Give one way a proper understanding of marketing math helps you be a better consumer?
To help you best appreciate the benefits of marketing math to the consumer, we asked consumer advocates and marketing experts this question for their best insights. From being a smarter and savvier consumer to avoiding marketer’s traps, there are several ways understanding marketing math helps consumers become better at engaging with businesses in the marketplace.
Here are eight ways these leaders became better consumers through understanding marketing math:
- Be a Smarter and Savvier Consumer
- Make Informed Purchasing Decisions Based on Marginal Utility
- Save Money
- Make Better Choices as a Consumer
- Get a Better Idea of Investment and Risk
- Protect Yourself From Being Tricked With Sales Gimmicks
- Be Better Able to See Through Sales Pitches
- Avoid Marketer’s Traps
Be a Smarter and Savvier Consumer
Marketing math is a critical tool for understanding how businesses work and how to make the most of your interactions with them. By understanding concepts like gross margin, markup, and break-even point, you can more effectively identify good deals and negotiate effectively. You can also more easily understand the impact that your spending has on a business’s bottom line. In short, marketing math can help you be a smarter, savvier consumer.
Aviad Faruz, FARUZO New York
Make Informed Purchasing Decisions Based on Marginal Utility
A proper understanding of marketing math can help you understand the concept of marginal utility, which is the extra satisfaction that a consumer gets from consuming one more unit of a good or service. If you are trying to decide whether to buy a new car or lease one, your marginal utility is the extra satisfaction you would get from owning the car compared to leasing it.
If you valued the car at $20,000 and the lease at $400 per month for three years, your marginal utility would be $16,800.
By understanding this concept, you can be a better consumer by making informed decisions about whether to buy or lease a new car.
Lorien Strydom, Financer.com
Save Money
Consumers can save money through understanding marketing math. The more a company spends on marketing, the more they charge for their products. Comparable products can always be found with less marketing investment at a lower cost. However, this often comes with a sacrifice in quality as well. Perform due diligence to make sure that you aren’t buying a subpar product to save a few bucks. But there are many companies that simply rely on word of mouth marketing, and have excellent products.
Robert Burns, Nuleev
Make Better Choices as a Consumer
By understanding the marketing principles and the math behind them, you learn how to translate numbers into useful information to help you make better choices as a consumer. For example, if you know that if you buy two products at $100 each, you will spend $200 total, you might decide to buy just one product at $150 instead. Or, if you know a product sells for $20 per unit on average and the store has 5 units in stock, you can calculate that the product sells for $100 per item. Marketing math helps you understand the value of different prices or deals to determine whether they are good deals.
Jennifer Ayling, Words With Jennifer
Get a Better Idea of Investment and Risk
One way a proper understanding of marketing math can help you be a better consumer by giving a better idea of investment and risk. It’s odd, but a lot of owners of small businesses are unaware of the value of a loyal, repeat customer to their company.
You should have a clearer notion of what you are willing to risk or invest in order to bring in a solid, recurring customer after figuring out that amount. The result of the calculation will also indicate how crucial it is to retain your current clientele.
Gaining a new customer is far more expensive than keeping an existing one and even increasing their worth. Find out how much an average new customer is worth to you in order to decide how much you are willing to invest in marketing. All of these in turn help you understand the value behind better marketing for customers and to be a better consumer as a result.
Maneesh Sharma, Donorbox
Protect Yourself From Being Tricked With Sales Gimmicks
As a consumer, it is important to have a basic understanding of marketing math. This knowledge can help you avoid being tricked by sales gimmicks and make more informed decisions about your purchases.
For example, marketers often use “anchoring” to make their products seem like a better deal than they actually are. This involves presenting consumers with an artificially high starting price, which makes subsequent discounts seem more significant.
By being aware of this tactic, you can avoid being duped into paying more than you should. In addition, understanding marketing math can also help you take advantage of sales and discounts. By knowing how to calculate percentages and understand pricing strategies, you can save money on your purchases and stretch your budget further. With a little knowledge of marketing math, you can be a smarter, savvier consumer.
Divya Karthik, Plumbers Nearby
Be Better Able to See Through Sales Pitches
Knowing how marketing works has definitely made me a more savvy consumer. I’m able to see through most sales pitches and better understand what companies are really trying to offer me. As a result, I’m able to make better choices about what products I buy and support businesses that align with my values. Understanding marketing has also made me more critical of the media I consume. Rather than just passively accepting whatever message is being presented, I’m able to analyze it and decide for myself whether or not it’s something I want to support. In short, understanding marketing has made me a better consumer by helping me see the world in a new light.
Marc J. Shuman, Shuman Legal
Avoid Marketer’s Traps
It’s imperative for people to understand basic marketing tactics. This is because we often buy things without realizing we’ve fallen into the marketers’ trap. There are a lot of ways marketers get us to buy their products. For example, high-value items are placed at eye-level in racks. Or some stores put groceries at the back, so you’ll have to walk through the entire store just to get some apples. If you know how these marketing tricks work, you’d better be able to avoid them.
Cristina Cason, Texas Family Homebuyers
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