CUSTOMER INSIGHTS

Benedikt Schnurr, PhD

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Nature of the Course

My Part Your Part

• Theoretical/Conceptual input • Active participation
• Examples • Critical and analytical thinking
• Structure

Outcome
• Joint discovery & learning

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Literature

Basic Literature
Mothersbaugh. D., Hawkins, D., and Kleiser, S. B. (2020). Consumer Behavior: Building
Marketing Strategy, 14th Edition. McGraw Hill.
Solomon, M. R. (2020). Consumer Behavior: Buying, Having, and Being, Global Edition, 13th
Edition. Pearson.

Academic Journal Articles (see Syllabus and Moodle)

Cases (see Syllabus and Moodle)

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Session Structure

(i) Lecture

(ii) Science Insights

(iii) Case Discussion

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EXAM

Date: February 13, 13:00 – 14:00, Audimax

Nature: multiple-choice

More information to come in time!

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Customer Insights 6
INTRODUCTION TO
CONSUMER BEHAVIOR
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Consumers Are a Strange Breed

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Consumers Are a Strange Breed
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qWHJ29-s4U

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What is Consumer Behavior?

“The study of the processes involved when individuals or groups select, purchase, use, or
dispose of products, services, ideas, or experiences to satisfy needs and desires.”

Consumer Perspective Marketer Perspective

How do consumers decide that they need a How are consumer attitudes toward products
Prepurchase product? formed and/or changed?
Issues What are the best sources of information to What cues do consumers use to infer which
learn about alternative choices? products are superior to others?

Is acquiring a product a stressful or pleasant

How do situational factors, such as time
Purchase experience?
pressure or store displays, affect the
Issues What does the purchase say about the
consumers’ purchase decision?
consumer?

What determines whether consumers will be

Does the product provide pleasure or
satisfied with a product and whether they will
perform its intended function?
Postpurchase buy it again?
How is the product eventually disposed of,
Issues Do consumers tell others about their
and what are the environmental
experiences with the product and infuence
consequences of this act?
their purchase decisions?

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Applications of Consumer Behavior

Marketing Strategy Regulatory Policy Social Marketing

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Marketing Strategy and Consumer Behavior
Market Analysis
Company
Competitors
Conditions
Consumers

Market Segmentation
Identify product-related need sets
Group customes with similar need sets
Describe each group
Select attractive segment(s) to target

Marketing Strategy
Product, Price, Distribution, Promotion, Service

Consumer Decision Process

Problem recognition
Information search
Alternative evaluation
Purchase
Use
Evaluation

Outcomes
Individual
Firm
Social

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Marketing Strategy and Consumer Behavior
Market Analysis
Company
Recognizing firms’ (marketing) abilities
(strength/ weaknesses), including NPD,
channel, advertising, service, research,
consumer knowledge, …

Competitors
Knowledge of competitors’ capabilities and
strategies

Conditions
State of economy, physical environment,
government regulations, technological
developments

Consumers
Knowledge of consumers’ needs and desires
and anticipate their reactions

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Marketing Strategy and Consumer Behavior
Market Segmentation

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Group Cohesion

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Marketing Strategy and Consumer Behavior
Marketing Strategy
Product
Consumers buy need satisfaction, not a
physical product

Price
Consumer cost: everything a consumer
must surrender in order to receive the
benefits of owning/using a product

Communication
With whom? What? Where? When? What
effect?

Distribution
How? Where? When?

Service
Auxiliary or peripheral activities that are
performed to enhance the primary product

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Marketing Strategy and Consumer Behavior
Consumer Decision Process

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Marketing Strategy and Consumer Behavior
Outcomes
Firm outcomes
Product/Brand position
Sales and profits
Customer satisfaction

Individual outcomes
Need satisfaction
Injurious consumption

Society outcomes
Economic
Physical environment
Social welfare

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Consumer Research
Micro Disciplinary focus Magazine usage sample research issues
Experimental psychology: product role in How specific aspects of magazines, e.g. design
perception, learning, and memory processes and layout, are recognized and interpreted
Clinical psychology: product role in psychological How magazines affect readers’ body images
adjustment
Microeconomics: product role in allocation of Factors that influence the amount of money
individual or family resources households spend on magazines
Social psychology: product role in the behavior of How ads in a magazine affect readers’ attituds
individuals as members of social groups toward depicted products
Sociology: product rle in social institutions and Pattern by which magazine preferences spread
group rlationships through a social group
Macroeconomics: product role in consumers’ Effects of price of fashion magazines and expense
relation with marketplace of items advertised during times of economic crises
Semiotics: product role in the verbal and visual How underlying messages communicated by ads
commnication of meaning are interpreted
Demography: product role in the measurable Effects of age, income, and marital status of a
characteristics of a population magazine’s readers
History: product role in societal changes over time Ways in which our culture’s depiction of femninity
and masculinity have changed over time
Cultural anthropology: product role in a society’s How fashions and models in a magazine affect
beliefs and practices readers’ definition of masculine versus feminine
Macro behavior

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Consumer Trends
https://www.mintel.com/global-consumer-trends

Health Undefined Collective Empowerment Priority Shift

Coming Together Sustainable Spaces Digital Dilemmas

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Be Cautious About Trends

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Be Cautious About Trends

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Now, You Know…

…what consumer behavior is

…how consumer behavior shapes marketing strategy (and vice versa?)

…the scientific disciplines that study consumer behavior

…consumer trends (to look out for)

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SCIENCE INSIGHT
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Science Insight
Barasch, A., Zauberman, G., & Diehl, K. (2018). How the intention to share can undermine
enjoyment: Photo-taking goals and evaluation of experiences. Journal of Consumer
Research, 44(6), 1220-1237.

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Introduction

Sharing experiences with others can benefit consumers in multiple ways, for example boost
their mood and enhance their sense of meaning (Lambert et al. 2013; Reis et al. 2010)

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Introduction

Existing Research on Sharing This Research

Experiences

Sharing occurs after the experience has Effect of anticipating sharing an experience
ended

à How do consumers’ salient intentions to share an experience in the future affect their
enjoyment of that experience in the present?
à How does taking photos with the intention to share them later influence consumers’
enjoyment of an experience?

Why focus on photo taking?

• Facebook: 350 million photos uploaded every day (gizmodo.com)
• Instagram: 1,074 photos uploaded every second (omnicoreagency.com)

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Theoretical Background

Self-presentation concern:
• People are motivated to present themselves to others in a favorable light (Goffman 1959)
• Social situations induce a desire to control the way people appear to others (Schlenker
1980; Tedeschi 1981)
• Taking photos with the intention to share them with others activates a self-presentational
motive of communicating desired identities to others (Gollwitzer 1986; Leary and
Kowalski 1990).

à Taking photos with the intention to share them with others increases self-presentation
concerns (an inherently negative state; (Ariely and Levav 2000; Mackie and Goethals
1987), thus undermining enjoyment of the experience
à Self-presentation concerns decrease pleasurable immersion in the experience itself, thus
reducing enjoyment (Csikszentmihalyi 1997; Killingsworth and Gilbert 2010)

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Hypotheses

H1: Relative to taking photos for the self, taking photos with the intention to share with others
will reduce enjoyment of an experience.

H2: Relative to taking photos for the self, taking photos with the intention to share with others
will increase self-presentational concern.

H3: Self-presentational concern will diminish enjoyment both directly and indirectly through
reduced engagement in the experience.

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Study 1: Photo Taking at a Tourist Attraction

Participants and design:

153 participants approached in front of the Rocky Statue in Philadelphia, who ere about to
take a photo

Measures:

Independent Variable:
Photo taking goal (for myself/to share with others)

Dependent Variables:
Enjoyment of the experience (1 = not at all, 15 = extremely)
Recommendation intention (1 = not at all, 15 = extremely)

Results (logistic regression):

Enjoyment of the experience: B = –1.54, p < .01

Recommendation intention: B = –1.21, p = .05

à When individuals take photos to share, they enjoy the experience less than when they
take photos for themselves.
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Study 2: Field Experiment

Participants and design:

440 students were asked to create a Christmas holiday album either for themselves or to
share on Facebook

Measures (survey distributed after holidays):

Enjoyment of the Christmas photo-taking experience (1 = not at all, 7 = extremely)

Results (independent samples t-test):

Enjoyment of the experience: Msharing goal = 5.15 vs. Mself goal = 5.58; p = .01

à When individuals take photos to share, they enjoy the experience less than when they
take photos for themselves.

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Study 4: Moderation by Self-consciousness
Participants and design:
289 participants watching a first-person walking tour through Carcasonne were asked to
imagine either taking photos for themselves or in order to share them with others

Measures:
Enjoyment of the experience (1 = not at all, 7 = extremely)
Self-consciousness (13-item scale)

Results (regression analysis):

Enjoyment: b = –.60, p = .001
Interaction: b = –.10, p < .01
Sharing goal: self-consciousness à enjoyment: b = –.07, p < .01
Self-goal: self-consciousness à enjoyment: b = .03, p = .24

à For those who take photos for themselves, self-consciousness is not related to
enjoyment. However, for those who take photos to share with others, being higher in self-
consciousness is related to lower enjoyment during the experience

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Study 5: The Effect of Sharing with Different Audiences
Participants and design:
153 participants experiencing a virtual London bus tour were asked to either take photos for
themselves or in order to share them with close friends or to share them with acquaintances

Measures:
Enjoyment of the experience (1 = not at all, 7 = extremely)
Self-presentation concerns (three-item scale)
Engagement in the bus tour (two items)

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Study 5: The Effect of Sharing with Different Audiences

Results (one-way ANOVAs):

6 5.55 5.6 Enjoyment: F(2, 150) = 3.96, p = .02

4.92
5 SP concerns: F(2, 150) = 4.99, p < .01
4 3.30
Engagement: F(2, 150) = 6.77, p < .01
2.74 2.90
3

1
Self Distant others Close others
Enjoyment Self-presentation concern

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Discussion
Contributions

Research on sharing experience (Lambert et al. 2013; Reis et al. 2010; Tamir and Mitchell
2012):
Previous research: effects of sharing after an experience
This research: intention of sharing an experience during an experience

Research on impression management (Baumeister 1982)

Identification of hedonic costs of anticipating future self-presentation: seeking future utility
from sharing photos can diminish hedonic utility in the present.

Research on photo taking (Barasch et al., 2017; Diehl et al. 2016)

Previous research: effects of taking versus not taking photos on enjoyment of an experience
This research: effects of taking photos for different audiences

Future research

• Examining how photo-taking goals affect features of the photos

• Additional situational variables

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Now, You Know…

…how certain goals while taking a photo can affect the enjoyment of an experience

…how to empirically test these effects

…how examining these effects contributes to consumer research

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CASE
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Case – Alexa

Choose two of your favorite brands and devise an idea for an Alexa “skill” that consumers
could find useful. How would these skills help sell more of the brands’ products and/or
increase customer loyalty?

How can brands remain relevant in the Age of Alexa? What strategies should brand
managers employ to continue to influence consumer purchase decisions if consumers
become more reliant on AI assistants?

What kind of products or brands will most likely be either negatively or positively affected by
an increased use of AI assistants?

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THANK YOU
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