Perception

Notes prepared by: Jaison Neethan D’Souza, (2007-09, MBA, SJEC)

BASICS OF PERCEPTION AND MARKETING IMPLICATIONS

Individuals act and recent on the basis of their perceptions, not on the basis of objective reality. in reality is a totally personal phenomenon, based on that persons need , want s, values, and personal experiences. But for the marketer’s consumer perception is more than the knowledge.

ELEMENTS OF PERCEPTION

Sensation

Sensation Is the immediate and direct response of the sensory organs to stimuli. A stimulus may be any unit of input to any of these senses. Examples of stimuli include products, packages, brand names, advertisements and commercials. Sensory receptors are the human organs that receive sensory inputs. Their sensory functions are to see, hear, smell, taste and feel. All of these functions are called into play, either singly or in combinations, in the evaluation and use of most consumer products.

The absolute threshold

The lowest level at which an individual can experience a sensation is called the absolute threshold. The point at which a person can detect a difference between “something” and “nothing” is that person’s absolute threshold for that stimulus.

The differential threshold

The minimal difference that can be detected between two similar stimuli is called the differential threshold or the just noticeable difference.

Subliminal perception

People are motivated below their level of conscious awareness. People are also stimulated below their level of conscious awareness; that is, they can perceive stimuli without being consciously aware that they are doing so. Stimuli that are too weak or too brief to be consciously seen or heard may nevertheless be strong enough to be perceived by one or more receptor cells. This process is called subliminal perception because the stimulus is beneath the threshold, or “limen” of conscious awareness, though obviously not beneath the absolute threshold of the receptors involved.

Dynamics of perception

Human beings are constantly bombarded with stimuli during every minute and every hour of every day. The sensory world is made up of an almost infinite number of discrete sensations that are constantly and subtly changing. According to the principles of sensation, intensive stimulation “bounces off” most individuals, who sub consciously block a heavy bombardment of stimuli.

One type of input is physical stimuli from the outside environment; the other type of input is provided by individuals themselves in the form of certain predispositions based on previous experience. The combination of these two very different kinds of inputs produces for each of us a very private, very personal picture of the world. Because each person is a unique individual, with unique experiences, needs, wants and desires, and expectations, it follows that each individual’s perceptions are also unique.

Perceptional Selection

Consumers subconsciously exercise a great deal of selectivity as to which aspects of the environment they perceive. An individual may look at some things, ignore others, and turn away from still others. In actually, people receive only a small fraction of the stimuli to which they were exposed.

Which stimuli get selected depends on two major factors in addition to the nature of the stimulus itself. (1) Consumers previous experience as it affects their expectations. And (2) their motives at the time. Ease of these factors can serve to increase or decrease the probability that a stimulus will be perceived.

Nature of the stimulus

Marketing stimuli include an enormous number of variables that affect the consumers perception, such as nature of the product, its physical attributes,  the package design, the brand name, the advertisements and commercials including copy claims, choice and sex of model, size of ad, topography, the position of print ad or a commercial, and the editorial environment.

Expectations

People usually see what they expect to see, and what they expect to see is usually based on familiarity, . Previous experience, or preconditioned set. In a marketing context, people tend to perceive products and product attributes according to their own expectations.

Motives

People tend to perceive the things they need or want; the stronger the need the greater the tendency to ignore unrelated stimuli in the environment. In general, there is heightened awareness of stimuli that are relevant to ones needs and interests and a decreased awareness of stimuli that are irrelevant to those needs.

Selective perception

The consumers “selection” of stimuli from the environment is based on the interactions of expectations and motives with the stimulus itself. These factors give rise to four important concepts concerning perception.

Selective Exposure

Consumers actively seek out messages that they find pleasant or with which they are sympathetic. And they actively avoid painful or threatening ones. They also selectively expose themselves to advertisements that reassure them of the wisdom of their purchase decisions.

Selective attention

Consumers exercise a great deal of selectivity in terms of the attention they give to commercial stimuli. They have a heightened awareness of stimuli that meet their needs or interests and minimal awareness of stimuli irrelevant to their needs. Thus, consumers are likely to note ads for products that would satisfy their needs and disregard those in which they have no interest.

Perceptual Defense

Consumers subconsciously screen out stimuli that they find psychologically threatening, even though exposure has already taken place. Thus, threatening or otherwise damaging stimuli are less likely to be consciously perceived than are neutral stimuli at the same level of exposure.

Perceptual Blocking

Consumers protect themselves from being bombarded with stimuli by simply “tuning out” – blocking such stimuli from conscious awareness. They do so out of self – protecting because of the visually overwhelming nature of the world in which we live. The popularity of such devices as TiVo and Replay TV, which enable viewers to skip over TV commercials with great ease, is, in part, a result of perceptual blocking.

Perceptual Organization

People do not experience a numerous stimuli they select from the environment as separate and discrete sensations rather they tend to organize them into groups and perceive them as unified wholes.

Figure and Grounds

People have tendency to organize their perceptions into figure and ground relationship. How a figure- ground pattern is perceived can be influenced by prior pleasant or painful associations with one or the other element in isolation.

Grouping

Individuals tend to group stimuli so that they form a unified picture or impression. The perception of stimuli as groups or chunks of information, rather than as discrete bits of information, facilitates their memory and recall. Grouping can be used advantageously by marketers to simply certain desired meanings in connection with their products.

Closure

Individuals have a need for closure. They express this need by organizing their perceptions so that they form a complete picture. If the pattern of stimuli to which they are exposed is incomplete, they tend to perceive it, nevertheless, as complete; that is, they consciously or subconsciously fill in the missing pieces.

Perceptual interpretation

Stimuli are often highly ambiguous. Some stimuli are weak because of such factors as poor visibility, brief exposure, high noise level or constant fluctuations. Even the stimuli that are strong tend to fluctuate dramatically because of  such factors as different angles of viewing, varying distances, and changing levels if illumination.

Perceptual distortion

Individuals are subject to a number of influences that tend to distort their perceptions, such as physical appearances, stereotypes, first impressions, jumping to conclusions and the halo effect.

Consumer imagery

Consumers have a number of enduring perceptions, or images, that are particularly relevant to the study of consumer behavior. Products and brands have symbolic value for individuals, who evaluate them on the basis of their consistency with their personal pictures of themselves.

Product positioning

The essence of successful marketing is the image that a product has in the mind of the consumer-that is positioning. Positioning is more important to the ultimate success of a product than are its actual characteristics, although products are poorly made will not succeed in the long run on the basis of image alone.

Product repositioning

Regardless of how well positioned a product appears to be, the marketers may be forced to reposition it in response to market events, such as competitor cutting into the brands market share or too many competitors stressing the same attribute.

Perceptual mapping

It helps them to know how their product and service appear to the customer when compared to the competitors’ product and services.

Positioning of services

Compared with manufacturing firms, service marketers face several unique problems in positioning and promoting their offering. Because services are intangible, image becomes a key factor in differentiating a service from its competition. The marketing objective is to make the customer understand the how the service factor is related to the product.

Perceived price

It is important to know how the consumer perceives the price, as high, low or as fair. The consumer must be made to perceive the price which he is paying is fair. No one will be happy to know that they have paid twice the price.

Reference price

A reference can be external or internal; it can be any price that a consumer uses as a basis for comparison in judging another price.

Perceived quality

The consumer usually judges the quality of a product or services with the other attributes relating with it. Such related factors become important to understand in order to satisfy the customer.

Perceived quality of the product

Cues that relate to the physical characteristics of the product like color, flavor, or aroma, size etc

Perceived quality of the service

The service is more difficult for the consumer to evaluate; it is intangible, variable and perishable. They are produced and consumed at the same time.

Price quality relationship

The studies have found out that consumers rely on price as an indicator of product quality, that consumers attribute different quintiles to identical products that carry different price tag, and that such consumer characteristics as age and income affect the perception of values.

 Retail store image

Retail store have image of their own. The customer perceives the retail store according to their image and environment. The study proves that the customer determines by the availability of the products available in the stores, advertising, time availability and easy shopping.

Manufacturer’s Image

The customer’s imaginary extends beyond the perceived price and store image. The manufacturer who enjoys the favorable image generally finds new customer in his store where new products are accepted more readily than those manufacturers who have a less favorable or neutral image.

Perceived Risk

The perceived risk varies depending on the person, the product, the situation and the culture. Some of the customers may perceive high degree of risk depending on the consumption situation.

Types of Perceived Risk:

Functional Risk: Is the risk that product will not perform as expected.

Physical Risk: Is the risk to self and others that the product may pose.

Financial Risk: Is the risk that the product will not be worth its cost.

Social Risk: Is the risk that a product choice will bruise the consumer’s ego

Time Risk: Is the risk that the time spent on in the product such may be wasted if the product does not perform as expected.

How consumers handle risk

Consumers develop a self defensive weapon in order to satisfy the unsatisfied needs.

Consumers seeks information

Consumers seek information through his friend family and other people. They spend more time thinking and getting information about the product when they associate a high degree of risk with the purchase.

Consumers are brand loyal

Consumers remain brand loyal in order to avoid the risk.

Consumers select by brand image

When consumers have no experience with the product they trust the brand name. The consumers often think about the well known brand, worth buying and go for the product.

Consumers reply on store image

If the consumers do not have any information about the product they trust the merchandise buyers of reputable stores and depend on them.

Consumers buy the most expensive model

When in doubt the consumers feel that the most expensive model is probably the best in terms of quality and price.

Consumers seeking reassurance

Consumers who are uncertain about the product choice seek for reassurance through money back guarantees and warranty’s or trial use etc.