Business Finance Homework Help

1.Was covered how the science and study of Consumer Behavior can be simplified into one single sentence. 

• What was it?
• What does it mean? Explain each key component of that statement, and provide at least one example to support your answer.

2.Role human emotions play in influencing our behaviors. 

When people’s standards of living and purchasing power are relatively simple and basic, their consumption behavior tends to be driven by rationality. As our standards of living and purchasing power increase, our purchases frequently become less rational. 

• Explain the difference in the dual system model, between System 1 and System 2 thinking, and which one is said to account for the majority of our decisions.
• Discuss how emotions play a role in the decision process of the modern-day digital consumer, as he/she evaluates and purchases products and brands. In your answer, provide at least one example.

3.Marketing is, in essence, a game of perceptions. 

• How are perceptions created? What role do our senses have in creating and sensing perceptions?
• As a marketers, how can we create perceptual, sensory experiences for our customers, that augment the brand (Bx) and user (Ux) experience?
• Can we still deliver such experiences in a digital economy? Provide at least two examples to support your answer.

4.Memories play a vital role in our current and future behaviors. Over time, based on experiences we encounter since infancy, our brain collects and stores massive amounts of data, that is evaluated as either highly salient (important, relative) or not. Lesser important experiences are typically in a short-term memory “drive”, and do not last long. Long-term memories on the other hand, are stored and retained, to be retrieved upon experiencing a triggering stimulus/i.

• What part of the brain is responsible for memory?
• Does technology in the digital age significantly impact our memory? 

How does that affect marketing and promoting to target audiences? What methods can marketers use/implement so that their products/brands and their experience(s) are more memorable, are retained longer, and can be more easily retrieved? Provide at least one example to support your answer.

5.Below you can see the Communication Process Model.

• What is it meant by “encoding” from the sender, and “decoding” from the receiver? 
• Apply the Communication Process Model to one (pick one!) of the following scenarios. Explain who the sender is, what is being “encoded” in the promotional content, the Media channels it should be sent out to, who the audience is (receiver), and how the audience (receiver) “decodes” the message (makes sense out of it):
  • Anheuser-Busch promoting its new Hard Seltzer beverage.
  • Nike launching and promoting its new athletic footwear, the Nike Air Zoom BB NXT.
  • FCA’s Jeep brand’s launch of the Jeep Gladiator Mohave Edition pickup truck. 
  • Advertising campaign from the start-up company The Farmer’s Dogbrand of dog food. 
• The study of Consumer Behavior  is believed to have become a sub-discipline of the marketing field … 
• What is motivation? 
• How do emotions affect or influence our motivation to do something, take action?
• How can technology be used to stir (or trigger) emotional responses, and therefore ultimately motivate consumers to respond or take action? In your answer, include a discussion on how social media can be a valuable communication and motivational tool. Provide at least two examples in your answer.
• What is anthropomorphism? Why is it applied to various products’ mascots or products?
• How do human beings develop personalities? Why are brands given “personalities” too, even though they are essentially, an asset representing a product? 
• In your discussion, include how television played a key role in the development of brand personalities, and provide two target demographic groups that are, or have been, profiled as a target market for a popular, ‘personable’ brand. (example: in class we discussed how Cheetos snacks’ cheetah character has evolved from a cartoony, childish personality, to a witty,  and more antagonistic adult character).

8.Recall from our Lecture on Attitudes, the “ABC Model” (see image below).

Visit our lecture, and see Slide #8 on the Hierarchy of Effects Model, concerning Attitudes. 

• Why do purchases situations that are more involving require first a level of cognition (rationale)?
  • [cognition – affect – behavior] or [cognition – behavior – affect]
• Why do purchases situations that are focused on delivering a unique customer or user experience (Cx, or Ux) manifest an emotional level (affect)?
  • [affect – behavior – cognition]

Apply each of the above hierarchies (see slide #8) to both of the following purchase situations, explaining what the user/customer is experiencing throughout the process, and the purchasing experience: 

• Booking a flight and hotel reservations for a business trip that will last through the weekend
• Booking a flight and hotel reservation for a family vacation that will last 10 days
• Discuss how MySpace (the original social network) and Facebook tapped into our basic human instinct to develop group behavior(s) and group mentality (aka herd mentality). 
• Explore the origins of both, and discuss how Facebook became the dominant social network, and a favored social media platform for marketers. 
• Furthermore, how and why do social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok become more popular venues than Facebook? In your answer, include a discussion of how they particular have an impact on the constant battle between the Ideal Self and the Actual Self.
• How have those two platforms become instrumental in the influencing of consumer target markets? Explain and provide at least two examples.

10. How a typical household is a system of Inputs and Outputs. Inputs are information, goods and services going in (via multimedia, purchases, situations, etc.), and Outputs are experiences, data  and outcomes (via usage, results, waste, feedback, etc.).

Interestingly, households are dynamic systems constantly under a state of change. Therefore, any changes within the household can affect future Inputs and Outputs… and any changes in the external environment outside of the household can impact and influence one or multiple members within. 

• Explore and discuss how the consumer culture within the household changed since the end of World War 2, as a result of new markets, new technologies, and new opportunities for women. 
• Explore and discuss how the digital economy has added power of influence to children in a household, changing once again the consumer culture. 
• Open-ended question: who creates consumer cultures? The marketer(s), or the Consumer(s)? 

Provide as many examples for either one as you wish.

Group of answer choices:

• In the late 1990’s
• In the 1980’s
• In the 1920’s
• After Y2K
• In the 1950’s

References ARE REQUIRED to be used for completing the exam. They should be listed in APA format at the end. Your answers however, do not need to be in APA format, but they need to be well structured, clear, and appropriate.