UNIT 1

ASSIGNMENT OF CONSUMER

BEHAVIOUR

SUBMITTED TO: Dr. Bhagwan

SUBMITTED BY: Kusum Kumari

CUHP17MBA29

3rd Sem
Table of Contents
1. CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR.................................................................................................................. 3
1.1 Definitions of consumer behaviour ................................................................................................. 5
1.2 Nature of Consumer Behaviour: ..................................................................................................... 6
2. CONSUMER BEHAVIOR AND MARKETING CONCEPT:......................................................... 10
2.1 Marketing Concept: ........................................................................................................................ 10
2.2 Interrelation between consumer behavior and marketing concept: .......................................... 12
3. CONSUMER RESEARCH PROCESS: ............................................................................................. 13
4. MODELS OF CONSUMER DECISION MAKING : ....................................................................... 16
4.1 SCHIFFMAN AND KANUK’S MODEL OF CONSUMER DECISION MAKING ............... 16
4.2. BUYER’S BLACK BOX MODEL : ............................................................................................. 24
4.3. SIMPLE STIMULUS RESPONSE MODEL .............................................................................. 28
4.4. ASSAELL’S CONSUMER DECISION MAKING MODEL: ................................................... 29
5. CONSUMER DECISION MAKING PROCESS ............................................................................... 30
1. CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR

Before knowing about consumer behavior firstly we have to know about who is a

Consumer and what is consumer interest? So, consumer is any individual who

purchases goods and services from the market for his/her end-use is called a

consumer or we can say that it is the one who consumes goods and services available

in the market.

Example - Tom might purchase a tricycle for his son or Mike might buy a shirt for

himself. In this example, both Tom and Mike are consumers.

Every customer shows inclination towards particular products and services.

Consumer interest is nothing but willingness of consumers to purchase products and

services as per their taste, need and of course pocket. For example:

Person A and B went to the nearby shopping mall to buy dresses for themselves. The

store manager showed them the best dresses available with him. Person A

immediately purchased two dresses but B returned home empty handed. The dresses

were little too expensive for B and she preferred simple and subtle designs as

compared to designer wears available at the store.

In this example person B and A had similar requirements but there was a huge

difference in their taste, mind set and ability to spend. So both interest are different.
“Consumer Behaviour is a branch which deals with the various stages a consumer

goes through before purchasing products or services for his end use” or we can say

that Consumer behaviour is the study of how individual customers, groups or

organizations select, buy, use, and dispose ideas, goods, and services to satisfy their

needs and wants. It refers to the actions of the consumers in the marketplace and the

underlying motives for those actions. Marketers expect that by understanding what

causes the consumers to buy particular goods and services, they will be able to

determine—which products are needed in the marketplace, which are obsolete, and

how best to present the goods to the consumers. The study of consumer behaviour

assumes that the consumers are actors in the marketplace. Consumers play various

roles in the marketplace. Starting from the information provider, from the user to the

payer and to the disposer, consumers play these roles in the decision process. The

roles also vary in different consumption situations; for example, a mother plays the

role of an influencer in a child’s purchase process, whereas she plays the role of a

disposer for the products consumed by the family.

Why do you think an individual buys a product?

 Need

 Social Status

 Gifting Purpose
Why do you think an individual does not buy a product?

 No requirement

 Income/Budget/Financial constraints

 Taste

When do you think consumers purchase products?

 Festive season

 Birthday

 Anniversary

 Marriage or other special occasions

There are several factors which influence buying decision of a consumer ranging

from psychological, social, economic and so on.

1.1 Definitions of consumer behaviour are as follows:

1. According to Engel, Blackwell, and Mansard, ‘consumer behaviour is the actions

and decision processes of people who purchase goods and services for personal

consumption’.
2. According to Louden and Bitta, ‘consumer behaviour is the decision process and

physical activity, which individuals engage in when evaluating, acquiring, using or

disposing of goods and services’.

1.2 Nature of Consumer Behaviour:

1. Influenced by various factors:

The various factors that influence the consumer behaviour are as follows:

a. Marketing factors such as product design, price, promotion, packaging,

positioning and distribution.

b. Personal factors such as age, gender, education and income level.

c. Psychological factors such as buying motives, perception of the product and

attitudes towards the product.

d. Situational factors such as physical surroundings at the time of purchase, social

surroundings and time factor.

e. Social factors such as social status, reference groups and family.

f. Cultural factors, such as religion, social class—caste and sub-castes.

2. Undergoes a constant change:

Consumer behaviour is not static. It undergoes a change over a period of time

depending on the nature of products. For example, kids prefer colorful and fancy

footwear, but as they grow up as teenagers and young adults, they prefer trendy

footwear, and as middle-aged and senior citizens they prefer more sober footwear.

The change in buying behaviour may take place due to several other factors such as

increase in income level, education level and marketing factors.

3. Varies from consumer to consumer:

All consumers do not behave in the same manner. Different consumers behave

differently. The differences in consumer behaviour are due to individual factors such

as the nature of the consumers, lifestyle and culture. For example, some consumers

are technoholics. They go on a shopping and spend beyond their means.

They borrow money from friends, relatives, banks, and at times even adopt unethical

means to spend on shopping of advance technologies. But there are other consumers

who, despite having surplus money, do not go even for the regular purchases and

avoid use and purchase of advance technologies.

4. Varies from region to region and country to county:

The consumer behaviour varies across states, regions and countries. For example,

the behaviour of the urban consumers is different from that of the rural consumers.

A good number of rural consumers are conservative in their buying behaviours.

The rich rural consumers may think twice to spend on luxuries despite having

sufficient funds, whereas the urban consumers may even take bank loans to buy

luxury items such as cars and household appliances. The consumer behaviour may

also varies across the states, regions and countries. It may differ depending on the

upbringing, lifestyles and level of development.

5. Information on consumer behaviour is important to the marketers:

Marketers need to have a good knowledge of the consumer behaviour. They need to

study the various factors that influence the consumer behaviour of their target

customers. The knowledge of consumer behaviour enables them to take appropriate

marketing decisions in respect of the following factors:

a. Product design/model

b. Pricing of the product

c. Promotion of the product

d. Packaging

e. Positioning

f. Place of distribution

6. Leads to purchase decision:

A positive consumer behaviour leads to a purchase decision. A consumer may take

the decision of buying a product on the basis of different buying motives. The

purchase decision leads to higher demand, and the sales of the marketers increase.

Therefore, marketers need to influence consumer behaviour to increase their

purchases.

7. Varies from product to product:

Consumer behaviour is different for different products. There are some consumers

who may buy more quantity of certain items and very low or no quantity of other

items. For example, teenagers may spend heavily on products such as cell phones

and branded wears for snob appeal, but may not spend on general and academic

reading. A middle- aged person may spend less on clothing, but may invest money

in savings, insurance schemes, pension schemes, and so on.

8. Improves standard of living:

The buying behaviour of the consumers may lead to higher standard of living. The

more a person buys the goods and services, the higher is the standard of living. But

if a person spends less on goods and services, despite having a good income, they

deprives themselves of higher standard of living.

9. Reflects status:
The consumer behaviour is not only influenced by the status of a consumer, but it

also reflects it. The consumers who own luxury cars, watches and other items are

considered belonging to a higher status. The luxury items also give a sense of pride

to the owners.

2. CONSUMER BEHAVIOR AND MARKETING CONCEPT:

2.1 Marketing Concept:

In marketing concept the firms analyze the needs of their customers and then take

decisions to satisfy those needs. It is a strategy that firms adopt and implement to

satisfy need, increase sales, maximize profit and beat the competition. To understand

the marketing concept firstly we need to understand the other concepts i.e.

production, product, selling concept.

Development of Concept: Production

Concept

Product
concept

Selling Concept

Marketing
Concept
The Production Concept:

The term production concept was coined by the Henry Ford. According to this

concept consumers will prefer products that are widely available and highly

affordable. Firms use this concept to achieve high production efficiency, low costs,

and mass distribution. But production concept sometime lead to marketing myopia.

The Product Concept:

According to this concept consumer will prefer product that offer most in quality,

performance and innovative features. It mainly focus on product that are improving

over time. However, managers are sometimes caught up in a love affair with their

product and do not realize what the market needs. Product concept sometime also

lead to a marketing myopia.

The Sales Concept:

Assume that consumer are not interested to buy a product unless they are

aggressively persuaded to it. In this time company use promotional tools to stimulate

more buying because selling is not only tactics to sell your product. But most firms

practice the selling concept when they have overcapacity. Their aim is to sell what

they make rather than make what the market wants.

The Marketing Concept

This concept mainly focus on achieving organisational goals by knowing the needs

and wants of target market and delivering the desired satisfaction better than

competitors. Four pillars of marketing concept are: target market, customer needs,

integrated marketing and profitability. When firms first began to adopt the marketing

concept, they set up separate marketing departments whose objective it was to satisfy

customer needs. The marketing concept relies upon marketing research to define

market segment, their size, and their needs. To satisfy those needs, the marketing

team want to understand the behaviour of consumer.

2.2 Interrelation between consumer behavior and marketing concept:

The study of consumer behavior, which is concerned with the manner in which

consumers choose and utilize products and services in relation to their needs and

wants, is directly related to marketing concept as consumer behavior derives

strategies from its three approaches namely product concept, production concept,

and selling concept. Product concept is essential in studying consumer behavior as

it guides the business in concept creating products that consumers will buy according

to high quality, performance, and beneficial features. Production concept is also

important in consumer behavior as it presupposes that consumers will be more

interested in products if they are available at lower prices. With these, the selling

concept comes from the conclusions and creations gathered from considering
product and production concepts. In relation to consumer behavior, selling concept

tells whether consumers purchase products through aggressive marketing strategies.

3. Consumer research process:

Consumer research plays a very important role to understand the consumer

behaviour, when company decides to launch a new product into the market.

Companies conduct market research to better understand the consumers, their needs

and their satisfaction level. For research Purpose Company conduct surveys, in

depth interview etc...After analyzing the result company make decisions about

design, quality, and price of product. There are two type of consumer research

quantitative and qualitative research. Quantitative research defines your business

by measuring something, in numerical form such as consumer satisfaction.

Qualitative research mainly focus on what it is and why customers think and feel as

they do. Consumer research helps businesses or organizations that understand

customer psychology in a better way. Number of research techniques are used to

provide systematic information about what customers need.

The process of consumer research started as an extension to the process of market

research. Consumer research process can be broken down into following steps:

1. Develop research objectives: The first step of consumer research process is

to clearly define research objective, purpose of research, why is the research

being conducted.

2. Collect Secondary data: In second step collect secondary data first, it helps

in understanding if research has been conducted earlier and if there are any

pieces of evidence related to the subject matter that can be used by an

organization to make informed decisions regarding consumers.

3. Primary Research: In primary research, organizations or businesses collect

their own data. This research make use of various data collection methods

(qualitative and quantitative) that helps primary researchers (original research

 performed by individual researcher to meet the objectives) to collect data first

hand.

a. Qualitative Consumer Research: Qualitative research, is descriptive in

nature, mainly focus on thinking and feeling of consumer. It’s a method that

uses open ended questions, to gain meaningful data from respondents. Number

of method are used in qualitative research:

Focus Groups: Focus groups is a small group of experts who work together to

analyze a product or service. Focus group comprises of 6-10 respondents. A

moderator is assigned to focus group, who facilitate discussions among the

members to draw meaningful insights.

 One-to-one Interview: In this method researcher asks open ended

questions to collect data from the respondents. It is conversational method.

This method totally depends on the experience of researcher. This is a

time-consuming method and can take more than one attempt to get the

desired results.

 Content/ Text Analysis: Social media is an example of text analysis. Text

analysis is a qualitative research method where researchers analyze the social life

by decoding words and images from the documents available. Researcher analyze

the data and take decision.

 5. Quantitative Consumer Research

Quantitative research is related to numbers and statistics. A consumer who

purchases regularly can vouch for how customer-centric businesses have become

today. With just one questions companies are able to collect data that question

has the power to make or break a company.

6. Collect and analyze data: Data is collected and analyzed to understand

consumer behavior and their purchasing pattern.

7. Prepare report: Finally, a report is prepared after analyzing and collecting

data so that organizations are able to make informed decisions and understand

the consumer behavior.

4. MODELS OF CONSUMER DECISION MAKING :

4.1 SCHIFFMAN AND KANUK’S MODEL OF CONSUMER DECISION

MAKING

This model of consumer decision making developed by Schiffman and Kanuk

It is the problem solving consumer model. It provides an overview of the

consumer decision making process. The model is made up of three major

components:

Input , Process, Output

1. Input:

The input component comprises of the external and internal factors that

influences (which are the sources of information) consumer’s product related

values, attitudes and behavior. Internal factors are motivation, perception,

learning, personality and attitude. External factors are culture, subculture,

reference group, family and social class culture. The input component also

includes the marketing mix elements i.e. the various marketing stimuli used

by the organizations and the socio-cultural environmental factors, which will

also act as a stimuli and influence the consumer’s purchase decision.

a) Marketing Stimuli:

Marketing mix efforts will consist of the four P’s i.e. Product, Price,

Place and Promotion. Marketers are interested in knowing how

consumers will respond to the various marketing stimuli. Marketer use

various marketing strategies to communicate with prospective

consumer because there is not a direct contact between marketer and

consumer. Marketing mix may be in the form of attractive product

features, size, packages, and suitable prices. Marketing strategies like

media advertising, personal selling, direct marketing, other sales

 promotion measures and selection of suitable distribution channels (to

ensure the availability of the product at the market place) are used.

b) Socio-Cultural or External factor :

Culture has the broadest and deepest influence on consumer behavior.

The socio-cultural inputs also play a major role in influencing the

consumer’s decision making process. The social cultural environmental

factors comprises of family, social class, culture, subculture, informal

source and all the other non-commercial sources. The family members

put a strong influence on the buyer’s behavior. Informal sources will

include public’s communication (comments expressed) via print media

etc. Social class influences can be seen in consumer choice of the retail

outlets, exposure to media etc. There are certain unwritten things that

can be followed by each culture. These cultural norms will put

restrictions on the buying behavior of individuals. In this way culture

also influences the buying behaviour of consumers. The socio-cultural

environment will only influence consumers’ decision to avoid a

product; whereas, the marketing efforts will induce and motivate them

to purchase the specific product.

2. Process:

The process component of the model starts with the psychological field.

i.e.the psychological factors such as motivation, perception, learning,

personality and attitudes. These factors will determine the consumers’

needs or wants, their knowledge about the various product choices, how

they gather more information about product and how they evaluate

alternatives. Consumer decision making process consists of three stages,

viz. a) Need Recognition Stage, b) Pre-purchase Search Stage, and c)

Evaluation of Alternatives Stage.

a) Need Recognition:

consumer recognize a need when he face some problem. The need or problem

recognition, among consumers can be of various type. Some consumers may

experience the ‘actual state type of problem’. This type of problem may occur

when consumer recognize a problem in the form of a product not performing

satisfactorily. For example the housewife may realize that the mixer she was

using does not grind properly. Another type of need or problem recognition

could be the ‘desired state consumer’. In this state consumer may experience

the desire for something new. The desired state is the starting point for the

consumer to become involved in the decision making process. The need or

 problem recognition can be either simple or complex. Simple problem

recognition refers to needs that occur frequently and can be dealt with almost

automatically. Complex problem recognition is characterized as a state, when

a problem occurs over a period of time and the actual state and desired state

gradually moves apart.

b) Pre-purchase Search:

During this stage the consumer recognizing a need that requires being

satisfied. If consumer is satisfied with the product in the past, the consumer

will make a choice without going for an extensive search for information. If

consumer has no prior experience, the consumer will collect information

about product before arriving at a particular choice. The consumer will be

influenced by his or her internal psychological field before being engaged in

an external search for information. Past experience with product play a very

important role. If the past experience is good, consumer will collect less

information about product and take decision. Many consumer decisions will

be based on a combination of past experience (internal sources), marketing

and non-commercial information (external sources). The amount of

information a consumer will collect depends on various situational factors.

The situational factors can be broadly classified into three type a) Experience

b) Social acceptability of the product c) Value related considerations.

Experience will be related with past experience of product (satisfactory or

not). Social acceptability will consider whether the product is socially visible

and acceptable to the society. While being involved in a pre-purchase search,

 the consumer will try to search and gather information from all the possible

known sources.

c) Evaluation of Alternatives:

The usual human tendency is to select a brand from a sample of all possible

brands. The evaluation of alternatives is carried out by using two types of

information i.e. a) The Evoked Set is the one in which consumer make a list

of brands from which they plan to make their selection b) The Criteria based

in which consumer set criteria for evaluating each brand. The evoked set will

vary from consumer to consumer and marketer must use different promotional

techniques to make a favourable and more relevant product image to the large

consumer.

3.Output:

The output component of the consumer decision making is closely related to two

kinds of past decision activities, a) Purchase Behaviour and b) Post-purchase

Behaviour.

a) Purchase Behaviour:

The consumer may make three types of purchase, namely: first times or trial

purchases, repeat purchases and long term commitment purchase. When the

consumer is purchasing the product for the first time, he or she may buy lesser

quantity than usual. This will be a trial purchase because the consumer would

purchase the product to try it out on an experimental basis. The consumer

would prefer to evaluate the product through direct use on a first time trial
 basis. This can happen especially when purchasing a new brand. If the

consumer finds the new brand, after the trial to be satisfactory, he/she is likely

to repeat the purchase. When a consumer goes for repeat purchase, it is an

indication that the product has met the consumer’s approval and that he or she

is willing to purchase it again for consumption purpose. Then the firm can

look forward to a long term commitment from the purchaser. Of course, in

case of certain type of durable goods like refrigerators, washing machines,

ovens etc., a consumer will directly move to a long term commitment (through

purchase) without being involved in a trial purchase.

b) Post-Purchase Evaluation:

In a post-purchase evaluation process consumer judge their experience against

their expectations when being involved. There are three possible outcomes

when consumer evaluate the product’s performance in the light of their own

expectations:

I. If actual performance matches expectations, it leads to a neutral feeling.

II. If Performance of product exceeds expectations, it leads to a

satisfaction.

III. If Performance of the product falls below expectations, causing

negative disconfirmation of expectations leading to dissatisfaction.

The degree of post-purchase analysis that consumers undertake will depend on the

importance of the production decision and the experience in using the product.

Feedback is an indication for the marketer that consumers likes the product. If the
product performs as per consumer expectations, it is likely that the consumer will

buy it again.

4.2. BUYER’S BLACK BOX MODEL :

The buyer’s black box, comprises two sub components, viz., the buyer’s

characteristics and the buyer decision process.The buyers characteristics could

be personal, psychological, cultural and social.

Figure 1: Model of Buyer Behavior

a) Personal:

Personal factors are age & life-cycle stage, occupation (occupation affects

consumption patterns), economic situation, lifestyle, personality

c) Psychological:
 Psychological factors are motivation (motives; urge to act to fulfil a goal or

satisfy a need/want), perception, learning (a relatively permanent change in

behavior as a result of ones’ experience; relates to memory; learning could

be experiential based on direct experience or conceptual based on indirect

experience), beliefs (thoughts that a person holds about something) and

attitudes (a favorable or unfavorable feeling towards an object, person or a

situation).

c) Cultural:

Culture includes subculture, social class, and reference group. Culture is a sum

of values, knowledge, beliefs, myths, language, customs, rituals and traditions

that govern a society. Culture influence the consumer decision e.g. Influences

on our eating patterns, clothing, day to day living etc.

-sub-culture is a subset of culture. It is a smaller groups of people within culture

with shared value systems within the group but different from other groups.

These group are identifiable through demographics).

-social class is an ordered and relatively permanent divisions of society into

upper and middle lower classes. Members in these classes share similar

values, interests, lifestyles and behaviors; the division is based on

combination of occupation, income, education, wealth, and other variables.

b) Information search: After a need is recognized, the consumer goes for an

information search, so as to be able to make the right purchase decision. He

gathers information about the product category and the variations, various

alternatives and the various brands. Such a search could be ongoing, specific

or incidental.

The consumer could recalls information that is stored in his memory

(comprising information gathered and stored, as well as his experiences, direct

and indirect). He could also seek information from the external environment.

The sources of information search could be personal (family, friends,

peers and colleagues), commercial l (marketers’ communication in the form

of advertising, salespersons, publicity etc), public (mass media, consumer

forums, government rating agencies) and experiential (self and others’

experiences). Personal contacts are highly influential sources, public sources

are highly credible.

c) Evaluation of alternatives: Once the consumer has gathered information

and identified the alternatives, he compares the different alternatives available

on certain features. These are those features that a consumer considers in

choosing among alternatives; these could be functional/utilitarian in nature

(benefits, attributes, features), or subjective/emotional/hedonic (emotions,

prestige etc.).The consumer also uses decision rules that help a consumer
simplify the decision process. At the end of the evaluation, purchase intentions

are formed.

d) Purchase decision: After the consumer has evaluated the various

alternatives, he selects a particular brand. Consumer purchases may be

trials/first purchases or repeat purchases. The consumer may further have to

make decisions on where to buy from, how much to buy, whom to buy from,

when to buy and how to pay. It is noteworthy that a purchase intention (desire

to buy the most preferred brand) may not always result in a purchase decision

in favor of the brand; it could get moderated by attitudes of others and

unexpected situational factors.

e) Post purchase behavior: After the purchase, the consumer uses the

product and re-evaluates the chosen alternative in light of its performance viz.

a viz. the expectations. He could be experience feelings of neutrality

(Performance meets expectations), satisfaction (Performance exceeds

expectations) or dissatisfaction (Performance falls short of expectations). This

phase is significant as it (i) acts as an experience and gets stored in the

memory; (ii) affects future purchase decisions; (iii) acts as a feedback.

f) Buyer responses: While in the black box, the buyer also takes a decision

with respect to the product, brand, dealer, timing and amount.

4.3. SIMPLE STIMULUS RESPONSE MODEL

As per the stimulus response model, there are marketing and other stimuli

which enter the consumer black box and subsequently produces certain buyer

responses. The marketing environment comprise of various marketing mix

elements which act as cues in influencing consumer response. The buyer is

exposed to a variety of information which inform and educates him or her on

the product’s existence, price to match the product features, availability at

the various outlets, ably supported by the promotional tools such as

advertisement, contests, and sweep take publicity etc. while marketing

environment helps to build up product awareness. This combined with the

other stimuli will make the product respond either positively or negatively

towards the offer.

4.4. ASSAELL’S CONSUMER DECISION MAKING MODEL:

Assaell’s model on consumer decision making as seen in figure indicates

that the consumer’s involvement in decision making play an important

role. It depends upon the type of purchase involved. Decision is of two

type i.e. simple one and complex one. In case of high involvement

purchases (or complex decisions) the decisions making process will

involve information search and evaluate brand alternatives. Whereas, in

case of low involvement purchases the consumer make seek little or no

information and considers only one brand.

involvement in purchase decision

High involvement Low involvement

Complex decision making limited decision making

Decision making
(Automobiles, computers) (Cereals)

Brand Loyalty inertia

(Personal care products) (canned foods)

Asaell’s consumer decision making model

Fig indicates the various individuals and environmental factors, which can influence

consumers purchase decisions. Product features and design, benefits sought from the
product (or brand), suitable pricing and ideal location are the number of factor that

helps the consumer in decision making process. It is post purchase satisfaction or

dissatisfaction behaviour, which will count. If post purchase satisfaction is positive

it will induce adoption and loyalty. Whereas post purchase dissatisfaction could

result in the discontinuing usage of the product. Ultimately the post purchase

behaviour of consumers will have repercussions on the communication (or word of

mouth) they have with the prospective customers.

5. CONSUMER DECISION MAKING PROCESS

Consumer Decision Making Process means the process of Identifying and verifying

the decision making of the consumer by the business leaders or the marketers. End

user is a term that is used in the business to describe the consumer that ultimately

consumes the goods. End Consumer is the heart and soul of any business stability.

But End User may or may not be the purchaser of the company product. In consumer

behaviour marketer understand and studying individuals, organization or groups of

people and the process from which the individuals, organization or groups of people

go through while selecting, securing, using, and consuming a product or a service in

order to satisfy the needs. A consumer goes through several stages before purchasing

a product or service and that stages helps the consumer to take decision.

Steps in Consumer Decision Making Process

NEED REcognition

INFORMATION GATHERING/SEARCH
↓

EVALUATION OF ALTERNATIVES

PURCHASE OF PRODUCT/SERVICE

POST PURCHASE EVALUATION

1. Need Recognition

The first step in the consumer decision making process is identifying the need. The

need is the most important element which leads towards the actual buying of the

product or service. Finding out what the customer needs is the first step in Consumer

Decision Making Process. Determining the needs and wants of the target market

provide support to many marketing decisions. An individual who buys cold drink or

a bottle of mineral water identifies his/her need as thirst

2. Searching and gathering Information

The potential consumer after identifying his needs moves on to the second stage i.e.

searching & gathering information. Consumer need all the information about the

product before spending their money. During this phase of Consumer Decision

Making Process the consumer evaluates the entire positive and negatives aspects of

the purchase. Due to the changing trends and online shopping sites the consumers

are far more informed and are able to make better purchase decisions.
Information can be collected from many different sources like prints or electronic

media or from people reviews about the certain products. Some Sources of

information are mentioned bellow.

 Personal Contacts: This is a very strong source of information and has the

greatest influence over the mind of the consumer. The Consumers tend to

discuss the needs and there interests in different products with friends, family,

colleagues and acquaintances and make purchase decisions based upon their

recommendations.

 Commercial Information Sources: Electronic media, TV Ads, Newsletters,

Sale Persons and Public displays are some important types.

 Printed Sources – Newspapers and Magazines

3. Evaluating the Alternatives

The Consumers begin to search out for the best alternatives or options available after

he/she identifies the need and the source to satisfy that need. At this stage consumer

evaluates different options based upon product price, product quality, product

quantity, and value added features of a product or other important factors. The

Customers reviews and compare prices for the substitute products before choosing

the product are very important to satisfy the need in the best possible manner.

The consumer after need recognition and collecting useful information choose the

best product available in the market based upon his taste, style, income or preference.

But in such cases steps such as information search and evaluation of alternatives are
generally missing. These two steps are important when an individual purchases

expensive products/services such as laptop, cars, mobile phones and so on.

4. Actual Purchase of the Product or the Service

After going through above stages, in this stage consumer decide the product. After

proper assessment of all the facts the consumer makes a logical decision to buy a

product based upon his needs and wants.

5. Post Purchase Evaluation

In the final stage of consumer decision making process the consumer evaluates or

analysis the purchased product, usefulness of the product, satisfaction delivered from

the product, Value of the product with respect to the need fulfillment of the

consumer. If the consumer feels that the product bought delivered the value and has

met the expectation they will become the loyal customers of the product means that

create loyalty.

Consumer Decision making Process is very important for marketers to successfully

market their products and product line. Understanding the targeted market fully

increases the efficiency of a marketing plan and yields better result from promotional

plan.