Discussion Response (150 words)

Respond to the following discussion response ?

Deborah Chenois

According to the American Marketing Association, as quoted by Finch (2012), high involvement purchases are "seen as having important personal consequences or as useful for achieving important goals". For many of us, the purchase of a house is potentially the highest involvement purchase we will make. I have purchased several houses in my lifetime, and the problem recognition phase in almost every case occurred when I was being relocated for a job and had to leave my current house. Once those job relocations became agreed to, my first steps in the information search process typically involved reviewing online listings in my area of choice and the selection of a realtor. From there, during the evaluation of alternatives phase involved touring potential homes as well as seeking out information about communities from friends and coworkers. Typical activities in the purchase decision phase included contract negotiation and home inspection. Last but not least, after the purchase I would often continue to review online listings in an attempt to determine whether I had paid a fair price for the home.

The four main psychological processes influencing consumer behavior include motivation, involvement, and behavioral and cognitive learning (Finch, 2012). The simple purchase of a bottle of water provides a useful backdrop to describe activities marketers can undertake to impact each of these four processes. With respect to motivation, many consumers are health conscious, and water consumption is widely held to be an important element in maintaining good health. By appealing to this motivation, a water company can leverage consumer motivation to sell its products. In terms of involvement, a bottle of water purchase would generally be considered to be low involvement decision, meaning marketers should be more attentive to emotional vs. intellectual appeal (Finch, 2012). Additionally, the low involvement nature of the bottle of water purchase indicates it would be more appropriate to focus on the consumer's behavioral, vs. cognitive, learning. As such, the use of positive imagery, specifically fitness related themed elements, would be effective in this case. Cognitive learning, since it generally related to higher involvement purchase decisions, would not necessarily come into play in the marketing plan for a bottle of water.

Reference

Finch, J. (2012). Managerial marketing. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc