Page 180 - Foundations of Marketing

Consumer Buying Behavior | Chapter 6 147

repeated. However, marketers should be wary not to repeat a message too many times, as con-
sumers can grow tired of it and begin to respond unfavorably. Information can be presented
verbally, numerically, or visually. Marketers pay great attention to the visual components of
their advertising materials.

Evaluation of Alternatives
A successful information search within a product category yields a group of brands that a
buyer views as possible alternatives. This group of brands is sometimes called a consideration
set (or an evoked set ). Consumers assign a greater value to a brand they have heard of than
to one they have not—even when they do not know anything else about the brand other than
the name. For example, a consideration set of computers might include laptop, notebook,
and tablet computers from Dell, Toshiba, and Apple. A consumer will probably initially lean
toward the one with which he or she is most familiar, or which his or her friends prefer, before
conducting any additional searches.
To assess the products in a consideration set, the buyer uses evaluative criteria : objective
characteristics (such as the size) and subjective characteristics (such as style) that are important
to him or her. Consider that one buyer may want a large display, whereas another may want
a computer with a lot of memory. The buyer assigns a certain level of importance to each cri-
terion. However, some features and characteristics carry more weight than others, depending
on consumer preferences. The buyer rates and eventually ranks brands in the consideration set
using the selected evaluative criteria. It is possible that the evaluation stage may yield no brand
the buyer is willing to purchase. In that case, a further information search may be necessary.
Marketers can influence consumers’ evaluations by framing the alternatives—that
is, describing the alternatives and their attributes in a certain manner. Framing can make a
consideration set A group
characteristic seem more important to a consumer and facilitate its recall from memory. For
of brands within a product
example, by stressing a car’s superior comfort and safety features over those of a competitor’s,
category that a buyer views
a carmaker can direct consumers’ attention toward these points. You have experienced the as alternatives for possible
framing effect if you have ever walked into a gourmet grocery or high-end clothing store where purchase
the displays make the products seem so appealing you just have to buy them, only to return
evaluative criteria Objective
home and be less satisfied than you were in the store. Framing has a stronger influence on the and subjective product charac-
decision processes of inexperienced buyers. If the evaluation of alternatives yields one or more teristics that are important to
brands that the consumer is willing to buy, he or she is ready to move on to the next stage of a buyer
the decision process: the purchase.

Purchase Buying on the Weekend: How Much

In the purchase stage, the con- Does It Cost?
sumer chooses to buy the product
or brand yielded by the evaluation
of alternatives. However, product
availability may influence which 50%
brand is ultimately purchased. If the
brand that ranked highest in evalu- 40%
ation is unavailable and the buyer Snapshot
is unwilling to wait until it is avail- 30%
able again, the buyer may choose to
20%
purchase the brand that ranked sec-
ond. For example, if a consumer is
10%
at the mall shopping for jeans and
the preferred Levis in her size are 0%
out of stock, but the Lucky brand $30 or Less $31–$50 $51 or More
jeans are not, the consumer may opt
to purchase the Lucky brand to save
another trip to the mall later. Source: Jae Yang and Paul Trap.

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