Interview Questions Which Helped Analyze the Buying Behavior - Essay Example

Attempts to predict and, whenever possible, to guide decision processes in buyers are naturally among the most important concerns that shape s of action of all economic participants. However, despite the existence and wide applicability of numerous time tested marketing techniques, with commercial advertising being the most important one, actual buyers decision processes still can surprise marketeers. For instance, this fact is well exemplified by the article of Tim Craig titled "Consumer behavior is the latest blur", in which the author points out that contrary to what many would assume, a lot of affluent people are often inclined to make purchases in discount stores instead of fashionable and expensive boutiques. Therefore, even though it is impossible for sellers to have a perfect knowledge of a buyers decision process, at least because it is never completely rational (Drucker et al., 2001, pp.143-160), the more they approach this ultimate goal, the better prepared they become to offer exactly the type of a product or service that people demand. To see how buyers decision processes operate in real life, we may investigate two cases of purchases of the same product, a feature-rich Samsung mobile phone, by two different people, 27-year-old Greg and 22-year-old Kelly. To clarify the roots of their decisions, a series of interview questions were created which helped analyze the buying behavior of each person. Let us see what those questions were and which answers were given to them by Greg and Kelly. The interview questions were grouped according to the logic of the AIUAPR model of buyer decision making (Mercer, 1996, pp.51-55) that emphasizes the succession of mental states of a buyer through which he or she must progress to make single or repeated decisions to buy something. In this connection, as the first such state is awareness that a certain product or service exists, the first question to Greg and Kelly was how did they learn about that particular model of the phone. Greg answered that he learned about it from the commercial by Verizon mobile service provider who promoted this model along with value-added content services, while Kelly actually saw this phone already owned by her friend. Thus, Greg can be said to have been correctly targeted by the advertising campaign, and Kelly represents an instance when an experience of others instigates us to repeat it. After awareness, the next crucial step in buyers decision process is the emergence of the interest in a product or service. Surely, if this step does not occur, then buyers awareness would be useless for sellers. And of course, the real interest can emerge not just after the brief attention to catchy ads, but if the message persuades people that a product or service suits their needs. In our case, the attempt was made to reflect this stage of the decision-making process by the question about why did Greg and Kelly assume that the phone would satisfy their needs. In this respect, Greg informed that he was interested in the prospect of having a single device that would combine in it not only the functions of a phone, but music-playing capabilities as well, thus sparing him from the need to have separate units that would be inconvenient to carry along. For Kelly as the main eye-catcher served the fashionable look of the phone, and the possibility to have it in bright red color, the one she has an affection to. From this aspect of the decision-making process we can see that these were actually two different qualities of the product that interested Greg and Kelly in the first place. The third step in the account of decision-making processes within the AIUAPR model is the understanding as the level of appreciation of the degree to which the qualities of the actual product can bolster the interest that has previously emerged. To uncover how our interviewees passed this stage they were asked how, and if at all, they collected additional information needed for the complete understanding that the decision to purchase this phone would be justified. Greg responded that after the initial advertisement he took his time to search Internet for the additional technical information about the phone and for users opinions, and also went to a local Verizon office to actually see it. Kelly in her quest to gather additional information about the product went even further as she borrowed her friends phone for two days. So, both parties invested their time into the phase of obtaining of better understanding of the qualities of the product, but Greg took a gradual approach to it, and Kelly found a way to actually imitate the situation as if she already owned the phone. The next indispensable part of the buyer decision process in our chosen model is the formation of attitudes to the product or service that is already known and understood. Of course, the attitude to the product that is to be purchased should in the end be positive enough to tip the scale towards the actual purchase. To the question what was the final attitude to the product which immediately preceded the purchase of the mobile phone Greg answered that for him it was mostly a positive one as he felt that all of his expectations related to the phones functionality were confirmed by what he had found out, and that he was prepared for some minor drawbacks that could emerge. In her turn, Kelly answered that her attitude before the purchase of the phone was extremely positive, and, as she purchased the phone immediately after having given the one she was testing back, by the purchase she in fact was as if restoring the state of affairs which she described in the following way: "After half a day of my friends phone use I knew it was perfect for me, it was already a kind of my own". The step that follows all the previous ones in the AIUAPR model is, finally, the very act of purchase. In this regard, Kelly and Greg were asked two questions. The first one was the request to estimate the time that passed since the initial acquaintance with the phone until the purchase. It took Greg around two weeks to buy the phone, and for Kelly this time lasted for four days, which correlates with our observation about Gregs more gradual decision-making process. The second question was about how long time did they spend in the store making the purchases. If we disregard the time spent on formal procedures, it turned out that Kelly spent only a minute to request the model in red color. On the contrary, before finally voicing his buying decision Greg spent almost fifteen minutes as he was comparing various alternative color options and was checking the list of accessories supplied with the phone with the one he was expecting for on the basis of information that he had gathered. The AIUAPR model also presupposes the stage represented by repeated purchases. However, as mobile phones may be changed by most people not oftener than once in a year or rarer, so that model ranges of all manufacturers become almost completely renewed, and as the purchases were made by both interviewees quite recently, they tend to postpone the decision about the repeated purchase. Again, in our case the repeated purchase would most probably mean the purchase of another phone by Samsung, or prolongation of contract with Verizon for the provision of mobile content services for the phone. On ground of all this, we see that some of the characteristics that influenced the buying behavior of Kelly and Greg were similar, and some were different. For example, both of our interviewees were firstly informed about the existence of the concrete model of a phone, and then started their inquiries in the prospect of buying it. On the other hand, Kellys decision was much more emotional, which could be seen from her oft-recurring phrases like "I liked", "great-looking", "pretty", etc. Greg was instead much more focused on the rational and technical aspects of the purchase as he aimed to obtain a universal tool for several of his needs - phone and music player. Interestingly, when already commenting on their after-purchase impressions, Kelly noticed that she found the music player embedded in the phone to be a very convenient feature to which she had not paid much attention before, and Greg said that after a while he liked the look of the phone even more. In this way, both buyers gradually leveled out their discrepant initial emphases. It would also be useful to remark that the comparison was done between two buyers with similar demographics. Indeed, both of them are young educated persons with a sufficient income that largely would exclude the factor of price from their decision-making processes. At the same time, we can witness that even within a similar demographic sector different aspects of the buyer decision processes coexist. To some degree the gender difference may account for that, but this fact also confirms our earlier remark about the complexity of the real-life buyers decision processes. Sources Craig, T. (2004). Consumer behavior is the latest blur. Retrieved June 08, 2006, from http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0FNP/is_12_43/ai_n6082088 Drucker, P. F., Hammond, J., Keeney, R., Raiffa, H., Hayashi, A. M. (2001). Harvard Business Review on Decision Making. Harvard Business School Press. Mercer, D. (1996). Marketing. Blackwell Publishers. Rossiter, J. R., Mick, D. G., Monroe, K. B. (2003). "How to construct a test of scientific knowledge in consumer behavior". Journal of Consumer Research, 30(2), 305. Read More