Shoppers are operating in two modes: transactional or relational. Can you identify which of these motivations is relational and which are transactional? Can you see where they each fit within Maslow’s hierarchy of needs [define]? The forces that influence whether people buy include: Basic Needs - We buy things to fulfill what Maslow describes as the bottom of his hierarchy; things like food and shelter. Convenience - You need something now and will take the easiest or fastest path to get it. Think about the last time you were running out of gas, or were thirsty and found the nearest beverage of choice. This could also be choosing the safe vendor (no one ever gets fired for hiring IBM), purchasing something to increase comfort or efficiency. Replacement - Sometimes you buy because you need to replace old things you have (e.g., clothes that don’t fit or are out-of-date). This could be moving from a VCR to a DVD player. Scarcity - This could be around collectibles or a perceived need that something may run out or have limited availability in the future. Additionally, there’s a hope to gain a return on investment, such as collectible or antiques; anything that accrues value over time. Prestige or Aspirational purchase - Something is purchased for an esteem-related reason or for personal enrichment. Emotional Vacuum - Sometimes you just buy to try to replace things you cannot have and never will. Lower prices - Something you identified earlier as a want is now a lower price than before. Maybe you were browsing for a particular large screen TV and you saw a great summer special. Great Value - When the perceived value substantially exceeds the price of a product or service. This is something you don’t particularly need, you just feel it’s too good a deal to pass up. (Like the stuff they place near the end caps or checkout counters of stores.) Name Recognition - When purchasing a category you’re unfamiliar with, branding plays a big role. Maybe you had to buy diapers for a family member and you reach for Pampers because of you’re familiarity with the brand, even though you don’t have children yourself. Fad or Innovation - Everybody wants the latest and greatest. (iPhone mania.) This could also be when someone mimics their favorite celebrity. Compulsory Purchase - Some external force, like school books, uniforms, or something your boss asked you to do, makes it mandatory. This Follow

One of the interesting new features that online distribution (and activation) of games bring to players is the ability to fully test a retail game before buying it. By having access to the full game, the player can not only test its complete feature set, but also have contact with the same online community he’d meet when purchasing it. The catch, however, is that the player is only allowed to play the game for a certain number of days - the test version ceases to work after the trial date has passed. From what I know, Steam was the first major distribution channel that tried something like this, and now, making certain games available for free during a few days is becoming increasingly usual on that system. What impact does the free trial period have on the online presence of certain games? Valve’s World War 2 game Day of Defeat:Source has already been through two such trials, and here’s how it has worked for them. Day of Defeat:Source was the new version of Day of Defeat, a popular Half-life 1 mod. The difference was that DoD:S was a retail version that must be bought, and even though it’s still technically a Half-life 2 mod, it’s considered a full game on practice. The initial release was pretty good and the game managed to gather good attention, even though the player base did suffer some major (and uncommon) drop over the following month. On February 2006, the game saw its first free weekend. Still something a bit new, the initial reaction was good, and the game managed to achieve online popularity for a while, going back to the amount of online players it had reached on release. It’s hard to determine how much of that actually turned out to be from new sales - it could be that many players that had already bought the game decided to go back playing it because of the sudden increase in the number of online players - but the game managed to get an actual increase of 40% in its online presence, so apparently this small free weekend did work pretty fine for them. On July 2006 they did another free weekend, and while the residual increase in online presence wasn’t as good as the previous one - around 15% at best, I’d say - they did manage to top their previous records of average number of players online. Judging by the graphs, having free weekends seem to have worked for them as small steps toward increasing the number of online players; apart from the free trials, the Follow