CONSUMER BEHAVIOR Q.

1: A) How would you imagine that their consumption of products and services might differ from couples with children? ANS:
Historically, the emphasis in consumer behavior studies has been on product, service, and brand choice decisions. As shown throughout this book, however, there are many more facets to consumer behavior. The experience of using products and services, as well as the sense of pleasure derived from possessing, collecting, or consuming things and experiences (mechanical watches, old foundation pens, or a baseball card collection) contributes to consumer satisfaction and overall quality of life. These consumption outcomes or experiences, in turn, affect consumers future decision processes. Thus, given the importance of possessions and experiences, a broader perspective of consumer behavior might view consumer choices as the beginning of a consumption process, not merely the end of a consumer decision-making effort. In this context, the choice or purchase decision is an input into a process of consumption. The input stage includes the establishment of a consumption set (an assortment or portfolio of products and their attributes) and a consuming styles (the rules by which the individual or household fulfills consumption requirements). The process stage of a simple model of consumption might include (from the consumers perspective) the using, possessing (or having), collecting, and disposing of things and experiences. The output stage of this process would include changes in a wide range of feelings, moods, attitudes, and behavior, as well as reinforcement (positive or negative) of a particular lifestyle (e.g., a devotion to physical fitness), enhancement of a sense of self, and the level of consumer satisfaction and quality of life. Consuming is a diverse and complex concept. It includes the simple utility derived from the continued use of a superior toothpaste, the stress reduction of an island holiday, the stored memories of a DVD reflecting ones childhood, the sacred meaning or magic of a grandparents wrist watch, the symbol of membership gained from wearing a school tie, the pleasure and sense of accomplishment that comes from building a model airplane, and the fun and even financial rewards that come from collecting almost anything (even jokers from decks of cards). In fact, one mans hobby of collecting old earthenware drain tiles has become the Mike Weaver Drain Tile Museum. There are special possessions that consumers resist replacing, even with an exact replica, because the replica cannot possibly hold the same meaning as the original. Such possessions are often tied, in the consumers mind, to a specific physical time or person.

Consider the male love affair with cars, which can manifest it in many ways. Clearly , some men identify themselves with the automobiles that they own-it becomes an extension of the self, and some men personalize their vehicles in order to bond more fully with them (e.g. special paint color, custom wheels). Some individuals even take a characteristic of their vehicles, with a powerful engine giving the owner a sense of greater power, and high performance handling providing the man with the notion that he is similarly capable of high performance.

Q: 1 (B) What is opinion leadership? ANS:

Opinion leadership is the process by which one process (the opinion leader) informally influences the actions leader as a highly credible objective source of product information, who can help reduce their search time and perceived risk. Opinion leaders in turn are motivated to give information on advice to others in part because doing so enhance their own status and self image and because such advice tends to reduce any that they may have other motives include product involvement, other involvement. Market researchers identify opinion leaders by such methods as self designation, key informants, the psychometric method, and the objective method. Studies of opinion leadership indicate that is individuals specialize in a product or product category in which they are highly interested. An opinion leader for one product category may be an opinion receiver for another. Generally opinion leaders are gregarious, self confident innovative people who life to talk. Additionally they may feel differentiated from others and choose to act differently. They acquire information about their areas of interest through avid leadership of special interest magazines and by means of new product trials. Their interests often overlap adjacent product areas, thus their opinion leadership may extend into related areas. The market move is an intense care of such a person. These consumers possess a wide range of information about much different type of products. Retail outlets and other dimensions of markets. They both initiate discussions with other dimensions of markets, they both initiate discussion with other consumers and respond to the request for market information over a wide range of products and services market moves are also distinguishable from other opinion leaders because their influence systems not so much from product experience but from a more general knowledge or market expertise that leads them to an early awareness of a wide array of new products and services.

The opinion leadership possess usually takes place among friends, neighbors and work associate that have frequent physical proximity and thus have ample opportunity to hold informal product related conversation. These conversations usually occur naturally in the context of the product category usage.

Q: 2 (A). What are the strengths and weaknesses of motivational research? ANS:
The terms motivational research which should logically include all types if research into human motives has become a term of art used to refer to qualitative research designed to uncover the consumers sub conscious or hidden motivation based on the premise that consumers are not always aware of the reasons for their actions. Motivational research attempts to discover the underlying feelings, attitude and emotions concerning product service or brand use. Motivational research also provides marketers with a basic orientation for few new product categories and enables them to explore consumer reactions to ideas and advertising copy at an early stage to avoid costly errors. Further more as with all qualitative research findings provide consumers. While some critics accuse marketers of creative needs and of manipulating consumers into buying goods they do not need most people agree that marketers cannot create needs? However they can awaken talent needs and encourage consumers to encourage in whole some behaviors. Evaluation of motivational research despite its criticisms, motivational research is still regarded as an important tool by marketers who want to gain deeper insights into the whip of consumers behavior than conventional marketing research techniques can yield. Since motivational research often reveals in suspected consumer motivation concerning a product or brand usage its use today is in the development of new ideas that can penetrate the consumers conscious awareness by appealing to unrecognized needs. Motivational research also provides marketers with a basic orientation for new product categories and enables them to explore consumer reactions to ideas and advertising copy at an early stage to avoid costly errors, further more as with all qualitative research techniques. Motivational research findings provide consumer researchers with basic insights that enable them to design structured quantitative marketing research studies to be conducted on larger more representative samples of consumers.

Q: 2 (B). What is social class? ANS:

Although social class can be thought of as a continuum a range of social positions on which each member of society can be placed researchers have preferred to divide the continuum into a small number of specific social classes, or strata. Within this framework, the concept of social class category. Consistent with this practice, social class is defined as the division of members of a society into a hierarchy of distinct status classes, so that members of each class have relatively the same status classes. So that members of each class have relatively the same status and members of all other classes have either more or less status. To appreciate more fully the nature and complexity of social class, we will briefly consider several underlying concepts pertinent to this definition. Social class and social status: Researchers often measure social class in terms of social status: that is, they define each social class by the amount of status the members of that class have in comparison with members of other social class. In social class research (sometimes called social stratification), status is frequently thought of as the relative rankings or members of each social in terms of specific status factors. For example, relative wealth (amount of economic assets), power (the degree of personal choice or influence over others), and prestige (the degree of recognition received from others) are three status factors frequently used when estimating social class. To secure an understanding of how status operates within the minds of consumers, researchers have explored the idea of social comparison theory. According to this social psychological concept, individuals quite normally compare their relative social standing. This is especially important in a marketing society where status is often associated with consumers purchasing power (or how much can be purchased). Simply stated, individuals with more purchasing power or a greater ability to make purchase shave more status. Those who have more restrictions on what they can or cannot buy have less status.

Q: 4 (A) Are there any circumstances in which information from advertisement is likely to be more influential than word of mouth? ANS:
In a world before the internet, web logs and virtual or buss marketing, firms advertising and promotional programs largely relied on stimulating or persuading consumers to tell your friends how much you like our product. This is the one way in which markets encourage their product discussion. For instance, Daffys half price retailer operating in several north eastern [www.daffy.com] used an outdoor poster to boldly state that friends dont let friends pay retail. Here the implication is that you should share your knowledge and experience with others. The objective of a promotional strategy of stimulating is to run advertisement or a direct marketing program that is sufficiently interesting and informative to provoke consumer into discussing the benefits of the product with others. In a classic study a group of socially influential high school student were asked to become member of a panel participants were encouraged to discuss their record choices with friends. Preliminary examination suggested that these influential would not qualify as opinion leaders for musical recording because of their relatively meager ownership of the product category. However some of the records the group evaluated made the top 10 charts in the cities in which the individual member of the group lived, these same recording did not make the top 10 chart in any other city, this study suggests that product specific opinion leaders can be created by taking socially involved or influential people and deliberately increasingly their enthusiasm for product category. A more recent research effort explored the notion of increasing enthusiasm for a product category, over a 12 week period of time, half the participants were assigned to look at corporate websites and half were asked to look at online discussions (chat rooms, forums etc). Consumers who got their information from online discussion got their information from online discussions reported greater interest in product category. It is felt that chartrooms and other forums provide consumers with personal experiences and may offer greater trustworthiness, relevance and empathy than market generated internet websites. Another related form of advertising message are ads designed to stimulate word of mouth was from time to time used by a small number of marketing firms to supplement their regular advertising image or brand advertising. Ads designed to stimulate word of mouth portrayed people in the act of informal communication. The two step follow of the communication theory highlights the role of interpersonal influence on the transmission of information from the mass media to the population at large. This theory provides the foundation for a revised multi-

step flow of communication model, which takes into account the fact that information and influence often are two way processes and that opinion leaders both influence and are influenced by opinion.

(B) How would you identify the innovators for this product?

Q: 5 (A). How can marketers use measure of recognition and recall to study the extent of consumer learning? ANS:
Measures of consumer learning: For many marketers, the dual goals of consumer learning are increased market share and brand loyal consumers. These goals are interdependent: Brand-loyal customer provides the basis for a stable and growing market share, and brands with larger market share have proportionately larger groups of loyal buyers. Marketers focus their promotional budgets on trying to teach consumer that their brands are best and that their products will best solve the consumers problems and satisfy their needs. Thus, it is important for the marketer to measure how effectively consumers have leaned its message. The following sections will examine various measures of consumer learning: recognition and recall measures, cognitive measures, and the attitudinal and behavioral measures of brand loyalty. Recognition and recall measures: Recognition and recall tests are conducted to determine whether consumer remember seeing an ad, the extent to which they have read it or seen it and can recall its content, their resulting attitudes toward the product and the brand, and their content, their resulting attitudes toward the product and the brand, and their purchase intentions. Recognition tests are based on aided recall, whereas recall tests use unaided recall. In recognition tests, the consumer is shown an ad and asked whether he or she remembers seeing it and can remember any of its salient points. In recall tests, the consumer is asked whether he or she has read a specific magazine or watched a specific television show, and if so, can recall any ads or commercials seen, the product advertised, the brand, and any salient points about the product.

Q: 6 (A). What is cross cultures consumers analysis? How can a multinational company use cross cultural research to design each factor in its marketing mix? ANS:
Cross-cultural consumer analysis: To determine whether and how to enter how to enter a foreign market, marketers need to conduct some form of cross cultural consumer analysis with in the scope of this discussion, cross cultural analysis is defined as the effort to determine to what extent the consumer with an understanding of the psychological, social and cultural characteristics of the foreign consumers they wish to target so that they can design effective marketing strategies for the specific national markets involved. In a broader context cross cultural consumers analysis might also include comparison of sub cultural groups with in a single country. For our purpose we limit our discussion of cross cultural consumer analysis to comparisons of consumers of different countries. Similarities and differences among people: A major objective of cross-cultural consumer analysis is to determine how consumers in two or more societies are similar and how they are different. Such an understanding of the similarities and differences that exist between nations is critical to the multinational marketers who must devise appropriate strategies to reach consumers in specific foreign marketers. The grater the similarity between nations, the more feasible it is to use relatively similar marketing strategies in each nation.

Q: 6 (B). How should marketers promote products and services to working women? What appeals should they use? Explain. ANS:
Women as depicted in media and advertising: Many women feel that the media and advertising create an expectation of beauty that most women can never achieve. Consequently, they want to definition of beauty to change. Dove has an advertising campaign that is challenging the

traditional sense of beauty and has been well received by women. Real women are portrayed in the companys ads with gray hair, winkles, and flawed skin- i.e., real people! Importantly, the campaign lets women know that beauty comes in many sizes, shapes, and ages. Supporting Doves realistic approach, recent study found that 65 percent of women 35 to 45 years of age felt that most advertisements aimed at them were patronizing, and 50 percent also found the ads to be old fashioned. Something the working women market: To provide a richer framework for segmentation, marketers have developed categories that differentiate the motivations of working and non-working women, for instance, a number of studies have divided the female population into four segments; stay at home housewives; plan to work housewives; just a job working women; and career oriented working women.