Customer Buying Behavior

The main aim of the marketing is to meet and satisfy target customer need and wants buyer behavior refers to the people of organization conduct activity and together with impact of various influence on them towards making decision on purchase of product and service in a market. The field of the customer behavior studies how individuals, group and organization select, buy, use and dispose of goods, service, ideas or experience to satisfied their needs and desire understanding consumer behavior and knowing customer are never simple. The wealth of products and service produced in a company make our economy strong. The behavior of human being during the purchase is being termed as ''Buyer behavior". Customer one says one thing but do another. They may not be in touch with their deeper motivations. They are responding to influence that chain their mind at the last minute. A buyer makes take a decision whether save or spend the money.

"Buyer behavior is all psychological, social and physical behaviors of potential customer as they become aware of evaluate, purchase, consumer and tell others about product & service."

CONSUMER BUYING DECISION PROCESS:There are a following five stage in consumer buying process.

1. Problem Identification:The buying process starts with when buyer recognizes a problem or need. The need can be internal or external stimuli. Marketers need to identify the circumstance that trigger a particular need. By gathering information from number of the customers, marketers can identify the most frequent stimuli that spark and interest in a product category. They can then develop marketing strategies that trigger consumer interest.

2. Information search:The consumer tries to collect the information regarding various products and service. Through gathering the information, the consumer learns about completing brand and their features. Information may be collected from magazine, newspaper, retailer, friends, family, members, telephone dictionary, business association, etc. marketers should find out the sources of information and their relative degree of important to consumers.

Personal sources: - Family, friends, neighbor, etc. Commercial sources: - Advertising, sales person, dealers, packaging. Public sources: - mass media, consumer, rating organizations.

3. Evaluation of alternative:There is a no single process used by all consumers by one consumer in all situations. There is several first, the consumer processes, some basic concept are: First the consumer is trying to satisfy needs. Second, the consumer is looking for certain benefit for product solutions. The marketer must know which criteria the consumer will use in the purchase decision.

4. Choice of purchasing decision:From among the purchase of alternatives the consumer makes solution. It may be to buy or not. If the decision is to buy. The other additional decision are : Which type of bike he must buy? From whom to buy a bike? How the payment to be made? And so on The marketers up to this stage have tried every means to influence the purchase behavior, but the choice is properly consumers. In the evaluation stage the consumer forms preference among the brand in the choice set. The consumer may also form an intension to but the most preferred brand.

5. Post Purchase Behavior:After purchase the product, the consumer will experience the same level of product. The marketer's job not end when the is buying must monitor post-purchase satisfaction, post- purchase action, post purchase use and disposal.

(1) Post purchase action:The customer, satisfaction or dissatisfaction with the product influence subsequent behavior. if the customer satisfied, he or she will exhibit a higher probability of purchasing the product again. Dissatisfaction of consumer may abandon and return the product.

(2) Post-purchase use or disposal:The marketer should also monitor new buyers use dispose of the product. If the consumer store the product in a close, the product is probably not very satisfying. If the consumer throws the product away, the marketers needs to know how they dispose of it; especially it can be hurt the environment.

Characteristic of buyer behaviors:The chief characteristics of the buyer behavior are as follow: It consists of mental and physical activities which consumer undertakes to get goods and services and obtain satisfaction from them. It includes both observable activities such as the walking through the market to examine merchandise and making a purchase and mental activities such as forming attitudes, perceiving advertising material, and learning to prefer particular brands. Consumer behaviors are very complex and dynamic to constantly changing. And therefore, management need to adjust with the change otherwise market may be lot. The individuals specific behavior in the market place is affected by internal factor, such as need, motives, perception, attitudes, as well as by external of environmental influence such as the family, social groups, culture, economics and business influences.

MAJOR STEPS IN CONSUMER RESEARCH PROCESS

The major steps in consumer research process include: 1. Defining the Objectives of Research The first and most difficult step in the consumer research process is designing the objectives of research. What is the research being carried out for? For example to: Segment the market for bicycles Learn about consumers attitudes about on-line shopping Determine how many households use e-mails? Carefully designed statement helps determine type and levelof information needed. Purpose of study determines what kind of research will be undertaken, whether it will be qualitative research or quantitative research.

If the purpose of study is to come up with new ideas for promotional campaigns then qualitative study is usually undertaken. Respondents spend time with highly trained interviewer-analyst who interview them and analyses their responses. If the purpose of study is find out how many respondents use certain products and how frequently then quantitative study that can be computerized may be used Sometimes the researchers don't know what questions to ask. In such cases small scale Exploratory Research is carried out before conducting a full scale study. This is done in order to explore the main issues 2. Collecting and Evaluating Secondary Data Second step of the research is to collect secondary data. Secondary information is data originally generated for some purpose other than the present research objectives. Such data may be collected from earlier in-house studies or customer's information collected by the firm's sales or credit department 3. Designing a Primary Research Study Primary Information is original research conducted by individual researchers and organizations to meet with specific objectives. Secondary research provides sufficient insight into the clues and directions for the design of primary information Primary research is conducted when detailed information on consumers' purchasing patterns or product usage is required or the consumers' socio-cultural or psychological information is needed. Research to secure such information is more costly and time consuming than secondary research Syndicated Data It is often very costly to collect primary data. Many companies routinely purchase syndicated data on consumption patterns. Syndicated data are data of interest to a large number of users that are collected periodically and compiled and analyzed according to a standard procedure; then sold to interested buyers Design of Primary research Design of a primary research is based upon the purposes of study Qualitative Study: To get new ides Quantitative Study: Descriptive Information