Reference no: EM132218655

Assignment - Consumer behaviour

In any purchase of any product/services, consumers tend to go through five stages of the consumer decision- making process (CDMP). However, there are many internal factors (needs & motivation, personality & self- concept, perception and attitudes) and situational factors (retail or website environment) that may influence this process.

Working individually, please select the following products/services:

1. Zara (Woman or Men)
2.

Once you have selected the brand, apply it to the consumer decision-making process, including the different consumer behaviour theories and concepts covered in the key lectures (Lecture 1 to 4) to produce a report. This report is about understanding the target customers of the selected brand in terms of their psychological profile (needs & motivation, personality & self-concept, perception and attitudes) and how the brand can influence the target customers' consumer decision making process (CDMP).

1. Introduction: Briefly explain why a good understanding of consumer behavior is a requirement of any organisation, including the selected brand. Briefly describe the product/services selected above including a brief background about the brand. Who are the key target consumers that the brand can focus on - think about the common characteristics of the key target customers? What are possible types of the decision making process that the target customers have with this purchase? Briefly define the scope of the report.

2. Using the five-stages of the CDMP as an overall framework, you then identify and apply how the following psychological influences (needs & motivation, personality & self-concept, perception - including perceived risks and attitudes) may become active in a particular stage of the CDMP. For example, the first stage of the CDMP is the need recognition and thus, the needs and motivations of the target customers may become active in this stage. With the product/services and the key customers in mind, what are needs and motivations that they are likely to have or want to be satisfied? Explain.

3. Also, some situational factors (retail/website environment) can potentially influence this process. In your opinion, how do these situational factors become active in a certain stage of the CDMP? Explain.

4. Key recommendations: What recommendations would you make to the brand in order to facilitate/influence the target consumers to purchase and become satisfied with the selected brand?

Instructions

The main aim of this assessment is to test your ability to describe and apply insights about consumers using the theoretical principles of consumer behaviour discussed in the key lectures (Lecture 1 to 4) to construct your report. This report is about understanding the target customers of the selected brand in terms of their psychological profile (needs & motivation, personality & self-concept, perception and attitudes) and how the brand can influence the consumer decision-making process (CDMP) of the target customers.

1. Select a brand from those listed above. Your role is to assist the selected brand in trying to understand its target customers better.

2. Look at the assessment rubric. You then conduct some research on the selected brand. In particular, you are required to find at least 5 academic journals that relate to the CDMP, psychological influences (needs & motivation, personality & self-concept, perception and attitudes) and/or external environment. Keep in mind that they relate to theories (not the brand) and you then can apply those theories to the brand selected. If you aim for HD, please try to find about 8-10 journal articles.

3. The assignment must be written in a report format. See the recommended structure on the next page. Your final report should be about 3,000 words in length (plus/minus 10%), excluding a one page executive summary and the reference list. The written report must be presented in a professional manner in terms of the font size, spacing, margins, design and referencing (Harvard system of referencing). Importantly, you must always keep back-up files in a safe place (cloud storage, dropbox, and/or university Onedrive).

4. The assignment must be submit through the unit Canvas page which is also linked to the Turnitin plagiarism software. The similarity score less than 10% is expected and preferably around 5%. Thus, students are expected to give proper citations and references to information sources. Any intentional copy from other sources (such as any information from the internet or previously submitted assignments - including your own prior submission) can be considered as an academic misconduct.

Recommended structure

Executive summary - it is generally a page long and includes your key findings and should be written last (excluded from word count)
Table of contents Introduction
– Company and a product description
– Describe the key target customers and their demographic profiles
– CB definition
– Scope of report Main headings
– Use the five stages of the consumer decision making process as an overall framework
– Apply and integrate the psychological influences (needs & motivation, personality & self-concept, perception and attitudes) and external environment to the particular stages of the CDMP.

Key recommendations

– Logical, theory-based, creative and actionable recommendations will receive more marks, this may include:
o What is the recommendation?
o What is the particular CB theory or concept it based on? - Receive higher marks
o How can it be implemented?
o Why should it be implemented?
– Remember that recommendations should be drawn from the discussion.

Reference (excluded from the word count)

– Harvard system of referencing (the guide available on the unit Canvas page)
– At least 5 academic journal articles (recommended 8 to 10 for HD)
– Other information (website, newspaper articles, etc.)

3,000 word report