Consumer Attitudes and Behavior when Selecting a Holiday - Assignment Example

Consumer Behavior and Holidays Question Comparing and Contrasting FCB and CBDP Models in Relation to Purchase of a Holiday The two models can be said to be both useful to consumers as they try to make their decisions on what to purchase. The FCB applies the principle of Feel-Do-Learn. What matters is which one of the three comes first. In relation to holiday purchase, most consumers tend not to plan for a holiday according to the case study, and they do not want to begin thinking about what they expect when they get there. Instead, they will see those things when they get there; therefore, there is no need to plan for it. Other consumers of holiday claim that, they might not be able to plan for a holiday successfully since every time they do so, other more important activities come in between and make them think otherwise about having a holiday. This makes holiday to be categorized under the fourth quadrant of self-satisfaction. In this quadrant, the holiday consumer would be having information about a holiday place, they haven’t been to that place before, they haven’t planned to go there but the thought to do so might have just been an impulse one which just came immediately the thought to go for a holiday rung in their minds. They then visit the place, they might feel the place is really refreshing and good for a holiday, after that, they will decide to treat themselves in the holiday place and have some good time. Therefore this is the model of Do-feel-learn. This may contrast a bit with the CBDP model where the holiday consumer will have to recognize the need for the holiday first, they then go on an information search about the best or appropriate place they would want to go to for a holiday, they would then evaluate and analyze the various alternatives they just found from the search to decide on the best and appropriate holiday purchase, they then make the decision to make the appropriate purchase which is making the decision to visit the place of choice, and finally have a post-purchase evaluation on whether the holiday place of choice was the best or failed to meet the expectations (Schiffman, Kanuk, & Hansen.H, 2008). The consumers who use the CBDP model therefore seem to be those consumers who are keen about what they purchase before they do the purchase. They most of the time work on a budget and would choose what will fit in their budget. This therefore is a more appropriate way to do a holiday purchase than to just carry out a blind purchase on something you have no idea about. Question 2 Information Search Process for a Holiday and Other Products Consumers normally carry out information search for all the products before they make the purchases. The information search on these products may be internal, where the search will be dependent upon the customer’s previous experiences on such products to make a base for their current decisions about the product. Consumers may also have to carry out an external search on using various environmental factors and agencies before making their decision to either purchase or not. In such cases, the consumer might be having little of no information or experience about the product, its functionality, brands, price, availability, quality, etc.; therefore, they would have to consult with those who already own such similar products or the expertise who deal in such products such as a brand of a car (Michael, 2010). The consumer may decide to use an agency or middlemen to provide them with sufficient information about the product. On the other hand, the consumer may also decide to visit the local stores for consultation, look for the information from the local newspapers, magazines, Television advertisements and may other sources of media. On the other hand, information search for a holiday may be a bit different and a bit similar to this kind of information search for other products such as household goods or a car. This may be different in the sense that, the consumers normally seek for the first hand information about places to visit. Most of the time, the consumers hardly have any idea about these places, and would totally rely on the external information search to provide them with the information about the holiday product to purchase. They therefore do not have previous experiences which they can use as a base to make the current decisions on purchasing the products. They will have to visit the place for the first time in order to get the experience, and once they get the feeling of that particular place, they wouldn’t be searching for the information about it again in the future, but would just revisit it if they liked it during their first visit. However, this search process may also be applied to other products in situations where the consumer does not have any idea or previous experience about the product; they will need this kind of external information search. The similarities in the search processes can also occur due to the fact that, the places where the search is carried out may be the same, such as in the magazines, newspapers, radios, television advertisements, visiting warehouses or using agencies or middlemen (Palani, 2012). Question 3 Implications of Findings When advising a manager of a holiday company, it would be very important for them to study and know the consumer behavior about the holiday as a product and be able to categorize consumers on the basis of their behaviors so that they might carry out product differentiation and possible market segmentation as well as formulate a pricing policy. This way, the holiday company will be able to have different market segments occupied by different consumers, who enjoy different products packages in the different market segments at different but appropriate prices. The holiday company managers also need to invest a lot in advertising their holiday products in various media. Having found out that consumers for holiday product normally act differently before deciding on making the purchase, where some will have to use the CBDP model while others will use FCB model. In this way, the holiday product consumers will have to make decision to purchase the holiday product without several considerations, hence the managers should make the holiday products always in good and appealing condition for such consumers to come and receive positive response about the place that will make them feel like using the product more and more. The holiday products are always greatly affected by the quality of services offered by the company. Therefore, the company manager must be advised that high quality services should always be offered to the consumers in order to create a positive first impression that will make the consumers like the facility and the services, hence spend more. on the other hand, for the holiday product consumers who follow the CBDP model and go through problem identification, information search, analysis and assessment, our chase as well as poet-purchase analysis, the holiday company manager should be advised to improve on advertisement and publications in order to provide information about their holiday company on various search platforms such as social media, websites, print media, as well as multimedia in order to increase the chances of the company being found during the search by such consumers. Question 4 The traditional theory could have suggested the first quadrant for holidays. This is because the traditional theory also acts more or less like the CBDP model where before a purchase is made, there is a the recognition of the problem, information search, analysis and assessment, purchase and post-purchase evaluation. This looks more of an economic model as there is nothing done without a prior action on the issue. The consumer hence ends up making an informed purchase every time without any misguidance or impulses. The consumer then would use the model of; learn-feel-do which is an informative model. In this case, they would first investigate about the product to learn actually what it is, where, and how it works. They would then try to test the product by carrying out an assessment of the feasibility of the holiday purchase they would want to make, and finally make a decision on whether to purchase or not to. However, the case suggests the fourth quadrant model where most of the consumers of holiday as a product would not mind about carrying out an assessment or a search on the holiday product before its purchase. They would rather just purchase first and find out for themselves whether it is worth it or not. They therefore use the Do-feel-learn model which is a self-satisfaction model. Bibliography Michael, B. (2010). Consumer Buying Behavior:Understanding Five Stages of the Buying Process. Formulis Publication , 1-2. Palani, S. (2012). Consumer Attitudes and Behavior when Selecting a Holiday. Siema Soraya Consumer Journals , 23-25. Schiffman, G., Kanuk, L., & Hansen.H. (2008). Holiday Decision Making. Law Reacher, The Law Essay Professional , 1-12. Read More