The Consumer Journal Report requires to analyse the internal and external factors influencing the consumer decision making process for a major purchase – e.g. a car or a holiday.
The analysis MUST be based on reality and within Australian market. The assignment should be in report format. It is important to be analytical and NOT descriptive, demonstrating an understanding of which theories were at play in this purchase situation. Marking Criteria.
• Description of Internal Influences (Perception, Learning, Motivation, Personality & Attitude).
• Description of External Influences (Group Influence, Culture).
• Analysis and demonstration of understanding.
Buyer behavior is very crucial for the survival of a business, hence the reason why the factor influencing customer purchase of certain goods should be researched on. This report aims to delve into and explore the various influencing factors (both internal and external) that lead up to the making of a ‘virtually big’ decision by individuals. It tries to bring an analytical perspective into these factors particularly in the Australian setting or rather consumership. These research aims at explaining that not only the financial factor should be consider as the one affecting the consumer behavior but a lot of things too. It further explain how these internal and external factors affect the consumer when purchasing an apartment in Australia.
The concept of consumer behavior is all about the study of individuals and the various cognitive as well as non-cognitive processes that buyers engage themselves into before coming to a decision of buying a certain product or service. The human tendency that makes us edged towards perfectionism and satisfaction in whatever we do has it that keen and well though through decisions are almost necessary whenever we want to buy anything especially is the said product or service costs a considerably high amount of money.
Psychologically we are aware that such decisions don’t just occur but instead are driven by a number of influences that concurrently run through our minds whenever we want to buy something. This thoughts and pre-eminent conditions are principally responsible for whatever final decision we end up with. The typical process of consumer decision making, or rather what goes into account during the decision making process begins with the need recognition and awareness that as a consumer you need to have a certain product or be rendered a given service. A number of both internal as well as external influences that we’ll analyze later in this report play a role into the arousal of these needs amidst our inner selves.
The development of interest comes in as the second step in the process where we actually gain interest into what we want to buy and begin to gather relevant information such as how much it would cost us and even where we would find whatever we are looking for. The next step in the process would take the form of alternative evaluation where we try to evaluate what other options are in our disposal before moving ahead to purchase the desired product or service. The last step in the consumer decision making process I would argue is the reason why most of us take keen interest and put a lot of thinking before making our next purchase. I say this because this is where consumers make their own self evaluation into the decision they just made – it is where consumers can gauge their satisfaction into the product or service and subsequently their decisions.
The Australian economy I would beg to argue has led to the rise of the ethical consumer. This can be principally attributed to the fact that the economy hasn’t been that friendly to the consumers and every once in a while they’ve had to make some tough choices and end up being a bit wary regarding their own financial wellness. A common scenario that I would like to use as a case example that Australian consumers are likely to face every once in a while is that of making the decision on the ownership of their own homes or apartments especially in a vibrant city such as Sydney. Euro monitor (2016) reports that Australian consumers of late have had to deal with escalating house prices which mean that consumers will have to put in more thoughtful effort before coming to a decision. An Australian consumer looking to owning a home during such unfriendly economic times would be influenced by two main forces; the internal influences and the external influences. In these scenario we look at consumer decision making when purchasing an apartment. The consumer decision when purchasing the apartment is influence by both the internal and the external factors as discussed below.
A buyer’s personality trait is one of the internal influences that predetermine the individuals drive towards taking interest on a particular product in this case an apartment. It is the thoughts, emotions, intentions and behavior that we express as we move through our environment (marketingteacher.com .2016). If the individuals’ personality feeds into the need to buy a home then it is likely that he or she will make up his or her mind about buying and try to counter anything that tends to oppose what is aligned with their personality. The consistency theory of decision making argues that people (in this case our house buyer) seek comfort from their internal alignment and the internal alignment it is referring to is the alignment to our internal personalities (our thoughts, emotions and intentions about something we want) and therefore it has a big of an influence when it comes to consumer decision making.
Perception is yet another internal factor influencing how decisions turn out. In the case of our house buyer in Sydney, it is hard to see how he/she can end up with the decision of buying the apartment yet they never had a positive perception towards the idea in the first place.it is all about noticing something and assigning meaning to it and the side of the scale (be it positive or negative) that it falls under determines whether it can be given any attention in the mind of an individual. It would therefore seem that this factor and the theory of explanatory coherence can be tied together based on the fact that they both relate what we want to a simple explainable hypothesis like a simple positive perception towards something.
Day to day interactions with other people creates a tendency of adopting new ideas and norms or mentalities from those whom we interact with and it ends up being a learning process that affects how we perceive things and generally molds our decision making processes. In the case of the home buyer, if he/she through the various interactions with friends gradually learnt that it is a basic necessity and a must have to own an apartment or a house in Sydney then its probably apparent that the individual will go for the house. I would argue that this is determined to a large extend by popular opinion among those we interact with and would therefore make it appropriate if I tied it with the involvement theory of decision making which posits that interactions leads to generation of norms.
When an individual is making a decision to buy a house in Sydney, personal motivation plays a very critical role in ensuring the fate of the final decision. It is motivation that acts as the energizing force that drives behavior and attitude. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs posits that for whatever we consider a need, there are positives gained and at the same time negatives reduced. This therefore means that the urge to fulfill or achieve something we think of as a need will act as a motivator that most of all drives us towards an aligned decision. Since housing is considered as one of the basic human needs, it would be substantial to note that an individual intending to buy a house in Sydney is likely to be motivated by the sheer fact that this is a basic need and therefore a must have.
As the last of the internal influences, attitude of an individual towards may seem like an external influence but in real sense it is all about an internal evaluation simply expressed outwardly about an idea at hand. Attitude sort of pre-determines the fate of a decision to a large extent because it doesn’t only affect how we make decisions but also the interactions with whom we make especially for our case of a house buyer in Sydney. We can’t expect that he/she will see the idea through with a negative attitude towards the idea of buying a house in Sydney. A theory that is in action in this particular instance is the consistency theory of decision making because in essence someone with a negative attitude towards the idea tends to block it out completely even though it would be seen by others as a brilliant move.
Group influence follows a normative approach of interactions among and within groups. It is through these group interactions that group norms and values are created and gradually gather prominence among the members. The social influence theory of is one of the key theories that come to mind in this context with respect to the case of an individual opting to buy a house in Sydney since the theory revolves around group think and influence. This therefore insinuates that a decision is likely to be hugely affected by group influence.
Cultures posses distinct norms and core values that are highly held by respective individuals and therefore in some way or another they depict the kinds of decisions we make. For instance a Muslim would easily opt for beef meat rather than pork because of his/her culture. The theory of commitment argues that people feel obliged to fall in place to their cultural norms or to the majority norms and therefore an individual traditionally raised in the outback would most likely make the decision to forgo the idea of buying a house in Sydney for his/her conventional outback.
Conclusion
Generally, consumer behavior is influenced by a lot of factors when purchasing an apartment or any other significantly expensive item.It’s good for a producer to be aware of such influence so that they can produce goods that attracts their customers. From the above discussion financial factors are not the only things that influence the decision making when purchasing an apartment. The family too plays a big role when, buying an apartment since they have to decide the location and the size. Different commodities are influenced by different factors when a customer wants to purchase them. So the business should find out what factors are likely to influence a commodity to be purchased, since these factors are not the same for all the products.
References
Anon, (2016). Consumer Decision Making.
Changingminds.org. (2016). 2016].
Euromonitor.com. (2016). Consumer Lifestyles in Australia.
Friesner, V. (2014). Internal Influences – Emotion and Perception – Marketing Teacher.
Friesner, V. (2014).
Friesner, V. (2014). Internal Influences – Lifestyle and Attitude – Marketing Teacher.
Friesner, V. (2014). Internal Influences – Motivation – Marketing Teacher.
Friesner, V. (2014). Internal Influences – Personality – Marketing Teacher.
Oregonstate.edu. (2016). Social Influence Theories.
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