Navigating choices: a framework of consumer search

Abstract

Consumers are inundated with choices, yet they effectively find products that satisfy them. In this review, we draw from the marketing, economics, psychology, and ecology literatures to outline a general framework for consumer search, implicit in many prior descriptions of consumer behavior. Within the framework, we particularly focus on navigation, which we define as the act of deciding the order in which to inspect products with the intention of learning more about them. We focus on navigation because it has received relatively little attention in marketing. We also highlight opportunities for future research in understanding interactions between stages of the framework. By understanding this framework, researchers and marketers can gain key theoretical insights into the consumer experience when looking for a product. Further, understanding these processes is likely to yield practical results that can help in the design of more effective search experiences, ultimately increasing consumer satisfaction.