Consumer Marketing Terms

Consumer Terms

A consumer is a person who uses a service or product. Consumer goods are goods purchased for use by an individual or household, as opposed to by a business. When a consumer displays interests or beliefs known as psycho-graphic variables, this is known as "activities, interests and options, or AIO."

According to the American Marketing Association's website, Marketing Power, a brand is a "name, term, design, symbol or any other feature that identifies one seller's good or service." Brand marketing describes the process of communicating a message with advertising. Brand marketing attempts to portray a good or company in a certain, positive light in order to make customers aware of the brand.

E-mail marketing describes the process of sending advertisements though e-mail. When a consumer subscribes, or opts-in, to communication from a company, this is known as permission-based e-mail. When a consumer decides he no longer wishes to receive communication, he can opt-out and unsubscribe. An HTML e-mail describes an e-mail that contains HTML rather than plain text. When an e-mail fails to deliver, this is known as a hard-bounce.

Target markets are the end goal of a marketing team; these are the people who are most likely to buy the product. Target markets are often described with the terms audience or demographic. Different target markets require different marketing techniques. For example, a market of young children responds to advertisements differently than a market of middle-aged housewives. Target markets can be specific or general depending on how many demographics it specifies. Demographics include age, income, occupation, lifestyle and buying motives.

Before a company releases a product nationally or globally, they release the product into a test market. These markets are small and may include only a specific geographic area or retail store. Companies assess the sales in the test market before deciding whether or not they should reduce a product nationally.