Many people think of marketing as something companies do: advertising campaigns, product launches, or social media strategies.

But marketing is also a way to understand how people make decisions. When we choose a college, consider a job offer, or decide where to live, we sort through alternatives and decide what matters most.

The goal of this blog, Living with Marketing, is to explore how ideas from marketing help explain the choices we make. Sometimes those ideas reveal patterns that are surprisingly easy to recognize once you know what to look for. I recently saw a good example of this in my marketing class at Boston College.

 

How people make big decisions

This semester, I asked my students to apply a framework called the consumer decision process to a choice they had already lived through: choosing where to go to college.

The assignment asked them to identify which stage of the process was most decisive, which competing school came closest to being chosen, and what that competitor might have done differently to change the outcome.

As I read through the essays, I noticed something interesting. Major decisions rarely hinge on a single universal moment. Instead, the tipping point occurs at different stages depending on the person.

For some students, the decision became clear during a campus visit, when they could finally imagine what daily life there might feel like. For others, the decisive moment came when they compared financial aid offers or weighed the practical trade-offs between schools.

 

Trade-offs: why some factors outweigh everything else

One of the most striking patterns in the essays was how students handled trade-offs.

In marketing, we sometimes describe this using two terms: compensatory and non-compensatory decision-making.

A compensatory decision works like a mental spreadsheet. A strength in one area can offset a weakness in another. A higher salary might compensate for a longer commute, or a stronger reputation might compensate for a less attractive location.

But for important decisions, people often rely on non-compensatory factors, better known as deal-breakers. These are the criteria an option must satisfy before it is seriously considered.

In everyday terms, it’s like using filters on Amazon. If a product doesn’t meet your minimum rating or price range, it disappears from the list, no matter how good its other features might be.

One student’s essay illustrated this clearly. They were torn between Boston College and a highly prestigious university located in a rural setting. The other school had a higher national ranking and a slightly stronger athletic reputation.

But the student ultimately chose BC because of what they called the “backyard factor.” For them, being in a city mattered too much to ignore. The opportunity to access internships and professional networks during the school year outweighed the prestige of the other institution.

In other words, location was non-compensatory. No amount of prestige could compensate for the lack of urban access.

It wasn’t a choice between a good and a bad school. It was a choice between two different life strategies.

 

Tie-breakers: when two strong options compete

Another consistent theme in the essays was the presence of a close second.

Most students were not choosing among dozens of schools. By the final stage of the decision, they were usually comparing two strong options.

When that happens, the final choice often depends on a small number of factors that act as tie-breakers.

For some students, the tie-breaker was financial. One student wrote candidly that while they preferred the atmosphere at BC, a large enough scholarship from a competing school would have changed the outcome.

This reveals something important about how decisions work. When a competitor changes its price, it is not just changing a number. It is changing how people interpret the entire offer.

Campus visits played a similar role in many of the essays. For a high school senior, a campus visit is more than a tour. It functions as a kind of product trial.

Just as someone might test-drive a car before buying it, walking across a campus helps students decide whether the experience matches the life they imagine for themselves.

Several students described moments during visits when the school suddenly felt real. Sitting in a dining hall, watching students move between classes, or simply spending time on campus helped them picture their future there in a way brochures and rankings could not.

 

The pattern behind the stories

Reading through the essays, I was struck by how often the final decision came down to just one or two factors.

Students mentioned many considerations—ranking, campus culture, cost, location—but the outcome usually turned on a small number of signals that felt decisive to them.

From a marketing perspective, this is exactly what we would expect. When people compare strong options, they rarely evaluate every attribute equally. Instead, they focus on the few differences that matter most and use those to break the tie.

 

What these decisions reveal

Although this assignment focused on choosing a college, the patterns the students described appear in many other decisions.

When people evaluate a job offer, consider moving to a new city, or decide whether to pursue graduate school, they often follow a similar path.

1. They identify a set of acceptable options.
2. They gather information to reduce uncertainty.
3. They compare alternatives using a small number of key criteria.
4. And eventually, one option stands out.

Looking back at decisions this way can also make future choices easier.

Many important decisions feel overwhelming because there are so many possible factors to consider. But in practice, the outcome often depends on just one or two criteria that matter most.

Recognizing those “tie-breakers” can help clarify what to pay attention to the next time you face a difficult choice.

 

A simple way to reflect on your own decisions

Think about the last major decision you made—choosing a college, accepting a job, buying a home, or making another important purchase.

Two questions are worth asking.

1. What was the close second?
   Was there another option that nearly won?
2. What actually decided the outcome?
   Was it cost, location, opportunity, culture, or something else?

If that competing option had been slightly different—if the price had been lower, the location closer, or the opportunity stronger—would the decision have changed?

Looking back at decisions this way can be surprisingly revealing. Many choices that once felt complicated turn out to have hinged on a small number of decisive signals.

Marketing frameworks don’t make decisions for us. What they can do is help us see the structure of the decision more clearly.

And sometimes that clarity makes the next decision a little easier.

Further reading

OpenStax: Consumer decision process