La Cumbre Mundial de la Sociedad de la Información (CMSI)

C h a p t e r o v e r v i e w

Introduction to this chapter

The nature of behavioural theory in relation to marketing communications is explored and relationships examined and developed with the context of the mar-keting communications mix. Target market behaviour has to be understood. The theoretical focus of this understanding has become, over the last four decades, the cognitive, affective and behaviour stage models that are the hierarchy of effects or response type. On the other hand, the buying process has also been modelled. The marketer needs to know the who/why/what/how/when and where¹about buying. It is the ‘why’ that is the most mystifying and problematic but it is clear that what is bought is an important consideration, especially in relation to the amount and kind of information sought.

Aims of this chapter

The main aim of this chapter is to consider behaviour theory in relation to the communication process. In particular the chapter seeks to:

● place communication within a cultural context and discuss other environmental trends and influences on buyer behaviour

● outline the major inputs of buyer learning theory and show the complexity of buyer behaviour

● facilitate understanding and use of the buyer decision-making process.

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C o m m u n i c a t i o n , c u l t u r e a n d o t h e r e n v i r o n m e n t a l i n f l u e n c e s o n

b u y e r b e h a v i o u r

Communication and culture is looked at more closely in the international context in Chapter 20. However, it is so crucial to the workings of marketing communi-cations that it is felt that there is a need to deal with the usual cultural issues and those of buyer behaviour and to attempt a synthesis of the two approaches at this early stage in this book. Culture has many definitions. International study relies heavily on the work of Hofstede²_,who refers to culture as the collective mental programming of the people in an environment, where culture is not a character-istic of individuals. Culture therefore encompasses a number of people who were conditioned by the same education and life experience. Marketers should there-fore be concerned with the size of markets and, of course, demographics and other factors that give rise to trends within markets or segments. For example, time pressures have given rise to convenience foods. The home environment has become somewhat of a cocoon leading to many changes in home entertainment,

‘do it yourself ’ (DIY) products and so on. Indulgences such as weekend breaks and excitement, fantasy, health and many leisure pursuits are other examples. The ability to measure the size of such markets is of little use if the product and com-munications do not fit in with the culture. People worldwide share certain needs, but needs may be met differently in different cultures. Language as a cultural vari-able is important but, more than this, other cultural elements include things such as customs and religion.

Culture is important in communication because it differs between societies.

What may be very acceptable in one country might not be acceptable in another. This is because culture is learnt. Culture may be seen as the sum total of learned beliefs, values and customs. These then shape and influence the buyer behaviour of people in a particular societal context.

Subculture, social class and reference groups

When considering the importance of buyer behaviour in the development of effective marketing communications strategy, the marketer must also take notice of the fact that very few consumers live, work, or make decisions in social isola-tion. Individuals are influenced by culture – traditions, lifestyles and so on asso-ciated with a particular country. A culture can affect the ways that consumers seek to satisfy needs, the weighting given to choice criteria, the preferred brands and so on. The study of culture is also useful in understanding and use of cul-tural stereotypes in advertising. For example, to make a product look chic it might be placed in a French, or more specifically Parisian, setting. In other words the context in which the consumer receives the communication plays a very important part in the process, so that if a consumer listens to a radio advertise-ment in the workplace, he or she may well do so surrounded by work friends and colleagues. More broadly, most people live as part of a community and as such are subject to the norms, values and influences of those around them.

Groups are very influential on individual consumers. Subcultures are smaller groups where beliefs, values and so forth are different to those of the main-stream. Like any segment, subcultures are based upon some parameters such as age, religion, ethnicity and so on. Subcultures will only be important to

marketers if they conform to the rationale behind segmentation, i.e. whether they are substantive or accessible. Also, there may well be sub-subcultures that exist. A subgroup of the British Asian might be the British South Asian. It may be that the social class a person is in, or aspires to be in, is a key factor for the marketer. Most societies are stratified into some form of class system where rel-atively homogeneous groupings exist based largely in the past on, for example, income, educational platform and occupation. This notion does differ from country to country but in many countries the stratification is very similar, based as it is on a grading system originally designed by sociologists. In the UK the social grades of A, B, C1, C2, D and E were used for some time as a way of describing socioeconomic types in the population. However, the influence of others in the various groups to which an individual might belong, such as fam-ily, was recognized. Family and home life are a constantly changing part of the environment. Learned behaviours are not uncommon. Not spending enough time with children has resulted in behaviours on the part of working parents that are far removed from previous generations. Family lifecycles have also changed.

The traditional move from being single to being a newlywed, to having young children then growing children (full nest) to empty nest (children move out) and being on one’s own (remaining partner, spouse having died) is no longer a cer-tainty (not that it ever was for some people). Changes such as both parents work-ing have meant, for example, dual incomes. Communicators have consequently had to use different media and media spots to be able to cater for these changes.

Returning to work has meant that for many mothers, work colleagues are as important as daytime television or radio spots. Of course, a reality these days are things like divorce and remarriage. This has given rise to the so-called ‘second chancer’, a segment that has different characteristics again to those aforemen-tioned. For example, they tend to be older than ‘normal’ married people and have a higher household income, are more content with life and spend time seeking to enrich their lives rather than to please others. Reference groups are those groups with members whose presumed perspectives or values are used by an individual as the basis for his or her judgements, opinions or actions. Marketing communications often seeks to replicate the communication and interaction between individuals within groups where one member offers a solution to other members’ problems. Sales promotional strategies will often encourage the group interaction. For example, a wine club may offer a discount or some other incen-tive for a member to introduce a friend (Belch and Belch, 2001). Marketers have long used reference groups for aspirational advertising and have long been aware of disassociate groups, i.e. groups to which consumers do not belong (or do not wish to belong) but which can be used in advertising.

Culture and consumer behaviour

Hofstede’s ‘five dimensions of culture’ model is used extensively by de Mooij (1998). These dimensions are power distance, individual (versus collective), mas-culine (versus feminine), uncertainty avoidance and long-term orientation. These dimensions are discussed more fully in Chapter 20 but suffice to say here that this model represents yet another typological system of classifying people by cultural parameters. This kind of approach might be acceptable to some, as might Mueller’s context work (Mueller, 1996). To others, however, generalizations of culture can often be more harmful than useful. While it might be the case that segmentation studies are useless unless a segment is substantial and accessible,

fallacies should be avoided. For example, a need such as self-actualization (see Maslow’s hierarchy of needs later in this chapter under ‘Motivation’), if seen as an individualistic concept, might give the impression that self-actualizers will only exist in low-context cultures. This would be a very superficial approach that underscores the need for a deeper understanding of cultural models. A cor-nerstone of the systems that have been developed to look at cross-cultural clas-sification is the original Values and Life Styles (VALS) system devised by Maslow and Rockeach in 1975. This and VALS 2 (in 1989) are probably the best known lifestyle and values approaches that characterize culture and aspects of buyer behaviour but others have followed. A VALS-type system is illustrated in Chapter 4 and returned to in various parts of this book.

Buyer behaviour can be defined as the things buyers do while satisfying wants, needs and desires. This is done through searching for and selecting purchases, using these products and services, and then re-evaluating their usefulness and either going on to repurchase the same products and services or rejecting them.

This process may be almost involuntary or impulsive but at other times more detailed and exhaustive.

IKEA: extending the brand into the

‘second chancer’

segment

Putting it into practice, or implementation if you prefer, can be the most diffi-cult part of any business activity. Doing this on a global stage is even more daunting but IKEA have achieved this with apparent aplomb. The IKEA busi-ness idea is to offer a very wide range of home furnishings with good design and availability but at low prices, making their products functional and afford-able. IKEA therefore claim to ‘side with the many’ rather than the few who can normally afford good design. IKEA claim to appeal to the needs, tastes, dreams, aspirations and wallets of almost everyone. Their claim is that they have a partnership with the customer. They do their part by having good design ideas that allow products to be manufactured using pre-existing processes. They buy in bulk from all around the world so as to get the best deals. This allows IKEA to offer the low prices for which they are famous. IKEA admit, however, that the partnership with the customer contributes towards this by the very nature of the flat-packed products that are for the most part self-assembly. ‘This means we don’t charge you for things you can easily do on your own. So together we save money . . . for a better everyday life.’ This is a good proposition. The self-serve warehouse is promoted as an experience in itself, a day out. You can even dine there and then take your furnishings home with you.

This has not always been the IKEA market position. Since its humble begin-nings in founder Ingvar Kamprad’s childhood somewhere in the 1930s and the official 1943 founding of IKEA – Ingvar Kamprad Elmtaryd (the farm he grew up on) Agunnaryd (the village near the farm) – to the present day, IKEA has travelled from nothing to a presence in twenty-nine countries around the world. IKEA has therefore literally moved from matchsticks through a vast range of furnishings in six decades. The first showroom was opened in 1953.

By 1956 flat packs had begun. Designers joined the growing number of employees. Particle board arrived by 1969 and by the early 1970s so had modern plastics. IKEA moved outside Scandinavia in 1973, opening up first in Switzerland, then Austria, the Netherlands and Belgium – reaching the USA by 1985, with by then thousands of employees. The company says that V I G N E T T E

‘At first, we weren’t sure the USA needed IKEA. After all, what could we bring to the country that has everything?’ They soon realized that the need for use-ful, attractive home furnishings at ‘prices for every wallet’ is everywhere. So by 1998 they had opened in China and by 2000 in Russia. IKEA offers products for virtually every home furnishing eventuality, from the bedroom to the kitchen, from adults to children, from simple everyday objects to products with a great deal of design input.

From the start marketing and customer satisfaction has appeared a natural part of IKEA’s raison d’être. Even its first showroom, opened in 1953, was cre-ated for competitive advantage through three-dimensional presentation.

Design is and has been for most of IKEA’s history a key component and the source of many prizes. It is the past decade that has seen IKEA’s appeal spread to a broader group, not just lower-income groups such as students or families with young children. By the late 1990s, the UK consumer was being invited via IKEA’s television advertising to ‘chuck out the chintz’, and come on down to IKEA to replace this dreary old stuff with shiny new IKEA products.

IKEA had already been successful elsewhere. For example in Belgium, from the early to mid-1990s, IKEA nearly doubled the number of customer store visits and its turnover, and brand awareness soared after a successful inte-grated marketing communications campaign involving television, radio, news-papers, magazines and employees themselves.

Recognizing that the environment out there is in a constant state of flux, IKEA have not been slow in targeting newly divorced people. A campaign in America featured a divorced woman and her daughter shopping for furniture after the ex-husband had kept the household goods in the divorce settlement. This group of ‘second chancers’, as a whole, has potentially a great deal of dispos-able income and the kind of needs that organizations like IKEA can satisfy – in many markets throughout the world. Similarly, IKEA has not been shy to approach the gay community. In 1994 IKEA were running an advertisement in the USA that depicted two gay men shopping for a dining-room table together.

This was some time before competitors understood the attraction of this lucrative market.

Sources: Adapted from Baack and Clow (2002); www.ikea-usa.com/about_ikea/our_vision/

better.asp; www.ikea-usa.com/about_ikea/timeline/slash.asp; www.ikea-usa.com/about_ikea/

timeline/fullstory.asp; www.ikea-usa.com/about_ikea/timeline/years_1940.aspp; www.ikea-usa.

com/about_ikea/timeline/years_1950.asp; www.ikea-usa.com/about_ikea/timeline/years_1960.

asp; www.ikea-usa.com/about_ikea/timeline/years_1970.asp; www.ikea-usa.com/about_ikea/

timeline/years_1980.asp; www.ikea-usa.com/about_ikea/timeline/years_1990.asp (all 2002).

De Pelsmaker, Geuens and Van Den Bergh (2001).

What makes a global brand if cultures and subcultures are so very different around the globe? Should marketers focus on differences or look towards simi-larities? How have IKEA managed to satisfy the needs and wants of so many diverse peoples? Perhaps the only way is through a marketing approach that is flexible rather than rigid, open rather than closed, forward thinking rather than backward looking. Map out the importance of design, of store layout and other aspects of IKEA’s operation that you feel contribute to the overall image of the company and brand.

S T O P P O I N T

T h e c o m p l e x i t y o f b e h a v i o u r a n d b u y e r l e a r n i n g t h e o r y

The basic buying impulses of incentive, purchasing power and availability are fairly simplistic. Satisfying needs, whether physical, social, emotional and so on, can be seen to be easily achieved through situational factors such as living in a particular environment that predetermines, for example, what one eats. The weather, utilities, services available and so on may be determining factors in buy-ing behaviour. Motorway services might not be the preferred place to refuel one’s car and body but may in some circumstances be the only option. Getting cash from a machine in a wall might be the only means of obtaining spending money on a holiday island using a particular credit card and PIN number. More com-plex theories of consumer and organizational buyer behaviour and of consumer and organizational buyer decision-making abound in the literature, as do mod-els of buyer behaviour. There is also a need to reflect on the practical analysis of buyer behaviour in relation to marketing communications. The intimate rela-tionship between the two processes of buyer behaviour and marketing commu-nications is well recognized in the traditional marketing literature. The notion of involvement is fundamental to this since this represents the degree to which a stimulus of some sort, marketing or corporate communications originated included, is relevant to an individual’s need or want. The greater the relevancy, the more extensive the search is likely to be. The degree of involvement can depend upon many things including low or high cost of the item and whether the purchase situation is an ongoing one or a one-off or even impulse. It is not simply the case that because an item is low in cost that it is low in involvement.

Motivation

Motives, or why we feel compelled to take particular actions, can be viewed from a number of different standpoints. The commonest approach over decades has been to look at Maslow’s ‘Hierarchy of needs’. This model suggests that human needs are built on a pyramid structure, with the most basic (physiological needs – hunger, thirst and so on) at the base of the pyramid, whereby humans need things like food, shelter and sex in order to sustain life. Next up the hierarchy are safety needs involving security and protection from physical harm, followed by social needs where love, affection, belonging and acceptance are desired. Esteem needs are next in the pyramid, where a sense of accomplishment, status and respect from others is sought. At the top of the pyramid is the need for self-fulfilment and the realization of ones own potential, called self-actualization. The simple premise here is that the lower level must be satisfied before other levels, i.e. once basic needs are met the human can move up the pyramid to higher-order needs such as those at the top of self-actualization. The reality is far more complex than this simple con-cept. Many products are sold on different levels. A product that nourishes might well be sold on parental love (social). A person wishing to achieve the ultimate in self-actualization by climbing a mountain or shooting some rapids might well ignore safety needs from the start. On the other hand, in simpler situations, it is easy to see how needs can be different within a product category. Volvo some time ago was emphasizing safety and love for children in its advertising.

Human motives can be understood further by studying personality. The psycho-analytic theory of Freud explains much about motivation and personality, and

this has been applied to consumer behaviour situations. This is a probe for deeper-seated motives that are the basis for buying behaviour and purchase decisions but that are unclear even to the consumer. Probing the unconscious

this has been applied to consumer behaviour situations. This is a probe for deeper-seated motives that are the basis for buying behaviour and purchase decisions but that are unclear even to the consumer. Probing the unconscious