The Consumer MarketThe Consumer Market

Who do marketers target, and why?Reminder: Unit 1 Test will be on Friday (Feb 28)

The more marketers know about their customers, the more they can cater and anticipate customer needs

Consumer profiles:• Category of people that are likely to be

attracted to a certain product

• Divided into a primary market (regular customers) and the secondary market (other, occasional customers)

Why we target?Why we target?

Demographics is the study of obvious characteristics that categorize people:

• Age: Seven different age groups• Pre consumers: (ages 0-9)• Allowance customers (ages 10-15)• Youth Market (ages 16-19)• Postsecondary Market (20-25)• Family formation (nesters – ages 25-40)• Establishment (40-55)• Mature Market (55+)• Why is age the most important demographics factor?

DemographicsDemographics

Gender:• Numerous products marketed exclusively to

women and men separately• Each gender has different needs or wants.

Income:• Grouped based on money earned. Ie: Mercedes

and BMW focus on the upper-class whereas Honda Civic focuses on middle or lower class.

Ethnicity and Culture:• Especially important in international business• Some products are targeted only for certain ethnic

group. • Can anyone think of an example?

Demographics Continued..Demographics Continued..

We can classfiy consumers based on personality, attitude, lifestyles, religious beliefs and interests.

For example: sports fans, gamers, bikers (hog) treckies, hippies, college students, hunters and fishers.

PsychographicsPsychographics

People have different wants and needs depending on geographic area:• Urban area – tiny parking space• Suburban area – small parking space• Rural area – big parking space with

unpaved roads• For example, if you were automaker, how

would you differentiate your product so that you can target each of the 3 areas?

GeographicsGeographics

The usage of demographics, psychographics and geographic data collection to interpret (and to understand) the wants and needs of a targeted group of people

The collection, analysis, and interpretation of information used to develop a marketing strategy or to solve a marketing problem

What is Marketing What is Marketing Research?Research?

Proper marketing research needs to:• Be collected in a methodical,

organized manner• Use numerous different strategies

and collect a wide range of data Market research provides hard

data: information based on supportable facts.

What is Marketing What is Marketing Research?Research?

Ultimately makes marketing efforts more successful

When a company wants to earn more money/expand/develop a new product, develop a product, etc

If a strong competitor moves into the marketplace• Ie: What is the best location for my store?• What products should I sell? Should I

advertise? Marketing research helps us answer these

important questions!

When is Marketing Research When is Marketing Research Needed?Needed?

Primary Research:• Qualitative: used to measure people’s

reactions, responses or feelings towards a given subject or problem

• Quantitative: involves collecting data by surveying a representative sample of a target-market population

• For example, survey is done to find out whether people will want to buy my magic pen.

Gathering Data – Key Gathering Data – Key ConceptsConcepts

Data Mining:• A research process marketers use to look for

unknown connections and patterns among collected data

• Allows marketers to extract useful information from the volumes of data available

• Makes connections between marketing activities and consumer behaviour

Gathering Data – Key Gathering Data – Key ConceptsConcepts

A survey is a set of carefully planned questions that are used to gather data

Can be: written, oral, in person, on the phone, through the mail or internet

Open ended questions:• Are very difficult to analyze and take more

time to answer Random Sampling:• Is necessary: a survey that does not accurately

represent the entire targeted market is biased

SurveysSurveys

Tickle Me Elmo handout

Homework:Homework: