Learning

According to Kotler’s Definition, learning involves changes in an individual’s behavior arising out of the experience. Most of the human behavior is learned over time, out of the experience.

Following are the features of consumer learning

·        Consumer learning is a process. A process which continually changes and acquires new knowledge.

·        This knowledge can be obtained from reading, discussing, observing, thinking, etc.

·        Newly acquired knowledge or personal experience, both serve as feedback.

Elements of Consumer Learning

Motivation is the driving force of all important things to be learnt. Motives allow individuals to increase their readiness to respond to learning. It also helps in activating the energy to do so. Thus the degree of involvement usually determines the motivation to search information about a product.

For example, showing advertisements for summer products just before summer season or for winter clothes before winters.

Motives encourage learning and cues stimulate the direction to these motives. Cues are not strong as motives, but their influence in which the consumer responds to these motives.

For example, in a market, the styling, packaging, the store display, prices all serve as cues to help consumers to decide on a particular product, but this can happen only if the consumer has the motive to buy. Thus, marketers need to be careful while providing cues, especially to consumers who have expectations driven by motives.

Response signifies how a consumer reacts to the motives or even cues. The response can be shown or hidden, but in either of the cases learning takes place. Often marketers may not succeed in stimulating a purchase but the learning takes place over a period of time and then they may succeed in forming a particular image of the brand or product in the consumer’s mind.

Reinforcement is very important as it increases the probability of a particular response in the future driven by motives and cues.

Elements of Consumer Learning

MOTIVATION:

“It is the processes that lead people to behave as they do”.

It occurs when a need arises that a consumer wishes to satisfy. Motivation is based on needs and goals. It acts as a spur of learning. Uncovering consumer motives is one of the prime tasks of marketers, who then try to teach motivated consumer segments why and how their products will fulfill the consumer’s needs.

CUES:

“It is a stimulus that suggests a specific way to satisfy a silent motive”.

If motives serve to stimulate learning, cues are the stimuli that give direction to these motives. In the marketplace, price, styling, packaging, advertising and store displays all serve as cues to help consumers fulfil their needs in product-specific ways. Cues serve to direct consumer drives when they are consistent with consumer expectations. Marketers must be careful to provide cues that do not upset those expectations.

RESPONSE:

“Response means how individuals react to a drive or cue or how they behave”.

Learning can occur even when responses are not overt. The automobile manufacturer that provides consistent cues to a consumer may not always succeed in stimulating a purchase. A response is not tied to a need in a one-to-one fashion. If the manufacturer succeeds in forming a favorable image of a particular automobile model in the consumer’s mind, when the consumer is ready to buy, it is likely that he or she will consider that make or model.

REINFORCEMENT:

“A positive or negative outcome that influences the likelihood that a specific behavior will be repeated in the future in response to a particular cue or stimulus”.

It increases the likelihood that a specific response will occur in the future as the result of particular cues or stimuli. Through positive reinforcement, learning has taken place.