Avoiding the Buyer's Fallacy: Consumer Perceptions of Products Before Purchase.

Abstract

Consumers are motivated to find the products that will provide the greatest benefit; however, choosing the right product is not an easy task. Consumers must choose between a myriad of products with varying features despite limited information and experience with their use. The factors that seem important at the time of purchase can be very different from what actually makes a person happy with owning and using a product. In this dissertation, I propose that consumers commit a Buyer’s Fallacy by misjudging which product attributes will be most influential regarding their satisfaction with a product. Specifically, when deciding which product to buy, consumers often choose products with many added features offering greater functionality. However, added features can decrease a product’s ease of use, and lead to less satisfaction after using the product, a process known as feature fatigue (Thompson, Hamilton, & Rust, 2005). This dissertation addresses how consumers demonstrate the Buyer’s Fallacy by overlooking ease of use at the time of purchase, and how consumers sometimes avoid this judgment problem. Through three projects, I establish the following: 1) Ease of use is a major factor in consumer satisfaction as reported through consumer-provided online product reviews, but different product design attributes influence the same respondents’ product recommendations for others; 2) Older adults show a reduction in the Buyer’s Fallacy because they are more likely than younger people to focus on avoiding the negative impact of additional features on ease of use; 3) Consumers can avoid the Buyer’s Fallacy by focusing on usability through a visual representation of a product’s interface and features. These findings can help improve consumer decision making, and have implications for product marketing.