Chapter 6- Consumer Decision Making



It is important to know how consumers behave and make decisions. Consumer behavior describes how consumers make purchase decisions and how they use and dispose of the purchased good or services. Consumers usually follow a 5 step process called Consumer Decision Making Process when determining what to buy, and whether they should purchase it or not. The 5 steps in this process are (1) need recognition, (2) information search, (3) evaluation of alternatives,(4) purchases and (5) post-purchase behavior. 

The first step is need recognition, electronic devices aren't a need, more as a want that people feel the need to have. Apple is a largely known company and many external stimuli affect this company. Some are recommendations from others that already have the phones, some are the new design and colors that comes with the phones and also advertisements all of social media impact the company's sales. 

After recognizing the needs and wants, consumers search for information about the product. There are two different types of ways to research information. Internal information search is information stored in the memory. This information is stored from previous experience with the product. For exampling researching Apple phones is considered internal if the person already has an Apple phone or has dealt with Apple products before. External information is information in the outside environment. There are two types of external information sources which are nonmarketing-controlled and marketing-controlled. A nonmarketing controlled information source are not associated with marketers promoting a product. This would include trying a product for the first time, getting recommendations from a personal source or reading reviews from a source. A marketing-controlled information source is based on the product with marketers promoting. This includes sales promotion, salespeople and the internet. 

After getting information, the consumer is ready to make a decision.To make that decision consumers may evaluation alternatives. With Apple products especially the phones since they are a big hit, most people wouldn't really recommend an alternative. But there are some people, that will think about other phones including the Samsung Galaxy or even the LG phones. They both can compare to the Apple phones, all of them include touchscreen and they all have large screens now. 

Purchase is the next step in the process, people are purchasing a lot of Apple products especially their phone since a new one comes out every year and many people want to have the newest phone. In the first 3 days alone, the iPhone 6 / iPhone 6 Plus sold around 10 million devices. 

Post-purchase behavior is how well these expectations are met determines whether the consumer is satisfied or dissatisfied with the purchase. Most Apple consumer are satisfied with their products especially their phones since so many people purchase their phones yearly.