Which is, what brand within the product category you're going to purchase.
Once you have decided on the brand, the next question arises is,
where do you going to buy it?
Are you going to buy it through a specific specialized dealer or
are you going to buy it through a mass merchandiser?
That's definitely an important question.
Once you decide on the channel or the place you are going to buy the product,
you have to think about how much money do you want to spend.
Of course different channels have different prices so
this is an important consideration as a consumer.
Then you have to decide when do you want to buy it.
If the product is a more high involvement product, then probably
you will delay the purchase in order for the price of the product to come down.
On the other hand, if it's a low involvement product
which arises out of necessity, you might buy it immediately.
The final decision which you can encounter is the payment method.
That is, are you going to pay by cash or credit, or
take some kind of a loan, and so on.
Now let's go deeper into the different psychological processes which consumers go
through when they make their decision.
There are different theories provided
by psychologists which impact consumer behavior processes.
Under motivation, there's Freud's theory, which looks into a laddering or
projective technique.
Now, what is a laddering technique?
Basically, every consumer, when they purchase a product,
go through different stages of the decision in order to eventually arrive at
the product they want to purchase.
And this is basically a laddering technique.
On the other hand,
Maslow proposed a theory which looks at the needs of the consumers.
Every consumer has certain types of needs.
First of all, every one of us have a physiological need like food,
water, shelter, and most of the cases,
our frequently purchased product falls under this category.
The second type of need is called safety need,
this includes security and protection.
Third need is called social needs, this includes love,
affection, and so on and so forth.
The fourth type of need is called self-esteem need,
this includes recognition, status, and so on.
Finally, at the most highest level, you have self-actualization needs.
This includes self-development, realization, and so on.
Think about the example of purchasing a Apple iPhone.
Now, of course, it has some needs which arise out of necessity.
But none of the needs of purchasing a Apple iPhone
comes from a physiological need.
They are definitely more like esteem needs or self-actualization needs.