Situational Statement: Krugman And The Concept Of Involvement

The concept of involvement is becoming really important in marketing. This concept was introduced in the mid-sixties by Krugman and his presentation of low involvement learning. Involvement was initially a concept used in social psychology (Houston and Rothschild 1978). Involvement was linked with individuals’ self-esteem and ego and how each individual’s values, culture could influence his/her actions. For example, individuals considered as highly involved would be more likely to solve a problem using their own experience (Sherif and Cantril 1947). This seems easy to accept: if one 's very self (the ego) was highly involved, then one certainly could be expected to take a stand on an issue. Furthermore, there was another related view which …show more content…
(Like a car). A special situation affect on products which consumer had not any tendency to buy them before. Those products in special situation have more risk to purchase. In this case, having knowledge about a brand and loyalty to it can help us in decision making process. For example, a general purchase situation is in store purchase which consists of internal stimulus of shops such as the way of furnishing, and arranging product, and can be effective on decision making process. Asael (2004) point out that situational involvement can lead to unexpected decisions. Olshavsky&Granbois (1979) found out that buying a gift is a special situation and has more risk. In such situation, purchaser seeking products with high quality. To illustrate that, I will use an example from my personal experience. When I was in France, I was in a supermarket called Carrefour to do some shopping. I wanted to buy an iced roll-on because I looked very tired. When I took the first product from the shelf, I saw an ad on the screen promoting lotions and roll-ons for men to be feel less tired and give your face some vitality. I was very impressed and it helped to make my purchase straight away. This shows that situational involvement has a very strong impact on the shopping experience of consumers and it can definitely accelerate the decision-making …show more content…
Furthermore, there can be different levels of involvement, from inertia to passion. Inertia means that that the consumer doesn’t have any motivation to consider alternatives offered on the market. He might keep buying the same type of products over and over. When a consumer feels involved and very related to a product, we can say that he has entered in a flow state. That means that the consumer is loyal, devoted and even addicted to a product. We can take the traditional example of Apple Iphones. People have the possibility to order their phones at home and be delivered in a few days but the majority of Apple clients go to stores and wait for hours to get their brand new Iphone. This is definitely what we can call devotion and involvement to a product but also to a brand. The brand image plays an important role in that process as well. If we use the example of Apple again, there is the same phenomenon with laptops