How many fmcg products from 1970’s you enjoy to remember in your lifetime

Team DigitalGumma September 21, 2022October 22, 2022 13 Comments How marketers use learning & memory theories?, How Nostalgia helps Sales?, Memory Marketing Makes the Most of Customer Experiences, What does this tell us about measuring memory?, What is a brand memory?, What is Consumer Knowledge, What is learning and memory in consumer Behaviour?, Which is more important brand recognition or brand recall?, Why do brands use nostalgia?

Types of Memory

Psychologists distinguish among three distinct types of memory systems, each of which plays a role in processing brand-related information:

permits storage of the information we receive from our senses. This storage is very temporary; it lasts a couple of seconds at most. For example, when walking to work you pass by a French bistro cafe and you get a quick, aromatic whiff of espresso and fresh croissants. Although this sensation lasts only a few seconds, it is sufficient to allow you to consider whether you should investigate further. If you retain this information for further processing, it passes into short-term memory.

(“STM”) also stores information for a limited period of time, and it has

limited capacity. This is similar to working memory in a computer; it holds the information we are currently processing. Our memories can store verbal input acoustically (in terms of how it sounds) or semantically (in terms of what it means). We store it when we combine small pieces of data into larger chunks. A chunk is a configuration that is familiar to the person and that they can think about as a unit.

(“LTM”) is the system that allows us to retain information for a long period of time. Information passes from STM into LTM via the process of elaborative rehearsal. This means we actively think about the chunk’s meaning and relate it to other information already in memory. Advertisers sometimes assist in the process when they devise catchy slogans or jingles that consumers repeat on their own and retain in their LTM.

Storing Memories

It’s important to understand how we store all of the massive amounts of information we retain in our minds. Just like a really disorganized “filing cabinet from hell,” our memories about brands (not to mention everything else we know) are useless if we don’t know where to find them.

Advertisers can structure their communication to make it more likely that subsequent messages will call up the knowledge of a brand we’ve already retained.

Memories that are stored in long-term memory (LTM) are not actually isolated from one another; they are linked together into categories— networks of associated memories that have features in common with each other.

Forming categories, and using categories to guide behaviour, is a fundamental part of human nature. Mental categories are sometimes referred to as — patterns of knowledge in LTM that help us organize information. We have schemas about objects (that a triangle has three sides and may take on different angles), about people (that Sam is friendly, likes to golf, and always wears sandals), about events (the particular steps involved in ordering a meal at a restaurant), and about social groups (we call these group schemas stereotypes). Schemas are important in part because they help us remember new information by providing an organizational structure for it.

Memory marketing—the actual process of reminding customers of past experiences—is mainly successful because memories are rarely kept to oneself. The power of the memories you capture, no matter the format, comes from being retold and shared.

Accessing Memories

Not surprisingly, recall is enhanced when we pay more attention to the message in the first place. Some evidence indicates that we can retrieve information about a pioneering brand (the first brand to enter a market) more easily from memory than we can for follower brands, because the first product’s introduction is likely to be distinctive and, for the time being, has no competitors to divert our attention (Kardes, Kalyanaram, Chandrashekaran & Dornoff, 1992).

In addition, we are more likely to recall descriptive brand names than those that do not provide adequate cues as to what the product is (Zaichkowsky & Vipat, 1992).

Of course, the nature of the ad itself also plays a big role in determining whether we’ll remember it. We’re far more likely to remember spectacular magazine ads, including multi-page spreads, three-dimensional pop-ups, scented ads, and ads with audio components (Sass, 2007).

It is well-known that memory affects our buying behavior. For example, if you have fond memories of a sweet that you loved as a kid, for example, Gems, you most likely still like that sweet. The scent and the taste of that sweet bring back memories, experiences, and comfort from your childhood.

Here are some other factors advertisers need to remember:

State-dependent retrieval. We are better able to access information if our internal state (for example, our mood at the time) is the same at the time of recall as when we learned the information. If, for example, we recreate the cues that were present when the information was first presented, we can enhance recall.
Familiarity. Familiarity enhances recall. Indeed, this is one of the basic goals of marketers who try to create and maintain awareness of their products. However, this sword can cut both ways: Extreme familiarity can result in inferior learning and recall.
. The salience of a brand refers to its prominence or level of activation in memory. As we have already noted, stimuli that stand out in contrast to their environments are more likely to command attention which, in turn, increases the likelihood that we will recall them.
Novelty. Introducing a surprise element in an ad can be particularly effective in aiding recall, even if it is not relevant to the factual information the ad presents (Heckler & Childers, 1992). In addition, mystery ads, in which the ad doesn’t identify the brand until the end, are more effective at building associations in memory between the product category and that brand—especially in the case of relatively unknown brands (Fazio, Herr, & Powell, 1992).

Pictorial versus verbal cues. Is a picture worth a thousand words? Indeed, we are more likely to recognize information presented in picture form at a later time (Childers & Houston, 1984; Childers, Heckler, & Houston, 1986). Certainly, visual aspects of an ad are more likely to grab a consumer’s attention. In fact, eye-movement studies indicate that about 90 per cent of viewers look at the dominant picture in an ad before they bother to view the copy (Krober-Riel, 1984).
But, while ads with vivid images may enhance recall, they do not necessarily improve comprehension. One study found that television news items presented with illustrations (still pictures) as a backdrop result in improved recall for details of the news story, even though understanding of the story’s content did not improve (Brosius, 1989).

Memory Marketing Makes the Most of Customer Experiences

Giving people something to recall is the new common ground for brands and their audiences

Long before branding was introduced, consumers developed loyalty to retailers because they offered credit as well as the necessary assortment of goods at a convenient location (Chandler, 1977:227 through Webster, 2000, p. 18).

Later, when manufacturers shifted their focus from satisfying the retailer, to nurturing the consumer, they began to develop trust and credibility through advertising (Webster, 2000). The traditional push-techniques were replaced by pull-techniques, and the producers branding efforts were considered the main tool by producers to create relationships with the consumers (Webster, 2000)6.

As the producers’ brands became even stronger, the producers gained ‘trade leverage’ in negotiations. Retailers therefore started to introduce their own private-labels, which indubitably created even more tension in the producer-retailer relationship (Webster, 2000).

Recognition and recall are often critically important to marketers because they serve as objectives for marketing communications such as advertising effectiveness, influence consumer choice, and have important strategic implications.

Learning involves “a change in the content or organization of long term memory and/or behavior.” The first part of the definition focuses on what we know (and can thus put to use) while the second focuses on concrete behavior. For example, many people will avoid foods that they consumed shortly before becoming ill.

The Advertising Marketing Association defines consumer behaviour as “the dynamic interaction of affect and cognition, behaviour, and the environment by which human beings conduct the exchange aspects of their lives” [78]. Accordingly, this definition includes the thoughts and feelings that people experience and the actions they perform in consumption processes.

Thus, it involves all aspects of the environment that can influence human thoughts, feelings, and actions, including opinions from other consumers. For instance, products and packaging, brands, advertisements, price information, and many other aspects can be considered environmental factors.

Indeed, consumer behaviour is a complex phenomenon for investigation and thus is a heterogeneous field. Marketing academics have published research papers mostly about consumer behaviour who have a multidisciplinary skill about training, objectives, and methods.

In fact, aesthetics plays a central role in consumers’ choice of products [264, 379], in judgments of artificial [380, 381] and natural environments [382, 383], and in attitudes, judgments, and behaviour toward other people [384–386]. Some of the questions that neuroaesthetics aims to answer are related to the understanding of which neural processes of aesthetic features influence people’s attitudes, decisions, and behaviour and, in general, what are the neural underpinnings of aesthetic appreciation [387].

What does this tell us about measuring memory?

First, that time between exposure and measurement matters. The 24 hours mark is ideal because that’s the point where the memory curve starts to flatten. Second, that advertising memories are encoded in context (asking questions about the show in which the ad aired, for instance, is going to help consumers remember that ad). Finally, that memories can endure—either via repetition for explicit types of memories, or via implicit internalization.

Doordarshan: Then the only world wide View.

Research tells us that memories start to decay immediately after they’re formed. That decay follows a curve that is very steep at the beginning (the steepest rate of decay occurs in the first 24 hours) and levels off over time. In a controlled experiment, Nielsen tested the memorability of 49 video ads immediately after consumers were exposed to them in a clutter reel, and we tested that memorability again the day after exposure (among a separate group of people). Levels of branded recognition had fallen nearly in half overnight.

First, there is generic knowledge which includes general information about classes of products, instances exemplifying the products, the existence of different types of products (implying knowledge of correlations between product attributes such as luxuriousness and gas consumption of an automobile), and information about the attributes or dimensions that are relevant and important in making decisions concerning the products (e.g., the distribution of existing product types along the price dimension).

Second, there is individual knowledge about specific products that are involved in a judgment or choice. This would include information such as the prices, color, taste durability, features, etc., of each product. Furthermore, this knowledge structure would include information about relationships among the products. For example, that product X is more expensive than product Y, or that product A and product B are manufactured by the same company.

Third, there is information that serves as ingredients to the judgment or choice strategy. This information might include specific facts from either individual or generic knowledge stores concerning the products, as well as information that is inferred (not given) about the individual products that may be relevant to a specific judgment strategy. For example, if product durability is deemed to be important in making a decision and durability information is not available, the subject will be likely to infer product durability for each product under consideration. This durability information would be an ingredient in judgment and decision stages of the overall process.

Fourth, there is a judgment procedure that combines :he ingredient information to render a characterization of each product that is reflected in :he subject’s individual product ratings. The most general judgment procedure appearing in virtually every theory of judgment and choice is the linear weighted combination rule (e.g., Information Integration Theory’s weighted averaging rule, Social Judgment Theory’s additive composition rule, Decision Theory’s expected utility, and so forth). However, alternative representations of the product, for example, as an image composed of perceptual and conceptual features, would also be admitted.

Fifth, decision strategies are concerned with commitment to an action such as purchasing or not purchasing a product. Here there is a greater variety of processing models. Some strategies compare unitary representations of products to choose an optimum (highest expected utility) or a minimally acceptable (satisficing) item; some search product-by-product for a conjunctive intersection of jointly sufficient features or a disjunction of separately sufficient features; some involve an attribute-by-attribute comparison of products that eliminates products until a winner is chosen (elimination by aspects); some compare products to a prototype instance to select the product most similar to the ideal instance: and so forth.

What is Consumer Knowledge

Consumer knowledge definition: consumer knowledge is a brand’s research into the demographics, wants, and needs of their target customers.

Consumer knowledge is an essential aspect of marketing and is needed to influence the following aspects of an effective strategy:

Buyer personas
Brand messaging
Marketing mix
Media mix
Targeting
Product development

Consumer knowledge can be gathered using both qualitative and quantitative methods, such as written feedback or analytics reports.

You can remind your customers of the special moment they lived with your brand—as well as with your product. From greater loyalty to enhanced brand advocacy, memory marketing helps you connect with your customers over the most genuine thing there is: experiences.

The idea is that when consumers acquire knowledge through their own information-processing, they learn and remember in their buying decisions. For example, if you have acne problems and use a product that helps resolve them, you have learned through experience to purchase that product again.

Memory refers to the location of short-term data, while storage refers to the location of data stored on a long-term basis. Memory is most often referred to as the primary storage on a computer, such as RAM. Memory is also where information is processed. It enables users to access data that is stored for a short time.

A Brand Memory Identity, as we define it, is a description of the ideal memory your customer should have of your brand. And should be developed as one of your first phases of trade show and event planning.

Nostalgic campaigns remind your customers of those episodes that once made them feel good. As they relive the experience, they are likely to also extend those feelings of warmth to your brand for taking them back in time. That’s a win-win for everyone

Nostalgic brands rely on the strong brand identity and not on the old products. Consumers search for nostalgic brands because they search for the lost pleasure. Nostalgic brands bring back memories.

The spirit of the brand can only be inferred through its products and its advertising .

Brand recognition is the extent to which a consumer can correctly identify a particular product or service just by viewing the product or service’s logo, tag line, packaging or advertising campaign. Brand recognition can also be triggered via an audio cue, such as a jingle or theme song associated with a brand.

Brand recall tends to indicate a stronger connection to a brand than brand recognition. For example, people tend to think of more brand names when prompted by a product than by a category. Brand recall is also called unaided recall or spontaneous recall.

The Sins of Consumer Memory and Their Implications For Advertising

THE SIN OF TRANSIENCE

The sin of transience implies that ‘recall’ of advertising is much more likely to reflect a generic description of what is expected about the brand rather than specific benefits included in the message. This has clear implications for interpreting measures of advertising message recall. But, more importantly, it underscores the need to develop unique brand benefit associations that become a part of the generic understanding of the brand. It also suggests that the specific content of marketing communication should be consistent with, or carefully integrated with, prior understandings of the brand.

THE SIN OF ABSENT-MINDEDNESS

Absent-mindedness results when we fail to pay proper attention to something and therefore do not encode it properly, or when the information is actually in memory, but overlooked when we need to retrieve it. The consequence of the sin of absent-mindedness manifests itself both in failing to remember past experiences as well as failing to remember to do something in the future. Both, of course, can prove troublesome for marketing communication. Also, the fact that absent-mindedness is more likely for routine experiences that do not in and of themselves require elaborative encoding (e.g. exposure to advertising) adds to the problem.

THE SIN OF BLOCKING

Blocking is typified by the all-too-familiar experience of recognizing someone but not being able to remember their name. According to Schacter, the sin of blocking involves a different kind of forgetting from absent-mindedness and transience. Unlike absent-mindedness, the memory has been encoded and stored, and in fact a retrieval cue could be in place that would be expected to trigger recall. Unlike problems with transience, the information is still in memory; it just remains tantalizingly out of reach when required.

Blocking is basically associated with names, and therefore potentially a problem for brand names. The problem seems to occur in the left temporal pole, where the fragile link between the characteristics associated with something and the name by which it is known is made. The reason we often have trouble remembering someone’s name is that they are difficult to retrieve because people’s names tend to be isolated from conceptual knowledge.

THE SIN OF MISATTRIBUTION

Perhaps the most common occurrence of the sin of misattribution reflects source misattribution where someone does in fact correctly remember something they have learned, but attribute it to the wrong source. This is often referred to as ‘unconscious transference,’ and is the bane of eyewitness identification. As Schacter has put it: “A strong sense of general familiarity, together with an absence of specific recollection, adds up to a lethal recipe for misattribution.” This is potentially lethal in the case of eyewitness identification. While not as serious, it can certainly be a potential problem with brand benefit associations in memory.

THE SIN OF BIAS

The sin of bias reflects how current understandings, beliefs, and feelings have the ability to distort how we interpret new experiences and our memory of them. Biases that are associated with our memory of past experiences will greatly influence how we perceive and understand new information or situations. Schacter identifies five major types of bias: consistency, change, hindsight, egocentric, and stereotypical biases.

The neurological source of bias seems to come from something in the left brain that Gazzaniga (1998) has called an ‘interpreter’ that continuously draws upon our experiences and understanding of things in order to provide some stability to our psychological world. This interpreter utilizes such things as inferences, rationalizations, and generalizations in relating the past with the present, enabling us to justify our present attitudes with our past experience and feelings. The left brain interpreter, however, is mediated by systems in the right brain that are more attuned to actual representations of what is going on in the world around us.

THE SIN OF PERSISTENCE

As we know, emotionally charged experiences are better remembered than less emotional occasions. Persistence involves remembering things you wish you would forget, and is strongly associated with our emotional experiences.

Research has shown that emotionally-charged information automatically attracts attention; and in the briefest exposure, the emotional significance of a stimuli will be retrieved from nondeclarative emotional memory, evaluated, and mediate how we encode the information. Understanding the emotional associations generated by an advert is critical. Because people are more likely to remember the central focus of emotionally arousing information rather than memory for peripheral details, it is essential to tie the brand in marketing communication to the appropriate emotion. Otherwise, it will become peripheral to the information conveyed (a problem with many highly entertaining adverts).

The seven ‘sins’ of memory, clearly have implications for marketing communication.

Recent work in neurobiology has shown, especially with the advent of fMRIs and PET scans, that memories are not ‘snap shots’ stored in the mind waiting to be recalled. Rather, they are made up of a number of component parts waiting to be reassembled and ‘remembered.’ As a result, a lot of things can interfere with our ability to accurately remember.

It is often used in marketing to trigger positive feelings towards a brand or an idea. Nostalgia triggers a feeling of comfort, warmth, and contentment, so many brands are now using it. It tugs on the audience’s heartstrings and makes them associate your brand with positive feelings.

Nostalgia can also be especially great for a brand because an audience feels less connected to money and is more willing to spend. Between this and the feelings of connectedness that result from nostalgic feelings, incorporating this style of marketing into your campaigns is potentially beneficial for your brand.

How do you create nostalgia in marketing?

Here are six steps to help you create and leverage nostalgia marketing strategies that positively affect your target audience:

Understand your audience.
Identify cultural memories.
Incorporate company history.
Offer something new and familiar.
Listen to your customers.
Use social media.
Consider important company events.

Nostalgia marketing is the strategy of tapping into positive, familiar concepts from previous decades to build trust for new ideas and reinvigorate modern campaigns. In other words, it’s a tactic of associating your company with something that customers already love and have fond memories of.

Nostalgia is a desire to return to an earlier time in life. An example of nostalgia is the craving to be back in college again. The condition of being homesick; homesickness. Reminiscence of the speaker’s childhood or younger years.

Reasons to remember brands over time

Catchy jingles: These are not just sounds, but catchy songs that move the user. These types of emotions are related to happy feelings. The positive side is that if a jingle works, it will stay in the consumer’s mind for a long time. Isn’t that the case with Kit Kat’s jingle?

7 Ways to Get People to Remember Your Brand

Give emotion. People love getting positive emotions.
Get closer to consumers with social media.
Give away promotional gifts.
Share the values of the target audience.
Help solve consumer problems.
Stay consistent with your brand strategy.
Constantly be seen.

Nostalgia campaigns work especially well with Millennials

Reliving positive memories and beloved icons from the past can feel good. We’re all so busy with hectic work schedules, unrelenting responsibilities and more. Fond memories make us smile and that can leave us open to brand messaging.

Studies suggest that nostalgia encourages consumers to spend their money by promising an immediate return in the form of happy memories. The reason why retro marketing has become increasingly popular in recent years is the linking of the brand and the customer at a deeper, emotional level.

Nostalgic attachment: “The product serves as a link with a past self.” Interdependence: “The product is a part of the user’s daily routine.” Love: “The product elicits emotional bonds of warmth, passion or other strong emotion.”

“Nostalgia serves a crucial existential function,” Dr. Routledge says. “It brings to mind cherished experiences that assure us we are valued people who have meaningful lives. Some of our research shows that people who regularly engage in nostalgia are better at coping with concerns about death.”

Branding is important because it sets you apart from your competition and gives your customer a reason to buy from you. Consistent, strategic branding leads to strong brand equity. Your brand is the promise you make to your customer. Your branding tells your story and why you are in business.

The brain simmers with activity. Different groups of neurons (nerve cells), responsible for different thoughts or perceptions, drift in and out of action. Memory is the reactivation of a specific group of neurons, formed from persistent changes in the strength of connections between neurons.

Nostalgia by motivating us to remember the past in our own life helps to unite us to that authentic self and remind us of who we have been and then compare that to who we feel we are today. That gives us a sense of who we want to be down the road in the future.

Nostalgia instigates approach-motivation, “mixing memory and desire,” in the words of Eliot (1888). Specifically, nostalgic memories of one’s best self tend to motivate people to pursue a more idealized self in the future. Sedikides and Wildschut (2020) also found that nostalgia also boosted self-esteem.

Intriguingly, most states of nostalgia are triggered by negative emotions such as loneliness, concerns about death, and even boredom. However, studies show nostalgia can increase feelings of social connectedness and enhance meaning in our lives.

Nostalgia is triggered by something reminding an individual of an event or item from their past. The resulting emotion can vary from happiness to sorrow. The term “feeling nostalgic” is more commonly used to describe pleasurable emotions associated with and/or a longing to go back to a particular period of time.

On average the earliest memories that people can recall point back to when they were just two-and-a-half years old, a new study suggests. On average the earliest memories that people can recall point back to when they were just two-and-a-half years old, a new study suggests.

According to a recent survey, these are the top 10 most common first childhood memories:

Vacation.
First day of school.
Trip to the doctor.
Being outside.
An accident or injury.
A tooth falling out.
Receiving a gift.
Playing with friends.

Nostalgia campaigns work especially well with Millennials

Each stage of the customer journey requires a different approach from the marketer if they want to move customers smoothly down the funnel. The last thing you want to do is send someone the wrong message at the wrong time.

It’s important to note that the sales funnel or buyer’s journey is not a one-size-fits-all model. It varies a lot from brand to brand and there is not a single agreed-upon version of the funnel. Some have more stages than others and give each stage a different name, but the overall idea remains the same. And that overarching idea is to provide your audience with marketing content that is timely, targeted, and relevant.

A consumer-brand relationship, also known as a Brand Relationship is the relationship that consumers think, feel, and have with a product or company brand

While FMCG products are part of the standard retail distribution market, there are practical distinctions that set them apart from general CPG categories. At their core, FMCG products will be used far more frequently than standard products — often daily. This is an important consideration because it enables FMCG brands to grow faster and accrue more value than other CPG brands.

What Makes for a Successful FMCG Brand?

Any successful FMCG product will typically be a low cost but high volume item. While the profit margins from such a product can be quite small, FMCGs lend themselves well to high sales velocity. If a brand can move enough volume, it can generate impressive overall profits. This makes FMCG markets an ideal proving ground for new brands and CPG startups — the low cost gives manufacturers room to experiment.

The drawback is that FMCGs tend to be highly competitive segments where the first impression is crucial. FMCG brands must have a rich understanding of their customers, category, and competition. This understanding will influence everything from promotional strategies — such as launch discounts and holiday sales — to A/B testing of attractive packaging.

Brand personality is a framework that helps a company or organization shape the way people feel about its product, service, or mission. A company’s brand personality elicits an emotional response in a specific consumer segment, with the intention of inciting positive actions that benefit the firm.

Brand value is the monetary worth of your brand, if you were to sell it. If your company were to merge or be bought out by another business, and they wanted to use your name, logo, and brand identity to sell products or services, your brand value would be the amount they would pay you for that right.

As CPG experts have previously noted, FMCG markets are statistically distinct from other markets in terms of sales achievements. Let’s say that an FMCG brand sells $1 million in products that are used daily — such as perishable food or toiletries. That will have a higher impact on the brand’s long-term prospects than a CPG company selling $1 million in ingredients or condiments. This is because FMCG products are used at a faster rate than CPG items, which means customers will replace them more frequently.

What is a core brand idea? A core brand idea is the simple concept that sits at the heart of your business. It is the sum of your philosophy, your essence and your values that inspires everything you do. It is the reason your brand exists, it’s what drives you to deliver value to your customers every day.

FMCG’s typically have a short shelf life, due either to their high turnover or fast deterioration. For example, pre-packaged food, soft drinks, and toiletries are purchased frequently, thus increasing their sales velocity. Meanwhile, FMCGs like meats, fruits, vegetables, dairy, or baked items are perishable — they lose their freshness relatively quickly if unsold.

Brand recall, also known as unaided recall or spontaneous recall, is the capacity consumers have to remember brand names with little prompting. Strong brand recall can translate to valuable brand equity, where a famous brand name leads to increased market share because they’re at the top of customers’ minds.

Why is brand recall important?

Brand recall is important because it improves your chances of being associated with a particular service or product. It gives you a competitive edge and, as long as the sentiment is positive, it is one of the best kinds of free advertising.

The more you remain in your customers and prospect’s minds, the more you increase your market share, and your bottom line. Brand recall also boosts customer retention and loyalty, as people are generally more likely to put their faith in brands that others trust.

The fast-moving-consumer-goods industry has a long history of generating reliable growth through mass brands. But the model that fueled industry success now faces great pressure as consumer behaviors shift and the channel landscape changes. To win in the coming decades, FMCGs need to reduce their reliance on mass brands and offline mass channels and embrace an agile operating model focused on brand relevance rather than synergies.

Brand recall is the top-of-mind recollection of a certain brand when a consumer is asked about a product category. It is a relatively stronger link which leads to final purchase. Brand Recognition is the ability of consumers to identify or recognize the name of a particular brand among other brands

Brand awareness is often the first step to driving performance-marketing goals, such as leads and sales. Make people more aware of your brand — especially by targeting relevant, high-quality audiences — and you increase your chances of generating conversions and dominating your market

Brand recognition is the visual and audio cues people use to identify a brand. Brand awareness, on the other hand, is the knowledge that a brand exists. This is the extent to which the general public knows that a company, along with its products and services are available on the market.

If you are not getting the amount of recognition and sales that you are aiming for, there may be only a small amount of people aware of you. If this is the case, it is time to increase your marketing efforts.

Brand recognition is a feature on the road to brand awareness, but you need to understand both if you’re going to thrive in today’s business world.

Need for studying consumer behaviour

Buyer behavior is studied to predict buyers’ reaction in markets. If a firm understands its customers, it becomes successful in the market place. The success of any business is based on understanding the consumer and providing the kind of products that the consumer wants.

The consumer decides what to buy, when to buy and also what not to buy. One cannot thrust a product on a consumer. A marketer sells what the consumer wants. So, emphasis is placed on knowing what the consumers’ wants are.

Studying consumer behavior is very much emphasized for the following reasons.

To satisfy need of customers

Consumers respond favorably while evaluating the products that best satisfy their needs. A marketer studies how consumers spend their available resources on the consumption of related items. It includes the study of what they buy, when they buy it, where they buy it and how often they use it. So, a knowledge of consumer behavior will be of immense help to the marketer which will help to satisfy their needs.

He can understand the consumer’s reaction to a firm’s marketing strategies. It would help in planning and implementing marketing strategies.

Helps to understand consumer psychology

The study of consumer behavior enables the marketer to understand the psychology of consumers. Consumer psychology is based on his knowledge, attitude, intention and motive.

The psychology of customer develops on the basis of knowledge he has. Sales promotion plays an important role to provide the knowledge of the product to consumers.

Attitude is a state of mind or feeling. Attitude explains behavior. Intention means a desire to do something. A marketing programme is formulated only after understanding the intention of consumers. Motive is the integral state which directs the behavior of a person.

3. Helps to understand consumer motives

A study of the behavior of a consumer is essential to understand his/her buying motives. A motive is an urge for which an individual seeks satisfaction.

Consumers have several motives. All these motives may not have the same intensity of purchase. Only a few motives prompt the consumer to buy a product or service. The study of consumer behavior involves both motives and purchases.

Helps to understand consumer choices

It is important for the marketer to understand how consumers make their choices. Human beings are usually very rational. They make systematic use of information available to them before they buy. A marketer studies the behavior of the customer and accordingly alter his presentation, enticing the customer to go for the product.

Helps to understand consumer preferences

A business firm which is ignorant of consumer preferences cannot succeed in the market place.

Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production. So, a firm must plan its production and distribution to suit the needs of consumers. Thus, the extent of consumer understanding determines the effectiveness of marketing mechanism.

Consumer behavior research helps the marketer to

Satisfy need of customers
Understand consumer psychology
Understand consumer motives
Understand consumer choices
Understand consumer preferences

Consumer Differentiation:

In marketing, consumer differentiation is a way to distinguish a consumer from several other consumers. This helps to make a target group of consumers with the same or similar behavior.

Though you have a targeted customer demographic in your business, you can still have variations between individual customers. Each group of consumers are different and their needs and wants differ from other groups. When a marketer is knowledgeable about the differentiation of each group of consumers, he can design separate marketing programs.

Consumer differentiation will help to tailor your strategies to the needs of varying customer groups. When consumer differentiation is done, you can expand the width and breadth of your services. You will be able to effectively serve a wider group of people.

Retention of Consumers:

“Consumer behavior is of most importance to marketers in business studies as the main aim is to create and retain customers,” says Professor Theodore Levitt (Kumar, 2004).

Consumer behavior is not just important to attract new customers, but it is very important to retain existing customers as well. When a customer is happy about a particular product, he/she will repeat the purchase. Therefore, marketing the product should be done in such a way that it will convince customers to buy the product again and again.

Thus, it is very evident that creating customers and retaining them is very important. This can be done only by understanding and paying attention towards the consumer’s buying behavior.

Design Relevant Marketing Program:

Understanding consumer behavior allows you to create effective marketing campaigns. Each campaign can speak specifically to a separate group of consumers based on their behavior.

For example, while targeting the kid’s market, you may have to look out for venues such as TV ads, school programs, and blogs targeting young mothers. You will need to take different messaging approaches for different consumer groups.

A study of consumer behavior enables marketers to understand what motivates consumers to make purchases. Furthermore, the same motive can be utilized in advertising media to stir the desire to make a purchase. Moreover, marketers should take decisions regarding the brand logo, coupons, packing, and gifts on the basis of consumer behavior.

Predicting Market Trend:

Consumer behavior analysis will be the first to indicate a shift in market trends. For example, the recent trend of consumers is toward environment-friendliness and healthy food. This changing market trend was observed by many brands including McDonalds. Based on consumer behavior, McDonald’s brought healthy food options.

By conducting a consumer behavior study, a company saves a lot of resources that might otherwise be allocated to produce a product that will not be sold in the market. For example, in summer a brand will not waste its resources producing a product that will not sell in summer. Based on consumer behavior the company decides on a production strategy which will save on warehouse costs and marketing costs.

One of the most important reasons to study consumer behavior is to find out answers to some of the questions.

Competition

Innovate New Products

Stay Relevant in the Market

When the world is changing as rapidly as it is happening today, the biggest challenge we all face is staying relevant to our target market. And do you know what is the main reason behind the rapid changes? It is the ever-changing behavior of our customers.

Improve Customer Service

Higher brand recognition generally means higher popularity and therefore greater market share, and vice versa. At the most extreme end of the brand recognition scale, you have companies that are almost synonymous with the service they offer. Think Xerox, Google, and Coca-Cola.

Here are the 5 levels of brand recognition and how you can build your business to improve it:

Brand rejection. If someone associates your brand with something negative, they will purposely avoid your product.
Brand non-recognition.
Brand recognition.
Brand preference.
Brand loyalty.

Measure brand awareness using these ten tactics

Launch a brand awareness survey, stat.
Check your social media followers.
Use Google Trends data.
Let brand tracking software do the heavy lifting.
Look into your brand name mentions.
Look for branded search volume in your Google Analytics.

Have a distinctive personality that is appropriate for your target audience. Be consistent in its messaging and design, reinforcing the position, promise and personality at each touch point. Demonstrate the value that your company provides for the customer, and how that value is created.

The millennial effect

Consumers under 35 differ fundamentally from older generations in ways that make mass brands and channels ill suited to them. They tend to prefer new brands, especially in food products. According to recent McKinsey research, millennials are almost four times more likely than baby boomers to avoid buying products from “the big food companies.”

And while millennials are obsessed with research, they resist brand-owned marketing and look instead to learn about brands from each other. They also tend to believe that newer brands are better or more innovative, and they prefer not to shop in mass channels. Further, they are much more open to sharing personal information, allowing born-digital challenger brands to target them with more tailored propositions and with greater marketing-spend efficiency.

Millennials are generally willing to pay for special things, including daily food. For everything else, they seek value. Millennials in the United States are 9 percent poorer than Gen Xers were at the same age, so they have much less to spend and choose carefully what to buy and where to buy it.

The e-commerce potential for FMCGs could change in the near future. One Neilsen report predicts that by 2022, FMCG e-commerce growth will reach 18.4% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) while total global sales will hit $400 billion. Most of these benefits are expected to be leveraged in the developing world, while developed countries will continue to rely on a balance of in-person and online FMCG sales.