Brand Building and Consumer Decision Making

Brand Building & Consumer Decision Making

Brand Building & Consumer Decision Making

A person can rarely go into a local shopping mall and not find a Victoria’s Secret store. Victoria’s Secret sells women’s lingerie, pajamas, perfume, and other feminine-related items. The store uses “girly” colors, such as pink and reds, as well as visually appealing super-models to sell the brand. While the brand has been profitable and widely marketed, the brand does not go without controversy, using super-models in barely-there clothing. This paper will discuss the typical Victoria’s Secret consumer and consumer attitudes, discuss marketing strategies, and the role Victoria’s Secret plays in underage self-esteem.

Buyer Decision Process

Kotler and Armstrong (2010) describe the buyer decision process in five steps: need recognition, information search, evaluation of alternatives, purchase decision, and postpurchase behavior (p. 178-179). The Victoria’s Secret consumer first starts by watching a Victoria’s Secret commercial, looking at an advertisement, receiving information in the mail, researching online, or just by determining that a certain product is needed when looking through her wardrobe. The consumer sees a want or desire for a product. All of the latter can determine if the buyer decides to purchase or not. With Victoria’s Secret campaigning, a women is given the impression that if she buys Victoria’s Secret products, she will feel and be deemed as sexy. The consumer is shown that Victoria’s Secret as an array of quality products that can produce enhancing results.

Next, the buyer may ask friends or family about the product. The buyer may wait for a sale. The buyer may go to the store and try on products. There are rarely other commercials for other lingerie products, so catalog or mail advertising may be the only alternative to research other products. The buyer may find that feminine lingerie and related items are not as of high quality as Victoria’s Secret,...