Decision Making Process And Buyer Behaviour

Need is something must have for fulfil a purpose or for a living thing to survive. Such as, air, nutrition or education. Need are different for everyone. Need in poor country may be clean water but need for rich country are luxury. Need are thing that necessary but might be something a person don’t want. For example, we still have to pay tax although we don’t like to pay it.

Want can be define as something that considered a luxury, desired and not a necessary thing. Want is something that a person preferred and desired for to make his life become more comfort and pleasure. For example, a girl will prefer a branded hand bag such as Louis Vuitton instead of a not branded and cheaper one.

Decision making process is the study of identifying and choosing option based on the values and preferences of the decision maker. Decision making process is to prevent making a wrong decision and let decision maker make a best decision. Few type of decision making: decision whether, decision which and contingent decision.

In decision making process got 5 steps. Problem recognition, information search, information evaluation, decision, post-purchase evaluation.

Problem recognition. Recognize problem and needs. Find information about the product to help the decision maker make decision. Information sources: personal, commercial, public and experiential sources. Information evaluation. Process that filter and narrow down the gathered information. Filtering factor could be price, availability, quality of the product or more.

Final decision. Decided which product to buy and choose where, how, when and from whom to buy it. Post-purchase evaluation. Feeling and comment after purchased the product, also known as cognitive dissonance. Might be different with the one decision maker expected, could be better or worse. Product company often do advertisement for let and convince their consumer feel comfort.

Three type of buyer behaviour. Routine decision making, limited decision making and extensive decision making. Routine decision making: buying low price product frequently such as food. Limited decision making: buying medium price product infrequently such as clothes. Extensive decision making: high price product, rarely purchasing, like car, house. There are four major buyer behaviour influence factor: culture, social, personal and psychological.

Marketing mix also known as 4Ps, product, price, promotion and place. Tool that use to implement company marketing strategy.

Product separated into 3 levels, Core, actual and augmented product. In core product level there are luxuries. In actual product level may have some requirement such as quality level, features, brand name and packaging. Augmented product is something additional like product assistance and customer services. For example, customer care and warranties.

Price represents the value of a good or service among potential purchases and for ensuring competition among sellers in market. A product price too low will cause lose money, if too high will got no sales. Total revenue = price * quantity and profits = total revenue – total cost. LV running premium price for maintain its luxury image.

Place refer to how, where customer get the product. Four type consumer channel: Channel A: Producer ƒ  Consumer. LV use channel A.

Channel B: Producer ƒ  Retailer ƒ  Consumer.

Channel C: Producer ƒ  Wholesaler ƒ  Retailer ƒ  Consumer.

Channel D: Producer ƒ  Agent ƒ  Wholesaler ƒ  Retailer ƒ  Consumer.

Promotion refers to method used to let consumer know about the product such as advertising and sales. Promotion is a way to let marketers communicate with their customer too. In conclusion, LV is luxury product with high quality and services. Its satisfaction is guaranteed.

(584 words)

Assignment 2

Introduction (Needs and Wants)

A need is something that is required for organisms to live a healthy life or something requires to fulfilling a purpose. An insufficiency would cause a bad consequence, such as dysfunction or death. Physically, a person needs are air, nutrition, warmth and shelter. Then, a person’s needs in social are belonging and affection. Individual will need education and self-expression.

Needs are vary according to a person’s health, physical environment and many other reasons. For example, what is an only a want in a poor country may be seen as a need in a rich country. A need might be what a person doesn’t want. For instance, patient may not want to take medicine but it is required.

A want may define as something that is considered a luxury, desired and it’s not necessary to survive. Whereas a want is something that a person preferred and would like to have to make his life becomes more comfort or pleasure. For example, a person needs a reliable transportation, shelter but he would like to have a superior car and a bungalow. Want for a person will influence by his characteristic and could be bad. For instance, a violent person will wants to punch something because he wants to release his anger instead of other methods.

Abraham Maslow hierarchy of needs

Abraham Maslow hierarchy of needs explain what motivated individuals in life to achieve. He postulated that within every human being there is a hierarchy of five needs, arranged in the order in which the individual seeks to fulfil them. Psychological needs are the needs for food, drink, shelter, sexual satisfaction and other physical requirements. Then, next stage of the hierarchy, safety needs, which is need for order, security and protection from physical and emotional harm, as well as assurance that physical needs will continue to be met. Next, social needs refer to need for affection, belonging, acceptance and friendship. Self-esteem is the need for self-respect, reputation, achievement, autonomy and status. Lastly, self-actualisation is the need for self-fulfilment, growth and achieving personal potential.

This paragraph is referring to:

Jonathan, G. (2004). Basic human needs. In: Jonathan, G, et.al. Marketing. London: Kogan Page, pp. 118-119.

Decision Making Process and Buyer Behaviour

Decision making process is the study of identifying and choosing alternatives based on the values and preferences of the decision maker. Making a decision because there are alternative options to be considered, and we not only want to identify these alternatives but also want to choose the one that has the highest chance of success, most efficiency for our objective and lowest risk.

There is several basic type of decision making. First, decisions whether. For example, should I buy a new pen? Yes or no. Next, decisions which. These decisions involve a choice of one or more alternatives from among a set of possibilities. For example, which pen should I buy? Last type, contingent decisions. These are decision that have been made but on hold until some condition is met. Let’s say, I decided to buy a pen, but I have to wait until I got enough money to buy it.

5 stage of decision making

Moreover, research suggests that consumer go through five stage decision making process in any purchase. Diagram below showing the five stage of decision making:

I should buy Sony Ericsson.

Nokia.

Nokia or Sony Ericsson?

What’s available?

My phone spoiled.

Post-purchase evaluation

Decision

Information evaluation

Information search

Problem recognition

Stages Example

This let the marketer to consider the whole buying process rather than just the purchase decision. This implies that customers pass through all stages in every purchase.

The buying processes start with problem recognition. At this stage, the buyer recognises a problem or need. Let’s say, a consumer’s mobile phone spoiled and need buy another mobile phone to replace it. Then the buyer reach second stage, information search. Consumers often have some information searching to help them through their purchase decision. Consumers can obtain information from several sources like personal, commercial, public and experiential sources. For example, family and friends as personal sources, advertising and dealers as commercial sources, newspapers and specialist magazines as public sources, previous experiences with products as experiential sources. Moreover, consumer may examine the product before they decide to purchase it.

After information searching, next stage is information evaluation. Information evaluation involves a process of narrowing down a wide list of potential options to an evoked set, typically by constructing performance criteria with which to judge choices. The factor could be price, availability or ability of product. As example, Nokia have better software support, Sony Ericsson have better multimedia function and LG have better design. So, a mobile phone buyer has narrow down a wide list of brands and choosing between Nokia and Sony Ericsson.

After evaluating information, consumer will make a final decision. While buying the product, consumers will choose where, when and from whom to buy. For example, a buyer chooses to buy a Nokia mobile phone from reseller because the price will be cheaper after a week.

Finally, the last stage of decision making process, post purchase evaluation. It is common for consumers to experience concerns after making a purchased a product. It’s well known as cognitive dissonance Consumer will compare it with theirs expectations and they might feel that making a wrong decision. Companies often do advertising to convince their consumers feel comfortable that they own a product from a famous and strong company. Furthermore, consumers will feel comforted that owning the latest advertised product. It’s important because either satisfaction on that product will affects consumer loyalty, company’s reputation etc.

Type of decision making

There are three types of decision making, which is vary in terms of how complex or expensive a product is and how a consumer involved in purchasing it. Routine decision making is the most common type consumers purchase inexpensive product frequently in short time. Need very little search and decision effort and consumers often have favourite brands. Examples include food, daily uses etc.

Second, Limited decision making is purchase moderate product infrequently. Usually is unfamiliar with brand in a familiar product category. It requires a moderate amount of time for information gathering. For examples, Clothes, familiar product class but not the brand.

Last, extensive decision making, which is not familiar, expensive and rarely bought products. Consumers spend a lot of time seeking information and making decision on it. For examples, cars and houses.

Buyer behaviour influence factor

A consumer’s buyer behaviour is influenced by four major factors; cultural, social, personal and psychological.

First are psychological and personal influences. Personality means a person’s characteristics that lead to relatively consistent and lasting responses to the environment. A personality included demographic factors such as age, sex, race etc. Attitude is one of the most important concepts in understanding consumer behaviour; it is a learned disposition to act in a certain way. Attitude are formed over time, slow to change, and are excellent predictors of buyer behaviour.

Motivation, a need sufficiently stimulated that an individual is moved to seek satisfaction. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs offers a useful concept which simplified suggests that people are motivated to satisfy a higher level of need once we have satisfied a lower level need. Learning factors changes a person’s behaviour by experience and observes more or less permanent change in behaviour which occurs as a result of practice.

Perception is the process of selecting, organizing and interpreting information to produce meaning. The selective perception process: Selective exposure, consumers select which promotional messages they will expose themselves. Selective attention, consumers select which promotional messages they will pay attention to. Selective comprehension, consumer interprets messages in line with their beliefs, attitudes, motives and experiences. Selective retention: consumers remember messages that are more meaningful or important to them.

Article idea from, Consumer behavior3 session. 2010, viewed 31 October 2010, .

Consumer buying behaviour is influence by their family, reference groups, social class and culture. Consumer influence most by their family, sometime the decisions are made by the family unit. Moreover, any reference group that has a positive or negative thinking will influence on a person’s attitude and behaviour. For example, people bought a luxury product not because he likes it but his belonging group are using it even though he is not that rich. Then, social class influences many aspect of people life. Social class determines to some extent, the types, quality and quantity of product that a person buys. Lower class people tend to stay close to home when shopping and do not engage in much pre-purchase information gathering. Cultural influence refers to opinion, attitude or belief. As an individual growing up, he will influenced by their family members. Subculture is groups within a culture who have greater similarities. They share their own set of values, attitudes and beliefs. They can be formed from national, religious, racial or geographic groups.

Marketing Mix/ 4Ps

In economics, a luxury good is a good for which demand increases more than proportionally as income rises. Luxury goods are said to have high income elasticity of demand: as people become wealthier, they will buy more and more of the luxury good. Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy is the largest luxury good producer in the world with over fifty brands, including Louis Vuitton, the brand with the world’s first designer label.

Louis Vuitton history

With its unmistakable LV logo, Louis Vuitton is one of the most recognizable luxury brands in the world. What began as a shop selling handcrafted luggage in Paris in 1854 has transformed into a global fashion juggernaut.

Louis Vuitton began manufacturing trunks in Paris in 1854, and the company he started went on to become one of the world’s most famous makers of luxury goods, known especially for its designer luggage pattern: a beige-on-chestnut monogram, “LV.” Vuitton’s high-quality travelling trunks were such a hit that he had to expand his factory within a few years, relocating to Asniéres in 1860. As the years went by the Vuitton line gained international recognition, thanks in part to a bronze medal at the 1867 World’s Fair and a gold medal at the 1889 World’s Fair, both held in Paris. After Louis died in 1892, his son, Georges, took the company to new heights, developing what is recognized as the first “designer label” on a product. (Widespread copying of Vuitton patterns pushed Georges to design the distinctive “LV” monogram.) Vuitton’s luggage company has since become a world leader in luxury consumer goods, with products that include travel books, perfume, distilled spirits and designer clothing.

Georges Vuitton is also credited with developing Vuitton’s unique five-combination lock. In 1936, after Georges died, his son, Gaston-Louis, took the helm of the company… In 1983 the Louis Vuitton Company joined with America’s Cup to form the Vuitton Cup, a preliminary competition — called an eliminatory regatta — for the world’s most prestigious yacht race. Following the house’s merger with Moët Hennessy in 1987, Louis Vuitton today is the crown jewel of luxury titan LVMH. In 1998 Vuitton entered the world of high fashion with the designs of Marc Jacobs, current creative director.

Marketing mix / 4Ps

The marketing mix also known as 4Ps is the set of tools the firm uses to implement its marketing strategy, putting the right product in the right place, at the right time with the right price. It includes product, price, promotion, and place.

Product

‘Luxury’

Durable

Quality

Lines of Product

Brand

Fashion

Service

Warranties

Customer

Care

Gift

Wrappings

“Three Levels of Product of Louis Vuitton”A product is a good, service, or idea consisting of a bundle of tangible and intangible attributes that satisfies consumers and is received in exchange for money or some other unit of value.

There are 3 levels of products: core product, actual product and augmented product. In core product level, first marketers must define what the core benefits the product will provide to the customer. Then, marketer must build the actual product around the core product. It may have some requirement such as quality level, features, brand name and packaging. After actual product, augmented product offer additional consumer assistances and services. For example, customer care and service, warranties etc. Louis Vuitton main products are leather bags and wallets and monogram is its original product line. Louis Vuitton also produce series of leather goods for business world, including briefcases, organizers, palm cases and so on, all can be easily found in business meetings and offices.

Price

Price is the value placed on what is exchanged. Price represents the value of a good or service among potential purchases and for ensuring competition among sellers in market. Price is important to the marketer, relate directly to total revenue = price * quantity and profits = total revenue – total cost.

There are factors affecting pricing decisions. First is organizational and marketing objective. Marketer need to be consistent with company’s gaols. Then, pricing objectives usually is to survive, to increase cash flow, to recover cash faster, especially short life cycle product. Additional, pricing used to increase or maintain market too.

Too high a product price may result in no sales being made. Price a product too low and a company can lose money with every sale. Hence, it is important to price attractively so that the product will appeal to customers, they’ll feel good about their purchase and the company can generate a profit.

Louis Vuitton has the premium pricing to keep its luxury image and selling point. Furthermore, Louis Vuitton products never have discount sales or duty free store, usual price for its handbags is around $3000 and its wallets need at least $200. And so, its product is fashionable, durable and has prestige image that fit into high class society.

Place

Place refers to how, when and where a product gets to the customer. The place can refer to a number of elements including the location where a product is purchased, the distribution channel used to move the product into a place where the customer can buy it, or the sales channel. There are four consumer channels.

Channel A: Producer ƒ  Consumer. For example, door to door purchases. This channel is the simplest method, often use in services since the service provider must be there to deliver the service.

Channel B: Producer ƒ  Retailer ƒ  Consumer. This channel is also commonly used by larger retailer like shopping products or supermarket such as Kmart, no discrepancy in quantity supply and demand.

Channel C: Producer ƒ  Wholesaler ƒ  Retailer ƒ  Consumer. There are smaller retailers in this channel, like widely distributed products.

Channel D: Producer ƒ  Agent ƒ  Wholesaler ƒ  Retailer ƒ  Consumer. This channel is used by mass distribution such as processed food and also when there are a number of small producers. This is the most efficient distribution channel for consumer products.

Louis Vuitton is using channel A, a direct channel from producer to consumer. Its company market its own stores located worldwide, which allows it to control product quality and pricing. Furthermore, this also allow Louis Vuitton to prevent counterfeit products entering its distribution channels.

Promotion

Promotion refers to all the marketing methods that are used to let consumers know about the company’s product such as advertising and sales. Then, promotion also is a way of marketer communicates with consumers. Nevertheless, marketer still will need to choose their audience and decide where, when and whom to promote.

Louis Vuitton is more emphasize on personal selling and don’t emphasize on sales promotion to reinforce their luxury image. Advertisements of Louis Vuitton convey luxurious image and high-end fashion. Its advertisement features world famous celebrities and politicians like Steffi Graf, models and actresses like Jennifer Lopez.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Louis Vuitton is a premium luxury product that made with high quality and durable materials and high class fashion. Each item is handcrafted by a skilled and trained artist. They make sure its flawless product that won’t able to find a loose thread, and scratch or any others wrong details. Nevertheless, Louis Vuitton gives premium after sale service too, such as warranty and customer care. So, satisfaction of Louis Vuitton product is guaranteed.

(2584 words)

Reference / Bibliography

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