Katia Adams and C.B Whittemore recently teamed up to write a terrific post on ‘Transcultural Perspective on the Retail Experience’. As it turns out, I recently wrote a paper for my company on consumerism (which I should hopefully be able to post on my blog shortly), and I felt their post was ideal to expand on the issue of ‘too much choice’.
Katia is a Brazilian national living in the USA who blogs about transcultural marketing, and shares her experiences of living in a foreign country. Katia’s ability to discuss cultural differences struck me, as I never really experienced a cultural shock when I moved to the UK 7 years ago… Well, the Brits do drive on the wrong side of the road, still use the imperial metric system, and the Queen is an A-List celebrity!
Aged 14, I remember being terribly excited when spotting Amora (Amora relève le plat!) mustard or Bonne Maman jam (Confiture Bonne Maman, c’est toi qu’on aime tant!) at the supermarket; in fact, I was always trying to spot French products on the shelves. Interestingly, British supermarkets are usually much smaller than French supermarkets, but because of the wide variety of products available, consumer confusion is something companies still have to face and tackle.
Katia says: ‘I had visited the US a couple of times before I came to live here, and one of the things that struck me most was the enormous variety of products available on store shelves compared to Latin America. The impact of “wide variety” alone has its effects on building size, and so one sees enormous super markets and drug stores in the US compared to relatively small to moderate sized stores in Latin America.’
Although an explosion of consumer choices may mean we sometimes get exactly what we want, too many choices can also overwhelm us to the point where we do not choose anything at all – this is what I call too much noise (cf. buying decision-making process) or information overload. And while this is a nightmare for consumers, it is a catastrophe for marketers!
‘In Brazil, Colgate is the dominant toothpaste brand and, being a good conservatively minded consumer, I was a regular user of the “original” white Colgate. When I migrated to the US, I still used Colgate, but I “migrated” to some of the other varieties of my regular brand, like Colgate with fluoride or the whitening agent, the pump or some other attribute. Then, I began to engage in brand trial with one of the other competitive premium brands. What happened then is that I experienced “choice pressure” – perceiving that I “had to” choose from a wide variety of options rather than sticking conservatively to one brand. At that point, I would say, marketing had molded in me the mindset of a classic mass market consumer.’
‘Should louder’ than the competition!
I recently worked on a project for a major feminine care manufacturer (unglamorous, I know!!) on consumer confusion, however although due to confidentiality reasons, I cannot discuss the findings of this research into too much detail.
The research helped us realise that product innovations such as scented liners and Always Freshelle created even more confusion across the category. When we asked women to group different products in the feminine care category, we quickly realised that the perceived category landscape didn’t make any sense at all as consumers didn’t differentiate between liners and towels. We analysed consumers’ perceived product benefits and emotional needs to create a Decision Tree. The Decision Tree highlighted level by level the product and emotional needs that are important when making a purchase. Manufacturers can use this tool to decide whether they should launch a product or not.
Decision Trees are excellent tools aimed at helping marketers and consumers alike to choose between several courses of action. They provide a highly effective structure within which you can lay out options and investigate the possible outcomes of choosing those options. They also help you to form a balanced picture of the risks and rewards associated with each possible course of action. It’s definitely something businesses need to look into…
Filed under: Consumer Buyer Behaviour, Qualitative Research, Transcultural Marketing
Laurence-Helene, wonderful addition to the conversation! Thank you. Helping consumers deal with brand confusion is a big opportunity. I find the proliferation of brand extensions so dizzying and overwhelming that I ignore them in stores. I will find out about them reading case studies or business articles which will lead me to try the product and then adopt it.
Hi Christine,
Thanks for the comment! You are right, brand confusion is a big opportunity. And the decision tree can turn this opportunity into a strength. The decision to purchase or not, is rarely made in-store hence the importance of floor labelling, wobblers, stickers etc to attract consumers’ attention.
Hey,
Thanks for posting our post on your blog! Your addition is awesome. At some point, companies must really wonder if line additions do really do more good than bad in “real” life, and not on perceived differences.
Katia
Mr Collier created a lot more than just a list
How’s this for choice overload - walk into any Starbucks outlet and there are apparently now more than 6,000 different combinations of coffee to choose from. If you tried a different one each day it would take you over 16 and a half years to try them all. It’s enough to make you want a Cup of tea.
Ditto Neil!
Great post and conversation.
I think that software developers continue to face this with regard to features.
More features creates more confusion for end-users. Which in some cases has led end-users to either refuse to upgrade with all the “new” features or to even use the software.
More choice can be paralyzing.
Keep creating…such thoughtful posts,
Mike