Thursday, 5 May 2011

Group Conformity, Opinion Leaders and Peer Pressure

Whether it is apparent or  not, every individual belongs to a group. The obvious and most common groups are family unit, friendship group and work or school group. Even those who claim to have no family, friends or other kinds of relationships are categorised by nation, culture and ethnicity. Everybody is part of a group.

For a team of marketers, knowing every single person they may want to attract is part of a group makes their job that little bit easier. Of course, it's possible to sell to a nation of people but more often than not, advertisers want to know how best to reach a more specific type of person.

Drawing from the title of this blog post, groups tend to have leaders and the people within the group are likely to act like each other. This conformity often leads to peer pressure, the desire to fit in with one's peers. Before going too in depth, it's important to define what a group is and to then look into the effects of this natural instinct of categorising ourselves.

  1. Solomon et al - Reference Group: an actual or imaginary individual or group conceived of having significant relevance upon an individual's evaluations, aspirations or behaviour.
  2. Dictionary.com - Group: Any number of persons or things ranged or considered together as being related in some way.
  3. Businessdictionary.com - Group: A collection of indivduals who have regular contact and frequent interaction, mutual influence, common feeling of camaraderie, and who work together to achieve a common set of goals.
  4. Brassington and Pettitt - Reference Group: Any group, whether formally or informally constituted, to which an individual either belongs or aspires to belong, for example professional bodies, social or hobby-oriented societies, or informal, vaguely defined lifestyle groups.
From these definitions, it is clear that a group is a collection of people who share similar interests and/or character traits.

Brassington and Pettitt (2007) distinguish three types of groups:
- Membership Groups: groups to which the individual already belongs
- Aspirant Groups: groups to which the individual would like to belong
- Dissociative Groups: groups to which the individual does not want to belong or be seen to belong to

These photos show how someone of my age may feel about the three types of groups.

Membership Group

Aspirant Group

Dissociative Group

I've created a profile to help understand how advertisers use these groups to reach their target market. Her name is Wendy and she is a 38 year old woman who is overweight. She has a good group of friends and a comfortable living and feels the only thing holding her back is her issue with weight. The following advertisements would target her...

This would be Wendy's dissociative group, she would not want to be seen as a lover of fast food. Burger King would not aim to target health conscious people who stick to healthy diets.
Special K would target Wendy as she is trying to lose weight. This is her aspirant group. She wants to be like these women whose jeans fit them perfectly and have slim figures. Because this is who she wants to be, she is likely to buy this product.
Wendy would relate to this advert as she has a good circle of friends so this scene would be familiar. This can be classed as Wendy's membership group, Jacob's Creek wants to target people who are socialable and quite young.

Peer Pressure

I'm not sure I would believe a person who told me they had never experienced peer pressure. It does not discriminate against age or gender and I believe it infiltrates a person's groups at one point or another, if not constantly.
An individual can react to these pressures by compliance (doing as it suggested), internalisation (absorbing the beliefs and ideas that are being encouraged) or counter conformity (going against what others are doing).

For most people, the phrase 'peer pressure 'probably brings up a sense of self consciousness or perhaps self belief. It's that desire to be as good as, if not better than, your friends. To school children it means angst, to marketers it's a way of selling to one person but affecting many. This leads to the topic of...

Group Conformity

Fuelled by peer pressure, members of a group often have a desire to be like their fellow members. If one girl buys a Ralph Lauren jumper, the others will too. If one boy starts styling his hair, the rest will follow. It's a human instinct to crave acceptance. This is shown in Maslow's hierarchy of needs at the level of 'Belonging Needs'.

Source: Lifework Transitions, 2002
When I was 11, everyone at my school was wearing Adidas All-Stars. My friend and I, who were sadly without the much sought after footwear, went into the woods near our homes and ruined our current trainers as best we could. Jumping in mud, scraping away at the soles... just to get a pair of these:

I did get them in the end. And I was ecstatic... because I 'fit in'. It all seems a bit ridiculous now though.
Ridiculous as I may think that experience was, I still follow trends, although now I would only follow a trend if I liked it and it suited me. Back then that wasn't such an issue. Now I present myself so that I feel good about myself and I can show my best side... which results in people approaching me and getting to know me... which results in the formation or joining of yet another GROUP.

Opinion Leaders

In my opinion (no irony intended), the term opinion leader is very vague. Any person who influences one or more people can be defined as an opinion leader. A person can be a leader, a follower or a bit of both. Marketers want to be on the positive side of someone who is a leader. Hollywood blogger Perez Hilton is an opinion leader. If he is negative about a venue in L.A. it's likely to suffer.If he recommends a store in L.A., it will most likely see the financial benefit. Celebrities have the power to influence large majorities, hence the success of sponsorship and endorsements, because they are seen as aspirational by many consumers.

If a brand can successfully market to an opinion leader, they are likely to get a good return.Groups are often made up of these kinds of people:

  1. Tourists: lack strong social ties to the group, and maintain only a passing interest in the activity
  2. Minglers: maintan strong social ties, but are not very interested in the central consumption activity
  3. Devotees: express strong interest in the activity,but have few social attachments to the group
  4. Insiders: exhibit both strong social ties and strong interest in the activity
Source: Solomon et al, 2010

Although opinion leaders, most likely to be part of the insiders category, may not heavily influence all members of the group... the potential is there.

Groups Gone Wrong!

It's vital to remember that group influence is not alway positive. Marketers need to be sure they do not attract the wrong kind of person resulting in a negative affiliation.



  • Brassington, F. and Pettitt, S. (2007) Essentials of marketing. 2nd ed. Harlow: Pearson.
  • Dictionary.com (2011) Available from: www. dictionary.com [Accessed 5 May 2011].
  • Businessdictionary.com (2011) Available from: www.businessdictionary.com [Accessed 5 May 2011].
  • http://www.lifeworktransitions.com/exercises/part1/mazlow.html
  • Solomon, M. R., Bamossy, G. Askegaard, S. and Hogg, M. K. (2010) Consumer behaviour: a European perspective. 4th ed. Harlow: Pearson.

Learning, Memory and Nostalgia

Learning and Memory

In order to effectively teach someone, you must adapt your teaching methods to suit the way that individual learns. If you don't, they probably won't understand or remember what it is you are teaching. This is no different for advertisers. They need to know how people learn and how they engage with advertising in order to make it effective.
Dictionary.com defines learning as "The act or process of aquiring knowledge or skill." Interestingly, it also gives this definition: "The modification of behaviour though practice, training or experience." I believe that the second definition is more applicable to advertising. Advertisers are always, in one way or another, encouraging people to change something about themselves. Whether it be where they shop, how they look or what they buy.

There are two types of learning that relate well to marketing.


Behaviourist Approach
Cognitive Learning
All behaviour is a response to stimulus. We learn to respond to stimuli in particular ways based on the environment we were in when we experienced that stimuli in the past.
The acquisition of knowledge and skill by mental processes.
·         Classical Conditioning – Pavlov
A reflexive or automatic type of learning in which a stimulus acquires the capacity to evoke a response that was originally evoked by another stimulus.
·         Latent Learning
The type of learning that occurs, is not exhibited until there is some reinforcement or incentive to demonstrate it.
·         Operant Conditioning – Skinner
Operant conditioning is a method of learning that occurs through rewards and punishments for behaviour. Through operant conditioning, an association is made between a behaviour and a consequence for that behaviour.
·         Observational Learning
This occurs when an observer’s behaviour changes after viewing the behaviour of a model. An observer’s behaviour can be affected by the positive or negative consequences of a model’s behaviour.

Examples:
Classical Conditioning:
Operant Conditioning:
 
Latent Learning: If Person A drives Person B to work every day, Person B will learn the route to work without actual having driven themselves. 
 
Observational Learning:
To summarise,  "behavioural theories assume that learning takes place as the result of responses to external events" (Solomon et al, 2010, p246)and "cognitive learning occurs as a result of mental processes" (Solomon et al, 2010, p250).

 Now that it's clear what each type of learning means, how have they been utilised by advertisers?
A behaviourist learner will respond to stimuli that they recognise from another environment.

The stimuli of couples enjoying their first loves would evoke the feelings a person may have had in a personal environment. Therefore this advert would grab attention. It doesn't require cognitive learning, simply a response to something the person has previously experienced.


This next commercial, however, requires more concentration as it is basically teaching its audience about tooth sensitivity and how to find a solution.


The Memory Process:

External Inputs > Encoding > Storage >  Retrieval
Put simply = What we notice > Placing that into our memory > Retaining information > Remembering information as and when necessary

Our senses out our link to our memory. By using sensory branding, a greater emotional connection is created between the brand and the consumer.
Without memory, we would literally be living in and for the moment.
Nostalgia
 " A bittersweet emotion where we view the past with both sadness and longing." (Solomon et al, 2010, p264)
"A wistful desire to return in thought or in fact to a former time in one's life, to one's home or homeland, or to one's family and friends; a sentimental yearning for the former happiness of a certain place or time." (Dictionary.com, 2011)
A marketer can always connect on a personal level with a consumer if they tap into the consumer's memory and trigger nostalgia.
My Nostalgia Collage
This is an ideal way to reach a target market, by using world events that they would remember. My grandmother would respond to a feature relating to WW2, whereas I would be more responsive to an article relating to 9/11. By using nostalgia based advertising, agencies can filter out people who don't fall into their target audience and truly grasp the attention of those they want to target.
There is a vast difference in the number of memorable occasions on my timeline when compared to my mother's. This proves how one event which is influential for my mother may provoke no reaction in me.
  • Jessica - Born 1989


Although I was only 2 months old when the Berlin Wall came down, I always think of as an occasion in my lifetime. To remind myself that history isn't only in text books or that it is always in the distant past.
I realise now that I have forgotten the Clinton/ Lewinsky scandal, re-election of George Bush, inaugration of Barack Obama and the deaths of Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden. I have decided not to change my timeline because the 5 topics I initially thought of have clearly had more of an impact on my life. Note that the following list approximately three times longer than mine and I am about a third of my mother's age.
  • Paulette - Born 1957
1963 - JFK assassination
1969 - Man walks on the moon
1973 - End of Vietnam War
1980 - John Lennon assassination
1981- Reagan assassination attempt
1981 - Prince Charles and Lady Diana's wedding
1982 - Invasion of the Falkland Islands
1989 - Fall of the Berlin Wall
1997 - Princess Diana's death
2001 - World Trade Centre attack
2001 - Afghanistan War
2003 - Iraq War
2005 - Hurricane Katrina
2006 - Death of Saddam Hussein
2011- Japan crisis
2011 - Prince William and Kate Middleton's wedding
2011 -Death of Osama Bin Laden
Surprisingly, many of the things my mother recalled occured within my lifetime but did not affect me as greatly as they did her. This is possibly a generational thing but, I think, an important piece of information relating to how each generation responds to certain events and situations.
Nostalgia based advertising in use...

This advert uses music to trigger a memory of good times. 'We Like to Party' by the Vengaboys was huge in the 1990s and odds are, people who were partying at that time have memories of this song.
Coco Cola love nostalgia based advertising. Most people I know have said to me that they know Christmas is coming when they see one of Coco Cola's ads.
This is a great example of using nostalgia based advertising yet still appealing to a range of generations. Hovis' ad enhances the point I made earlier, about how my grandmother would respond to WW2 and I would respond to 9/11. In this case, she can relate to coal strikes (and probably the entire ad) and I can relate to the millenium celebrations.
Fairy Liquid is 50 years old this year and they have used some adverts from their archive to celebrate. This old style of ad will make some people nostalgic, while others may have memories of using the bottle to make space rockets as children. It's a brand that a large number of people can relate to and have probably been familiar with since childhood.

Advertisers need to know how their consumers learn so that they recognise how best to grab the consumer's attention so that they retain it in their memory. Memory is also used to stir up feelings of nostalgia to create an immediate bond between a consumer and a brand.

  • Dictionary.com (2011) Definition of learning. [online] Available from www.dictionary.com [Accessed 4 May 2011].
  • Dictionary.com (2011) Definition of nostalgia. [online] Available from www.dictionary.com [Accessed 4 May 2011].
  • Solomon , M. R., Bamossy, G., Askegaard, S. and Hogg, M. K. (2010) Consumer behaviour: a European perspective. 4th ed. Harlow: Pearson.

Monday, 2 May 2011

Gender Differences in Buyer Behaviour

It would be impossible to deny that men and women are very different. With comparisons regarding thought processes and differing attitudes and approaches to pretty much anything made up of atoms, I may struggle to stay on track. This is, after all, a blog about Understanding the Customer, not a review of Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus.


Despite the thousands of publications, jokes and agony aunt questions, the differences between men and women are obvious and simple. This statement is supported by the way men and women are advertised to. When marketing, stereotyping is welcomed. Boys like girls, girls like shoes.




Marketing has a tendency to be dominated by male values due to the large proportion of men working within the industry. (Solomon et al, 2010) Although this is a well known fact, it is illogical as women do the majority of shopping for a household.

To introduce the difference in buyer behaviour with regard to men and women, please watch these two videos. The first shows what happens when men and women shop and the second explains why.
Interestingly, Global News discusses the similarity between the way men shop to the way they hunt, and they way women shop to the way they search for berries. (This point starts at 53 seconds.)



This suggests that the way each gender shops should be mirrored by the way they are marketed to. For example, men have a direct approach to shopping so an advertisement for a masculine product should be simple and direct. Personally, I think that ads act as a reminder for men to purchase a product. Like when they need shaving gel or more car polish.

 
Direct approach: "Come taste the Whopper!"

For women, ads are more of an encouragement. When I see an ad for soap, I don't go out and immediately buy it, however if I see an ad for soap with moisturiser and exfoliating beads in it, I may go and purchase it because it's better than my current soap. A man would not see the point in buying more soap when it is not necessary.


This image doesn't make me want to go out and buy mascara, it makes me want to buy that one because of all of its advantages. The text explains why this mascara is superior, highlighting the fact that women will shop around and look for better quality products. Advertising towards men is less likely to explain the product and have text in the advert, whereas women want to know more about their purchases.

 This introduces the concept of what makes up a gender specific advertisement.


MEN
WOMEN
Point A
Linear
Curved Lines
Point B
Neutral Colours
Bright Colours
Point C
Focus on Product
Notice More Detail
Point D
More Likely to Pick Up Obvious Messages
More Like to Understand Complex Metaphors
Point E
Concise Language
Conversational Language
Point F
Humorous
Emotive

The following advertisements are examples of each point:

Point A:

 Note the 3 boxes, creating a distinct, linear appearance.
Clear use of wavy and curved lines.

Point B: For this point I am not showing specific ads, but the distinction of colour between male and female Google image ad searches. By searching "womens perfume ad" and "mens perfume ad", it is easy to see how use of colour differs.


Point C:

 The pint of Guiness is the main focus here, with limited text.
A lot of information is given using text and photographs.

Point D:

I am man. I eat met. Very simple.
Brings a foreign situation into London.

Point E:

Clear and straight to the point.

Chatty and conversational with TK Maxx's buyer.

Point F:

Cleverly getting the message through. (Personal favourite!)

Using nostalgia to sell a quality product.


Sex-typed and Androgynous Products

According to Solomon et al (2010), products are sex-typed or androgynous. Sex-typed defines a product that takes on masculine or feminine characteristics. Put simply, Barbies for girls and Hotwheels for boys.

Androgynous products are not gender specific, like vodka. Adverts for spirits tend to appeal to both sexes; they become sex-typed when promoting beer or cocktails. Note the differences in these ads… sex-typed or androgynous?

 

Knowing what kind of person makes up your target market, sex-typed or androgynous, makes appealing to their senses easier. Androgynous people tend to be adaptable and relaxed about society’s expectations of each gender whereas those who are sex-typed will show more allegiance to their culture’s views on gender roles.

These two adverts, for very similar products produced by the same brand, demonstrate differences in gender buying behaviour.
 
  
Primacy vs. Recency

It’s not just what is in the ad that grabs the attention of men and women, when the ad is seen also makes a huge difference.
During television ad breaks, do you remember the first one that ran or the last? If you’re going down an escalator on the London Underground, was it the first poster that stayed in your mind or the last? Odds are, if you’re a woman it was the first and if you’re a man it was the last. This is called primacy and recency. (Brunel and Nelson, 2003) Women are more likely to remember the first advert they noticed whereas as men will remember the last.


I’m trying to work out where I fit in in all of this. Am I sex-typed? Am I androgynous? My immediate reaction is “Yes, definitely sex-typed and feminine.” My bedroom houses more than 40 pairs of shoes and two wardrobes and a chest of drawers bursting with clothes and accessories. I have far more lotions and hair products than I will ever use. I own pretty much every minute of Sex and the City that was ever aired and my iPod matches my duvet cover.

Yet the BBC thinks I have a masculine brain. Not surprising, I must admit, as I can be painfully logical and am less sensitive than most of the men I know. Plus I’m pretty good at parking! ;-)

How does this relate to advertising? If I had more money, I would be a marketer’s dream. Brand conscious and materialistic, two characteristics marketers must love. But how are they targeting me? They are definitely manipulating my personality and self-concept. (And doing a great job.) I suppose it is fair to assume that your personality and self-concept rely heavily on what kind of consumer you are, sex-typed or androgynous. For me, I’m sticking with sex-typed and feminine… because I’ve never been inspired to buy Lynx or polish my hubcaps.









  • Brunel F & Nelson M (2003) “message order effects and gender differences in advertising persuasion », Journal of Advertising, Vol 43, No. 3, September 2003
  • Solomon, M. R., Bamossy, G.,Askegaard, S. and Hogg, M.K. (2010) Consumer behaviour:a European perspective. 4th ed. Harlow: Pearson.