Difference Between Psychographic and Behavioral Segmentation

The key difference between psychographic and behavioral segmentation is that psychographic segmentation focuses on customer’s personality trait, values and attitudes, whereas behavioral segmentation focuses on activities of the customer.

Market segmentation is one of the key aspects of the marketing strategy. To define the target audience, marketers conduct market segmentation. Demographic, psychographic, behavioral and geographic segmentation are the four elements of market segmentation. In general, we use demographic variables as age, income, education, gender and geographic variables as country, city, state, neighborhood. We also use psychographic variables like lifestyle, attitudes, beliefs and behavioral variables like usage, loyalty, occasional, benefits.

CONTENTS

1. Overview and Key Difference
2. What is Psychographic Segmentation
3. What is Behavioral Segmentation
4. Relationship Between Psychographic and Behavioral Segmentation
5. Side by Side Comparison – Psychographic vs Behavioral Segmentation in Tabular Form
6. Summary

What is Psychographic Segmentation?

Psychographic segmentation refers to the division of market-based on consumer’s personality traits, values, attitudes, interests, and lifestyles. Moreover, identifying psychographic segmentation will allow businesses to develop and market their products as per the precise needs and expectations of customers.

With the aid of psychographic segmentation, marketers are able to be more targeted. As a result, they will be able to choose correct channels, conveying the correct message to the consumer. Moreover, they have the ability to identify correct offers to maximize exposure to key segments. Therefore, money is spent more wisely as businesses have more effective advertising methods. In addition, the business entity will have performance improvements in many areas.

Psychographic segmentation breaks down the market along the interests and attitudes of consumers where you can market the appropriate product to each segment of the market. For instance, some people are fond of the environment, while other people aren’t. In addition, psychographic segmentation helps people in digital advertising as well as, especially in contexts such as PPC campaigns and Facebook advertising

Methods to Group by Psychographic Segmentation

• Personality traits
• Lifestyle
• Opinions, Attitudes, Interests, Hobbies
• Social Status
• Degree of Loyalty
• Occasions

What is Behavioral Segmentation?

Behavioral segmentation is the process of dividing the total market into smaller similar groups based on the buying behavior of the customer. When businesses decide behavioral segmentation, they evaluate the buying patterns of customers such as usage/frequency, brand loyalty, customers’ expected benefits, etc.

Advantages of Behavioral Segmentation

• Identifying customers with similar behavior and targeting them
• Easier to cater to the identified regular behaviors of customers
• Easy to identify customer loyalty and brand loyalty

Customer behavior can affect the purchase of a product or service in many ways. For instance, a customer will be loyal to a particular product when regular product offers are given. Companies using Valentine’s day to target customer and their behavior to sell their product with a value addition is an example.

What is the Relationship Between Psychographic and Behavioral Segmentation?

Companies segment their markets in many ways. Psychographic segmentation and behavioral segmentation are important to identify customer behavior and customer mindset. Although segmenting variables are different, both of them help to reach the final target market. In other words, both criteria are equally important.

What is the Difference Between Psychographic and Behavioral Segmentation?

The key difference between psychographic and behavioral segmentation is that the psychographic segmenting occurs when customers are separated based on their attributes, values, interests, opinions, lifestyles, etc., whereas the behavioral segmentation separates consumers based on their actions. In most cases, psychographic segmentation may take behavioral data into account, while behavioral segmentation usually does not take psychographics data into account.

Moreover, a further difference between psychographic and behavioral segmentation is that the Psychographic segmentation helps to innovate products or position them in a way that makes them more appealing than competitors. Moreover, creating a perception for the buyer may help the business to understand how consumers see the brand and allow to position the brand for maximum benefit. On the contrary, behavioral segmentation creates a perception in the buyers’ mind so that they will adhere to the brand.

Summary – Psychographic vs Behavioral Segmentation

In summary, the difference between psychographic and behavioral segmentation is that the psychographic segmenting takes place when consumers are separated based on their attributes, values, interests, opinions, lifestyles etc., whereas the behavioral segmentation separates consumers based on their actions

Reference:

1. “Behavioral & Psychographic Segmentation: How To Develop Buyer Personas.” Medium, Data Dump, 26 Nov. 2017, Available here.
2. “Behavioral Segmentation Definition: Marketing Dictionary.” MBA Skool-Study.Learn.Share., Available here.
3. “Psychographic Segmentation in Marketing: Definition & Examples.” Study.com, Available here.

Image Courtesy:

1. “304353” (CC0) via Pixabay
2. “3529837” (CC0) via Pixabay

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