
customized slightly differently. 
 NEW BUY
• A new-buy selling situation occurs when a firm
purchases a product for the first time.
• New buys are the most time consuming for
both the purchasing firm and the firms selling
to them. 
 SERVICES
•  A type of economic activity that is intangible,
is not stored and does not result in ownership.
A service is consumed at the point of
sale. Services are one of the two key
components of economics, the other being
goods.
Characteristics of Services
SERVICE MARKETING TRIANGLE
 CULTURAL FACTORS
• Consumer behavior is deeply influenced by cultural
factors, such as buyer’s culture, subculture and
social class
• Culture
• Essentially, culture is the share of each company
and is the major cause of the person who wants
and behavior. The influence of culture on the
purchasing behavior varies from country to country,
therefore sellers have to be very careful in the
analysis of the culture of different groups, regions
or even countries.
 ECONOMIC MODEL
• The economic model of consumer
behavior focuses on the idea that
a consumer's buying pattern is based on the
idea of getting the most benefits while
minimizing costs. Thus, one can
predict consumer behavior based on
economic indicators such as
theconsumer's purchasing power and the
price of competitive products
•  Subculture
• Each culture has different subcultures, such as
religions, nationalities, geographical regions,
racial, etc. marketing groups may use these
groups, segmenting the market in several
small portions. For example, marketers can
design products according to the needs of a
specific geographical group.
•  Social Class
• Every society has some kind of social class is
important for marketing because the buying
behavior of people in a particular social class is
similar. Thus marketing activities could be
adapted to different social classes. Here we
should note that social class is not only
determined by income, but there are several
other factors such as wealth, education,
occupation etc.
 SOCIAL FACTORS
• Social factors also influence the purchasing behavior of
consumers. Social factors are: the reference groups,
family, the role and status.
• Reference groups
• Reference groups have the potential for the formation
of an attitude or behavior of the individual. The impact
of reference groups vary across products and brands.
For example, if the product is visible as clothing, shoes,
car etc., the influence of reference groups will be high.
Reference groups also include opinion leader (a person
who influences others by his special skill, knowledge or
other characteristics).
• Family
• Buyer behavior is strongly influenced by a family
member. So vendors are trying to find the roles
and influence of the husband, wife and children.
If the decision to purchase a particular product is
influenced by the wife of then sellers will try to
target women in their ad. Here we should note
that the purchase of roles change with changing
lifestyles of consumers.
•  Roles and Status
• Each person has different roles and status in
society in terms of groups, clubs, family, etc.
organization to which it belongs. For example,
a woman working in an organization as
manager of finance. Now she is playing two
roles, one of the chief financial officer and the
mother. Therefore, purchasing decisions will
be influenced by their role and status.
 PERSONAL FACTORS
• Personal factors may also affect consumer behavior.
Some of the important factors that influence personal
buying behavior are: lifestyle, economic status,
occupation, age, personality and self esteem.
• • Age
• Age and life cycle have a potential impact on the
purchasing behavior of consumers. It is obvious that
consumers change the purchase of goods and services
over time. Family life cycle consists of different stages
as young singles, married couples, unmarried couples
etc that help marketers to develop suitable products
for each stage.
• • Occupation
• The occupation of a person has a significant
impact on their buying behavior. For example,
a marketing manager of an organization is
trying to buy business suits, while a low level
worker in the same organization buy-resistant
clothing work.
• • Economic situation
• economic situation of the consumer has a great
influence on their buying behavior. If income and
savings a customer is high, then going to buy more
expensive products. Moreover, a person with low
income and savings buy cheap products.
• • Lifestyle
• Lifestyle clients is another factor affecting import
purchasing behavior of consumers. Lifestyle refers to
the way a person lives in a society and express things in
their environment. It is determined by the client’s
interests, opinions, etc and activities shapes their
whole pattern of acting and interacting in the world.
• • Personality
• Personality changes from person to person, time
to time and place to place. Therefore, it can
greatly influence the buying behavior of
customers. In fact, personality is not what one
has, but is the totality of the conduct of a man in
different circumstances. Has different
characteristics, such as dominance, aggression,
confidence etc that may be useful to determine
the behavior of consumers to the product or
service.
 PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS
• There are four major psychological factors that affect
the purchasing behavior of consumers. These are:
perception, motivation, learning, beliefs and attitudes.
• Motivation
• The level of motivation also affects the purchasing
behavior of customers. Each person has different
needs, such as physiological needs, biological needs,
social needs, etc. The nature of the requirements is
that some are more urgent, while others are less
pressing. Therefore, a need becomes a motive when it
is most urgent to lead the individual to seek
satisfaction.
• Perception
• Select, organize and interpret information in a way to
produce a meaningful experience of the world is called
perception.
• There are three different perceptual processes which are
selective attention, selective distortion and selective
retention.
• In the case of selective attention, sellers try to attract the
attention of the customer. Whereas in case of selective
distortion, customers try to interpret the information in a
way that supports what customers already believe.
• Similarly, in the case of selective retention, marketers try to
retain information that supports their beliefs.
• Beliefs and Attitudes
• Client has specific beliefs and attitudes
towards different products. Because such
beliefs and attitudes shape the brand image
and affect consumer buying behavior so
traders are interested in them. Marketers can
change beliefs and attitudes of customers
with special campaigns in this regard.