Page 186 - Marketing Management

ANALYZING CONSUMER MARKETS | CHAPTER 6 163

Learning

When we act, we learn. Learning induces changes in our behavior arising from experience. Most
human behavior is learned, although much learning is incidental. Learning theorists believe learn-
ing is produced through the interplay of drives, stimuli, cues, responses, and reinforcement. Two
popular approaches to learning are classical conditioning and operant (instrumental) conditioning.
A drive is a strong internal stimulus impelling action. Cues are minor stimuli that determine
when, where, and how a person responds. Suppose you buy an HP computer. If your experience is
rewarding, your response to computers and HP will be positively reinforced. Later, when you want
to buy a printer, you may assume that because it makes good computers, HP also makes good
printers. In other words, you generalize your response to similar stimuli. A countertendency to gen-
eralization is discrimination. Discrimination means we have learned to recognize differences in
sets of similar stimuli and can adjust our responses accordingly.
Learning theory teaches marketers that they can build demand for a product by associating it
with strong drives, using motivating cues, and providing positive reinforcement. A new company
can enter the market by appealing to the same drives competitors use and by providing similar
cues, because buyers are more likely to transfer loyalty to similar brands (generalization); or the
company might design its brand to appeal to a different set of drives and offer strong cue induce-
ments to switch (discrimination).
Some researchers prefer more active, cognitive approaches when learning depends on the infer-
ences or interpretations consumers make about outcomes (was an unfavorable consumer experi-
ence due to a bad product, or did the consumer fail to follow instructions properly?). The hedonic
bias occurs when people have a general tendency to attribute success to themselves and failure to
external causes. Consumers are thus more likely to blame a product than themselves, putting pres-
sure on marketers to carefully explicate product functions in well-designed packaging and labels,
instructive ads and Web sites, and so on.

Emotions
Consumer response is not all cognitive and rational; much may be emotional and invoke different
kinds of feelings. A brand or product may make a consumer feel proud, excited, or confident. An ad
may create feelings of amusement, disgust, or wonder.
Here are two recent examples that recognize the power of emotions in consumer decision making.
• For years, specialty foam mattress leader Tempur-Pedic famously used infomercials showing
that a wine glass on its mattress did not spill even as people bounced up and down on the bed.
To create a stronger emotional connection, the company began a broader-based media cam-
paign in 2007 that positioned the mattresses as a wellness brand and “the nighttime therapy
for body and mind.” 44
• Reckitt Benckiser and Procter & Gamble launched advertising approaches in 2009 for Woolite
and Tide, respectively, that tapped not into the detergents’ performance benefits but into the
emotional connection—and challenges—of laundry. Based on research showing that one in
three working women recognize they ruined some of their clothes in the wash over the last
year, Reckitt Benckiser launched an online and in-store “Find the Look, Keep the Look” style
guide for Woolite for “finding fashion and keeping it looking fabulous without breaking the
bank.” Based on the premise that a detergent should do more than clean, P&G positioned new
Tide Total Care as preserving clothing and keeping the “7 signs of beautiful clothes,” including
shape, softness, and finish. 45

Memory

Cognitive psychologists distinguish between short-term memory (STM)—a temporary and lim-
ited repository of information—and long-term memory (LTM)—a more permanent, essentially
unlimited repository. All the information and experiences we encounter as we go through life can
end up in our long-term memory.
Most widely accepted views of long-term memory structure assume we form some kind of asso-
46
ciative model. For example, the associative network memory model views LTM as a set of nodes
and links. Nodes are stored information connected by links that vary in strength. Any type of infor-
mation can be stored in the memory network, including verbal, visual, abstract, and contextual.