Consumer Behavior and Insight: A Report on McDonald's

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CONSUMER BEHAVIOR AND INSIGHT

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................................. 3
DISCUSSION................................................................................................................................... 4
P1............................................................................................................................................... 4
P2............................................................................................................................................... 7
M1............................................................................................................................................. 8
P3............................................................................................................................................. 10
P4............................................................................................................................................. 12
M2............................................................................................................................................14
P5 and M3................................................................................................................................17
CONCLUSION............................................................................................................................... 19
REFERENCES.................................................................................................................................20

INTRODUCTION
Consumer behavior is the process through which they make purchases and involve or influence
the decision and usage of the resources (Zhang and Benyoucef, 2016). This process includes the
choice decision-making of the individual towards buying of goods and services. This also
experiences the way to satisfy the needs and desires of the individual.
Companies usually experience typical relationships than consumers do. This would be
tremendously challenging to please the consumer. McDonald’s being the fastest food chain
would unite the largest purchaser of products and services to the consumer to be included in
the study. The report will also focus on the path to purchase as well as consumer decision-
making process applicable in B2B and B2C context (Khaniwale, 2015). The evaluation of the
products and services with respect to market research methods and effects on the consumer
decision-making would help in exploring the base for the study.
McDonald’s is an American Corporation which rechristened their business as a hamburger
stand. The company has joined B2C business goals through which they entails brick and mortar
measures for the people who walk in (De Mooij, 2019). On the other hand, B2B business try to
attract by adding more companies and selling the products to the consumer in much simpler
way such as Apple company. They undertake the individual purchasing decisions of consumer
and present the business to business structure.

DISCUSSION
P1
Different stages of the Consumer decision-making would entail the practices while deciding the
purchase of the business. The consumers are likely to have different perceptions before and
after purchasing a product or service. Therefore, it can be examined by the help of the five
stages which help in understanding the products and services of McDonald’s (De Mooij, 2019).
The five stages are:
Need
The first and foremost factor which leads to buying a product or service would involve
hamburger or any product offered by McDonald is its awareness and need. The people
purchasing food for their need, leisure and whenever they feel hungry. This is dependent on
the consumer whether they need other food product or a single burger is enough for them to
satisfy their hunger (Bradford et al., 2017).
Need/Awareness
Information
Search
Evaluating
Alternatives
Purchase
Decisions
Post
Purchase
Decisions

Figure 1: Stages of Consumer Decision-Making
Source: Bradford et al., 2017
Information gathering and search
The information gathering and search would help in gaining the details of the menu or products
that McDonald’s offer. This can help in presenting a better way to deal with the hardware and
software version. This can also help in collecting a finer tune with all the requirements and
gathering relevant information to the consumer. Further, with the media, it also includes the
online search, social media platforms and through family and friends (Oke et al., 2016). This can
help in gaining the information of the menu card and all the prices that are offered by
McDonald’s.
Alternative Evaluation
The comparative analysis for the products and services offered by the other companies can be
upheld in this stage. The consumers usually prefer the budget friendly and delicious products.
This can help in setting the products from fast food chain such as Subway, KFC and other. At the
end of this stage, it is likely to be consumer decision in order to meet with their intent to visit to
the places as well as choices of food (Ajzen, 2015).
Pre- Purchase Evaluation
The stage involves the final choices of the product that has to be bought by the customer. The
customer choosing McDonald’s products will undergo to their McDonald place. This can mine
up with the change in the possible changes in the product such as order for the wedges, French
fries and other to eat. This directs to pocket friendly prices (Aharith, 2016).
Post- Purchase Evaluation
This includes the evaluation of the product that is bought. This might meet the expectation of
the consumer. It is likely to be dependent on the satisfaction level of the consumer over a
product (Aharith, 2016).

The factors influencing the customer decision-making processes have been categorized as
personal, Psychological, economic, cultural and social factors. It can be majorly based on the
economic factor which includes money aspect. This defines the purchasing power of individual
with the current and future proposition (Khaniwale, 2015).
Figure 2: Factor influencing consumer decision-making process
Source: Rani, 2014
These factors can help in developing and brand preferences from consumer end. It might relate
to the controlled measures which appeal the target market. The length of the decision-making
process varies and it might be influenced by the roles of several people (Rani, 2014). The people
involved in the buying process with the level of the complexity and involvement in the decisions
relate to the suitable marketing mixes and target customers.
Economic Factors
Personal Income,
Disposable Income
Family Income
Expected future income
Liquid assest and
consumer credit
Living standards
Personal Factors
Age
Lifecycle
occupation
Lifestyle
self-concept and
personality
Psychological Factors
Involvement
Motivation
Perception
learning
attitude
Lifestyle
Cultural and social factors
Subcultural
Culture
Social class
Opinion Leaders
Social Groups
Role And status

P2
The consumer’s decision map depends on the Burgers and French fries offering from
McDonald’s, milkshakes and Variety of the products can help in examining the market
presence. The need of the consumer is recognized with the marketing campaign that enables
the stimuli of McDonald’s to promote their product in accordance to the region (Monga and
Williams, 2016). The consumers are the center of the marketers and while recognizing the
personal and specific influences it is also important to gain the nature of decision-making
process they use.
Figure 2: Illustration of Decision-making process- McDonald’s French Fries and Hamburger
Source: Marin, 2015
Need Recognition - It is necessary
to differentiate between desired
state and actual state i.e Hunger-
Food
Information Search - Internally-
person feels hungry he does and
search for the food
Evaluation of alternatives - If the
consumer not satisfied then they
look for possible alternatives such
as Chinese, indian Food than
McDonalds
Purchase - The chosen product to
eat fulfills the needs of the
consumer i.e under menu that
are pocket friendly prices.
Post Purchase Evaluation - The
consumer evaluates wether they
are satisfied with the quality meal
at reasonable prices and also
ambiance provided by the
restaurant clean and welcoming

The key success to the decisions of the consumer depends on the reason for buying this. It is
usually outweigh the rational reason for choosing the two car servicing companies with the
return to the company they used previously despite of the company. This might gain the trust
and loyalty to the company on managing the quality of services and customer service (Marin,
2015).
M1
The image of the pound saver menu has shown the way customer feels towards buying
behavior. This would direct on the chances of positive results which are high. The McDonalds is
customer oriented and reveals the idea of Black Box model. This would create a positive image
about the products besides building a brand.
This model is important as it helps in anyone making marketing decisions. This basically ensures
the whole buying process rather than purchasing it. The message delivered by the company is
usually through advertisement and make the consumer feel positive about their product
through brand image (Wang, et al., 2016). The key strategic measure of McDonald’s is that they
provide radio, television and internet services to pop up everywhere. The McDonald’s tries to
attract the customer through promoting new menu based on the festive seasons such as GCB
hamburger.

Figure 3: The Black Box Model of Consumer Behavior
Source: Zhang, 2015
The internal factors are likely to cover the mental factors of the consumer such as value, beliefs,
and lifestyle. This might relate to the consumer choices and purchase of not responding to the
external stimuli with the determined processes of the choices through black box. This black Box
theory helps in providing an advent way to market the products in the market and helping
consumer to make their decisions (Zhang, 2015). This can help in providing an available data
through which wide variety of sources can be managed with the behavioral response and
thereby approaching to the positive means of buying decisions and responses.

P3
DIFFERENCES BETWEEN B2B AND B2C BUSINESS
B2B- APPLE B2C- MCDONALD’S
The B2B business provide the selling of the
goods and service between two entities of the
business
The B2C has goods and services which are
processed to the consumer
The basic target are the company owners The key target is end user
The basic focus is on relationship building
between business
The key focus is on the popularity of the
product
B2B AND B2C DECISION-MAKING PROCESS
PROBLEM RECOGNITION – Under this needs
can be identified
PROBLEM IDENITIFICATION
NEED DESCRIPTION- products can be managed
with product characteristics direction
INFORMATION SEARCH
PRODUCT SPECIFICATION – Accuracy and
product description with performance
parameter review
EVALUATION OF ALTERNATIVES
SUPPLIER SEARCH- Suitable vendors PURCHASE
PROPOSAL SOLICITATION- inviting proposal
from suppliers
POST-PURCHASE EVALUATION
SUPPLIER SHORTLISTING- Finalizing the
product delivery supplier
PLACING ORDER- The order is purchased by
the suppliers
PERFORMANCE REVIEW- The satisfaction
parameters might meet with the assessment
details

Table 1: Differences between B2B and B2C business
Source: Aharith, 2016
The Similarity for B2B and B2C marks the decision-making process can help in managing the
B2B longer buying cycle. The role of the decision-making process might help in enhancing the
product utility (Zhang, 2015). This can also help in presenting the past relationship with the
suppliers and influencing the decisions. It can also help in managing the aspect of the customer
service and maintenance aspects of the product and services. This can direct the products of
Apple as they are utilized by the B2B business and influence the decision-making of the product
quality.

P4
There are different approaches through which the systematic management of the B2B and B2C
organizations can be undertaken. The Market research is all about capturing, interpreting and
analyzing the reports on data. This can make successful decisions through pertaining to
customers and managing the products and services along with the competitors balance (Martin
and Woodside, 2017). The businesses in the market would focus on providing viability of
introducing new product and impact on the demand of the brand perception which are likely to
be changed with the change in prices. The numbers of market research method are employed
by the companies such as McDonalds and Apple. They are:
Mixed Methodology
This can virtually include the B2C market research studies where it is not liable that the case is
always from B2C companies. This requires three main integrated factors such as capturing data,
handling complexity of B2B markets and managing or testing the results to achieve the
statistical balance in the business (Khaniwale, 2015).
Qualitative Methodology
This basically involves the exploratory reasons in the market research. The quest of participants
in the study primarily depends on the question based market. This can help in involving
interviews, projective techniques and focused groups.
Quantitative Methodology
The role of the quantitative method is important in terms of providing assistance to the
research tools. The validity and reliability of the research is based on the random sampling
technique. The research technique includes maximum difference in the scaling, covariance
analysis and choice modeling (Bradford et al., 2017). The higher the number of participants
involved in the research the more determined the results will be.
Ethnographic study