Low – Involvement Situations

In these situations, (typically surrounding consumables) the consumer may have little interest in going through the information regarding brands. It is in this context, marketers are attempting to create interest in their respective brands. Low involvement situations could also be present in some product categories (durables) where competition is not very tense. An example is the sewing machines category. For a long time there have been only a few major players (Usha, Singer) though there are a number of regional companies. Singer raised the level of involvement by introducing the Fashion maker, an up market version and following it up with a campaign. Homelite matchstick is another example which created involvement with value addition.

In the low-involvement category, marketing communication has been used to bring in a renewed perception about the products with brands image being the focus of the communication exercise. Taking advantage of the excise structure, ITC launched Hero cigarettes to target beedi smokers and get them involved in cigarettes. It used the ‘tinsel’ imagery.

The consumer after the awareness stage tries the product. Unlike the previous category, attitude about the brand is formed after the product trial (consumables). If the consumer is satisfied, he buys it again and this pattern could trigger off brand loyalty. (Whenever a need is felt – whenever tea is required, a particular brand of packaged tea may be bought). Even in case of durables, marketers may attempt to raise the low-involvement product to the high-involvement plane.

Marketers are also making use of the ‘self-concept’ principle to generate involvement .A consumer’s inspirational values and the manner in which he perceives himself influence the degree of personal influence, which he ascribes to product. In the ball pen category, Reynolds generated considerable amount of involvement by waving a ‘romantic spell’ as a positioning strategy for a product which has been well accepted for its functional utility. The black box of the consumer’s mind has several dimensions, which can be explored by marketers by a judicious mix of concepts and down to earth marketing practices.