Question

How does time pressure affect consumer behavior? Share a few specific examples to demonstrate you understand the impact time has on consumer behavior.

Answer 1

We can say that time is an important factor for consideration for a business especially when a consumer’s buying behavior is to be considered. The elements of seasonality, the day of the week as well as time constraints due to factors that may be unique to every individual cause what we call time pressure. When this occurs, a customer tends to make decisions that do not take into account a number of different factors and therefore ends up becoming a costly factor for them. In the easiest sense, we can say that businesses that market their products ineffectively or which have a fairly higher priced product tend to suffer due to this reason, since the customer will always either go for the cheapest or the most available product in the market, due to the time constraint. Seasonality factor affects the needs of the customer and therefore, their needs are affected. For example, a customer tends to stay indoors in the times of winter due to their inconvenience and therefore, make decisions which are more comfortable to them.

The day also acts as a factor for consideration, we can say that the time of the day would depict the readiness of a customer to go and purchase a product or to consider purchasing it. For example, a person might not want to go and purchase a product during high peak times, rush hour or during a time period they believe the queues would be large.