Consumer behavior, its models, and the factors influencing it.
Introduction
The online environment seems to obviously affect the way people think and decide on buying procedures. Online stores are developed in a way that gives users various choices and changes the communication methods among consumers and product marketers.
Consumer behavior and therefore, buying decisions are affected by various factors including cultural, social, personal, and psychological ones, determining a complex framework of how marketing practices should be developed.
Online buying has obvious significance, as nowadays technology and consumers demand to change the shopping experience, in an environment where internet integration and mobile data directly affect consumer behavior and consumerism trends.
Traditional blue-chip companies and their respective product marketing strategies have witnessed serious shifts due to the pandemic. COVID-19 is transforming consumer behavior day by day, proving that most of its changes have come to stay and (probably) permanently shape most of the industries.
In such times, where the consumer decision processes and the evaluation of the product choice are deeply affected by information technologies and social media, it would be valuable for product/marketing depts to backtrack a bit on the fundamentals of Consumer Behaviour, its models, and the factors influencing it.
Definition of consumer behavior
Consumer behavior topic is a fundamental field of study in marketing and economic theory, setting the framework of how people decide to spend their resources to consume products/ services as they desire (Kotler, 1991: 283).
According to the Siomkos (1994: 24), consumer behavior is defined as “all the relevant to product-market activities, thoughts, and effects that occur before, during, and after the purchase of a product, as these take place by buyers and consumers of products and services as well as by those who influence purchasing”.
Gajjar (2013:10) defines consumer behavior as “the selection, purchase, and consumption of goods and services to satisfy his/her wants”.
Various definitions are given in Hallahan (2000:1), by Robertson and Kassarjian (1991: vii), who define consumer behavior as “the scientific study of consumer actions in the market”.
Models of consumer behavior
The theory of consumer behavior gives a comprehensive explanation as to the economic, social, cultural, and psychological aspects of factors affecting consumers in the purchasing process.
As Solomon et al. (2008) state, there is a total of internal forces affecting consumer behavior, like perceptions, motivation, lifestyles, and behaviors. Additionally, external factors also exist, like the influences of groups such as the family, as well as demographics (age, gender, social class, etc.), social, religious, ethnic, and other cultural influences.
Rook (1985:254) supports that any individual behavior is the result of several factors generated by the environment and the existing situations. Hoyer et al (2012: 413) support that consumer gets a mix of influences, coming by society, social class, family, the personality of the person, lifestyle, all interacting in the consumer’s mind and affecting the purchasing decision.
The basic consumer behavior models analyze the stages of consumer behavior and the forces that affect his/her decision to buy. These models are characterized by rational, psychological, or sociological dimensions.
The traditional consumer behavioral models are characterized by the input-output format, where inputs are financial factors affecting consumer behavior and output concern the purchasing decision (Jacoby, 2002:51).
Integrating psychological factors in consumer behavior resulted in the development of behavioral models, in the form of stimulus — organism — response.
Nest, more contemporary models were developed. One of the simplest behavioral models is the “black box”, according to which consumer receives impulses entering the ‘ black box ‘ and this produces the response of the buyer, which means the purchasing decision. In short, what happens inside the “black box” during the purchasing process is an interaction of the observed stimuli and responses.
Figure 1. The model of stimulus-response (black box)
(Sandhusen, 2000: 218)
The general model of consumer behavior consists of three parts: the external influences before buying, the decision-making process when buying and the consumer’s behavior after purchase.
Figure 2 The general model of consumer behavior
(Kokkinaki, n.d, p. 25)
Factors influencing consumer behavior
Consumer behavior is affected by various factors: cultural, social, personal, and psychological:
- Cultural factors exert a wider and deeper influence on consumer behavior (culture, subculture, social class).
- Social factors relate to reference groups, that influence consumer behavior (family, friends, colleagues, neighbors).
- Personal factors refer to consumer’s issues like age, occupation, economic situation, lifestyle, personality, character.
- Psychological factors relate to motivation, perception, learning, and attitudes/habits.
More specifically, cultural factors include, as stated before, the following:
- culture: it includes the beliefs, roles, behavior, values, traditions of people in a society and is essential so as to understand consumer behavior.
- sub-culture: when peoples’ behavior is characterized by similar values, then smaller groups are formed and called sub-culture. Types of sub-cultures are nationality groups, religious groups, racial groups, and geographical areas.
- social class: Several features of the social class exist. For example, members of a social class have similar education levels, attitudes, values, communication styles, lifestyles, income, occupations, and so on. For example, classes are categorized as upper, middle, lower.
References
Gajjar N., 2013, Factors Affecting Consumer Behavior, International Journal of Research In Humanities and Social Sciences, Vol. 1, Issue:2, 10–15
Hallahan K., 2000, Invited Panel Presentation: The Public Relations Research Agenda — The Next Decade, Public Relations Division, International Communication Association, Acapulco, Mexico.
Hoyer W, MacInnis D, Pieters R., 2012, Consumer Behavior, Cengage Learning
Jacoby J., 2002, Stimulus-Organism-Response Reconsidered: An Evolutionary Step in Modeling (Consumer) Behavior, Journal of Consumer Psychology, 12(1), 51–57
Kotler P, 1991, Marketing, Management, Interbooks
Robertson, T. & Kassarjian, H., 1991, Handbook of consumer behavior. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Rook D., 1985, The Ritual Dimension of Consumer Behavior, The Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 12, №3, pp. 251–264
Sandhusen R, 2000, Marketing, Barron’s Educational Series
Siomkos G, (1994), Consumer behavior and marketing strategy, Piraeus: editions Stamoulis
Solomon M, Zaichkowsky J, Polegato R., 2008, Consumer Behaviour: Buying, Having, and Being, 4th Canadian Edition. Toronto, Pearson Prentice Hall
