consumer behavior qualitative research

Why qualitative market research is essential for understanding consumer behavior

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Highlights:

Qualitative market research is essential for deciphering evolving consumer behavior and meeting modern marketing challenges.
It distinguishes itself from quantitative research through its distinct approach and the types of insights it uncovers.
It uncovers the 'why' behind consumer choices, offering insights into motivations and emotions.
Qualitative methods include focus groups, in-depth interviews, ethnographic studies, observations, and content analysis for deep insights into consumer behavior.
Uncover the application of this research type, its ethical considerations, challenges and benefits of adoption, and more.

What do my prospects think about my offering? What can I do to change their minds? Who can I use to make a more convincing pitch? How will a particular target audience react if I package it in this manner? These are just a few questions amid changing consumer behavior, information overload to data privacy regulations, and shortened attention spans; hurdles that marketers face today. To overcome them and thrive amidst breakneck competition, businesses are increasingly turning to qualitative market research.

Why? Because goes beyond mere statistics, offering insights, quite literally, into the ‘why’ behind consumer behavior. By delving into the underlying motivations, attitudes, and emotions that drive choices, qualitative research equips marketers to adapt to shifting behaviors, personalize their strategies, navigate data privacy concerns, and craft compelling messages.

Moreover, understanding consumer behavior is the foundation of any marketing strategy as it shapes how products are designed, priced, promoted, and distributed. Understanding the intricate web of consumer choices helps businesses tailor their offerings, enhance customer satisfaction, and ultimately boost profitability.

How is qualitative research different from quantitative?

Qualitative research differs from quantitative research, which focuses on numerical data and statistical analysis. While quantitative research provides data on what, when, and how much, qualitative market research answers the ‘why’ and ‘how’ questions, providing deeper insights into consumer behavior. For instance, consider a market researcher trying to understand why a specific brand of smartphones is gaining popularity.

A qualitative approach might involve conducting in-depth interviews with consumers, allowing them to express their sentiments, experiences, and the reasons they are drawn to the product. This approach unveils the intricacies of consumer preferences and the emotional factors influencing their choices, which quantitative data alone cannot provide.

What are the different ways of conducting quantitative research to understand consumer behvaior?

1. Focus groups

These involve small, diverse groups of participants engaging in guided discussions about a specific product or topic. This method is excellent for uncovering consumer perceptions and attitudes. For example, a focus group can reveal why a new cereal brand is preferred over traditional ones by analyzing consumer discussions.

2. In-depth interviews

These are one-on-one conversations online or offlline between researchers and participants. They allow for a deeper exploration of individual experiences and motivations. Interviews are often used to understand why some customers prefer online shopping over physical retail, for instance.

3. Ethnographic studies

Here, researchers immerse themselves in the consumers’ environment, observing and interacting with them. For instance, a researcher living with a family to understand their dietary habits and preferences can uncover valuable insights for a food company.

4. Mystery shoppers / Observations

Direct observations involve researchers watching consumers in their natural settings. This method is particularly useful for understanding non-verbal behaviors and interactions. For example, observing how shoppers navigate a store can reveal what influences their purchasing decisions.

5. Content analysis

This approach involves studying textual, visual, or audio materials to extract meaningful insights. Analyzing customer reviews of a product can provide an understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of that product in the eyes of consumers.

6. Online customer communities, bulletin boards, chat rooms

These enable extensive geographic input, ideal for focused interest groups. Participants use text, video, and images to discuss their online customer journeys, either in group or one-on-one settings with moderators. Bulletin boards facilitate dynamic discussions by allowing visitors to respond to posted topics.

Related reading: How to tackle challenges of conducting focus groups studies in qualitative research

What makes examining customer behavior so important?

Purchasing power is crucial to consider. Even wealthy customers have budgets, so purchasing power plays a significant role in their buying decisions.
Well-designed marketing campaigns can persuade customers to switch brands or choose more expensive products when they resonate with the customers’ needs.
Personality traits like an individual’s background and upbringing shape their personality, which, in turn, affects their behavior in different situations.
Personal preferences to some extent remain steadfast. In the realm of advertising, for example, a vegan won’t buy animal-based products.
Economic conditions influence customer behavior. Positive conditions encourage indulgence, while negative economic situations lead to more frugal spending and increased demand for promotions.
Peer pressure and others’ opinions tangibly impact buying and usage decisions, with the potential to drive brand advocacy or reputational damage.
Social trends disseminated through various media platforms, determine what is popular and socially acceptable, offering opportunities for marketers to align their strategies with ongoing trends.

Benefits of using qualitative market research

Better contextual understanding: Qualitative research uncovers the ‘why’ and ‘how’ behind situations, providing a deeper, more contextual comprehension.
Unearthing unique insights: Open-ended questions reveal answers that quantitative surveys can’t capture, unveiling diverse perspectives.
Context-driven: By delving into motivations and past behaviors, researchers can discern their target market’s needs and preferences.
No tool dependency: Open-ended questions eliminate the need for scales or numerical measurements, streamlining the research process.
Smaller sample sizes: Smaller samples enable in-depth analysis, leading to more accurate hypotheses and conclusions.
Inspirational: Qualitative responses can inspire new research studies, fostering ongoing exploration.
Flexibility and detail: Without reliance on scales, researchers can craft creative and detailed questions, focusing on subtleties for robust insights.

Limitations

Researcher dependence: Qualitative research relies on researchers’ expertise, and not all may be well-versed in the subject matter.
Lack of statistical representation: It gathers perspective-based data rather than statistical measurements, limiting comparisons but not precise measurements.
Data replication challenges: Individual perspectives make replicating findings difficult, hindering the formation of definitive conclusions.
Researcher bias: Both conscious and subconscious researcher biases can impact the data and influence conclusions, necessitating the use of controls in data collection to mitigate this issue.

Related reading: Understanding consumer behavior to increase conversion

Qualitative market research in action

A prominent global health insurance provider sought to enhance its marketing effectiveness by understanding consumer behavior and attitudes across 12 countries. They catered to diverse customer segments, including students, working professionals, and retirees, offering various insurance options. Netscribes developed a comprehensive solution that involved a hybrid methodology combining telephonic and online interviews with representative customer subsets.

Over 2000 interviews gathered insights on brand preferences, perceptions, and competitive positioning, while a consumer journey analysis revealed factors influencing purchase decisions. By tracking brand health metrics yearly, the client identified preferred insurance providers, market players, claim types, competitor focus areas, and customer segments. This data empowered the client to adjust marketing strategies, refine brand messaging, and enhance product offerings, ultimately improving their marketing effectiveness.

When should you use qualitative market research?

When considering the application of qualitative research, it’s essential to align it with your business strategy, marketing objectives, and specific needs. Qualitative research is primarily aimed at comprehending a phenomenon, be it a problem, an insufficiency, or any other occurrence, by investigating its causes, motivations, objectives, and potential solutions. This is achieved by scrutinizing smaller segments of a population.

Utilize qualitative research when you seek to gain a unique understanding of a particular event or situation. It proves particularly valuable when examining how your target audience perceives specific circumstances and their emotional responses to them.

The significance of qualitative research becomes evident through several key aspects:

Uncovering emotional bonds: It allows brands to decipher the emotional connections customers establish with their products or services.
Identifying experience gaps: Qualitative research helps pinpoint shortcomings in customer experiences (CX) and user experiences (UX).
Tailored experiences: It empowers brands to craft experiences that are finely tailored to their specific target audience.
Improvement insights: Businesses can gain insights into enhancing their products, services, or overall CX.
Sensitive topics discovery: Qualitative research reveals customer experiences associated with sensitive subjects and language.
Competitive benchmarking: It aids businesses in understanding how customers compare their brand to competitors.
Innovative solutions: Identifies potential solutions and innovations derived from customer attitudes and experiences.

To effectively analyze qualitative market research, begin by defining your research subject and selecting the type of research aligned with the five qualitative research categories. Develop a set of questions that will serve as the foundation for your research. During the research process, diligently record your observations, whether digitally or through other means. For example, record interviews and securely store survey data in a well-organized database.

Incorporate open-ended questions in surveys, interviews, focus groups, and similar methods. Additionally, gather supplementary research materials such as government documents, niche-related articles, images, videos, and more.

To draw meaningful insights, search for patterns or similarities within your findings. Group these insights, organizing them by demographics if applicable, to derive conclusions and propose potential solutions effectively.

Ethical considerations to bear in mind

In the realm of ethical considerations in qualitative market research, several vital aspects come to the forefront. One essential element is the need for informed consent and privacy safeguards, ensuring that participants fully comprehend the research’s purpose and their rights, while also preserving their privacy, especially when sensitive topics are involved.

Additionally, maintaining transparency in reporting is paramount for upholding the research’s integrity, necessitating the disclosure of methodologies and any potential conflicts of interest. Ethical guidelines underscore the importance of avoiding manipulation or exploitation of participants, reinforcing the imperative adherence to ethical standards throughout the research process.

Technology applications aiding qualitative research

Studies such as these can now be significantly enhanced with the advancement of technology and science-based biometric tools, such as eye tracking and facial coding. These rely on actual versus reported behavior and attitudes providing more reliable and accurate insight. It’s by combining these advanced techniques with traditional qualitative approaches that you can truly unravel the complexities of today’s environment and gain the insight needed to develop superior shopper solutions. As we look to the future, the integration of AI, virtual reality, and enhanced data visualization techniques will undoubtedly reshape the landscape of qualitative research, making it an even more powerful tool for understanding consumer behavior.

Consumer behavior is in constant flux, evolving rapidly over time. What was effective a decade ago may no longer apply today in the complex realm of modern consumerism. In this dynamic landscape, qualitative market research emerges as a vital tool, dissecting your target market to forge a tangible strategy.

To ensure your endeavors yield valuable insights, partnering with a seasoned qualitative research agency is imperative. Netscribes has been a trusted partner for Fortune 500 companies and promising startups alike, collaborating to address industry disruptions, decipher evolving consumer trends, harness technological innovations, and expedite corporate expansion. To explore how our expertise can assist your business in conducting impactful qualitative market research studies to extract actionable consumer insights , reach out to us.

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Understanding the Depths of Qualitative Business Research: A Journey into Understanding Consumer Behavior

In the ever-evolving landscape of business, understanding consumer behavior stands as a cornerstone for success. Every decision, from product development to marketing strategies, hinges upon a deep comprehension of what drives consumers’ choices. This is where qualitative business research steps in, offering a journey into the intricate realms of the consumer psyche. Join us as we explore the significance of qualitative research in unraveling the mysteries of consumer behavior.

Understanding Qualitative Business Research

At the heart of qualitative business research lies a quest for depth and richness of understanding. Unlike its quantitative counterpart, which deals with numerical data and statistical analysis, qualitative research focuses on exploring attitudes, behaviors, and motivations through methods such as interviews, focus groups, and observation.

The Essence of Consumer Behavior

Consumer behavior is a complex interplay of various factors, including psychological, cultural, and social influences. To decode this intricate puzzle, businesses employ qualitative research methods to delve deeper into consumers’ minds, unveiling insights that quantitative data alone cannot provide.

Peering into Consumer Psyche

Qualitative research allows businesses to get up close and personal with consumers, providing valuable insights into their perceptions, preferences, and decision-making processes. Through in-depth interviews and focus groups, researchers can uncover the underlying motivations, desires, and pain points driving consumer behavior.

Exploring Consumer Motivations

One of the key objectives of qualitative research is to unearth the motivations behind consumer actions. By engaging directly with consumers in open-ended discussions, researchers can uncover the underlying drivers that influence their choices. Whether it’s the desire for status, the need for convenience, or the quest for self-expression, qualitative research helps businesses decipher the underlying motivations driving consumer behavior.

Unveiling Consumer Perceptions

Perceptions play a pivotal role in shaping consumer behavior. How consumers perceive a brand, product, or service can significantly impact their purchasing decisions. Through qualitative research methods like focus groups and ethnographic studies, businesses can gain valuable insights into how consumers perceive their offerings and identify areas for improvement.

Navigating Cultural Influences

Culture exerts a profound influence on consumer behavior, shaping values, norms, and preferences. Qualitative research allows businesses to navigate the complex terrain of cultural influences, helping them understand how cultural factors impact consumer perceptions and behaviors. By embracing cultural sensitivity and conducting ethnographic research, businesses can tailor their strategies to resonate with diverse consumer segments.

Uncovering Hidden Trends

In today’s fast-paced business environment, staying ahead of trends is crucial for maintaining a competitive edge. Qualitative research enables businesses to uncover emerging trends and anticipate shifts in consumer behavior before they become mainstream. By immersing themselves in consumers’ lives and observing their behaviors firsthand, researchers can identify nascent trends and capitalize on them proactively.

Informing Strategic Decision-Making

Ultimately, the insights gleaned from qualitative research inform strategic decision-making across all facets of business operations. From product development and marketing campaigns to customer experience initiatives, qualitative research provides the foundation upon which businesses can build successful strategies that resonate with their target audience.

In the realm of business, understanding consumer behavior is paramount to success. Through qualitative business research, businesses embark on a journey into the depths of the consumer psyche, unraveling insights that shape strategic decision-making. By peering into consumers’ motivations, perceptions, and cultural influences, businesses can gain a competitive edge in today’s dynamic marketplace.

So, embrace the power of qualitative research and unlock the secrets to winning over consumers’ hearts and minds.

Visit Philomath Research to learn more about how qualitative research can transform your business strategy and propel you toward sustainable growth.

What is qualitative business research, and how does it differ from quantitative research?

Qualitative business research focuses on exploring attitudes, behaviors, and motivations through methods like interviews, focus groups, and observation. It delves into the depth and richness of understanding, whereas quantitative research deals with numerical data and statistical analysis.

Why is understanding consumer behavior crucial for businesses?

Consumer behavior insights are essential for businesses as they inform strategic decision-making across all aspects of operations, including product development, marketing strategies, and customer experience initiatives. Understanding what drives consumers’ choices is key to staying competitive and meeting consumer needs effectively.

How does qualitative research help in unraveling consumer motivations?

Qualitative research allows businesses to engage directly with consumers in open-ended discussions, uncovering the underlying motivations behind their actions. Through methods like in-depth interviews and focus groups, researchers can delve into consumers’ desires, needs, and pain points, providing valuable insights into their decision-making processes.

What role does perception play in consumer behavior, and how does qualitative research address it?

Perception significantly influences consumer behavior, impacting how consumers perceive brands, products, and services. Qualitative research methods like focus groups and ethnographic studies help businesses gain insights into consumers’ perceptions, identifying areas for improvement and enhancing brand positioning.

How does qualitative research navigate cultural influences on consumer behavior?

Culture plays a pivotal role in shaping consumer behavior, and influencing values, norms, and preferences. Qualitative research embraces cultural sensitivity and conducts ethnographic studies to understand how cultural factors impact consumer perceptions and behaviors. By acknowledging cultural influences, businesses can tailor their strategies to resonate with diverse consumer segments effectively.

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Consumer Behavior Research

Exploring the Depths of Consumer Insights for Strategic Business Growth

In an era where understanding consumer behavior is more than a competitive edge, it’s a survival imperative, NielsenIQ (NIQ) and GfK emerge as pivotal allies. This expertise is essential for businesses in B2C commerce, retail, and beyond, aiming to navigate the complex consumer landscape for informed, strategic decision-making.

Definition and Importance of Consumer Behavior Research

Consumer behavior research is the study of how individuals make decisions to spend their resources on consumption-related items. It involves understanding the what, why, when, and how of consumer purchases. This field is crucial for businesses as it sheds light on consumer preferences, buying patterns, and decision-making processes. By understanding these aspects, companies can tailor their products and marketing strategies effectively, ensuring alignment with consumer needs and market trends, ultimately leading to increased customer satisfaction and loyalty.

Overview of the Impact of Consumer Behavior Research on Marketing Strategies

The insights from consumer behavior research are instrumental in shaping targeted marketing strategies. By understanding consumer motivations and behaviors, businesses can create more relevant and engaging marketing messages, leading to improved customer engagement and retention. This research helps in segmenting the market, identifying potential customers, and understanding the factors that drive consumer decisions. It also aids in predicting future trends, enabling companies to stay ahead of the curve. Effective use of consumer behavior research can lead to the development of products and services that meet the evolving needs of consumers, thereby enhancing brand loyalty and market share.

Consumer and shopper insights

Understand consumer and shopper behavior, demographics, and loyalty with modern, representative consumer panels and customer survey capabilities.

Understanding Consumer Behavior

These diverse influences combine to form unique consumer profiles, which businesses must understand to effectively target their marketing efforts..

Factors Influencing Consumer Behavior

Consumer behavior is influenced by a complex interplay of psychological, social, cultural, and personal factors. Psychological factors include perceptions, attitudes, and motivation, which guide consumers’ emotional and cognitive responses. Social factors encompass family, friends, and societal norms that shape buying habits through peer influence and social trends. Cultural factors involve the broader societal beliefs, values, and customs that dictate consumer behavior in a particular region. Personal factors such as age, occupation, lifestyle, and economic status also significantly impact consumer choices. These diverse influences combine to form unique consumer profiles, which businesses must understand to effectively target their marketing efforts.

The Role of Consumer Behavior in Decision Making

Consumer behavior plays a critical role in the decision-making process. It involves understanding how consumers decide upon their needs and wants, choose among products and brands, and determine their purchase methods. This knowledge is vital for businesses to design and position their offerings in a way that resonates with the target audience. Understanding consumer behavior helps in predicting how consumers will respond to marketing messages and product features, enabling businesses to tailor their strategies to meet consumer needs effectively. It also assists in identifying opportunities for new product development and market expansion.

Consumer Behavior Theories and Models

Consumer behavior theories and models provide frameworks for understanding and predicting consumer actions. The Stimulus-Response Model, for instance, illustrates how marketing stimuli and environmental factors influence consumer responses. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs explains consumer motivation in terms of fulfilling basic to complex needs. The Theory of Reasoned Action and the Theory of Planned Behavior focus on the relationship between attitudes, intentions, and behaviors. The Consumer Decision Model outlines the cognitive process involving need recognition, information search, evaluation of alternatives, purchase decision, and post-purchase behavior. These models help businesses in developing strategies that align with consumer psychology and behavioral patterns. They also assist in segmenting the market and targeting consumers with personalized marketing approaches, enhancing the effectiveness of marketing campaigns and product offerings.

Research Methods in Consumer Behavior Research

Customer analytics is vital for businesses across various sectors, including FMCG, sales, and e-commerce. It enables companies to create personalized experiences, improve customer engagement, and boost retention, ultimately leading to increased revenue. By understanding consumer behavior through data analysis, businesses can make informed decisions that resonate with their target audience.

Quantitative Research Methods

Quantitative research methods in consumer behavior research involve structured techniques like surveys and questionnaires to collect numerical data. These methods are useful for gauging consumer attitudes, preferences, and behaviors across larger populations. Statistical analysis of this data helps in identifying trends, testing hypotheses, and making generalizations about consumer behavior. Quantitative research is valuable for businesses as it provides measurable and comparable insights that can guide strategic decision-making. It helps in understanding the magnitude of consumer responses to various marketing stimuli and in assessing the potential market size for new products or services.

Qualitative Research Methods

Qualitative research methods in consumer behavior focus on understanding the deeper motivations, thoughts, and feelings of consumers. Techniques like in-depth interviews, focus groups, and observational studies provide rich, detailed insights that are not typically captured through quantitative methods. This approach is crucial for exploring the underlying reasons behind consumer choices, preferences, and attitudes. Qualitative research helps businesses in gaining a deeper understanding of consumer experiences, emotions, and perceptions, which can be invaluable in developing more effective marketing strategies, product designs, and customer service approaches. It allows companies to explore new ideas and concepts with consumers, gaining insights that can lead to innovation and differentiation in the market.

Experimental Research in Consumer Behavior

Experimental research in consumer behavior involves manipulating one or more variables to observe the effect on another variable, typically consumer behavior or attitudes. This method is used to establish cause-and-effect relationships, providing insights into how changes in product features, pricing, or marketing strategies might influence consumer behavior. Controlled experiments, often conducted in laboratory settings or as field experiments, allow researchers to isolate the effects of specific variables. This type of research is particularly valuable for testing new products, pricing strategies, and marketing messages before full-scale implementation. It helps businesses in making informed decisions based on empirical evidence, reducing the risks associated with new initiatives.

Factors Affecting Consumer Behavior

Psychological factors.

Psychological factors play a significant role in shaping consumer behavior. These include individual motivations, perceptions, attitudes, and beliefs. Motivation drives consumers to fulfill their needs and desires, influencing their buying decisions. Perception, how consumers interpret information, can significantly impact their choices, as it shapes their understanding of products and brands. Attitudes and beliefs, formed through experiences and social influences, guide consumer preferences and loyalty. Understanding these psychological factors is crucial for businesses as they influence how consumers view and interact with products and services. By aligning marketing strategies with consumer psychology, businesses can more effectively influence purchasing decisions and build stronger customer relationships.

Social Factors

Social factors significantly influence consumer behavior, encompassing the impact of society, family, and peer groups. Family members and friends can influence buying decisions through recommendations or shared experiences. Social groups, including social networks and communities, also play a role in shaping consumer preferences and behaviors. The influence of social media has become particularly significant, as it not only connects consumers but also serves as a platform for sharing opinions and experiences about products and services. Understanding these social dynamics is important for businesses as they can leverage social influences through targeted marketing strategies, influencer partnerships, and social media campaigns. Recognizing the power of social factors can help businesses in building brand awareness and loyalty among consumer groups.

Cultural Factors

Cultural factors are deeply ingrained elements that influence consumer behavior, including values, beliefs, customs, and traditions. These factors vary across different regions and societies, affecting how consumers perceive and interact with products and services. Cultural influences can determine consumer preferences, buying habits, and brand perceptions. For instance, color symbolism, dietary preferences, and language can all vary significantly between cultures, impacting marketing strategies and product development. Businesses must understand and respect these cultural nuances to effectively cater to diverse consumer markets. Adapting products and marketing messages to align with cultural values and norms can significantly enhance a brand’s appeal and acceptance in different markets.

Personal Factors

Personal factors, including age, gender, occupation, lifestyle, and economic status, also significantly influence consumer behavior. These factors determine individual needs, preferences, and purchasing power. For example, younger consumers may prioritize trendy and innovative products, while older consumers might value functionality and durability. Lifestyle choices, such as health consciousness or environmental awareness, can also drive consumer preferences and choices. Economic factors, such as income and economic conditions, influence consumers’ ability to purchase and their sensitivity to price changes. Understanding these personal factors is crucial for businesses to segment their market effectively and tailor their products and marketing strategies to meet the specific needs of different consumer groups.

Consumer Purchase Decision Making

Stages of the consumer purchase decision-making process.

The consumer purchase decision-making process typically involves several key stages: problem recognition, information search, evaluation of alternatives, purchase decision, and post-purchase behavior.

In the problem recognition stage, consumers identify a need or desire.

During the information search, they seek out information about products or services that can fulfill their need. In the evaluation stage, consumers compare different options based on attributes such as price, quality, and brand reputation.

The purchase decision involves choosing a product and making the purchase. Finally, in the post-purchase stage, consumers evaluate their satisfaction with the purchase, which can influence future buying decisions and brand loyalty.

Understanding these stages is essential for businesses to effectively influence consumers at each step, from raising awareness to ensuring post-purchase satisfaction.

Influences on Consumer Purchase Decisions

Consumer purchase decisions are influenced by a multitude of factors, including product attributes, brand reputation, marketing messages, social influences, and personal preferences. Product features such as quality, price, and usability are key determinants of consumer choices. Brand reputation, built over time through consistent quality and marketing efforts, also significantly impacts purchase decisions. Marketing messages and advertising play a crucial role in shaping consumer perceptions and driving demand. Social influences, including recommendations from family and friends, as well as online reviews and influencer endorsements, can sway consumer decisions. Personal factors such as individual needs, preferences, and financial constraints also play a critical role. Businesses must consider these diverse influences when developing products and crafting marketing strategies to effectively appeal to their target audience.

Impulse Buying Behavior

Impulse buying behavior refers to unplanned purchases made by consumers, often driven by emotional factors rather than rational decision-making. This type of behavior is typically triggered by external stimuli such as attractive product displays, promotional offers, or persuasive sales tactics. Emotional responses, such as excitement or the desire for instant gratification, also play a significant role in impulse buying. Retailers often leverage this behavior by strategically placing impulse items near checkout areas or using limited-time offers to create a sense of urgency. Understanding the triggers of impulse buying can help businesses in designing marketing strategies and store layouts that encourage such purchases, potentially increasing sales and customer engagement.

Online Shopping and Consumer Behavior

Impact of online shopping on consumer behavior.

The rise of online shopping has significantly impacted consumer behavior, offering convenience, a wider selection of products, and often competitive pricing. Online shopping has changed the way consumers research products, compare prices, and make purchasing decisions. The ease of access to a vast array of products and the ability to shop at any time have increased the frequency and diversity of purchases. Online reviews and ratings have also become important factors in the decision-making process, as consumers increasingly rely on the opinions of others. Additionally, the personalized shopping experiences offered by many online retailers, through targeted recommendations and tailored marketing messages, have further influenced consumer buying habits. Understanding these shifts in consumer behavior is crucial for businesses to adapt their strategies for the digital marketplace, ensuring they meet the evolving needs and expectations of online shoppers.

Factors Influencing Online Buying Behavior

Several factors influence online buying behavior, including website usability, product variety, pricing, customer reviews, and the overall shopping experience. A user-friendly website with easy navigation and a seamless checkout process is crucial for attracting and retaining online shoppers. A diverse product range and competitive pricing are also key factors in attracting consumers. Customer reviews and ratings significantly impact purchase decisions, as they provide social proof and reduce perceived risk. The overall shopping experience, including customer service, delivery options, and return policies, also plays a vital role in influencing online buying behavior. Security and privacy concerns are additional considerations, as consumers are increasingly aware of data protection and online fraud. Businesses must address these factors to create a compelling online shopping experience that meets consumer expectations and drives online sales.

Comparison of Online and Offline Consumer Behavior

Online and offline consumer behaviors exhibit distinct differences, influenced by the unique aspects of each shopping environment. Online shopping offers convenience, a broader selection, and often more competitive pricing, leading to different purchasing patterns compared to offline shopping. Consumers tend to spend more time researching and comparing products online, while offline shopping is often driven by immediate needs and sensory experiences. The tactile experience and instant gratification of offline shopping are not replicable online, but the online environment offers personalized recommendations and a wealth of product information. Offline shopping also provides opportunities for personal interaction and immediate problem resolution, which can enhance customer satisfaction. Understanding these differences is crucial for businesses to tailor their strategies for each channel, ensuring a cohesive and complementary shopping experience that meets the needs and preferences of consumers in both online and offline environments.

Consumer Satisfaction and Loyalty

Importance of customer satisfaction in consumer behavior research.

Customer satisfaction is a critical component of consumer behavior research, as it directly impacts repeat purchases and brand loyalty. Satisfied customers are more likely to become repeat buyers, recommend the brand to others, and provide positive reviews. Customer satisfaction is influenced by various factors, including product quality, customer service, and overall shopping experience. Understanding and measuring customer satisfaction helps businesses identify areas for improvement, enhance customer experiences, and build long-term relationships with consumers. High levels of customer satisfaction lead to increased customer loyalty, which is essential for business growth and sustainability.

Factors Influencing Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction is influenced by a range of factors, including product quality, price, service quality, brand image, and customer expectations. Product quality is a primary determinant of satisfaction, as consumers expect products to perform as advertised. Price also plays a role, as consumers evaluate the value they receive relative to the cost. Service quality, encompassing customer service interactions and the overall shopping experience, significantly impacts satisfaction levels. A positive, helpful, and efficient service experience can enhance satisfaction, while negative experiences can lead to dissatisfaction. Brand image, shaped by marketing communications and past experiences, influences consumer expectations and perceptions. Meeting or exceeding these expectations is key to achieving high levels of customer satisfaction. Additionally, personal factors such as individual needs, preferences, and past experiences also influence satisfaction. Businesses must consider these diverse factors to effectively meet consumer needs and enhance satisfaction levels.

Relationship Between Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty

The relationship between customer satisfaction and loyalty is strong and direct. Satisfied customers are more likely to develop a sense of loyalty to a brand, leading to repeat purchases and positive word-of-mouth recommendations. Loyalty is not just about repeat buying; it also involves an emotional connection and a preference for the brand over competitors. Satisfied customers are also more likely to be forgiving of minor issues and are less sensitive to price changes. Conversely, dissatisfied customers are more likely to switch to competitors and share negative experiences with others. Building customer loyalty requires consistently meeting or exceeding customer expectations, providing high-quality products and services, and maintaining positive customer relationships. Loyal customers are valuable assets to businesses, as they tend to have a higher lifetime value, lower acquisition costs, and can become brand advocates, promoting the brand through their networks.

Consumer Research and Marketing Strategies

Utilizing consumer research to develop effective marketing programs.

Consumer research is a vital tool for developing effective marketing programs. By understanding consumer needs, preferences, and behaviors, businesses can create targeted marketing strategies that resonate with their audience. Consumer research helps in identifying market segments, understanding consumer pain points, and uncovering opportunities for product development or enhancement. It also provides insights into the most effective channels and messages for reaching the target audience. Utilizing consumer research in marketing program development ensures that strategies are data-driven and customer-centric, increasing the likelihood of success. It enables businesses to tailor their marketing efforts to the specific needs and preferences of different consumer segments, improving engagement and response rates. Additionally, ongoing consumer research allows businesses to adapt their marketing strategies in response to changing consumer trends and market conditions, ensuring continued relevance and effectiveness.

Targeting Specific Consumer Segments Based on Research Findings

Targeting specific consumer segments based on research findings is a key strategy for effective marketing. Consumer research provides detailed insights into different consumer groups, including their demographics, psychographics, behaviors, and preferences. By analyzing this data, businesses can identify distinct segments within their target market, each with unique needs and characteristics. Targeting these segments with tailored marketing messages and product offerings increases the relevance and appeal of the brand to each group. For example, a segment characterized by health-conscious consumers would respond more positively to marketing messages emphasizing the health benefits of a product. Segment-specific targeting allows businesses to allocate marketing resources more efficiently, focusing on the most promising segments with the highest potential for conversion and loyalty. It also enhances the customer experience by providing consumers with products and marketing messages that are more closely aligned with their individual needs and preferences.

Adapting Marketing Strategies to Consumer Behavior Trends

Adapting marketing strategies to consumer behavior trends is essential for businesses to stay relevant and competitive. Consumer behavior is constantly evolving, influenced by factors such as technological advancements, cultural shifts, and economic changes. By staying attuned to these trends, businesses can anticipate changes in consumer needs and preferences, and adjust their marketing strategies accordingly. This may involve adopting new marketing channels, such as social media or influencer marketing, to reach consumers where they are most active. It could also mean developing new products or services that align with emerging consumer trends, such as sustainability or personalization. Adapting marketing strategies to consumer behavior trends requires a proactive approach, with ongoing research and analysis to identify emerging patterns. Businesses that successfully adapt to these trends can capture new market opportunities, enhance customer engagement, and maintain a competitive edge.

Case Studies in Consumer Behavior Research

Analysis of real-life examples and their implications.

Real-life case studies in consumer behavior research provide valuable insights into the practical application of theoretical concepts and the effectiveness of different marketing strategies. For example, a case study in the automotive industry might analyze how consumer preferences for eco-friendly vehicles have influenced car manufacturers’ product development and marketing strategies. In the retail sector, a case study could examine the impact of online shopping on brick-and-mortar stores and how these businesses have adapted to the digital era. These case studies offer concrete examples of how businesses have successfully navigated changes in consumer behavior, providing lessons and strategies that can be applied in other contexts. They also highlight the importance of consumer research in identifying market trends, understanding consumer needs, and developing effective marketing strategies. By analyzing real-life examples, businesses can gain a deeper understanding of consumer behavior, learn from the successes and challenges of others, and apply these insights to their own strategies.

Examination of Successful Marketing Campaigns Based on Consumer Behavior Research

Examining successful marketing campaigns that are based on consumer behavior research can provide valuable insights into effective marketing practices. These case studies demonstrate how a deep understanding of consumer needs, preferences, and behaviors can be leveraged to create impactful marketing campaigns. For instance, a campaign that effectively uses consumer data to personalize messages and offers can result in higher engagement and conversion rates. Another example might be a campaign that taps into current consumer trends, such as sustainability or wellness, to resonate with the target audience. Analyzing these successful campaigns can reveal key strategies and tactics that businesses can adopt, such as the use of specific channels, messaging techniques, or promotional offers. These case studies also highlight the importance of data-driven decision-making in marketing, showing how consumer research can inform and guide successful marketing initiatives.

Motivating Consumers and New Product Adoption

Strategies to motivate consumers to adopt new products.

Motivating consumers to adopt new products is a critical challenge for businesses. Effective strategies for encouraging new product adoption include leveraging social proof, offering free trials or samples, and creating educational content. Social proof, such as customer testimonials or influencer endorsements, can reduce perceived risk and increase consumer confidence in trying a new product. Free trials or samples allow consumers to experience the product firsthand, reducing barriers to adoption. Educational content, such as how-to guides or product demonstrations, can help consumers understand the value and benefits of the new product. Additionally, businesses can use targeted marketing campaigns to reach early adopters and innovators who are more likely to try new products and spread the word to others. Creating a sense of urgency or exclusivity around the new product, through limited-time offers or exclusive access, can also motivate consumers to adopt the product more quickly.

Innovations in Consumer Behavior Research for New Product Development

Innovations in consumer behavior research are playing a crucial role in new product development. Advanced analytics and data mining techniques allow businesses to analyze large datasets and uncover deep insights into consumer needs and preferences. Social listening tools enable companies to monitor social media and online conversations, gaining real-time insights into consumer opinions and trends. Virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) technologies are being used to test consumer reactions to new products in simulated environments, providing valuable feedback before market launch. Behavioral economics principles, such as understanding cognitive biases and decision-making processes, are also being applied to better predict consumer responses to new products. These innovations in consumer behavior research provide businesses with more accurate and comprehensive data, enabling them to develop products that are closely aligned with consumer needs and preferences, increasing the likelihood of market success.

Social Media and Consumer Behavior

Influence of social media on consumer behavior.

Social media has a profound influence on consumer behavior, shaping how consumers discover, research, and share information about products and services. Platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter serve as important channels for brand communication and engagement. Consumers use social media to seek recommendations, read reviews, and gather opinions from their networks, which significantly influences their purchasing decisions. Brands leverage social media for targeted advertising, influencer partnerships, and content marketing, creating opportunities for direct interaction and engagement with consumers. Social media also facilitates the spread of trends and viral content, quickly influencing consumer preferences and behaviors. The interactive and dynamic nature of social media means that consumer opinions and trends can rapidly change, requiring businesses to be agile and responsive in their social media strategies. Understanding the influence of social media on consumer behavior is essential for businesses to effectively engage with their audience and influence purchasing decisions.

Role of Social Media in Shaping Consumer Perceptions and Purchase Decisions

Recap of the importance of consumer behavior research.

Consumer behavior research is essential for businesses seeking to understand and effectively respond to the evolving needs and preferences of their target audience. It provides valuable insights into why consumers make certain choices, what influences their purchasing decisions, and how they interact with brands. This research is crucial for developing effective marketing strategies, creating products that meet consumer needs, and enhancing the overall customer experience. By staying informed about consumer behavior trends and applying these insights, businesses can improve customer engagement, increase brand loyalty, and drive growth. In today’s competitive marketplace, a deep understanding of consumer behavior is a key differentiator, enabling businesses to create more personalized, relevant, and impactful marketing initiatives.

Future Directions and Emerging Trends in Consumer Behavior Research

The future of consumer behavior research is marked by rapid advancements in technology and data analytics, leading to more sophisticated and nuanced understanding of consumer preferences and behaviors. Emerging trends include the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to analyze consumer data, providing deeper and more predictive insights. The integration of biometric data, such as eye tracking and facial recognition, offers new ways to understand consumer responses to marketing stimuli. The growing importance of sustainability and ethical considerations is also influencing consumer behavior, leading to increased demand for eco-friendly and socially responsible products. Additionally, the rise of the experience economy is shifting focus from product features to customer experiences, requiring businesses to create more immersive and engaging customer interactions. Staying abreast of these trends and continuously innovating in consumer behavior research will be crucial for businesses to remain relevant and competitive in the changing market landscape.

How NIQ and GfK Can Help

In the complex world of consumer behavior, NIQ and GfK offer the expertise and tools necessary to navigate this landscape effectively. With comprehensive solutions like:

NielsenIQ’s Homescan : Track, diagnose, and analyze consumer behavior from more than 250,000 households across 25 countries.
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By leveraging these tools, businesses can gain a competitive edge, adapting to market changes and consumer trends with agility and precision.

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The past, present, and future of consumer research

Maayan s. malter.

1 Columbia Business School, Columbia University, New York, NY USA

Morris B. Holbrook

Barbara e. kahn.

2 The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA USA

Jeffrey R. Parker

3 Department of Marketing, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL USA

Donald R. Lehmann

In this article, we document the evolution of research trends (concepts, methods, and aims) within the field of consumer behavior, from the time of its early development to the present day, as a multidisciplinary area of research within marketing. We describe current changes in retailing and real-world consumption and offer suggestions on how to use observations of consumption phenomena to generate new and interesting consumer behavior research questions. Consumption continues to change with technological advancements and shifts in consumers’ values and goals. We cannot know the exact shape of things to come, but we polled a sample of leading scholars and summarize their predictions on where the field may be headed in the next twenty years.

Introduction

Beginning in the late 1950s, business schools shifted from descriptive and practitioner-focused studies to more theoretically driven and academically rigorous research (Dahl et al. 1959 ). As the field expanded from an applied form of economics to embrace theories and methodologies from psychology, sociology, anthropology, and statistics, there was an increased emphasis on understanding the thoughts, desires, and experiences of individual consumers. For academic marketing, this meant that research not only focused on the decisions and strategies of marketing managers but also on the decisions and thought processes on the other side of the market—customers.

Since then, the academic study of consumer behavior has evolved and incorporated concepts and methods, not only from marketing at large but also from related social science disciplines, and from the ever-changing landscape of real-world consumption behavior. Its position as an area of study within a larger discipline that comprises researchers from diverse theoretical backgrounds and methodological training has stirred debates over its identity. One article describes consumer behavior as a multidisciplinary subdiscipline of marketing “characterized by the study of people operating in a consumer role involving acquisition, consumption, and disposition of marketplace products, services, and experiences” (MacInnis and Folkes 2009 , p. 900).

This article reviews the evolution of the field of consumer behavior over the past half century, describes its current status, and predicts how it may evolve over the next twenty years. Our review is by no means a comprehensive history of the field (see Schumann et al. 2008 ; Rapp and Hill 2015 ; Wang et al. 2015 ; Wilkie and Moore 2003 , to name a few) but rather focuses on a few key thematic developments. Though we observe many major shifts during this period, certain questions and debates have persisted: Does consumer behavior research need to be relevant to marketing managers or is there intrinsic value from studying the consumer as a project pursued for its own sake? What counts as consumption: only consumption from traditional marketplace transactions or also consumption in a broader sense of non-marketplace interactions? Which are the most appropriate theoretical traditions and methodological tools for addressing questions in consumer behavior research?

A brief history of consumer research over the past sixty years—1960 to 2020

In 1969, the Association for Consumer Research was founded and a yearly conference to share marketing research specifically from the consumer’s perspective was instituted. This event marked the culmination of the growing interest in the topic by formalizing it as an area of research within marketing (consumer psychology had become a formalized branch of psychology within the APA in 1960). So, what was consumer behavior before 1969? Scanning current consumer-behavior doctoral seminar syllabi reveals few works predating 1969, with most of those coming from psychology and economics, namely Herbert Simon’s A Behavioral Model of Rational Choice (1955), Abraham Maslow’s A Theory of Human Motivation (1943), and Ernest Dichter’s Handbook of Consumer Motivations (1964). In short, research that illuminated and informed our understanding of consumer behavior prior to 1969 rarely focused on marketing-specific topics, much less consumers or consumption (Dichter’s handbook being a notable exception). Yet, these works were crucial to the rise of consumer behavior research because, in the decades after 1969, there was a shift within academic marketing to thinking about research from a behavioral or decision science perspective (Wilkie and Moore 2003 ). The following section details some ways in which this shift occurred. We draw on a framework proposed by the philosopher Larry Laudan ( 1986 ), who distinguished among three inter-related aspects of scientific inquiry—namely, concepts (the relevant ideas, theories, hypotheses, and constructs); methods (the techniques employed to test and validate these concepts); and aims (the purposes or goals that motivate the investigation).

Key concepts in the late - 1960s

During the late-1960s, we tended to view the buyer as a computer-like machine for processing information according to various formal rules that embody economic rationality to form a preference for one or another option in order to arrive at a purchase decision. This view tended to manifest itself in a couple of conspicuous ways. The first was a model of buyer behavior introduced by John Howard in 1963 in the second edition of his marketing textbook and quickly adopted by virtually every theorist working in our field—including, Howard and Sheth (of course), Engel-Kollat-&-Blackwell, Franco Nicosia, Alan Andreasen, Jim Bettman, and Joel Cohen. Howard’s great innovation—which he based on a scheme that he had found in the work of Plato (namely, the linkages among Cognition, Affect, and Conation)—took the form of a boxes-and-arrows formulation heavily influenced by the approach to organizational behavior theory that Howard (University of Pittsburgh) had picked up from Herbert Simon (Carnegie Melon University). The model represented a chain of events

where I = inputs of information (from advertising, word-of-mouth, brand features, etc.); C = cognitions (beliefs or perceptions about a brand); A = Affect (liking or preference for the brand); B = behavior (purchase of the brand); and S = satisfaction (post-purchase evaluation of the brand that feeds back onto earlier stages of the sequence, according to a learning model in which reinforced behavior tends to be repeated). This formulation lay at the heart of Howard’s work, which he updated, elaborated on, and streamlined over the remainder of his career. Importantly, it informed virtually every buyer-behavior model that blossomed forth during the last half of the twentieth century.

To represent the link between cognitions and affect, buyer-behavior researchers used various forms of the multi-attribute attitude model (MAAM), originally proposed by psychologists such as Fishbein and Rosenberg as part of what Fishbein and Ajzen ( 1975 ) called the theory of reasoned action. Under MAAM, cognitions (beliefs about brand attributes) are weighted by their importance and summed to create an explanation or prediction of affect (liking for a brand or preference for one brand versus another), which in turn determines behavior (choice of a brand or intention to purchase a brand). This took the work of economist Kelvin Lancaster (with whom Howard interacted), which assumed attitude was based on objective attributes, and extended it to include subjective ones (Lancaster 1966 ; Ratchford 1975 ). Overall, the set of concepts that prevailed in the late-1960s assumed the buyer exhibited economic rationality and acted as a computer-like information-processing machine when making purchase decisions.

Favored methods in the late-1960s

The methods favored during the late-1960s tended to be almost exclusively neo-positivistic in nature. That is, buyer-behavior research adopted the kinds of methodological rigor that we associate with the physical sciences and the hypothetico-deductive approaches advocated by the neo-positivistic philosophers of science.

Thus, the accepted approaches tended to be either experimental or survey based. For example, numerous laboratory studies tested variations of the MAAM and focused on questions about how to measure beliefs, how to weight the beliefs, how to combine the weighted beliefs, and so forth (e.g., Beckwith and Lehmann 1973 ). Here again, these assumed a rational economic decision-maker who processed information something like a computer.

Seeking rigor, buyer-behavior studies tended to be quantitative in their analyses, employing multivariate statistics, structural equation models, multidimensional scaling, conjoint analysis, and other mathematically sophisticated techniques. For example, various attempts to test the ICABS formulation developed simultaneous (now called structural) equation models such as those deployed by Farley and Ring ( 1970 , 1974 ) to test the Howard and Sheth ( 1969 ) model and by Beckwith and Lehmann ( 1973 ) to measure halo effects.

Aims in the late-1960s

During this time period, buyer-behavior research was still considered a subdivision of marketing research, the purpose of which was to provide insights useful to marketing managers in making strategic decisions. Essentially, every paper concluded with a section on “Implications for Marketing Managers.” Authors who failed to conform to this expectation could generally count on having their work rejected by leading journals such as the Journal of Marketing Research ( JMR ) and the Journal of Marketing ( JM ).

Summary—the three R’s in the late-1960s

Starting in the late-1960s to the early-1980s, virtually every buyer-behavior researcher followed the traditional approach to concepts, methods, and aims, now encapsulated under what we might call the three R’s —namely, rationality , rigor , and relevance . However, as we transitioned into the 1980s and beyond, that changed as some (though by no means all) consumer researchers began to expand their approaches and to evolve different perspectives.

Concepts after 1980

In some circles, the traditional emphasis on the buyer’s rationality—that is, a view of the buyer as a rational-economic, decision-oriented, information-processing, computer-like machine for making choices—began to evolve in at least two primary ways.

First, behavioral economics (originally studied in marketing under the label Behavioral Decision Theory)—developed in psychology by Kahneman and Tversky, in economics by Thaler, and applied in marketing by a number of forward-thinking theorists (e.g., Eric Johnson, Jim Bettman, John Payne, Itamar Simonson, Jay Russo, Joel Huber, and more recently, Dan Ariely)—challenged the rationality of consumers as decision-makers. It was shown that numerous commonly used decision heuristics depart from rational choice and are exceptions to the traditional assumptions of economic rationality. This trend shed light on understanding consumer financial decision-making (Prelec and Loewenstein 1998 ; Gourville 1998 ; Lynch Jr 2011 ) and how to develop “nudges” to help consumers make better decisions for their personal finances (summarized in Johnson et al. 2012 ).

Second, the emerging experiential view (anticipated by Alderson, Levy, and others; developed by Holbrook and Hirschman, and embellished by Schmitt, Pine, and Gilmore, and countless followers) regarded consumers as flesh-and-blood human beings (rather than as information-processing computer-like machines), focused on hedonic aspects of consumption, and expanded the concepts embodied by ICABS (Table (Table1 1 ).

Extended ICABS Framework after 1980

Methods after 1980

The two burgeoning areas of research—behavioral economics and experiential theories—differed in their methodological approaches. The former relied on controlled randomized experiments with a focus on decision strategies and behavioral outcomes. For example, experiments tested the process by which consumers evaluate options using information display boards and “Mouselab” matrices of aspects and attributes (Payne et al. 1988 ). This school of thought also focused on behavioral dependent measures, such as choice (Huber et al. 1982 ; Simonson 1989 ; Iyengar and Lepper 2000 ).

The latter was influenced by post-positivistic philosophers of science—such as Thomas Kuhn, Paul Feyerabend, and Richard Rorty—and approaches expanded to include various qualitative techniques (interpretive, ethnographic, humanistic, and even introspective methods) not previously prominent in the field of consumer research. These included:

Interpretive approaches —such as those drawing on semiotics and hermeneutics—in an effort to gain a richer understanding of the symbolic meanings involved in consumption experiences;
Ethnographic approaches — borrowed from cultural anthropology—such as those illustrated by the influential Consumer Behavior Odyssey (Belk et al. 1989 ) and its discoveries about phenomena related to sacred aspects of consumption or the deep meanings of collections and other possessions;
Humanistic approaches —such as those borrowed from cultural studies or from literary criticism and more recently gathered together under the general heading of consumer culture theory ( CCT );
Introspective or autoethnographic approaches —such as those associated with a method called subjective personal introspection ( SPI ) that various consumer researchers like Sidney Levy and Steve Gould have pursued to gain insights based on their own private lives.

These qualitative approaches tended not to appear in the more traditional journals such as the Journal of Marketing , Journal of Marketing Research , or Marketing Science . However, newer journals such as Consumption, Markets, & Culture and Marketing Theory began to publish papers that drew on the various interpretive, ethnographic, humanistic, or introspective methods.

Aims after 1980

In 1974, consumer research finally got its own journal with the launch of the Journal of Consumer Research ( JCR ). The early editors of JCR —especially Bob Ferber, Hal Kassarjian, and Jim Bettman—held a rather divergent attitude about the importance or even the desirability of managerial relevance as a key goal of consumer studies. Under their influence, some researchers began to believe that consumer behavior is a phenomenon worthy of study in its own right—purely for the purpose of understanding it better. The journal incorporated articles from an array of methodologies: quantitative (both secondary data analysis and experimental techniques) and qualitative. The “right” balance between theoretical insight and substantive relevance—which are not in inherent conflict—is a matter of debate to this day and will likely continue to be debated well into the future.

Summary—the three I’s after 1980

In sum, beginning in the early-1980s, consumer research branched out. Much of the work in consumer studies remained within the earlier tradition of the three R’s—that is, rationality (an information-processing decision-oriented buyer), rigor (neo-positivistic experimental designs and quantitative techniques), and relevance (usefulness to marketing managers). Nonetheless, many studies embraced enlarged views of the three major aspects that might be called the three I’s —that is, irrationality (broadened perspectives that incorporate illogical, heuristic, experiential, or hedonic aspects of consumption), interpretation (various qualitative or “postmodern” approaches), and intrinsic motivation (the joy of pursuing a managerially irrelevant consumer study purely for the sake of satisfying one’s own curiosity, without concern for whether it does or does not help a marketing practitioner make a bigger profit).

The present—the consumer behavior field today

Present concepts.

In recent years, technological changes have significantly influenced the nature of consumption as the customer journey has transitioned to include more interaction on digital platforms that complements interaction in physical stores. This shift poses a major conceptual challenge in understanding if and how these technological changes affect consumption. Does the medium through which consumption occurs fundamentally alter the psychological and social processes identified in earlier research? In addition, this shift allows us to collect more data at different stages of the customer journey, which further allows us to analyze behavior in ways that were not previously available.

Revisiting the ICABS framework, many of the previous concepts are still present, but we are now addressing them through a lens of technological change (Table (Table2 2 ). In recent years, a number of concepts (e.g., identity, beliefs/lay theories, affect as information, self-control, time, psychological ownership, search for meaning and happiness, social belonging, creativity, and status) have emerged as integral factors that influence and are influenced by consumption. To better understand these concepts, a number of influential theories from social psychology have been adopted into consumer behavior research. Self-construal (Markus and Kitayama 1991 ), regulatory focus (Higgins 1998 ), construal level (Trope and Liberman 2010 ), and goal systems (Kruglanski et al. 2002 ) all provide social-cognition frameworks through which consumer behavior researchers study the psychological processes behind consumer behavior. This “adoption” of social psychological theories into consumer behavior is a symbiotic relationship that further enhances the theories. Tory Higgins happily stated that he learned more about his own theories from the work of marketing academics (he cited Angela Lee and Michel Pham) in further testing and extending them.

ICABS framework in the digital age

Present Methods

Not only have technological advancements changed the nature of consumption but they have also significantly influenced the methods used in consumer research by adding both new sources of data and improved analytical tools (Ding et al. 2020 ). Researchers continue to use traditional methods from psychology in empirical research (scale development, laboratory experiments, quantitative analyses, etc.) and interpretive approaches in qualitative research. Additionally, online experiments using participants from panels such as Amazon Mechanical Turk and Prolific have become commonplace in the last decade. While they raise concerns about the quality of the data and about the external validity of the results, these online experiments have greatly increased the speed and decreased the cost of collecting data, so researchers continue to use them, albeit with some caution. Reminiscent of the discussion in the 1970s and 1980s about the use of student subjects, the projectability of the online responses and of an increasingly conditioned “professional” group of online respondents (MTurkers) is a major concern.

Technology has also changed research methodology. Currently, there is a large increase in the use of secondary data thanks to the availability of Big Data about online and offline behavior. Methods in computer science have advanced our ability to analyze large corpuses of unstructured data (text, voice, visual images) in an efficient and rigorous way and, thus, to tap into a wealth of nuanced thoughts, feelings, and behaviors heretofore only accessible to qualitative researchers through laboriously conducted content analyses. There are also new neuro-marketing techniques like eye-tracking, fMRI’s, body arousal measures (e.g., heart rate, sweat), and emotion detectors that allow us to measure automatic responses. Lastly, there has been an increase in large-scale field experiments that can be run in online B2C marketplaces.

Present Aims

Along with a focus on real-world observations and data, there is a renewed emphasis on managerial relevance. Countless conference addresses and editorials in JCR , JCP , and other journals have emphasized the importance of making consumer research useful outside of academia—that is, to help companies, policy makers, and consumers. For instance, understanding how the “new” consumer interacts over time with other consumers and companies in the current marketplace is a key area for future research. As global and social concerns become more salient in all aspects of life, issues of long-term sustainability, social equality, and ethical business practices have also become more central research topics. Fortunately, despite this emphasis on relevance, theoretical contributions and novel ideas are still highly valued. An appropriate balance of theory and practice has become the holy grail of consumer research.

The effects of the current trends in real-world consumption will increase in magnitude with time as more consumers are digitally native. Therefore, a better understanding of current consumer behavior can give us insights and help predict how it will continue to evolve in the years to come.

The future—the consumer behavior field in 2040 1

Niels Bohr once said, “Prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future.” Indeed, it would be a fool’s errand for a single person to hazard a guess about the state of the consumer behavior field twenty years from now. Therefore, predictions from 34 active consumer researchers were collected to address this task. Here, we briefly summarize those predictions.

Future Concepts

While few respondents proffered guesses regarding specific concepts that would be of interest twenty years from now, many suggested broad topics and trends they expected to see in the field. Expectations for topics could largely be grouped into three main areas. Many suspected that we will be examining essentially the same core topics, perhaps at a finer-grained level, from different perspectives or in ways that we currently cannot utilize due to methodological limitations (more on methods below). A second contingent predicted that much research would center on the impending crises the world faces today, most mentioning environmental and social issues (the COVID-19 pandemic had not yet begun when these predictions were collected and, unsurprisingly, was not anticipated by any of our respondents). The last group, citing the widely expected profound impact of AI on consumers’ lives, argued that AI and other technology-related topics will be dominant subjects in consumer research circa 2040.

While the topic of technology is likely to be focal in the field, our current expectations for the impact of technology on consumers’ lives are narrower than it should be. Rather than merely offering innumerable conveniences and experiences, it seems likely that technology will begin to be integrated into consumers’ thoughts, identities, and personal relationships—probably sooner than we collectively expect. The integration of machines into humans’ bodies and lives will present the field with an expanding list of research questions that do not exist today. For example, how will the concepts of the self, identity, privacy, and goal pursuit change when web-connected technology seamlessly integrates with human consciousness and cognition? Major questions will also need to be answered regarding philosophy of mind, ethics, and social inequality. We suspect that the impact of technology on consumers and consumer research will be far broader than most consumer-behavior researchers anticipate.

As for broader trends within consumer research, there were two camps: (1) those who expect (or hope) that dominant theories (both current and yet to be developed) will become more integrated and comprehensive and (2) those who expect theoretical contributions to become smaller and smaller, to the point of becoming trivial. Both groups felt that current researchers are filling smaller cracks than before, but disagreed on how this would ultimately be resolved.

Future Methods

As was the case with concepts, respondents’ expectations regarding consumer-research methodologies in 2030 can also be divided into three broad baskets. Unsurprisingly, many indicated that we would be using many technologies not currently available or in wide use. Perhaps more surprising was that most cited the use of technology such as AI, machine-learning algorithms, and robots in designing—as opposed to executing or analyzing—experiments. (Some did point to the use of technologies such as virtual reality in the actual execution of experiments.) The second camp indicated that a focus on reliable and replicable results (discussed further below) will encourage a greater tendency for pre-registering studies, more use of “Big Data,” and a demand for more studies per paper (versus more papers per topic, which some believe is a more fruitful direction). Finally, the third lot indicated that “real data” would be in high demand, thereby necessitating the use of incentive-compatible, consequential dependent variables and a greater prevalence of field studies in consumer research.

As a result, young scholars would benefit from developing a “toolkit” of methodologies for collecting and analyzing the abundant new data of interest to the field. This includes (but is not limited to) a deep understanding of designing and implementing field studies (Gerber and Green 2012 ), data analysis software (R, Python, etc.), text mining and analysis (Humphreys and Wang 2018 ), and analytical tools for other unstructured forms of data such as image and sound. The replication crisis in experimental research means that future scholars will also need to take a more critical approach to validity (internal, external, construct), statistical power, and significance in their work.

Future Aims

While there was an air of existential concern about the future of the field, most agreed that the trend will be toward increasing the relevance and reliability of consumer research. Specifically, echoing calls from journals and thought leaders, the respondents felt that papers will need to offer more actionable implications for consumers, managers, or policy makers. However, few thought that this increased focus would come at the expense of theoretical insights, suggesting a more demanding overall standard for consumer research in 2040. Likewise, most felt that methodological transparency, open access to data and materials, and study pre-registration will become the norm as the field seeks to allay concerns about the reliability and meaningfulness of its research findings.

Summary - Future research questions and directions

Despite some well-justified pessimism, the future of consumer research is as bright as ever. As we revised this paper amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, it was clear that many aspects of marketplace behavior, consumption, and life in general will change as a result of this unprecedented global crisis. Given this, and the radical technological, social, and environmental changes that loom on the horizon, consumer researchers will have a treasure trove of topics to tackle in the next ten years, many of which will carry profound substantive importance. While research approaches will evolve, the core goals will remain consistent—namely, to generate theoretically insightful, empirically supported, and substantively impactful research (Table (Table3 3 ).

Future consumer behavior research questions

At any given moment in time, the focal concepts, methods, and aims of consumer-behavior scholarship reflect both the prior development of the field and trends in the larger scientific community. However, despite shifting trends, the core of the field has remained constant—namely, to understand the motivations, thought processes, and experiences of individuals as they consume goods, services, information, and other offerings, and to use these insights to develop interventions to improve both marketing strategy for firms and consumer welfare for individuals and groups. Amidst the excitement of new technologies, social trends, and consumption experiences, it is important to look back and remind ourselves of the insights the field has already generated. Effectively integrating these past findings with new observations and fresh research will help the field advance our understanding of consumer behavior.

1 The other papers use 2030 as a target year but we asked our survey respondents to make predictions for 2040 and thus we have a different future target year.

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How to Employ Qualitative Market Research to Understand Better the Consumer’s Behaviour

What influences consumer behaviour? That’s the burning question for every business and marketing company looking to increase their sales.

Over the past decade, how we analyse consumer behaviour has been revolutionised by tools for social media listening and online behaviour analysis. But there’s a problem: these tools generally only focus on quantitative metrics, giving binary answers to try and answer a very complex and nuanced question: what causes people to make their purchasing decisions?

At Symanto , we’ve developed AI technology to help answer that question. Our tools analyse vast amounts of both quantitative and qualitative data online for you to use as marketing research to understand consumer behaviour.

The difference between quantitative and qualitative data

Quantitative data is about understanding the facts of social phenomena. It assumes a fixed and measurable reality. As a result, it doesn’t allow for nuance and is quite limited in what it can tell us about the psychology behind human behaviour.

However, most of the data collected by social listening and web analytics tools is quantitative. It tells us what they are doing, but it doesn’t explain the cause of the behaviour or the psychology of the consumer.

Qualitative data, on the other hand, can provide us with a deep insight into the perspective of consumers. It is reported through language, and as such, it is as rich and complex as the psychology of the consumers themselves.

Traditionally, collecting, researching and analysing qualitative marketing data to understand consumer behaviour has been time and resource exhaustive . But as we will explore, Symanto has developed AI technology to extract useful qualitative information from existing data online within a matter of minutes.

This qualitative data helps you to understand your consumer base far more accurately than focussing on behaviour patterns and demographic information.

The limitations of measuring consumer behaviour

We’re not here to challenge the idea that measuring consumer behaviour is useful. It is indisputably useful to be able to notice trends in purchasing behaviour, and interactions on social media. But the problem is that this data can only tell you what is happening, it doesn’t leave you with much information as to why it’s happening.

Two people with similar demographic profiles can demonstrate the same behaviours, but their reasoning can be very different, and they respond to very different messaging. For example, two men in their 30s buy a food processor. One uses it to make smoothies to boost his morning workout, the other buys it to make quick mid-week meals for his family.

Will these two men make the same purchasing decisions moving forward? Unlikely, and yet this is the assumption we are likely to make if we try and predict consumer tendencies based solely on demographic profiles and past behaviours.

Symanto analyses qualitative marketing research to understand the personality traits behind human behaviour

At Symanto , our focus is on understanding who your customers are and through that information, we can more accurately predict why they do what they do. In other words, whereas most social listening tools work backwards from the end result (behaviour) to try and predict who your customer is (their psychological traits), we start at the source by studying what people say.

Our text analytics technology mines vast quantities of unstructured open-ended answers (the information that really helps us understand people) for useful insights, and extracts information such as the personality traits of the people behind the data.

Our psycholinguistic AI technology has learned to recognise and analyse patterns in language and associate how people use language with key personality traits.

Understanding personality traits

Personality traits are generally described as continuous patterns of behaviour, emotion, and thought. [1] Various approaches, from behavioural to psychoanalysis, have been utilized to generate a deeper understanding of personality and human development.

One of the popular theories is the Big Five personality traits theory which revolves around five factors :

● Openness to experience,

● Conscientiousness,

● Extraversion,

● Agreeableness

● Neuroticism. [2]

A relatively similar approach is the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI), developed by the mother and daughter duo Katherine Cook Briggs and Isabel Myers. [3] Their work further developed the typological theory proposed by Carl Jung, which stipulated that there are four main psychological functions, namely sensation, intuition, feeling and thinking, with one of these playing a dominant role for an individual most of the time. [4] It is this approach that Symanto’s technology is based on.

How can this information be applied to help companies?

Understanding personality traits helps to inform companies in two main ways:

1. How their consumers make decisions:

For instance, does the consumer make decisions in an impersonal way using logical reasoning, or do they base their decisions on personal values and how their actions affect others around them?

2. How their consumers prefer to take in information:

For example, does the consumer respond better to pragmatic information described in a literal way, or are they open-minded optimists who enjoy imagining scenarios and enjoy figurative and poetic language?

These two key aspects provide crucial insights for companies to enable them to better understand their consumers’ decision-making processes and furthermore inspire them to take an action.

Another significant advantage of uncovering the personality traits of consumers is that they are stable across time in contrast to behaviour.5 While our actions and choices vary considerably over time, our personality traits remain fairly constant.

Get better insights with Symanto

When it comes to analysing qualitative marketing research to understand consumer behaviour, Symanto’s suite of products can be used to extract meaningful insights such as the personality traits of your consumers. With this information you can make better decisions to drive the efficiency of your messaging and forge stronger relationships with existing customers.

Get in touch to find out how Symanto can develop a personal insights platform for your business needs.

[1] Kassin, S. M. (2003). “Psychology”. Prentice Hall, Inc. [2] Matthews, G. et al. (2003). “Personality Traits (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press. [3] Myers, I. B.; Myers, P. B. (1995). “Gifts differing: understanding personality type”. Davies-Black Pub. [4] Kaplan, R.M.; Saccuzzo, D. P. (2008). “Psychological Testing: Principles, Applications and Issues (7th ed.). Thomson Learning EMEA, Limited. [5] Matthews, G. et al. (2009). “Personality Traits (3rd ed.). Cambridge University Press. Pg. 447

Businesses and marketing teams, in particular, use qualitative market research to understand their market and customers’ needs and identify ways to improve their products.

What Is Qualitative Research in Marketing?

Qualitative marketing research is a powerful instrument and exploratory approach that provides meaningful details regarding the consumers’ motivations, preferences and behaviours.

Its purpose is to discover the “ why ” behind customer buying decisions by studying non-numerical data like language, experiences, images, etc. And deliver valuable details and insights into the intricacies of consumer perceptions and views.

Why is qualitative research important in marketing?

Qualitative research has a fundamental contribution in depicting the complexities of the consumers’ behaviour and human psychology.

Using a qualitative lens, research can go beyond numbers, surface information, and insights that quantitive research cannot identify. It allows marketers to put themselves in their customers’ shoes, truly understand their desires and craft tailored strategies.

One of the main advantages of qualitative research is highlighting psychological and emotional elements of customer decision-making. These insights allow businesses to personalise their offering and messaging.

What Is the Difference Between Qualitative and Quantitative Marketing Research?

Marketing research is executed via two approaches: qualitative and quantitative. They fundamentally differ regarding their goals, methods and what they seek.

Qualitative marketing search

It aims to uncover the core of consumer decisions and resumes to in-depth insights and exploration.

The main characteristics of qualitative research are:

Accent on quality . It focuses on smaller groups but digs more into details like experiences, thoughts, feelings, etc. The primary purpose is to obtain insights.
Context exploration . Qualitative research evaluates the context of behaviours. And pays attention to the psychological, social and environmental factors influencing buying decisions.
Answers the “Why” . Understanding the motives behind consumer behaviours, decisions, and preferences is paramount for businesses. That’s why they use qualitative research to discover what factors drive consumer actions.
Open-ended questions . Encouraging customers to answer freely to the research questions leads to getting detailed and meaningful responses.
Methods . Qualitative marketing research employs methods like focus groups, observation, ethnographic studies, interviews, etc. The scope is to delve into unstructured conversations and extract nuanced insights.

Quantitative research

It deals with collecting vast amounts of structured data from large samples. And has as main characteristics:

Accent on quantity . Quantitative research means surveying numerous participants with closed-ended questions. It’s all about statistical patterns and numerical data.
Patterns and trends . Such a methodology is great for determining trends, patterns and correlations within large amounts of data. And gets the answer to questions like what’s happening and how often.
Objective results . It concentrates on measurable and objective data and is a good fit for obtaining general conclusions or testing options.
Extrapolation . Quantitative research is used to make generalisations and uses a representative sample to outline the characteristics of a large group of consumers.
Methods . Standard methods for quantitative research are structured questionnaires and surveys. Their common features are replicability and consistency.

Quantitative vs qualitative data

Qualitative data, on the other hand, can provide you with deep insights into the perspective of consumers. It is reported through language, and as such, it is as rich and complex as the consumers’ psychology.

Collecting, researching and analysing qualitative marketing data to understand consumer behaviour has traditionally been time and resource-exhaustive .

However, companies like Symanto have developed AI technology to extract useful qualitative information from existing data online within a matter of minutes.

This qualitative data helps you understand your consumer base far more accurately than focussing on behaviour patterns and demographic information.

Qualitative Research Methods

These methods allow businesses to pick the minds of their target consumers and surface the beliefs, motivations and emotions that influence buying behaviours and decisions.

The most used methods for qualitative marketing research are:

Focus Groups

Focus groups are organised discussions on an established topic with a small group of persons selected based on clearly defined criteria. During these conversations, usually moderated by the organiser, participants share their experiences, opinions, expectations and thoughts.

Advantages of focus groups:

Variety of perspectives . Participants interact and share their point of view.
Real-time feedback . Researchers obtain answers to their questions right away and explore further the topics of interest.
Plentiful insights . Focus groups are a valuable source of qualitative data, as participants express their opinions freely.

Focus groups also have disadvantages: they have high costs and are time-consuming.

And are usually used when launching new products and new features of existing products. In such cases, the target audience input is absolutely necessary.

In-depth interviews are one-on-one conversations between a researcher and a relevant participant. During the interview, the participant’s points of view, experiences, opinions and preferences are discussed in detail.

They may be unstructured, structured or semi-structured. But usually, they offer the participant the liberty to express his opinions on a specific product or promotional campaign.

Interviews are valuable tools for qualitative marketing research because they allow:

Customisation . They can be personalised based on the participant’s experiences and background.
Personal connection . It is an individual format and it encourages participants to speak about their unique perspectives and thoughts.
Dig into details . Researchers have the possibility to ask detailed questions and explore complex issues.

Ethnographic Studies

Ethnographic studies are different from the previous methods because they imply the observation of the participants in their natural environment. Namely, the researcher will be a silent observer and note what the participant does, not what he claims he does.

Such a study means that the researcher will be present to watch the participant preparing dinner, shopping, meeting with friends or working.

Ethnographic studies are interesting because they provide:

A holistic understanding . Ethnography offers a panoramic overview of the participant’s life, environment, and circumstances, including daily routines and cultural nuances.
Details of unconscious behaviour . This method has the capacity to point out the participant’s actions and the context in which they appear, even if sometimes he might not be able to express what he does and why.
Real context . Researchers can better understand the consumer and his behaviours in his environment.

Observation

This method doesn’t involve a direct interaction between the participant in the qualitative marketing research and the researcher. It’s somewhat like being a fly on the wall. Researchers will observe and document the participants’ behaviour, interactions, and activities.

Observation is handy if researchers want to understand how consumers behave in certain situations like navigating a website, shopping in a store, why they stopped to enter a shop, which path they choose after entering the shop, etc.

Advantages of the observation research method:

Pain point identification . It’s a great way of spotting challenges and pain points that users experience with a product/service.
Non-intrusive . Since the researcher’s presence is not noticed, the participants act honestly without external influence.
Contextual insights . Observation has the possibility to reveal details related to the context provided by the real-life environment. Elements that other research approaches cannot capture.

The Limitations of Measuring Consumer Behaviour

Unquestionably , noticing trends in purchasing behaviour and interactions on social media is helpful. But the problem is that this data can only tell you what is happening. It doesn’t offer you much information about why it’s happening.

Two people with similar demographic profiles can show the same behaviours, but their reasoning and motives can differ , and they may respond differently to various messages .

For example, two men in their 30s buy a food processor. One uses it to make smoothies to boost his morning workout; the other buys it to make quick mid-week meals for his family.

Will these two men make the same purchasing decisions moving forward? Unlikely. And yet, this is the assumption we are likely to make if we try to predict consumer tendencies based solely on demographic profiles and past behaviours.

Symanto Analyses Qualitative Marketing Research to Understand the Personality Traits Behind Human Behaviour

At Symanto , we focus on understanding who your customers are; through that information, we can predict more accurately why they do what they do.

In other words, whereas most social listening tools work backwards from the end result (behaviour) to try and predict who your customer is (their psychological traits), we start at the source by studying what people say.

Our text analytics technology mines vast quantities of unstructured, open-ended answers (the information that really helps us understand people) for valuable insights and extracts information such as the personality traits of the people behind the data.

Symanto’s psycholinguistic AI technology has learned to recognise and analyse patterns in language and associate how people use language with key personality traits.

Personality traits are generally described as continuous patterns of behaviour, emotion, and thought. [1] Various approaches, from behavioural to psychoanalysis, have been utilised to generate a deeper understanding of personality and human development.

One of the popular theories is the Big Five personality traits theory, which revolves around five factors :

Openness to experience.
Conscientiousness.
Extraversion.
Agreeableness.
Neuroticism. [2]

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) is a relatively similar approach developed by the mother-and-daughter duo Katherine Cook Briggs and Isabel Myers. [3]

Their work further developed the typological theory proposed by Carl Jung, which stipulated there are four principal psychological functions, namely sensation, intuition, feeling and thinking, with one of these playing a dominant role for an individual most of the time. [4]

It is this approach that Symanto’s technology is based on.

How their consumers make decisions :
How their consumers prefer to take in information:

For example, does the consumer respond better to pragmatic information described literally , or are they open-minded optimists who enjoy imagining scenarios and figurative and poetic language?

These two key aspects provide crucial insights for companies and enable them to better understand their consumers’ decision-making processes and, furthermore, inspire them to take action.

Another significant advantage of uncovering consumers’ personality traits is that they are stable across time in contrast to behaviour. [5] While our actions and choices vary considerably over time, our personality traits remain reasonably constant.

Get Better Insights with Symanto

With this information, you can make better decisions to drive the efficiency of your messaging and forge stronger relationships with existing customers.

Get in touch to learn how Symanto can provide a personal insights venue for your business needs.

How to Conduct Qualitative Marketing Research?

Conducting qualitative research involves several steps, as outlined below:

Clearly define the objectives and the questions of the research

It’s vital to decide what you need to find out or achieve via the research you will do. Establish objectives that are measurable, specific and aligned with your marketing strategy.

Select just the questions that are important for your business and prioritise what matters most for your objectives. Choose open-ended questions to encourage participants to share their experiences, opinions and thoughts. Try to avoid creating questions that may get biased answers.

Carefully select the participants for your research

Your qualitative marketing research results depend heavily on participants’ quality and representativeness.

Identify individuals who are your target audience, are interested in taking part in the research and engage.

Data collection techniques

Open-ended questions . In order to obtain detailed responses and disclose the “why” behind consumers’ behaviours and buying decisions, you should formulate questions in such a way as to encourage participants to share their impressions and experiences.

Probing . Moderators should ask follow-up questions to detail participants’ responses to discover hidden motivations, surface contradictions, and identify valuable insights.

Projective techniques . They are used to delve into consumers’ unconscious feelings, desires, and thoughts. Such techniques provide participants with ambiguous stimuli like images or various scenarios and invite them to answer.

Data analysis and interpretation

The core pillar of qualitative marketing research is the analysis and interpretation of collected data. It’s the process that takes raw data and transforms it into valuable insights.

First, all discussions are transcribed, and documentation is gathered and reviewed for accuracy. Next, all the data is processed and analysed via thematic analysis. The primary purpose is to identify patterns and recurring themes.

Once the themes are in place, the subsequent phase needs to establish the connections within the data. Researchers identify trends, similarities, and discrepancies that help unearth consumer pain points, needs, attitudes, etc.

In a word, actionable insights that help shape product development and tailor marketing strategies and messages.

For a long period of time, qualitative marketing research was executed manually, a time-consuming and laborious activity. But today, advanced AI technology helps automate such tasks and turn text into unique insights.

One such tool is Symanto Brain :

Symanto Brain is a powerful AI-backed solution that supports 50+ languages and is trained on billions of data sequences. And enables you to create custom AI text analytics models right away.

Get ready to learn more about the people behind comments, social posts, and other texts (like those obtained in qualitative research). And quickly surface insights from emotions, psychographics, intents, customer journey details, etc.

Findings presentation and reporting

Usually, quantitative marketing research ends with comprehensive reports handed to decision-makers and lists all the findings, their implications and recommendations.

Such reports should have an organised structure, following a logical flow and providing context, results and their interpretation. Also, it should include graphics and charts to ease the interpretation.

Qualitative Marketing Research Advantages

Detailed insights . Qualitative research offers access to hidden insights and reveals beliefs, motivations, emotions and intricacies of buying behaviours.
Access real-world data . It offers concrete data directly from customers, with their own stories, words and experiences.
Understanding the exact context . Via qualitative research, businesses can understand consumer experiences in their context. And depict nuances and cultural factors that impact decisions.
Extended flexibility . Qualitative methods are adaptable and offer the possibility to explore a large variety of topics and adjust on the go during the study.
Leads product development. It’s a significant tool for testing new products and features, providing real-life feedback and the target audience’s opinion on products’ strengths and weaknesses.

Qualitative Marketing Research Disadvantages

Time consuming . Usually, qualitative research is lengthy and needs time, as it involves a lot of manual labour and field activities. Plus, data analysis and interpretation.
Costly . Qualitative research involves high costs as it requires skilled researchers, moderators, and various services and tools for analysis. Moreover, to convince participants to take part in such studies, you need to incentivise them.
Limited extrapolation . Because it uses small samples, generalising the findings to larger populations is problematic.
High potential for subjectivity and bias . Research bias may impact data analysis. Maintaining objectivity is sometimes tricky and requires rules and training.
Quantifying findings may be complex . Comparing changes in qualitative aspects in time can be challenging, as they are hard to measure and quantify.

Qualitative research is responsible for uncovering details and insights that escape quantitative research.

But, executing it needs careful consideration of research objectives, available resources and time restrictions. Combining quantitative and qualitative marketing research with AI tools is often the best option to understand your audience better.

[1] Kassin, S. M. (2003). “Psychology”. Prentice Hall, Inc.

[2] Matthews, G. et al. (2003). “Personality Traits (2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press.

[3] Myers, I. B.; Myers, P. B. (1995). “Gifts differing: understanding personality type”. Davies-Black Pub.

[4] Kaplan, R.M.; Saccuzzo, D. P. (2008). “Psychological Testing: Principles, Applications and Issues (7th ed.). Thomson Learning EMEA, Limited.

[5] Matthews, G. et al. (2009). “Personality Traits (3rd ed.). Cambridge University Press. Pg. 447

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Advertisements crafted by AI needn’t be short of consumer insights

If advertising were to be a done by AI, we’d realize that prompting isn’t just another rational process. It takes human creativity to come up with the sort of creative briefs that give rise to effective ads.

Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) is promising to take over many a creative function, from generating images and crafting copy to making audio-visual advertisements. How soon will GenAI take over these creative functions of the $800 billion advertising industry? Will AI machines end the human reign over the creative world? Before answering these profound questions, we have to answer a simple question: What goes into creating effective advertising?

There are a few who think that creating an effective advertisement is as simple as putting the response you want from the consumer into the headline of your ad. So if you want someone to buy a product, advertise “Buy XYZ brand" as the main message. To provide further impetus to buy that product, advertise information on its functional benefits. As the ultimate incentive, mention any price discount on offer too. But the truth is that this is not how effective advertisements are created.

A few decades ago, Jack Trout and Steve Riven, in their book Differentiate or Die: Survival in Our Era of Killer Competition, reminded businesses the importance of differentiating one’s product from others in the market. But this differentiation strategy often has little to do with rational product benefits. The technology and ingredients used to make products in most categories have stayed the same for decades. For example, the ingredients of the toothpaste we use have not changed in the past few decades. Even if a product is technologically superior, very few people can actually discern such technological differences.

Brand differentiation is about generating the right emotional stimulus on behalf of a product. The question ‘Which college do you study?’ in a soap advertisement, for example, could tug the heartstrings of many a young mother in India. To appreciate the persuasion impact of this simple question on the sales of a soap brand, one need to understand the importance of human behaviour insights in crafting effective advertising.

Insights are not peripheral truisms about human behaviour. That demand for a product will go down as its price goes up is not an insight. It is just a truism. Such truisms are often on top of the pile in reports on samples of consumer conversation. But to make differentiated advertisements, such elementary truisms of human behaviour do not help. Knowledge of many young mothers being ill at ease deep within as a result of insecurity brought on by post-pregnancy bodily changes, however, is an example of a behavioural insight. How much ever we churn the past sales data of Wipro’s Santoor soap, this insight will not be discovered. How much ever we churn consumer-conversation data, it would not emerge. An insight is a deep human need that a consumer might not even articulate in a normal conversation. For that matter, on the face of it, one might even deny such thoughts. So such insights may require deep qualitative consumer research to reveal.

Powerful insights come from a deep and creative understanding of consumer behaviour. As part of creating an advertisement for a deodorant in India, my team once had to understand whether the masturbation fantasies of Indian males differed from those in Western countries. What is the data-set that one could analyse to arrive at such an understanding?

Consumers will rarely tell the truth about such deeply personal aspects of their lives. That is when I realized that comparing the editorial content of Indian porn literature and Western porn material may provide an answer to that question. Will GenAI tools ever be this creative in their information search?

If GenAI has to take over any responsibility for brand communication from humans, it should be able to unearth unique human behaviour insights. GenAI platforms are built on Large Language Models with access to far more knowledge than a human being can ever remember. But hoping to get great human behaviour insights from an LLM would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. This is where the role of prompts in a brand’s GenAI strategy takes on huge importance.

In the traditional advertising industry, the creative brief was a well-thought-through document that was prepared after much research and discussions among the strategic minds both at the client’s end and within its advertising agency. A creative brief contained all the important elements needed to make a good advertisement: unique human behaviour insights, brand guidelines, the key response required from the particular campaign or ad, and so on. A close understanding of this brief is what guided human creative teams in developing various creative stimuli to generate the appropriate response from the target consumer.

If GenAI is to take charge of advertising, the crucial role played by the creative brief in the traditional ad industry will have to be taken over by an effective prompt strategy. It will quickly be found that prompting cannot be a rational process managed by tech engineers. The prompt strategy would have to be developed by human behaviour and design experts tasked with getting GenAI to explore the depths of behaviour that qualitative research has not yet reached. The prompt strategy would then be the big differentiator in the brand’s Gen AI game-plan.

Only with a truly creative prompt strategy would GenAI have been able to come up with a line like ‘Which college do you study?’ to sell more soap.

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The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW Washington, DC 20500

Progress Towards Delivering a Digital-First Public Experience

By Federal Chief Information Officer Clare Martorana

President Biden and Vice President Harris believe government agencies should deliver excellent outcomes for the American people, whether we are rebuilding America’s infrastructure or providing access to critical information, services, or benefits online. To help achieve this vision, six months ago, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) released guidance for Federal agencies on Delivering a Digital-First Public Experience , which set a bold vision and clear requirements for how Federal agencies serve their customers digitally – a ten-year roadmap for a modern digital experience. That means websites and digital services that are mobile friendly and easy to navigate with useful, timely, and trustworthy information that is widely accessible to the public.

Since the policy was issued, we have been focused on execution and meeting the needs of the people we serve. Some 430 Federal agencies and sub-agencies provide information and services to more than 400 million individuals, families, businesses, organizations, and local governments each year. And in many cases, accessing information and services may involve interacting with multiple agencies, which makes taking a coordinated approach so critical. Deliberate implementation is critical and some of this work has begun to deliver big wins for the American people across the Federal enterprise, including:

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) improved search and content so taxpayers could find the information they need this filing season. Based on analysis of search behavior, assessment of the 250 most-visited pages on IRS.gov , and qualitative user research, the IRS mapped where users typically look, which informed the creation and revision of content targeted toward first-time tax filers for the 2024 filing season. Within the first month, this revised content drew over 100 million views—which is nearly 30% of traffic to IRS.gov—and was more prominently featured in search engine results. Together with enhanced features in the IRS.gov Online Account and the new IRS Direct File pilot , these efforts reinforce the IRS’s commitment to help taxpayers find key information and complete common tasks as easily as possible.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) consolidated its web presence and is delivering content in new ways. NASA’s websites have been redesigned to provide a unified platform for information about the agency’s missions and research in both English and Spanish. Launched last fall, the new nasa.gov , science.nasa.gov , ciencia.nasa.gov , NASA+ , and NASA App all share a common design system based on the U.S. Web Design System, resulting in a more consistent look and feel within and across the sites. This in turn makes it easier for users to navigate and find the information they are looking for.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) redesigned its homepage around user needs. Launched in January, the new FEMA.gov homepage provides information in a more engaging format to help users know their risk, be more prepared for a disaster, and jumpstart their recovery after disasters strike. A new “How Can FEMA Help?” section makes it easier for users to access the most popular topics direct from the homepage. In the unfortunate event of a disaster, a redesigned and more personalized registration and intake process makes it easier for users to get the help they need.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) streamlined content and ensured accessibility. At a time when access to public health information is critical, a new CDC.gov will go live in May and will help users to more easily find information and the answers to their questions. The CDC archived more than 65% of outdated or inaccessible materials and rewrote key content so that it is accessible and better meets users’ needs.

But lasting structural change requires a strong foundation and much of the last six months has been focused on constructing the architecture and providing the tools that agencies need to deliver. OMB has been working with agencies across the Federal Government to build enabling structures, including by:

Assessing the Baseline . To enable better management, measurement, and prioritization, agencies inventoried over 10,000 public-facing websites and identified their top websites with the most user traffic. Through ongoing and upcoming actions, agencies will identify opportunities to improve content for the most common questions and to deliver digital self-service options.
Empowering Leaders. Our policy required agencies to take immediate action to build a foundation that will support ongoing improvement of websites and digital services. Sustained action requires focused leadership. To facilitate intra-agency coordination and ensure accountability, agencies each named a Digital Experience Delivery Lead, and in February, we launched the Digital Experience Council , convening cross-functional stakeholders from across government to bring a coordinated approach to digital experience delivery.
Promoting Shared Tools to Drive Transformation. Key implementation partners, such as the General Services Administration’s (GSA) Technology Transformation Services, have enhanced and promoted shared services and best practices that enable and accelerate digital experience delivery. Over the last six months, hundreds more Federal websites have begun to utilize the Digital Analytics Program (DAP), which offers free, easy-to-use web analytics, or have adopted the U.S. Web Design System (USWDS).

What comes next:

Most of the public interacts with their government digitally by default – and they expect their online experience to be consistent with their favorite consumer website and mobile app. More than ever, digital experience is central to Federal agencies’ mission delivery and our government’s ability to serve the American people.

OMB will continue to collaborate with our implementation and agency partners to drive collaboration and coordination across government to ensure we are best delivering for the American people.

Learn more :

Read the fact sheet on Delivering a Digital-First Public Experience

Get digital delivery resources, best practices, and implementation updates: Digital.gov

Explore TMF funding: Streamlined proposals to implement 21 st Century IDEA

Join us: CIO.gov

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Consumer behavior also influences trends, and you might want to use them. #life #confidence
Consumer Behavior

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Qualitative Marketing Research: Understanding Consumer Behaviour
qualitative marketing research practice 23. Traditional way of understanding the consumer: a rational. being aware of own attitudes and needs 23. New approach to the consumer: an emotional being ...
The case for qualitative research
INTRODUCTION. The stated goal of the Journal of Consumer Psychology (hereafter JCP) is to "contribute both theoretically and empirically to our understanding of the psychology of consumer behavior".1. To date, the vast majority of empirical research published in JCP to advance that goal has been based on findings obtained in either laboratory or field experiments.
The past, present, and future of consumer research
In this article, we document the evolution of research trends (concepts, methods, and aims) within the field of consumer behavior, from the time of its early development to the present day, as a multidisciplinary area of research within marketing. We describe current changes in retailing and real-world consumption and offer suggestions on how to use observations of consumption phenomena to ...
Consumer Behavior Research: A Synthesis of the Recent Literature
Inevitably, these changes lead to changed consumer behavior studies by which, when, how, and why the topics are studied. Like any other discipline, systematic analysis of the knowledge development status of consumer behavior field is critical in ensuring its future growth (Williams & Plouffe, 2007).It is of a greater importance for a field of research such as consumer behavior that, as ...
Consumer Behavior Research
what consumer behavior research is investigating (Sect. 2.1), which research approaches are used (Sect. 2.2), when researchers collect data themselves and when they use existing data (Sect. 2.3), and. how to obtain empirical data (Sect. 2.4), … by viewing consumer behavior research through the following paradigms: qualitative and quantitative ...
Introduction to Qualitative Consumer and Marketing Research
Qualitative consumer and marketing research is thought to have begun in the 1930s as a qualitative approach entered the realm of applied marketing research (Levy 2006; Kassarjian 1995). Through his established institute for Economic Psychology, Paul Lazarsfeld conducted interviews with consumers to study shoe buying behavior in Zurich in 1933.
PDF The case for qualitative research
Put simply, qualitative research can advance consumer psychology because this approach is conducive to theory building and theory refinement. More specifically, qual-itative approaches can contribute in a range of specific ways (Otnes & Fischer 2006).
The evolution of qualitative research in consumer behavior
The study of consumer behavior gained momentum in the late 1940s and 1950s, especially as its value was embraced by advertising agencies on behalf of their clients. A lot of that work was proprietary and did not appear in journals—and the Association for Consumer Research and the Journal of Consumer Research did not show up until the 1970s ...
Qualitative Market Research: Its Role in Consumer Behavior
Highlights: Qualitative market research is essential for deciphering evolving consumer behavior and meeting modern marketing challenges. It distinguishes itself from quantitative research through its distinct approach and the types of insights it uncovers. It uncovers the 'why' behind consumer choices, offering insights into motivations and ...
Qualitative Business Research: Unveiling Consumer Behavior
The Essence of Consumer Behavior. Consumer behavior is a complex interplay of various factors, including psychological, cultural, and social influences. To decode this intricate puzzle, businesses employ qualitative research methods to delve deeper into consumers' minds, unveiling insights that quantitative data alone cannot provide.
Consumer Behavior Research: Unlocking Market Insights
Qualitative research methods in consumer behavior focus on understanding the deeper motivations, thoughts, and feelings of consumers. Techniques like in-depth interviews, focus groups, and observational studies provide rich, detailed insights that are not typically captured through quantitative methods.
Qualitative Marketing Research
ABSTRACT. This is a perfect guide to understanding the core principles of qualitative marketing research. It presents qualitative marketing research in the broader context of marketing and managerial decisions, consumer psychology and contemporary knowledge about unconscious and automatic processes. Different types of qualitative marketing ...
What is Consumer Behavior Research? Definition, Examples, Methods, and
Consumer behavior research is defined as a field of study that focuses on understanding how and why individuals and groups of people make decisions related to the acquisition, use, and disposal of goods, services, ideas, or experiences. ... Researchers might use qualitative methods like in-depth interviews to understand the thought processes ...
Consumer Behavior Research Methods
Most consumer behavior research studies phenomena that require researchers to enter the field and collect data on their own, and therefore the chapter emphasizes the discussion of primary research methods. Based on the nature of the data primary research methods are further distinguished into qualitative and quantitative.
Qualitative analysis of customer behavior in the retail industry during
To identify the key impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on consumer behavior and the food retail industry in Romania - including aggressive shopping, hoarding, and stockpiling tendencies, selective shopping, etc. and how retailers were able to adapt their strategies to meet customers' evolving needs, qualitative research was implemented by ...
A Qualitative Research to Explore the Purchase Behavior Determinants of
Using qualitative research, in-depth interviews with 11 women were conducted. As a result of the interviews, ... Given that consumer behavior constitutes an important part of behavioral sciences; its complex nature makes it a necessity to study the topic in-depth. Therefore, the goal of the current study is to explore which socio-cultural ...
Qualitative Marketing Research Understanding Consumer Behaviour
This is a perfect guide to understanding the core principles of qualitative marketing research. It presents qualitative marketing research in the broader context of marketing and managerial decisions, consumer psychology and contemporary knowledge about unconscious and automatic processes. Different types of qualitative marketing research methods are examined, from the classic focus group ...
Qualitative semiotics: Can we research consumer meaning-making?
Abstract. The notion of "meaning" is central to marketing because it is only through the making of meaning that "added value" can be created. The marketing profession has several models of how such meaning is created, but Peircean semiotics can shed further light on the activity of meaning-making itself and the stages that are involved ...
The past, present, and future of consumer research
Abstract. In this article, we document the evolution of research trends (concepts, methods, and aims) within the field of consumer behavior, from the time of its early development to the present day, as a multidisciplinary area of research within marketing. We describe current changes in retailing and real-world consumption and offer ...
Unlocking Consumer Secrets with Qualitative Research
1 Deep Insights. Qualitative research is like a key unlocking the hidden motivations and emotions that drive consumer behavior. Through methods such as in-depth interviews and focus groups, you ...
PDF Introduction to Qualitative Consumer and Marketing Research
Qualitative consumer and marketing research involves a range of methods and approaches to explore and provide richly detailed data such as meanings, experiences, characteristics,metaphors,symbols,descriptions,feelings,interactions,impressions, motivations, and perspectives of consumer behaviors and marketing phenomena (Belk et al. 2013).
The Art of Qualitative Marketing Research
Qualitative marketing research employs methods like focus groups, observation, ethnographic studies, interviews, etc. The scope is to delve into unstructured conversations and extract nuanced insights. It deals with collecting vast amounts of structured data from large samples. And has as main characteristics:
Use Consumer Behavior for Market Research With Longwood MBA
Or call 833-960-0138 833-960-0138. for help you with any questions you have. Longwood University's online MBA - General Business track program teaches students how to harness consumer behavior research to make correct market decisions.
Advertisements crafted by AI needn't be short of consumer insights
So such insights may require deep qualitative consumer research to reveal. Powerful insights come from a deep and creative understanding of consumer behaviour. As part of creating an advertisement ...
Progress Towards Delivering a Digital-First Public Experience
Based on analysis of search behavior, assessment of the 250 most-visited pages on IRS.gov, and qualitative user research, the IRS mapped where users typically look, which informed the creation and ...

Why qualitative market research is essential for understanding consumer behavior

Highlights:

How is qualitative research different from quantitative?

What are the different ways of conducting quantitative research to understand consumer behvaior?

What makes examining customer behavior so important?

Benefits of using qualitative market research

Limitations

Qualitative market research in action

When should you use qualitative market research?

Ethical considerations to bear in mind

Technology applications aiding qualitative research

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Understanding the Depths of Qualitative Business Research: A Journey into Understanding Consumer Behavior

Understanding Qualitative Business Research

The Essence of Consumer Behavior

Peering into Consumer Psyche

Exploring Consumer Motivations

Unveiling Consumer Perceptions

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Uncovering Hidden Trends

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Consumer Behavior Research

Definition and Importance of Consumer Behavior Research

Overview of the Impact of Consumer Behavior Research on Marketing Strategies

Consumer and shopper insights

Understanding Consumer Behavior

Factors Influencing Consumer Behavior

The Role of Consumer Behavior in Decision Making

Consumer Behavior Theories and Models

Research Methods in Consumer Behavior Research

Quantitative Research Methods

Qualitative Research Methods

Experimental Research in Consumer Behavior

Factors Affecting Consumer Behavior

Social Factors

Cultural Factors

Personal Factors

Consumer Purchase Decision Making

Influences on Consumer Purchase Decisions

Impulse Buying Behavior

Online Shopping and Consumer Behavior

Factors Influencing Online Buying Behavior

Comparison of Online and Offline Consumer Behavior

Consumer Satisfaction and Loyalty

Factors Influencing Customer Satisfaction

Relationship Between Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty

Consumer Research and Marketing Strategies

Targeting Specific Consumer Segments Based on Research Findings

Adapting Marketing Strategies to Consumer Behavior Trends

Case Studies in Consumer Behavior Research

Examination of Successful Marketing Campaigns Based on Consumer Behavior Research

Motivating Consumers and New Product Adoption

Innovations in Consumer Behavior Research for New Product Development

Social Media and Consumer Behavior

Role of Social Media in Shaping Consumer Perceptions and Purchase Decisions

Future Directions and Emerging Trends in Consumer Behavior Research

How NIQ and GfK Can Help

The past, present, and future of consumer research

Morris B. Holbrook

Jeffrey R. Parker

Donald R. Lehmann

Introduction

A brief history of consumer research over the past sixty years—1960 to 2020

Key concepts in the late - 1960s

Favored methods in the late-1960s

Aims in the late-1960s

Summary—the three R’s in the late-1960s

Concepts after 1980