One of the most solidly established theories in the history of marketing for understanding a consumer's needs comes directly from the world of psychology. In 1954 Abraham Maslow, an American psychologist with a fair amount of notoriety behind him, identified through his studies different levels of needs and their relative complexity.

Abraham Maslow

To best describe them, he used a pyramid model (which is obviously not like the one used for Ponzi schemes) to explain in detail the hierarchies of needs and motivations, having the satisfaction of the essential needs, which form the base of the pyramid, as a necessary and sufficient condition for the satisfaction of the higher needs, located at the top. As one ascends obviously the individual moves from satisfying his or her own primal needs suitable for his or her own survival, to performing actions that can make him or her fulfilled in the social sphere in which he or she finds himself or herself, arriving at self-realization.

In Maslow's pyramid, an individual's needs are divided in this way:

  1. Physiological motivations: the basis of the model. They represent all primal actions and instincts aimed at self-preservation and not succumbing to the surrounding environment, such as hunger, sleep, sex, thermoregulation, and breathing.
  2. Security motivations: these are all those needs that an individual attempts to meet to ensure the security of his or her status quo. We are talking about job security, physical security, health security. This provides a sense of protection and peace of mind.
  3. Belonging motivations: correspond to the actions taken by an individual to initiate inclusion in the social fabric of belonging. They include needs for intimacy and personal relationships.
  4. Esteem motivations: almost at the top of the pyramid, the individual returns to focus on himself in order to build a good image of his professional and social figure in order to feel respected, recognized and envied. It is where the needs for social fulfillment and self-esteem are placed.
  5. Self-actualization motivations: Located on the top, they represent needs related to individual aspirations (whether work or sentimental) to solidify one's identity and express one's full potential.

The great merit of this theory is to ascertain that each person has unique and inimitable characteristics, but at the same time it exposes how their needs are accumulable and how it is possible to recognize them. In fact, only after satisfying the needs at the base of the pyramid will the need to satisfy the needs located at the top of the pyramid become apparent in the individual, activating actions of an ideological as well as physical nature.

Nevertheless, this turns out to be an extremely concise outline of what it takes to understand what needs a person feels the need to fulfill. This is why the Deep Marketing method is based on overcoming Maslow, as well as as as much research in psychology and sociology synthesized in Deep Needs, in order to have a scientific model that ensures greater integration with as many studies with a solid foundation to best understand an individual's needs.

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