Following Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs- what do I NEED?

 

Human psychology and brand marketing go hand in hand. Abraham Maslow, an American psychologist studied about healthy and successful people to gain an understanding about their personalities and what motivates them. Maslow’s 1943 paper- “A Theory of Human Motivation” is considered as an important framework in understanding human needs and behaviour.  After all, marketing is all about trying to motivate the consumer to buy a product and to persuade the consumer, brands need to understand their target market and what they are looking for.

Currently, the entire world is fighting a deadly coronavirus and the only way to avoid any encounter with this virus is to stay at home and maintain social distance. Staying at home might have created obstacles in many of our daily lives, but has been beneficial to many marketers and their brands in the market. Keeping this in mind, I have listed down one product, in this case, a mobile application, which I NEED.

  

PHYSIOLOGICAL NEEDS

This involves fulfilment of our basic needs of survival, that is, food, sleep, water, oxygen, health, etc. Considering food is one of our basic necessities and keeping the current pandemic situation in mind, online grocery delivery apps, like Big Basket, Grofers, Amazon Pantry, are the major requirement now.

SATEFY NEEDS

Under this category, we have physical security like safety, health and financial or job security. Online banking apps like BHIM UPI, Phone Pe, Google Pay, Paytm is something which I use almost regularly in order to make payments stay at home. When it comes to health concerns, Practo helps me to book a doctor’s appointment if needed and NetMeds is used to purchase medicines.

SOCIAL NEEDS- LOVE AND BELONGINGNESS

Being at home, applications like Google Duo and Whatsapp helps me stay connected with my friends and loved ones which fulfils my social needs.

ESTEEM NEEDS

This represents the desire of being accepted and valued by others and a sense of achievement and accomplishment. Applications like InShorts and Quora is used to fulfill esteem psychological needs.

SELF-ACTUALIZATION

This is the final stage in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs that comes after fulfilment of all the other stages. This represents realisation of one’s full potential which may include any creative pursuits or desire like travel. During this pandemic, travel is one thing which is forbidden, hence apps like Pinterest come to the rescue in order to explore the creative activites.