Transcript Social Class

Subcultures
Social Class
What is a social class?

The division of members of a society into a
hierarchy of distinct status classes so that
members of each class have relatively the
same status and members of all other
classes have either more or less status.
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A demographic variable.
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Consumers use social class as a frame of
reference (reference group) to compare their
values, attitudes, and beliefs to.
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Marketers use social class to predict
consumption behavior and as a
segmentation base.
– Income
– Occupation
– Education
Patterns of Social Stratification
Egalitarian class system
Class levels
100%
Privilege class system
Class levels
U.S. class system
Class levels
How many social classes are
there in the U.S.?
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Can be broken down into several different
categories, but always some variation of
lower, middle, and upper classes
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Social class mobility
Measuring Social Class
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Subjective measure
– Consumer’s self-perception
– Tends to underestimate lower and higher classes
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Reputational measure
– Informed community members
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Objective measures
– Selected demographic and socioeconomic
variables
Objective Measures

Single-variable indexes
– Occupation
» Widely accepted
– Education
» Associated with both occupation and income
– Income
» Amount of income, source of income
– Possessions
» Sociologists
Objective measures, continued
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Composite-variable indexes
– Combine variables to determine an overall
socioeconomic score
– Better indicators of social class than a single
variable
Using Social Class
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Ultimately, marketers use social class to
understand lifestyle and consumption
patterns
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Profiles of social class
Geodemographic Clustering
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PRIZM
– 40 clusters of zipcodes
– Socioeconomic and demographic variables
combined with survey and panel data on actual
consumer behavior
– Locates clusters of similar consumers
Targeting Social Classes
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What social class should be targeted?
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Size of segment
Disposable income
Specialized products
Unmet needs
Lower classes
 Affluent consumers
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