Understanding The Significance Of Consumer Behaviour Marketing Essay

Published Date: 23 Mar 2015

For years, the significance of consumer behaviour and the effective communication channels have been at the heart of any corporation in order to be successful. Managers or leaders have always been strived to strategize their consumer behaviour and communication channels more effectively and implement those strategies more competitively. Consumer behaviour is defined as to understand how consumers obtain, purchase, use, evaluate and dispose of products and services. By having a successful product launch, every corporation should use different communication channels to promote their product and it also help to create brand awareness too. This paper addresses this issue and undertakes a comprehensive literature review to extract and explain main constructs of the significance of consumer behaviour and effective communication channels as well as to elaborate building blocks this concept. Subsequently, this study proposes an anatomy for the significance of consumer behaviour and effective communication channels to be further used by other researchers and practitioners in studying the significance of consumer behaviour and effective communication channels and formulating the successful strategies for a corporation.

Keywords: consumer behaviour, communication channels, product launch

I. Introduction

For many years, consumer behaviour and the effective communication channels had played an important part for a product launch to be successful. If a corporation want to have a product launch success, they have to do a consumer research process in order to know their customers need and want as well as using multiple channels to promote their product. By using multiple communication channels, it helps to create brand awareness and generate profit for the corporation. Consumer behaviour is defined as to understand how consumers obtain, purchase, use, evaluate and dispose of products and services [16]. Consumer behaviour can be used by marketers to create the marketing strategy; targeting each consumer effectively once they understand their needs and wants through the research of consumer behaviour. Buying decision process model is a widely used tool for marketers to gain a better understanding about their customers and their behaviour [13]. There are 5 stages of buying decision process model are need recognition, information search, evaluation of alternatives, purchase decision, and post- purchase decision. The first stage is need recognition or sometime refers as problem recognition. Need recognition is basically the difference between the desired state and the actual condition. Information search is the second stage of buying decision process and consist of 2 types such as internal and external. Internal refers to memory whereas external is from the word of mouth from family, and friends, printed materials and many more. The third stage of buying decision process model is evaluation of alternative is the need to establish criteria for evaluation, features the buyer wants or does not want to purchase a particular product. Purchase decision is the fourth stage that explained about the product availability. The final stage of buying decision process is post-purchase decision is the final outcome on whether the customer are satisfied or dissatisfied about the product that they recently purchase [6].

II. Methodology

This study philosophically falls under interpretivism class, undertaken research approach is explanatory and research strategy is literature survey. Consequently this study used secondary data and qualitative analysis techniques. International journals as well as proceedings are dug up through international well- recognized databases like Emerald, Science Direct, Proquest, Ebsco and Springerlink as well as IEEEExplore. Papers were collected over a six month periods and reviewed jointly with authors over a three month period. A couple of discussions around the design and the objective of the study were done by some senior lecturers in three business schools as well as some PhD students in order to improve the flow of study. The arrangement of literature survey was planned to be started with reviewing the concept of conventional consumer behaviour and effective communication channels and then scrutinizing and elaborating the concept of consumer behaviour and effective communication channels to be further used by managers or leaders, researchers and other practitioners involved in strategies on how to make a product to be successful and how their decision making help them to achieve success.

III. Benefit of the significance of consumer behaviour and the effective communication channels

There are many benefits of the significance of consumer behaviour such as every corporation should have their own marketing plan so that they will know what are their marketing objectives and strategies. Marketing plan is a written document that outlines the specific actions to reach the marketing objectives of any corporation [4]. It is important for every corporation to have a marketing plan so that they can distinguish on how much they should budget to produce and promote the product. Marketing strategy is basically covers all the elements of the procedure of its marketing goals into one complete plan. Marketing strategy can be used to maximise limited resources of a corporation to increase its opportunities in sales and accomplish a sustainable competitive advantage [2]. Marketing strategy determines the choice of target market segment, positioning, marketing mix, and distribution of resources. Marketing strategy is also known as the foundation of a marketing plan.

Marketing mix is marketing manager's tool for achieving marketing objectives of any corporation. Marketing mix also known as the "4P of Marketing" and the "4P of marketing" are:

i. Product

ii. Price

iii. Place

iv. Promotion

It is important for any marketers to create or produce a product that will satisfy the need and want of a customer [21]. This will lead to customer satisfaction and customer loyalty. Customer satisfaction and customer loyalty are important because it will help a corporation to maintain a long term relationship with their customers [14]. There are many factors that influencing consumer behaviour such as psychological, culture, social and environmental. Psychological factors include motivation, perception, learning, self-concept, beliefs and attitude as well as personality. There are 3 types of environmental factors such as economic, political and technological. On the other hand, culture factors consist of 3 factors such as culture, subculture, and social class. Social factors consist of 3 factors such as household type, reference groups and roles and status. It is very important to use effective communication channels so that it helps to assure that the right target market is reached at the right time through the right channels with the correct message [8].

IV Drawback of the significance of consumer behaviour and the effective communication channel

There are several reasons on the drawback of consumer behaviour and the effective communication channels are:

a) Lack of preparation

b) The corporation did not do a marketing research beforehand to produce a new product.

c) Did not have a proper planning on the cost of product development. Business owners priced the product too high so the customers could not afford to purchase that particular product [3].

d) The marketing plan was created by a product developer without the knowledge of the market trends [19].

e) The corporation did not have clear description about the product such as providing the feature and benefit of the particular product when promoting the products by using different communication channels [9].

f) They did not meet the marketing objective and marketing strategies on how to promote the product [24].

g) Did not test the products first before launching the marketplace

h) Employees are not well- informed so they could not explain to the customers about the features and benefits of the product [18].

V. The possible solution of the significance of consumer behaviour and the effective communication channels

A) By doing a marketing research

It is very important for every corporation to do a marketing research in order to know what product to create to satisfy the need and want of their customers. Marketing research is the backbone of any good business plan. Marketing research is defined as the application of the scientific method in searching for the truth about marketing phenomena [25]. There are two methods of marketing research that are primary and secondary research. Primary research seeks to understand customer motivations, opinions and needs through quantitative and qualitative field research. On the other hand, secondary market research uses already existing sources of information to gather the data. There are two types of secondary research such as internal and external. Internal include customer database, company website, and company profile. External include printed material, getting the information from the internet and the agency [22].

Quantitative data focuses on numbers, statistics, and percentages. It also generally used to draw conclusion and tests a specific hypothesis. Examples of quantitative research include surveys and questionnaires. Qualitative data focuses on why consumers behave a certain way and the logic into their decision making choices and other natural social phenomena. It also help to figure out different types of marketing strategies and product designs that best suit their target market. This is a good way for any corporation to increase their revenues and consumer attitudes [23]. By analysing unstructured information such as interview transcripts, open ended survey responses, emails, notes, feedback forms, photos and videos, qualitative research is able to measure consumer's purchasing behaviours and attitudes. Examples of qualitative research include focus groups, in-depth interviews, and projective techniques [7].

According to Kotler and Armstrong (2010), they defined new product development as the development of original products, product enhancements, product alterations, and new brands through the firm's own research and development hard work. There are 8 stages of new product development are idea generation, idea screening, concept development and testing, marketing strategy development, business analysis, product development, test marketing, and commercialization[15].

1. Idea generation: Each department come together and generate ideas and suggestion of a product [17].

2. Idea screening: Goods ideas are spotted and poor ideas are dropped as soon as possible. Only products that will gain profit are accepted [5].

3. Concept Development and Testing: focus groups

4. Marketing Strategy Development: The marketing strategy statements consist of three different parts such as the description of the target market, product positioning as well as the sales, market share, and profit goals[12]

5. Business Analysis: A review of the sales, costs, and profit projections for a new product to find out whether these factors satisfy the company objectives. They can list down the advantages and disadvantages of the new product.[11]

6. Product Development: The product concept is being developed into a physical and several product prototypes in order to ensure that the product idea can be turned into a workable product [15].

7. Test Marketing: The product prototype and marketing program are tested in more realistic market settings. Customers and employees are providing feedback about the new product [1].

8. Commercialization: The introduction of a new product into the market through different types of the promotional tool of marketing [5].

B) Using different communication channels to promote the product when it enter the market

Today, consumers can get information from multiple sources; this requires a corporation to come out with multiple marketing channels to ensure the success of their product launch. There are many different effective communication channels such as advertising, sales promotion, public relation, and direct marketing. Advertising is one of the most powerful tools to persuade or encourage target audience to take action. It also carries out the marketing communication task. Example of types of advertisements include television advertisement, billboard, radio advertisement, print advertisement such as magazines, newspapers, catalogues, and flyers, banners and many more. Advertising provide information to customers about overall of the products such as the features and benefits of the product. By having advertisement, it also increased awareness and it acts as a reminder [10].Personal selling is also important because it encourage customers to purchase the products. Sales promotion is basically a short term inducement strategies to encourage the purchase or sale of a product or service. Examples of sales promotion are contests and games, free gifts, coupons, loyalty cards, and discounts [20].

VI. Discussion

A survey on existing literature, as conducted and explained earlier, reveals that the significance of consumer behaviour and the effective communication channels are about what a corporation need to do in order to determine the success of a product launch. Marketing research is important for every business and it should not just be a one- time activity. If a corporation want to be successful, they have to do their marketing research on a continual basis so that they can keep up with market trends and to sustain a competitive edge. Marketing research is very important for a corporation to understand their target market and to increase their sales.

There are many reasons for a corporation to do a marketing research such as to identify best customer segments, and the best positioning strategy against their competition. Marketing research also provides critical information and direction for any corporation. Moreover, marketing research is like a guidance for any corporation to make strategic business decisions, to discovery unmet customer needs, and also help a corporation to discover new ideas for products or services. By doing a marketing research can also help the corporation to develop more effective strategies, to identify the potential problems, and to find the possible solution to solve the problem too.

Distribution channels and their management also play a key role in success of a product launch because the products are noticeable and available to the right people, in the right manner, at the right place and time. It is also very important that the corporation to identify the best marketing mix for the product such as product, price, place and promotion. By doing a marketing research also help the corporation to reduce the risk of product failure. Before launching a new product in the market, they have to test the new product first to make sure that there will be demand for the new product. New product development stages are useful tools for any corporation who plan to create a new product in the future. New products can help any corporation to gain new customers, retain existing customers and increase profit too. By creating or producing new products, a corporation can gain competitive advantage over their competitors. By using different communication channel such as advertising and sales promotion can increase awareness of the product.

Conclusion

This paper is a conceptual research that utilizes literature survey and analysis approach to review and interpreting the concept of the significance of consumer behaviour and the effective communication channels. Firstly, the significance of consumer behaviour and the effective communication channels were reviewed from an evolutionary perspective and the main essence of this pivotal construct of business theory was a systematic managerial formula for making of a successful business decision-making and formulation of strategy. Then, the concept of consumer behaviour is defined as to understand how consumers obtain, purchase, use, evaluate and dispose of products and services. Hence, there are many benefits that can lead a product launch to success such as every corporation have to do their own marketing plan, objectives and strategies. Marketing strategy determines the choice of target market segment, positioning, marketing mix, and distribution of resources. Customer satisfaction and customer loyalty are important because it will help a corporation to maintain a long term relationship with their customer. There are several drawbacks on the significance of consumer behaviour and effective communication channel. The possible solution to solve the drawbacks are to do a marketing research, new product development and using different multiple channels.