Essay on Consumer Decision Making Process

Consumer behavior is the study of individuals, or organizations and the processes consumers use to search, select, use and dispose of products, services, experience, or ideas to satisfy needs and its impact on the consumer and society. Understanding the consumer behavior is crucial for effective marketing helping managers identify appropriate people to aim and design. There are four major aspects of customer satisfaction namely; consumer affect and cognition, consumer behavior, consumer environment, and marketing strategy (Saaty, 2008).

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The consumer behavior deals with issues like how we get information about products. How alternative products are assessed, why different people choose or use different products at a certain situation, deciding on value for money, extent of risk to take with what products, what influences our buying decisions, and our use of the product (Darley, Blankson, & Luethge 2010). It also examines ways in which brand loyalties are formed and changed. In summary the mental, emotional and physical activities that people engage in when selecting, purchasing, using and disposing of products and services so as to satisfy needs and desires are all what is entailed in consumer behavior (Saaty, 2008).

In our case we are going to discuss Canon USA, a personal electronics company from Japan whose American headquarters is located off the Long Island Expressway and near the technology corridor of Route 110. The headquarters features modern amenities and a 52-acre campus. Canon aims to be a good corporate citizen within the community and will continue fostering relationships in the surrounding area (Canon USA. 2017).

The products canon company manufacture are; cameras and camcorders, lenses, flashes and binoculars, office solutions, personal and home office solutions, professional and large formal printers, production printing , network video solution, projectors and reference display, healthcare technology and industrial products. The product that we will discuss in this situation is canon camera DSLR .Canon camera DSLR is the one which will help us analyze the process of decision making in a consumer (Canon USA. 2017).

To begin with, the consumer decision making include, need arousal, information utility, criteria development and evaluation of alternatives. A propositional inventory is developed that postulates the relationship between atmospherics and the three primary stages of consumer decision processes pre-purchase, consumption, and post-purchase evaluations (Hoffman & Turley, 2015). The online consumer behavior and decision making processes is viewed to examine the link between external factors and one or more components of the decision making process.

Need arousal; Need arousal is a measurement of whether the individual recognizes the need for a solution and chooses to activate the remainder of the process, or alternatively the need remains latent and the process is truncated (Hansen, 2005). Need arousal is the first component of in the decision making process procedure and therefore acts as the trigger of the continuation of the process. This is where a consumer can feel the difference between the current situation and the desired situation, so trying to resolve these differences (Triantaphyllou & Mann 1995).

Information utility involves the collection, processing, and use of information from any source to aid in the resolution of the problem or an opportunity (Milner & Rosenstreich, 2013). Information utility can provide a better understanding of where the customers get information, what information they are seeking and how they use it. This is influenced by marketing strategies of retailers for example; communicate information about the brand through promotion.

Criteria development; the development of criteria component of the model comprises a preliminary consideration leading to formation of an evoked set, and in tandem with this, development of the decision criteria that will later be used to evaluate possible solutions offered by the evoked set.

Evaluation of solution; this sits below criteria development and comes prior to outcomes. This may include; substitute products and product categories, as well as brand choice. Consumer at this stage, according to the information already obtained, Select a product that feels satisfy his need and buys it.

After purchase behavior: Consumer compare purchased products with ideas, products, competitors, perceptions and expectations of the product and two satisfaction and dissatisfaction, which may appear different reasons.

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A customer may need a camera not only to take the photos but also to have smart and clear photos at a fair price and maybe a small size which is easy to handle. These situations are the ones that a customer may desire among others like the connection to transfer the photos to his personal computer, rework the image in a computer and if the camera would send through email.

On the information utility, the company would gather the information from the customers by use of retailers where the customers would be reporting problems. The consumers would get the information about the product from the media, the same retailers or the personal sellers, the information displayed on the packaging material of the camera. The information that the consumer would get would be the price, the size and the resolution. This piece of information the customers could get easily from the retailers. The consumer may require a camera that is water proof to take photos inside the water, a camera that do not consume a lot of power, one that takes photos which can be edited by any photo editing software or can send the photos through email.

The criteria development would depend on what the customers has said of the product in the market, if it was on the superiority of the photos the company would improve on the megapixels of the camera (Peter, 2010). The customers would complain on the power consumption the strategy that would be laid is of making more superior batteries. The consumers would complain on the price, this would lay a strategy of making another model with the same features but at a cheaper cost. The demand of the waterproof cameras would rise and these would lead to us producing more. The evaluation of solution would be to work out on the criteria laid during the criteria development. Then the company would wait for the results.

Lastly, need to study consumer behavior is essential for marketers. Consumer decision making process helps the company create a product in the manner that the consumer wants. I would recommend the company to use media for the information about their products to reach the consumers. The companies should encourage personal selling in order to advertise their product.

References

Saaty, TL. 2008. Decision making with the analytic hierarchy process. International Journal of Services Sciences, 1(1), pp. 83-98

Canon USA. 2017. About canon. Retrieved from https://www.usa.canon.com/internet/portal/us/home, accessed on May 26, 2017

Hoffman, KD & Turley, LW. 2015. Atmospherics, Service Encounters and Consumer Decision Making: An Integrative Perspective. Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice, 10(3), pp. 33-47.

Hansen T. 2005. Perspectives on consumer decision making: an integrated approach. Journal of Consumer Behaviour, 4(6), pp. 420-437

Darley, WK. Blankson, C. & Luethge DJ. 2010. Toward an Integrated Framework For Online Consumer Behavior And Decision Making. Psychology &marketing, 27(2)

Peter, JP. 2010, Consumer Behavior and Marketing Strategy, 9th revised edition. New York: Kumar Publisher

Deaton, A & Muellbauer, J, 1980. Economics & Consumer Behavior. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Milner, T & Rosenstreich, D, 2013. A Review of Consumer decision Making Models and Development of a New Model for Financial Services, Journal of Financial Services Marketing, 18 (2), pp. 106-120.

Triantaphyllou E. & Mann, SH. 1995. Using the Analytic Hierarchy Process for Decision Making In Engineering Applications: Some Challenges. International Journal of Industrial Engineering: Applications and Practice, 2(1), pp. 35-44,