Thus, the marketing message has impacted on consumer behavior in a specific and deliberate way. Marketers typically have significant control over the marketing message in the advertising, the packaging and sometimes even the placement of the product (ensuring Corona is available at every major beach resort around the world, for example).
In conclusion, there are a number of different ways in which firms can exert influence over consumer behavior. Among the most important levers are control over information, merchandising and control over the marketing message. That firms have so many powerful levers at their disposal reflects the nature of the impact of the firm on consumers. Consumer behavior is often not the direct outcome of a singular action on the part of the marketer, but as the outcome of a set of cumulative actions, each of which influences the consumers' behavior is a specific way. The ways in which marketers can influence consumer behavior is bounded only by the information that marketers have about...
The field of consumer behavior has become increasingly specific and esoteric in recent years as marketers seek to perpetually refine their knowledge. Yet the fundamental truths still hold -- information, merchandising and marketing are the critical means by which firms influence consumer behavior.
Works Cited:
Law, D. & Yip, J. (no date). The impact of visual merchandising on the consumer decision process for intimate apparel. Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Retrieved June 15, 2010 from http://elearning.lib.fcu.edu.tw/bitstream/2377/3942/1/ce05atc902007000065.pdf
Mullen, B. & Johnson, C. (1990). The psychology of consumer behavior. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Nelson, P. (1970). Information and consumer behavior. The Journal of Political Economy. Vol. 78 (2) 311-329.
Vinson, D., Scott, J. & Lamont, L. (1977). The role of personal values in marketing and consumer behavior. Journal of Marketing. Vol. 41 (2) 44-50.
