Beliefs and Attitudes

Beliefs and Attitudes

Through doing and learning, people acquire their beliefs and attitudes. These, in turn, influence their buying behaviour. A belief is a descriptive thought that a person

belief lias about something. Anna Flores may believe that a Nikon camera takes great

A descriptive thought pictures, stands up well under hard use and is good value. These beliefs may be

that a person holds based on real knowledge, opinion or faith, and may or may not carry an emotional

(ibniit something. charge. For example, Anna Flores' belief that a Nikon camera is heavy may or may

not matter to her decision. Marketers are interested in the beliefs that people formulate about specific products and services, because these beliefs make up product and brand images that affect buying behaviour. If some of the beliefs are wrong and prevent purchase, the marketer will want to launch a campaign to correct them.

People have attitudes regarding religion, politics, clothes, music, food and almost everything else. An attitude describes a person's relatively consistent evalu­

attitude ations, feelings and tendencies towards an object or idea. Attitudes put people

A 'person's consistently into a frame of mind of liking or disliking things, of moving towards or away from

favourable or them. Thus Anna Flores may hold such attitudes as 'Buy the best', The Japanese make the best products in the world' and 'Creativity and self­expression are

evaluations, feelings and among the most important things in life'. If so, the Nikon camera would fit well

tendencies towards an into Anna's existing attitudes.

object or idea. Attitudes are difficult to change. A person's attitudes fit into a pattern and to

change one attitude may require difficult adjustments in many others. Thus a company should usually try to fit its products into existing attitudes rather than

try to change attitudes. Of course, there are exceptions in which the great cost of trying to change attitudes may pay off. For example:

In the late 1950s, Honda entered the US motorcycle market facing a major decision. It could either sell its motorcycles to the small but already established motorcycle market or try to increase the size of this market by attracting new types of consumer. Increasing the size of the

250 • Chapter 6 Consumer Buyer Behaviour

market would he more difficult and expensive because many people had negative attitudes toward motorcycles. They associated motorcycles with black leather jackets, switchblades and outlaws. Despite these adverse attitudes, Honda took the second course of action. It launched a major campaign to position motorcycles as good clean fun. Its theme 'You meet the nicest people on a Honda' worked well and many people adopted a new attitude toward motorcycles. In the 1990s, however, Honda faces a similar problem. With the ageing of the baby boomers, the market has once again shifted toward only hard­core motorcycling enthusiasts. So Honda has again set out to change consumer attitudes. Its 'Come Ride

With Us' campaign aims to re­establish the wholcsomeness of motorcycling and to position it as fun and exciting for everyone. 2S

Consumer Decision Process

The consumer's choice results from the complex interplay of cultural, social, personal and psychological factors. Although the marketer cannot influence

many of these factors, they can be useful in identifying interested buyers and in shaping products and appeals to serve their needs better. Marketers have to bd extremely careful in analyzing consumer behaviour. Consumers often turn down what appears to be a winning offer. Polaroid found this out when it lost millions on its Polarvision instant home movie system; Ford when it launched the Edsel; RCA on its Selecta­Vision and Philips on its Laser Vision video­disc player; Sony with DAT tapes; and Bristol with its trio of the Brabazon, Britannia and Concorde airliners. So far we have looked at the cultural, social, personal and psychological

Consumer Decision Process 251

Figure 6.5

Four types of buying behaviour

influences that affect buyers. Now we look at how consumers make buying de­ cisions: first, the types of decision that consumers face; then the main steps in the buyer decision process; and finally, the processes by which consumers learn about and buy new products.

Types of Buying Decision Behaviour

Consumer decision making varies with the type of buying decision. Consumer buying behaviour differs greatly for a tube of toothpaste, a tennis racket, an expensive camera and a new car. More complex decisions usually involve more buying participants and more buyer deliberation. Figure 6.5 shows types of consumer buying behaviour based on the degree of buyer involvement and the

degree of differences among brands. 2 ' 1

Complex Buying Behaviour

Consumers undertake complex buying behaviour when they are highly involved

complex buying

in a purchase and perceive significant differences among brands, or when the

behaviour

product is expensive, risky, purchased infrequently and highly self­expressive. Consumer buying Typically, the consumer has much to learn about the product category. For

behaviour in situations example, a personal computer buyer may not know what attributes to consider.

characterised by high Many product features carry no real meaning; an 'Intel 200MIIz Pentium II Pro',

consumer involvement in a purchase and

'SVGA display', '16Mb Sync DRAM, 256 Kb Cache' or even a '16X Max CD­ROM significant perceived with 33.6 RPS fax/data (upgradeable to 56K)'.

differences among This buyer will pass through a learning process, first developing beliefs about

brands. the product, then developing attitudes, and then making a thoughtful purchase

choice. Marketers of high­involvement products must understand the information­ fathering and evaluation behaviour of high­involvement consumers. They need to help buyers learn about product­class attributes and their relative importance

and about what the company's brand offers on the important attributes. Marketers need to differentiate their brand's features, perhaps by describing the

252 • Chapter 6 Consumer Buyer tichaviour

Marketers can convert low­ involvernent products into higher­involvement ones by

linking them to involving situations. Hurt: Nestlil creates involvement with soap­opera­like ads featuring the romantic relationship between two neighbours, Tony and Sharon.

brand's benefits using print media with long copy. They must motivate store sales­ people and the buyer's acquaintances to influence the final brand choice. Recognizing this problem, Dixons, the electrical retailers, is setting up the Link chain of stores dedicated to helping baffled buyers on to the information super­ highway and multimedia. 311

Dissonance­Reducing Buying Behaviour

dLssuna nee­ reducing Dissonance­reducing buying behaviour occurs when consumers are highly

buying behaviour

involved with an expensive, infrequent or risky purchase, but see little difference Consumer buying

among brands. For example, consumers buying carpeting may face a high­ behaviour in situations

involvement decision because carpeting is expensive and self­expressive. Yet characterised by high

buyers may consider most carpet brands in a given price range to be the same. In involvement butfe'w

this case, because perceived brand differences are not large, buyers may shop perceived differences around to learn what is available, but buy relatively quickly. They may respond among brands. primarily to a good price or to purchase convenience. After the purchase,

consumers might experience post­purchase dissonance (after­sales discomfort) when they notice certain disadvantages of the purchased carpet brand or hear

favourable things about brands not purchased. To counter such dissonance, the marketer's after­sale communications should provide evidence and support to help consumers feel good both before and after their brand choices. 31