A

  • Attitudes: A consumer’s overall evaluation, feelings, or beliefs about a product, brand, or service that influence their purchasing decisions.
  • Affective Responses: Emotional reactions or feelings a consumer experiences when interacting with a product or service.
  • Advertising Appeals: Methods used in marketing to attract consumer attention and generate emotional responses, such as humor, fear, or nostalgia.
  • Alternative Evaluation: The stage in the consumer decision-making process where consumers compare different products or brands before making a purchase.

B

  • Brand Loyalty: A consumer’s preference and consistent purchase behavior toward a particular brand over time, often due to satisfaction or emotional attachment.
  • Behavioral Segmentation: Dividing a market based on consumer behaviors, such as purchasing habits, brand loyalty, and product usage frequency.
  • Buzz Marketing: A strategy to generate word-of-mouth excitement and discussion about a product or service, often using influencers or viral campaigns.

C

  • Cognitive Dissonance: The psychological discomfort consumers feel when their actions or decisions conflict with their beliefs or expectations, often experienced after a purchase.
  • Consumer Decision-Making Process: The steps consumers follow when deciding whether to purchase a product or service, typically including need recognition, information search, evaluation, purchase, and post-purchase behavior.
  • Consumer Involvement: The degree of personal relevance and importance a consumer places on a particular product or decision. High involvement typically involves significant research and consideration.
  • Consumer Perception: How consumers interpret and make sense of information, products, or services, which can influence their attitudes and purchase decisions.
  • Conversion Rate: The percentage of potential customers who take a desired action, such as making a purchase, after engaging with marketing materials or a website.

D

  • Desire: A consumer’s strong emotional wish or want for a product or service, driven by their perceived need and benefits.
  • Differentiation: The process of distinguishing a product from competitors by highlighting unique features, benefits, or qualities that appeal to consumers.

E

  • Emotional Branding: A strategy that focuses on creating an emotional connection between the consumer and the brand to drive loyalty and advocacy.
  • Experience Economy: A trend where consumers seek to purchase experiences rather than just products or services, driven by emotional and sensory engagement.
  • External Influences: Factors such as family, culture, social class, and marketing efforts that impact consumer behavior and decision-making.

F

  • Family Decision-Making: The process by which family members collectively make purchasing decisions, often based on roles, power dynamics, and individual preferences within the household.
  • Framing Effect: The way information or an option is presented to a consumer, influencing how they perceive or evaluate it.

G

  • Groupthink: A phenomenon where individuals in a group tend to conform to the opinions or behaviors of others, potentially affecting individual consumer decisions.

H

  • Habitual Buying Behavior: A type of consumer behavior characterized by frequent purchases of the same product or brand with minimal decision-making effort.
  • Hedonic Consumption: The consumption of products or services for the pleasure or emotional satisfaction they provide, rather than for practical or utilitarian reasons.

I

  • Impulse Buying: Spontaneous, unplanned purchasing decisions often driven by emotions, advertisements, or attractive offers.
  • Internal Influences: Personal factors such as attitudes, perceptions, motives, and past experiences that shape consumer behavior and decision-making.
  • Information Search: The process consumers go through to gather data about products or services before making a purchase decision, which can be influenced by their level of involvement and perceived risk.

J

  • Jargon: Specialized language or terminology used in marketing or branding to communicate more effectively with certain consumer segments.

K

  • Knowledge Economy: A concept where the value of products or services is derived from the information or knowledge it provides to consumers.

L

  • Loyalty Programs: Rewards or incentives offered to encourage repeat purchases and customer retention, such as points systems or membership benefits.
  • Lifestyle Segmentation: Dividing a market based on consumers’ lifestyle choices, behaviors, activities, interests, and opinions.

M

  • Motivation: The underlying drive or reason that compels consumers to take action, including intrinsic motivations (personal satisfaction) and extrinsic motivations (external rewards).
  • Market Segmentation: The practice of dividing a larger market into smaller groups of consumers with similar needs, characteristics, or behaviors to target them more effectively.
  • Marketing Mix: The combination of product, price, place, and promotion strategies used to meet the needs of the target market and influence consumer behavior.

N

  • Need Recognition: The first stage in the consumer decision-making process, where consumers recognize a problem or need that requires a solution.
  • Neuro-Marketing: The use of neuroscience and psychological principles to analyze consumer responses to marketing stimuli and predict purchasing behavior.

P

  • Post-Purchase Behavior: The consumer’s actions and reactions after purchasing a product or service, including satisfaction, cognitive dissonance, and the likelihood of repeat purchases or brand advocacy.
  • Personal Selling: A direct, interpersonal method of communication used by salespeople to persuade consumers to purchase products or services.
  • Price Sensitivity: The degree to which consumers are influenced by price when making purchasing decisions, with some consumers being highly price-sensitive and others less affected.

Q

  • Quality Perception: A consumer’s judgment of a product or service’s quality, which can be influenced by factors such as branding, price, and prior experiences.

R

  • Reference Group: A group that influences an individual’s purchasing decisions and behaviors, such as friends, family, coworkers, or social influencers.
  • Rational Buying Behavior: Consumer behavior driven primarily by logical decision-making processes and based on practical considerations such as functionality, price, and quality.
  • Repeat Purchase Behavior: When consumers repeatedly buy the same product or brand over time, typically due to satisfaction, convenience, or brand loyalty.

S

  • Social Proof: The psychological phenomenon where consumers are more likely to purchase something if they see others (family, friends, influencers) doing the same, often used in testimonials or reviews.
  • Subcultures: Groups within a society that share distinct values, behaviors, and characteristics, which can influence consumer behavior. Examples include ethnic, religious, and hobby-based subcultures.
  • Satisfaction: The feeling of contentment or fulfillment that a consumer experiences after purchasing and using a product or service, influencing repeat purchase behavior and brand loyalty.

T

  • Trigger Events: External or internal events that prompt consumers to begin the purchasing process, such as a change in lifestyle, an advertisement, or a special offer.
  • Transactional Buying Behavior: A purchase behavior driven by completing a transaction or fulfilling a specific need without emotional attachment or brand preference.

U

  • Utilitarian Consumption: Consumption driven by the practical or functional benefits a product offers, such as efficiency, convenience, or value for money.

V

  • Valence: The emotional value or intensity that a consumer associates with a product, brand, or experience, which can either be positive (pleasure) or negative (discomfort).
  • Viral Marketing: A marketing strategy that encourages consumers to share content with others, typically through social media, creating a viral spread of information and increasing product awareness.

W

  • Word-of-Mouth (WOM): The spread of information and recommendations about a product or service through informal conversations, often influencing consumer trust and purchasing decisions.

X

  • X-Factor: A unique and compelling characteristic or attribute of a product, brand, or experience that differentiates it and captures the consumer’s attention.

Y

  • Youth Marketing: Marketing strategies targeted at younger generations, often involving trends, social media platforms, and brand experiences that resonate with youth culture.

Z

  • Zero Moment of Truth (ZMOT): The moment when a consumer researches a product or service online before making a decision, often after seeing an advertisement or word-of-mouth recommendation.