The consumer-driven world is dictated by what people consume, how they consume it and how much they consume. The consumption of products, services, culture and information represents how people interact with their social contexts.

Consumption is a fundamental part of the way societies and nations function. People in developed and developing societies have increasingly come to perceive themselves as consumers in a consumer-driven world alongside seeing themselves as citizens of a state. This is in part due to the post-war growth of individualism but it is also due to the rise of consumerism as a social concept. Consumerism has become a dominant global ideology; it has raised standards and expectations around the world, albeit at different rates. The world is becoming more affluent and flooded with choice. People are struggling to live within their means as hyper-consumerist values increasingly hold sway over their lifestyle choices. The problem is not how to get something but which one to get.

Debt-driven consumption

Debt is becoming more and more normalised and is becoming one of the foundations of modern lifestyles.

Debt has become one of the new pillars of many developed societies. People’s attitudes to money have changed due to their ever-increasing accrual of debt. Credit is easy, plentiful and no longer has a great stigma attached to it. This has lead to many people perceiving the function of money as currency for leisure and consumer goods, rather than living necessities or saving for the future. The current culture of instant gratification, which stems from technological advances, allows consumers many more commodities and luxuries on demand. This has meant that the general attitude to spending money has changed: people no longer defer purchasing a desired product until they have the means to pay for it, instead the various loans and credit cards at their fingertips mean their desires can be satisfied even though full payment of the amassing debts is merely a dot on the horizon.

This lack of concern about debt - after all, everyone is in the same boat – is producing young generations that do not understand the value of money. While their parents may have saved money in order to create their futures, today, young people spend it. Consumerism is encroaching on children’s lives earlier. Research has shown that even before they are teenagers, children are hugely affected by marketing. They desire brands and products because marketers and advertisers have told them that they should want them, as opposed to actually needing them.

Non-committal consumers

The consumer-driven world is fast becoming saturated with choice, which is conditioning people to be always on the lookout for the next big thing.

Today, everything is temporary and nothing is guaranteed: job security has declined and traditional social structures, such as the nuclear family, are being eroded. All of which is creating an unpredictable environment driven by reaction, both at an economic and consumer level; this volatility has affected consumers whose worlds are flooded with choice. As marketers strive to provide consumers with the ultimate in variety and individualisation, consumers have been habituated to be forever searching for whatever most suits their evolving needs and desires. Easily available credit has allowed people the funds to cultivate relationships with as many different brands as are beneficial to their lives at any given moment.

The internet has fuelled this disloyal tendency. It has enabled consumers to compare and contrast brands easily, making it simple and convenient to choose another more attractive, and often cheaper, product. In response to this trend the world of retail has had to increasingly make allowances for its commitment-shy shoppers by introducing tolerant return policies that allow customers to try after they buy without having to keep the item if they change their mind. Additionally, inexpensive clothing stores such as H&M and Old Navy allow people to spend little on high trend items that will be discarded once the season is over.

This consumer fickleness has lead to dynamism, particularly in fashion trends. Low-priced UK fashion stores, such as Primark and Peacocks, are keeping up with the catwalk trends to meet the demands of the consumers who want to change their styles more frequently because doing so grants social kudos. The Spanish chain, Zara, was considered to be at the forefront of this ‘fast fashion’ phenomenon, which commenced a few years ago. However, in response to the mass-market demand for instant gratification and inexpensive fashion solutions, more niche products and brands have emerged. While people are shopping at the ‘cheap-chic’ fashion stores, there is also the desire for more niche products and brands to differentiate individual styles from the mass-market fashion.

Convenience is key

Consumers increasingly expect to consume a multitude of products, services and experiences at once; they want their consumption to be as convenient and time-efficient as possible.

Time-starved modern lifestyles have created a new set of consumer needs and desires. They now not only want value-for-money, but also value-for-time. People want to be constantly achieving the most experiences from their leisure time. Therefore they require consumption experiences that allow multiple experiences simultaneously. For instance, consumers want to be able to pick up a video and a fresh coffee while doing the weekly supermarket shop or receive a massage while visiting the dentist. Achieving more than one task simultaneously makes consumers feel like they are being efficient and utilising the convenience experiences that companies are increasingly offering.

This type of convenient consumption is not just about services and experiences, it is also about products. Consumers are attracted to self-gifting products that offer more than one benefit at the same time so that they feel that they are treating themselves with convenience and efficiency. This can be seen in practical convenience products such as chewing gum that freshens the breath and cleans the palate while releasing vitamin C, but also in emotional convenience offers such as luxury aromatherapy bath products that allow consumers to enjoy relaxation while physically unwinding in a bath.

Consumer producers (prosumers)

Consumers are now creating and customizing products and entertainment experiences, then sharing their creations with the rest of the world.

Customization has become a standard feature. Mainstream consumers now expect to be able to modify the products they buy, whether it is downloading ringtones or bejewelling their jeans. Rather than merely modifying existing products, trailblazing consumers are actively looking for tools to create entertainment and products from scratch. For instance companies like Xingtone and Primetones are offering services that allow users to create ringtones from their personal digital music collections.

Consumers are taking full advantage of the creative freedom they now enjoy and companies are utilising this shift in control to their advantage by consulting their consumers on marketing strategies as well as product development; they are even casting their consumers in adverts for added validity, as Dove did in their Campaign for Real Beauty.

Today’s consumers are increasingly interested in expressing their creativity and personal style at a time when there is such a variety of styles that it is becoming harder to have original flair. However they are often going for products that make this easy. Products that allow consumers to ascribe to a mass-market brand with kudos, while being able to make the product unique to them, are also very popular such as Nike ID and Adicolour trainers and an Anya Hindmarch handbag. Mobile phones are also examples of mass-market products and services that consumers relish customizing. Mobile phones were one of the first products to offer consumers the opportunity to change the fascias and accessories like covers.

Technology has made customization tools much easier to access, particularly for trendsetters who are looking to make their own movies or mix their own music. Technology has also made sharing these creations possible. The internet and its various networks have given consumers and prosumers the forum and the means to communicate with each other through creativity; whether they’re friends or have never met before, what ties them together is the content they have created.

It is not just products and services that are caught in this wave of consumer production. Consumers are producing their own identities via methods of self-promotion. Social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook and Bebo have resurrected the whole notion of self-promotion. Each member of these sites has the freedom to customize their homepage with online accessories, such as wallpaper, and lists of their favourite things, like music – all available for others to view their profile and make a judgment about them. The power of online identities can be seen in the lonelygirl 15 fiasco which was sparked from the videos that were posted to YouTube and MySpace last June.

Authentic consumption

In a world driven by marketing hype and media spin, consumers are searching for brands that signify truth and authenticity.

Many people are reacting to hyped-up news stories, over-packaged pop culture, the promised happiness of materialism and over-paid professionals by rewarding brands and products that denote authenticity. They are fed up with dishonesty and manipulation and seek out brands they can relate to on a human level beneath the artificial publicity.It is not just brands that are benefiting or suffering from this trend of authentic consumption, popular culture is also being targeted by consumers who are disengaging with anything that they deem untrustworthy. ‘Reality’ TV has become a self-parody, in which the ‘reality’ it proposes to offer is in fact an edited and manipulated story, created by self-interested producers. Conversely, indie rock music and singer/songwriters have profited from this quest for the ‘real’. Artists such as Jack Johnson and Nellie McKay are rising in popularity, indicating that people are attracted to musicians with true vocal, musical and creative talent, rather than pre-fabricated pop.

Products, services, culture and information available for consumption must increasingly empathise with consumers in order to connect with them and give the impression of authenticity. Brands must now take a different stance: instead of marketing projecting lifestyle possibilities onto their consumers, they must now reflect their consumers’ lifestyles. They need to get to the heart of the motivations and aspirations of their target audiences in order for their brands to resonate with them. Brand offerings must be honest, exciting and passionate to compel developed, modern consumers to invest precious time and money.

In order for brands to successfully project an authentic image they must get under the skin of target consumers. Similarly savvy, conscientious consumers exhaustively research brands before they buy into them. Brand and company transparency is important. With every news story related to a particular company under scrutiny, brands must prove that the operational reality corresponds to the image they project. Consumers want to know about what lies at the core of an organisation: the values, attitudes, traditions, passions, aspirations and ethics, so that they can make informed decisions about who is authentic, who has integrity and who, therefore, they should support. There are also socially and ethically conscious consumers who want to know where their products have come from; they want to support local production. Companies like Waitrose have picked up on this desire for ethical products and have heavily incorporated their local sourcing into their marketing campaigns.