Lecture Two: Perception

This week we had a discussion about perception of the customer. To start I have two definitions:

My Definition

Perception is how someone understands their surroundings and information that is showered on them and then how they make decisions based on this information.

Definition Two

"Perception is the process of sensing, selecting and interpreting consumer stimuli in the external world."
(Wilkie, R. 1994)

The definition above by Richard Wilkie, who is a lecturer on perception at Leeds University, really sums up the way our brains 'sense' all this information that is around us and how it automatically selects the information that is the most relevant, Then from that how our brain interprets this information. This can then be explained even further by highlighting the 5 stages of the Buyer Decision Process Model, which are:

Need Recognition - This is where the consumer recognises the need to buy a particular product or service.

Information Search - This is where the consumer may do some research, or shop around as it may be more commonly known.

Evaluation of alternatives - This could be where the consumer may decide to choose say the companies own label as an alternative to the named brand of a particular product.

Purchase Decision - This is 'crunch time' where the consumer finally makes that decision based on the information that has been gather and processed. Buy or don't buy.

Post-Purchase Behaviour - This is where the consumer will feel the effects of there purchase. Are they happy with what they have bought, maybe not. Was it worth it etc.

From this we then talked about the two types of purchasing. The first is the obvious and is where a customer researches all the alternatives and tries to gather as much information as possible before they buy a product. This is for things like cars, computers, houses etc. The other type is impulsive and is essentially buy now, think later. The 5 stages of the Buying Decision Process here are completely rushed through and blurred. This can leave the customer feeling very happy because these sorts of decisions are made purely to satisfy the wants that the customer has. It's only until after that they may realise that the product cost too much or they didn't actually want it in the first place. This kind of decision making is common when buying clothes, shoes etc.

The next thing I want to talk about is the factors that influence the buyer's behaviour and they are (Source: Kotler):

Psychological - This is things like the beliefs and attitude of the buyer and includes all the the perception and motivational aspects that affect a buyer's decision making.

Personal - This is factors like the age and the lifestyles of the buyer, what kind of job they may have and what the economy might be like (For instance with the state of our economy at present people are 'tightening their belts' and not spending as freely as they may have a couple of years ago.).

Social - This includes factors that include social groups, family, friends etc. Also groups that the customer may be in and how what they say or do influence the decisions of the customer.

Cultural - This is very much like social but is more individual and will include factors like religion, education, peers etc.