Consumer Behavior

Chapter 7
Consumer Learning

NMIMS T4
July 2022 1
 Consumer Hat Exercise
 Think of anything you have ‘learnt’ to some level.
• Indoor game or outdoor game
• Singing, dancing, or playing musical instrument
• Painting or any craft
• Driving

Think about how you moved from not knowing anything to

reaching some level of proficiency

What do you learn about the learning process. 2

What Is Consumer Learning?
Why is it important in Marketing?

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The Textbook Definition of Consumer Learning

“Consumer learning is the process by which individuals

acquire knowledge about products and brands. And, use
that knowledge and experience to know which brands
best meet their needs”
“Consumer learning is the process by which individuals
acquire the purchase and consume knowledge and
experiences to use for related behaviour in the future”

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 Criticality of Marketing
Consumer learn from experience, observation and
interaction with others.

Marketing stimuli (product organoleptic, packaging, communication,

price) is an important source of consumer learning.
Word of mouth is a critical contributor to learning and influences
decisions.

Understanding consumer learning process is – critical to building the

marketing cues/brand offer.
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 Consumer Hat Exercise
 Think about 1 or 2 cases where you have switched brands. How did
it happen? How did you go about?

 Think about 1 or 2 important decisions you or your friends have

made. How did they go about making the decision? How did they
get to the final decision? What steps and influences.

What do you learn about the Consumer learning process. 6

 Marketing Hat Exercise

Reflect on the process of decision making …the learning

process in consumer decision making?

What steps? What is the process?

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 Elements of Consumer Learning
Drive or motivation Cues Response Reinforcement

• Unfulfilled needs – • Internal or External • Reaction/ learning • Satisfaction with

naturally happening or stimuli. from the cue experience
triggered
• Images/Association/ • Satisfaction and good
• • Marketing stimuli is
Lead to motivation/ Impressions stored feelings arousing
drive for learning a component
• Purchase and use stimuli
experience

Inner Brain workings

Consumer Learning

Perception
The learning from an episode – stored in consumer memory (altering
previous knowledge) for future use 8
 Consumer Hat Exercise
 A multinational is all set to launch a new brand of room fabric
fresheners. It’s a colorless, odorless spray (for rooms), liquid for
fabric
 It deodorizes the room and and disinfects the clothes

Think as a consumer ... What do you think of this brand? How well
do you think it will do in the marketplace? Will you buy it? Why?
Why not?

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 Consumer Hat Exercise
 The MNC had nice mildly fragrant fabric softener in developed
markets for machine wash
 It brought it to emerging markets in Asia and launched across
multiple markets

What do you think of it? How well do you think it did in the
marketplace?
Will you buy it? Why? Why not?

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 Consumer Learning
“Applied to New Products Launch”
Product Launch Contradicting Product Launch Contradicting
elements of learning elements of learning Consumer learning Relevant Relaunch

P&G launched Febreze as P&G launched Downy as a fabric

colorless, odorless spray for
stinky clothes/rooms
Assumption: Bad smell was
noticed and a consumer
problem
Reality: Poor sales - People who
lived with bad smells did not
notice it
softener was post wash with a
very mild fragrance
Assumption: People notice rough
clothes and need soft clothes.
Softness can be felt easily by touch
Reality: Poor sales - People did not notice
rough/harsh clothes post wash, the
ambient smells are strong in emerging Asia
and mild fragrance was not even noticed
Research Learning: Homemakers cleaned and tidied up a
room without noticing any mild bad odor since they are used
to it. Washed fabric from the machine is collected after
drying, when the mild perfume was lost in ambient smell
and perfume/softness not noticed
Marketing Action: Strong fragrance air freshener (Febreze) and a
strong perfumed Downy launched
Learning Process: Dirty room/ clothes requiring cleaning; normal
cleaning act triggered

Learning: P&G was trying to get
consumers learn a new
behaviour. But, the step on
motivation triggering and
relevant cues were absent in the
learning process
Learning: P&G was trying to get
consumers learn a new
Cues and Reinforcement: Spraying the room to enhance
behaviour. But, the step on
and feel good about cleaning; Adding fabric softener to
motivation triggering and
cycle and feeling & smelling dry clothes. Feeling good of a
relevant cues were absent in the
well-done cleaning that’s complete
learning process 11
 Relevant Principles to Remember
 ‘Brain’ plays a key role in learning – processes information from all senses as we
interact with the world
 The environment is rich with stimuli (marketeer and others) to trigger brain
processing

 Brain learns by making connections (Associations) between new information and

the one already in their memory. It then accepts, organises, stores the new
information

 The way information is received and interpreted is influenced by Family, Social and
Cultural contexts and what’s stored already in the brain.
 Different people learn differently
 You can consciously “think and learn”. You can also feel, emote and learn.
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 Consumer Hat Exercise

 Can you think of some examples of “Thinking and learning” and

some examples of “feeling and learning”
 Can you think of some examples in marketing

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 Consumer Hat Exercise

 What is a prerequisite for starting off the learning

process

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 Starting Point: For Good Learning
 Involvement – Consumer involvement in the learning process

Also known
 Consumers are exposed to many stimuli in a day.
 They are not in a perceptual state of unfulfilled needs.

Related Reality
 Most learning is passive – collecting and some level of processing
information – without being involved.
Marketing challenge – moving consumers from passive to active
learning and influencing low involvement consumers. 15
 Consumer Hat Exercise
 Think of a few ads/Posts you have seen recently and watched it with high involvement

interest.

 Think of a few products that you saw in a shop shelf in the last 6 months and got to

consider it closely, see it and buy it – though you had not thought of buying that

brand or product earlier (?)

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 Leveraging Consumer Involvement
In Communication
 Involving creative context – Emotive pay offs, engaging plot

In Product Communication
 Problem- solution  Performance demonstration
 Comparative superiority

In Point of Purchase
 Location and accessibility
 Shelf display, discounts, loyalty points.

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 Consumer Hat Exercise
 Can you think of some products that you as a consumer feel that they are low
involvement products for people like you? What are these products?

 Why is the involvement low?

Marketing Hat Perspective

 Can you think of how you can increase consumer involvement for these products?
 What all can a marketer do?

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Influencing Low Involvement Consumers

1. Increasing involvement by linking to issue

* Fairness creams or smoking or drink & drive!

2. Increasing involvement by linking to activity

* Energy drinks  “Take a break” for KitKat.

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Influencing Low Involvement Consumers
3. Reinforcing “low involvement” buying (For Bigger Brands)
* Loyalty programs  Reinforcing communication  Visibility

4. Shifting to cognitive learning

* Status quo challenging communication
“one more toothpaste” Hindu ads “Youth is watching you campaign”
* Discounts, trial promotions

5. Segmenting consumers on involvement and using different

strategies.
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 The Theories of Learning
 Cognitive learning
• More involved, a bit more conscious
• Need to know how ‘brain’ works

 Behavioral learning
• Less to do with understanding of internal brain processes
and more to do with understanding of “What response to
which stimulus”
• Relevant for low involvement learning as well

Behavioral Economics has its roots in Behaviourial learning

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Behavioral Learning Theories

 Classical conditioning (OB)

 Instrumental conditioning
(reinforcement)

 Observational learning (Routine)

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 Classical Conditioning
An automated response
that builds up with
repeated exposure to
stimuli and
reinforcement of
response

Behavioral scientist see this as “cognitive associative learning”.

Not just automated response, but acquisition of new knowledge –
using perceptual relationships, own conceptions and logical relations. 23
 Essential Requirement
• Repetition

Not Known
• How much is enough

The practice
• Empirical studies - no universal rules

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 Application Areas

 Stimulus generalisations  House brands, line extensions,

licensing
• HUL  Tata  Dettol Soap
• Disney Branding  Ninja/Superman branding
• Collaterals for events/places

 Stimulus discriminations  Brand positioning

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 CHE

BRAND DISCRIMINATION APPLICATION

APPLE
https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=3zyeSTEcNgk

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Brand Positioning Applications
J&N

Aaj India me kya chal raha

hai? Thanda matlab?
______Itni chocolaty kyu
hai?
Projective techniques you
know! 27
 Brand Positioning Application
Asian Paints Festival
Campaigns

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uvn171XY_3k

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4MLu1WkS7s&feature=emb_rel_end
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 Some Conditioning Concepts
To Remember
Instrumental/operant or Reinforcement Schedule
Experiential conditioning

• Trial and error learning • Positive or negative

• Storing outcome for future
• Continuous, fixed ratio or variable
-----------------------------
• The new dress buying scenario • Intangible vs tangible
• Coffee buying case

Decay – when reinforcement weakness

Extinction – when the association is broken (bad experience) 29
 Observational or Vicarious Learning
 Learning by seeing others whom you believe or look up to
(role model )
 Imagining yourself as one of the casts and experiencing and
internalizing the communications

Application Areas

Celebrity use/testimonials
Involving creative communication where consumers imagine
themselves as the main character in the communication
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 Cognitive Learning
 Looks at humans as ‘logical beings’ making choices
based on thinking and reasoning – looking for solutions
to everyday problems.

 Involves deliberate mental processing of information.

Related requirement: Understanding “Information Processing”
in our brains.
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 Information Processing
Repetition

Elaboration
& Encoding
Sensory Retrieval Working Long-Term
Sensory Input
Store Initial Memory Retrieval
Memory
processing

Forgotten Forgotten Forgotten

Lost Lost Extinct – Not
available

Response

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 Information Processing

Stages • Receptions, Storage, Retention and Retrieval.

• Rehearsal, Elaboration & Encoding, Visual Memory and

Elements
Language Processing, Grouping and Chunking.

Memory • Episodic or Semantic

Components

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 Cognitive Learning Model
Generic States of Cognitive Learning Tri-Component Attitude Model
• Definition—All attitudes have three
• Knowledge components
• Evaluation • Cognitive
• Behavior • Affective
• Conative

Aida Innovation Adoption

• Definition—Developed to explain how • Definition—Developed by Everett
marketing and selling messages engage Rogers to explain how consumers
consumers adopt new products and services
• Attention Put it in • Awareness
• Interest and Desire any given • Interest and Evaluation
• Action context! • Trial and Adoption

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Learning Outcome Measures

Intermediate
Learning  Recognition, Recall-brand, message
Measure

Intermediate
Brand  Brand Image/Personality
Measures

End
Effect  Behaviour – Purchase and use
Measures
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 To Look At Next

How Learning Impacts Perceptions and

Attitudes (Intermediate Stages)

Resulting in Final Behaviour

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 Chapter 7 :Learning Summary
 Consumer learning is the process by which individuals acquire knowledge about
products and brands to-know which ones best fit their needs for future
purchase/use. Understanding consumer learning process is critical to building
marketing offers/cues
 The steps in the learning process are: Drive or motivation, Cues/stimuli, Response,
Reinforcement. Learning from every episode is stored in consumers’ memory
altering any previous learnings. Our brains play a key role – by making connections
between new information and that already in memory
 Most learning is passive and the marketing challenge is to move consumers from
passive to active learning. The techniques to influence low involvement consumers
are – Linking to an involving issue, linking to a specific activity/time of day,
reinforcing low involvement (for bigger brands), shifting to cognitive learning

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 Chapter 7 :Learning Summary
 Behavioural learning is the theory of learning focussing more on stimulus response and less
on internal brain processes. The relevant theories/concepts are – Classical Conditioning,
Instrumental or Operant Conditioning, Observational & Vicarious learning
 Classical conditioning that builds up an automated response is also seen as ‘Cognitive
Associative’ Learning. The relevant application areas are in stimulus generalisation (House
brands, Line extensions, Licensing) and Stimulus discrimination for brand positioning.
 Instrumental conditioning is essentially experiential learning. Cognitive learning requires
understanding of information processing. There are different cognitive learning models. The
most used one is AIDA model – Awareness, Interest, Desire, Action. The mental processes
are: Reception; Rehearsal, Elaboration & Encoding for storage, Grouping & Chunking for
Retention and then Retrieval
 Recognition, Recall are intermediate learning measures, Brand Image, Brand Relationships
are intermediate Brand Measures of learning impact and Purchase and use are end impact
measures
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THANK YOU

payal.trivedi@sbm.nmims.edu

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