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 Introduction
‡ To a lay person, consumer attitude should represent as
the summary statement of his assessment about anything.
Thus, a consumer may have a negative attitude for the
products made in Korea. What it means is, that the
consumer has assessed the products of the country and
found them to be of not very high quality. This is what
consumer attitude represents.
‡ Theoretically speaking, attitude is ³learned predisposition
to respond in a consistently favourable and unfavourable
manner with respect to a given stimuli´
‡ Another way of describing attitude is that it is a
³relatively enduring organisation of interrelated
beliefs that describe, evaluate, and advocate
actions to an object or a situation.´
‡ Several characteristics of attitude are evident from
these two descriptions. The first is that attitude is
µnot a transient feeling¶ but represents an enduring
feeling or enduring evaluation . Second, it derives
its genesis and strength from a variety of sources
of information including perception and
experience. Third, it signals about the likely
course of action by the consumer.
‡ Attitude is also used as a replacement term for
describing µbelief system¶ of a person
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‡ In everyday life, consumers receive a variety of

marketing communications about what they should buy
and they should not. They come to know about different
claims and standings of the brands. On the basis of
inputs received from various sources, consumers
develop their assessment of the brands, better known as
the brand image. The brand image helps consumers in
believing which brand is more likely to have a particular
benefit or feature (technically know as the product
attributes). It should be noted here that since these
brand beliefs are based on consumer perception, they
may sometimes at variance with reality.
‡ A potential car buyer may believe that brand A of
car has style but it may not be actually true about
the brand A. In a similar vein, a potential lipstick
buyer may believe that the brand B of the lipstick
has the attributes of social prestige. In reality it
may not be so. Thus consumer attitude are based
on the perceptions, true or otherwise. But they
provide a very important clues as to whether the
consumers will take a particular course of actions
or not. Thus a person after having been bombarded
by a string of newspapers ads on various TV
brands available in India, may suddenly observe:
³Oh, the TV ads!I cant stand them any more´.
‡ Similarly, a typical housewife may have this to say
to her husband, after having viewed the Sunday
morning transmission, the TV ads are so
fascinating that they have taught a lot to our
children in making brand choice for grocery.
‡ These two statements express summary
evaluation of a marketing stimuli i.e., promotional
methods, and indicates how these will act in case
of consumers who were asked to respond. Thus,
the first consumer will probable zap the TV
commercials or skip them. The second housewife
may regulate the viewing hours of the television
for the the children.
The constituents of consumer attitude
‡ Many variables a buyer would face during
information search for the purpose of evaluating
and reaching a choice. The key variable that
would guide the customer in the process, is the
consumer attitude. Since an attitude provides a
series of cues to marketers with reference to
evaluation procedure, an understanding of
consumer attitude can help marketers predict
future purchase; and gauge the strength or
otherwise of their present sales. Even they
redesign their marketing mix efforts.
‡ Attitude as an concept, however, is far from
simple. An attitude consists of three constituents.
These are affective, cognitive, and conative.
‡ |
 part of the attitude refers to the feelings
that a consumer has.
‡ The 


 part refers to the information and
knowledge basis of the consumer.
‡ The third and final part of the attitude ± the

, refers to the intention of the customer.
‡ Let us take a hypothetical example of the attitude
formation in respect of an individual as well as
institutional buyers.
‡ For instance, assume that a research study reveals that
Indian females have a favourable attitude towards
ONIDA television. Similarly assume that Tata steel too
has indicated its favourable attitude towards HCL fax
machine. In operational terms these findings summarize
the knowledge of these buyers as what ONIDA TV and
HCL fax machine may possess. Secondly they indicate
how the female buyers and the TATA Steel feel about
these brands. Thirdly, they indicate the likely action if
these buyers are asked to go for these respective
products, i.e., ONIDA Television and HCL fax machine.
‡ To sum up, attitude indicates knowledge, feelings and
intended action for the given stimulus.
 The functions of consumer attitude
‡ @  


 
: Consumer attitudes
fulfill a utilitarian function as they guide
consumers in achieving their desired needs. Thus,
if the TV buyers consider technology and after
sale-service support as the two most important
criteria in TV selection, the buyer will be most
attracted by the message of those brand
alternatives that claim to possess the two
attributes. Such attitude towards these brands will
help the consumer achieve what he wants. Also it
will assist them in avoiding failure and
disappointment in brand evaluation.
‡ @  

 
: this function protects
consumers against internal and external anxieties and
environment. The marketing stimuli and more
particularly, products become an instrument of the
protection process.
‡ @  
 
: Often consumer attitude
are an expression of their value and self-concept. Value
expressive attitude maintain self-identity among
consumers and lead them to expressions and
determination The projection is often strong, evident and
extreme because consumers openly express opinion that
reflect their strong beliefs and self-concept. The
application of this function is all too evident in consumer
selection and evaluation of products, their price,
promotional items and the distributive outlets.
 Consumer Attitude: The models
‡ Model-making in attitudes have been attempted
in a variety of ways. Most prominent among
them are the multi-attribute models.Multi-
attribute attitude models explain how consumers
may combine their beliefs about product
attributes to form their attitude about various
brand alternatives. These models assume that the
brand which receives the best attitude, will be
chosen. They further assume that consumers will
go through the standard hierarchy of effective
sequence (i.e., Awareness-Interest-Desire-
Action).
‡ A careful scrutiny of all multi-attribute attitude models
establishes two general categories of these models.
1. Category I compromises the models that emphasize the
Attitude- Towards-Objects. Hence they are termed as
ATO models. Although a variety of ATO models are
found in consumer research, most of these models seek
information on the importance of brand attributes ,
beliefs about the presence or absence of those attributes
in the alternatives and information on their combined
effects in alternatives evaluations.
The ATO model suffers from a major weakness. It fails
to consider quite often, consumer attitude does not fully
equate with behavior. Thus a potential car buyer in spite
of having the most attitude towards Maruti may not
engage in buying Maruti, because of the adverse opinion
of other important people or due to temptation to invest
in some other profitable venture.
Š. Category II consists of those models that focus
on predicting the Behavioural Intention (BI) of
consumers to perform certain actions. This
could be purchase or non-purchase. It is termed
as BI model. This is an extension of ATO
Model. The model does not attempt to predict
behavior per se but intentions to behave.
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‡ After having made an analysis of attitude and its

formation, and the models, the questions that arise
for marketers to consider are as follows : What are
their marketing implications and what actions are
useful in managing them?
‡ Specifically, marketers may chose one or a
combination of steps to move consumers¶
evaluation of brand alternation n their favour.
 Area Inference (s) Action (s)

Market Segment market on Market products on the

identifi the basis of attribute basis of lifestyle and
cation belief, attribute benefit benefits segmentable
beliefs and product
benefit beliefs
Compe ‡Possibility of ‡Changing own products
titive attribute , beliefs and attributes and those of
Analysi benefits manipulation competitors
s ‡Positioning of ‡Continuously review
products product positioning with
proper communication
support
Marketing ‡Sources of ideas for new ‡Use consumer
Mix products perception and
attitude to design new
‡Communication has products
impacts on consumer ‡Enrich consumers
learning with fresh and
‡Importance of price- distinct information
evaluation matrix ‡Price-perception
should be made in the
‡Distribution outlets add line with brand image
to product image ‡Encourage
distribution in
consumer evaluation
Marketing ‡Need of a ‡Create exclusive
opportunity constant eye on riches or segments
analysis demographics and of consumer
social changes demographics

Attitude formation ‡Attitude as an ‡Strengthen the

and measurement indicator of brand positive attitude
preference and and modify the
behavior unsuitable ones by
‡Continuous feel a variety of means
of the market ‡Develop a regular
essential attitude checking
system