Consumer Behaviour and Marketing Strategy
Consumer behaviour is identified as the study of individual, groups or organisations and the processes that they use and dispose of products, services, experiences or ideas used to satisfy their needs. These processes are similar amongst consumers with in their social groups.
You may be asking yourself: what are the benefits of studying consumer behaviour?
For organisations, the study of consumer behaviour is applied on a daily basis. Consumer behaviour theories provide managers with the proper and accurate deliverables to target consumers. This is useful in the marketing practice to influence consumer behaviour, which ideally influences the organisation.
Marketing strategies are based on explicit and/or implicit beliefs about consumer behaviour. Explicit beliefs are assumptions based on the sound theories and research completed and is more likely to be successful than those decisions based on intuition (implicit beliefs). Solid consumer behaviour knowledge is thus seen as a competitive advantage when developing marketing strategies.
In order to survive in a competitive market, an organisation must provide their target consumer with more value than their competitions. Customer value is the difference between all the benefits derived from a total product and all the costs of acquiring those benefits. The difference between the total benefits and the total costs constitutes consumer behaviour.
Providing superior consumer values requires the organisation to do a better job of anticipating and reacting to consumer needs than the competition does. This is the essence of a great marketing strategy.
An understanding of consumer behaviour is the basis for marketing strategy formulation. Consumer’s reactions to the marketing strategy determine the organisations success or failure. These reactions also determine the success of the consumers in meeting their needs.
Market segmentation plays an important role in developing a marketing strategy based on consumer behaviour. A market segment has a unique need, organisations that focus solely on the needs of that segment will be able to meet that segments desires better than an organisation whose products or services attempts to meet the needs of multiple segments.
Market segmentation takes into consideration identifying need sets that the organisation is capable, or become capable, of meeting.
Identifying the various need sets typically involves consumer research. These need sets are associated with consumers age, stage in their life cycle, gender, social class. Organisations that segment will ideally focus on these variables.
Grouping consumers with similar needs, allows for marketers to group these consumers into one segment as far as product features and product image by which they are concerned about.
Once consumers with similar needs have been identified, these needs should be described in terms of the consumers’ demographics, lifestyle and media usage. A complete understanding of the potential consumers is necessary in order to design an effective marketing strategy. It is only with such complete understanding one can be sure to have correctly identified consumer needs. Organisations cannot communicate effectively with their customers if they do not understand the context in which their product is purchased or consumed.
Only once an understanding of each segment has been considered, one is able to select an appropriate target market. This considers the segmentation of the larger market on which one must focus their marketing efforts on. This decision is based on the ability to provide the selected segment(s) with superior customer values at a profit.
By selecting a target market, one is thus able to develop a marketing strategy.
A marketing strategy is the answer to the question: How will our organisation provide superior customer value to our target market? Formulation of a consistent marketing mix is the foundation of an effective marketing strategy that focuses on the product, price, communication medium, distribution routes and service excellence
Marketing strategies must thus be designed according to identifying the right product the consumer needs to satisfy their unmet needs.
This product must be delivered to the consumer at an acceptable price, assuring quality product for money. Marketing communication includes advertising, sales PR and any other signals that promote the product offering. These products must be available at the right places and at the right time to ensure product distribution. Service is the auxiliary or peripheral activity that is performed to enhance primary service of the product and support customer satisfaction.