marketing research

MKT 3230 A02 (3 CH) CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR

Dr. Marcio Coelho 108 Drake, MW 2.30 -3.45 pm

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Consumer Behaviour Project (20%) 1

This project is designed to enhance your understanding of the processes involved in and the influences on

Consumer Behaviour.

The main objectives of the Consumer Behaviour Project are:

• To develop an appreciation for the value of knowledge of Consumer Behaviour in developing a successful marketing strategy

• To provide a coherent framework for interpreting consumer reactions to marketing stimuli

• To develop an appreciation of the ethical dimensions of consumer marketing

• To develop your knowledge on how to write precisely and concisely for business writing

To achieve these objectives, you will be asked to do some specific tasks:

• Learn and use key terms, definitions, and concepts used in the field of Consumer Behaviour

• Show knowledge and understanding of the course material in your group project

• Engage in and report on your own consumer behaviour with an increased awareness of the internal and external forces at work when you make a purchase

• Share with the class your applications of Consumer Behaviour theory, using your group’s project

Your group will choose a product (good, service, combination, event, person, place, etc.) which is

currently offered for sale in the Canadian marketplace today by a specific company (it need not be

manufactured in Canada).

After learning about the consumers who buy this product, create the concept of a product extension. This

new product must be something that is not currently marketed by that particular company, that you think

would interest the same customers who are now buying the original product.

EXAMPLE: if you chose Gatorade with their green (and other colours) drink which is marketed to young

sporty people, particularly males, your product line extension might be a line of Gatorade sports clothing.

I should advise you to choose a product for which you will be able to find an advertising campaign; you

may use an ad from the Internet but be sure it can be printed out to hand in, and that it has the elements of

an advertisement and is not just a picture (an ad can be just a picture but that's a philosophical debate for

another time).

i. Point of View

When writing the project, put yourself in the role of a marketing consultant to the producer of the product

you have selected. Write it like a business report - clear and concise.

1 Project developed by M Louise Ripley, M.B.A., Ph.D from York University, Toronto. Used with Permission

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ii. General Format for all Five Parts

For each Part of the Project you will hand in within the first 15 minutes of class on the day it is due, the

required number of pages as stated below, typed in standard font - Times New Roman, Helvetica, or Arial

Regular (NOT Ariel Narrow), single-spaced in not less than 11-point type, with 1" margins all around.

a. Using Theory

As this is a course in an academic business program, I am looking for evidence that you're using the

theory you are reading about and discussing. So use the theory and use the terms. Don't waste space

defining terms; we all have the book. Instead, use them.

Remember when you're working on these assignments that you're not going to be graded on whether you

get a particular topic (e.g.: differential threshold) right for a particular purchaser of your particular

product .

Sometimes I do not have these "right" answers for all possible products students might come up with --

but you are being graded on whether you use the terms correctly and seem to understand them, and you

are being graded on how well you cover the material using your own product as an example.

b. The Five Parts of the Consumer Behaviour Project

i. Part 1 (0 marks but you can't go forward without submitting it)

LENGTH – 1 - 2 pages, single-spaced,

Due – Monday, January 20 in the UM Learn

Prepare a cover page like the cover page above.

In short, on no more than 2 pages, do six things (number them):

1. State the brand name and product class of a specific product currently existing in Canada (this is your original product), for which it would be possible to create a new product within the product

line* (this is your product extension).

2. The product class is the type o product, e.g. transports, food, energy and oil, construction, etc.). The brand name is the specific brand name of the product currently marketed. Add to this a few

words to tell me what this thing is, if it is not immediately obvious from its name. For example, if

you have the product class soft drinks and you tell me that your current product is Pepsi Diet

Cola, you do not need to tell me that that's a cola. However, if you have timekeepers as a product

class and you tell me that you're researching the Bagnasty's Absquatulator, tell me what it is.

3. State the current target market for the current product and then state the 3 most important characteristics of the current target market for this product. On a separate line, state the most

important customer need that your product meets. Don't analyze it; just state it. You should

elaborate this analysis on the last delivery which is due to same day of your group presentation.

Try as much as you can to be sure that this most important need relates directly to the eventual

product extension you will choose.

4. State where the current product is currently sold, both geographically and in terms of its type of distribution.

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5. State in Canadian dollars the price range at which the current product is usually sold. Maybe you will need to make a quick research here.

6. State the three most important environmental variable that affects your current product, out of the basic seven environments (demographic, geographic, economic, natural, technological,

political/legal, socio/cultural); then in not more than 3 lines explain each one of them (three lines

for each).

7. State your best idea at this time for a proposed product extension to be sold to this same target market and describe it in not more than 3 lines. You may change your idea as you progress

through the assignments, but having an idea at the start of what you will eventually sell to this

target market will help you to focus on what you analyze about them now.

That's it: No more, No less. This part doesn't have theory, at least not explicit stated theory. It is designed

to get your group started quickly and to get you to understand the importance of writing concisely.

While preparing Part 1, read the instructions for the other parts and be sure that you can do what is

required in the rest of the assignment with what you propose in Part 1. Here is what an Assignment One

might look like:

1. Original Brand Name of Product: Bagnasty’s Absquatulator

Product Class: Timers

Description: method to account for time spent doing crossword puzzles

2. Current Target Market: Crossword Puzzle Lovers

over age 18 (i.e. not children)

have very little free time

enjoy leisure highly structured

Need: method to help cut down on time spent doing crossword puzzles

3. Currently Sold: across Canada, in bookstores

4. Price Range: $4 - $6

5. Three Major Environmental Factor: socio-cultural, because it involves people's free-time activities

Technological: this is kind of a new technology that it is not applied to this specific field yet.

Political – Legal: As it will be a new application to this technology, maybe some regulations will

apply on it.

6. Product Extension: Bagnasty’s Pool-Side Absquatulator

Waterproof version of original to enable puzzlers to track puzzle-solving time pool-side or actually in the

pool

ii. Part 2 (10 marks)

LENGTH – 6 to 8 pages total, double-spaced + copy of ad.

Due – Friday, February 3, in the UM Learn

Chapters related to it: 1,5, and 2.

Choose one print ad for your company's current product and attach a copy of it to this report; make

another copy - you will need it later. In not more than 2 pages for this first part, identify the customers for

your current product and describe them in ways specifically relevant to the course material in Chapters 1, 2 and 5 of Solomon and in ways that clearly relate to how the product and the attached advertisement

appeal to those customers. Put the material relevant to each chapter on a separate page. Two pages for

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each chapter, and label them. Do not overlap or overrun pages and stick to margin etc. limits. Be specific;

think of this partly as an outline of what is most important in these chapters.

Realize that while you are in essence being asked to follow the outline of the chapter, you don't have

room to list absolutely everything. Use the BLUE TOPICS in the textbook as your guide, and look at the

bolded terms below those. For example, in Chapter 1 there are 15 Blue Topics (The first is Consumer

Behaviour: People in the Market Place) and in Chapter 2 there are 13 (the first is Smell, but note that you

don't need to write down all the senses, just the one main one that is relevant to your product and/or ad).

Write in true point form and you will have room to cover all of them. Be sure you use the terms in ways

that show me that you understand what they mean. You may relate the term to the current product, the

target market, or your advertisement. DO NOT YET USE THE NEW PROPOSED PRODUCT.

Note that most terms will apply in some way to any product. You cannot for example say that "schema" is

not applicable or that "positioning" is not relevant. There is a schema in every human thought, and no

marketer would start any marketing project without some idea of how to position the product in the

market. For example, while one of the five senses might not seem directly relevant for a product, it may

be relevant simply in the fact that it is NOT part of the product (think about Clinique's line of scent-free

cosmetics). You should have almost no items listed as "N/A" (not applicable).

In another two pages, choose the five most important points of the chapter and write further at length

(point form or prose) describing specifically how that point relates to your product and its ad.

iii. Part 3 (20 marks)

LENGTH – 8 - 12 pages total, double-spaced.

Due – Friday, March 16 in the UM Learn

Chapters related to it: 6 and 9

Do some informal research for this part - interviews or survey of a small group of current users of the

product or a product similar to yours and use the information in the first part of this Part, which is done

the same way as Part 2. Try to gather some simple information on demographics and psychographics that

might be helpful to you when you introduce your product extension.

You're looking for some early clues to whether or not your extension would be popular with your current

target market. In not more than 4 pages, further describe your current customers in ways specifically

relevant to the course material in Chapters 6 and 9 of Solomon, making specific reference to what you

found out in your limited market research and again using the Blue Topics as a guide. Put the material

relevant to each chapter on two separate pages, two pages for each chapter and label them. Do not overlap

or overrun pages. Do not include a separate analysis of the information you find out in your research, but

rather make sure it shows up in your writing to illustrate the terms and theories you are explaining (example: "57% of our respondents said they liked the symbolism in the ad"). As with Part 2, think in

terms of your customer, the current product, and the advertisement that reaches that customer. Ultimately

these three things should be inextricably linked: a good ad will target the reasons that the customer buys

the product.

Remember the basic rules of ethical research with human participants, even informal research as this is:

you must identify yourself and tell them what you are doing and why, you must assure them of

confidentiality, and you must tell them that they are free at any time to stop the interview. The sample

need not be large enough to be statistically significant - I'm more interested in how you use your results

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than that those results be statistically significant, I do not need to see your questionnaires or summaries of

data, and I don't want to see any statistical tables.

In another two pages, choose the five most important points of these chapters and write further at length

(point form or prose) describing specifically how that point relates to your product and its ad.

Although you are writing about your current product and its consumers, you are already beginning here to

think about your new product: what you're doing here is playing amateur psychologist, and trying to wrap

your mind around the learning processes and motivation that drives these people to buy this product, for

the express purpose of selling them something similar -- the very worst of what Marketing is often

accused of doing! Your main focus here is on the current product, but use this opportunity to ask them

briefly about their reaction to your proposed new product - Would they be interested? How much would

they expect to pay? Where would they expect to find the product?

As for this part you should need to prepare some questions, we should follow this dates to prepare the

survey:

Until February 5 – Send me the questions you’ve prepared for the survey.

Until February 12 – I will give you feedback on the survey.

From February 17 to March 16 – Do the survey with as much as people you can. Use the winter break to

collect data and analyse it.

From March 2 to 16 – Prepare the report for the Delivery 3.

iv. Part 4 (10 marks)

LENGTH - 6 pages total, double-spaced.

Due – April 1, 6, or 8.

This final part of the project will be your group presentation. Using what you learned overall, in not more

than 15 minutes, explain to the class about your original product, the advertisement you’ve choose, and

the new product line extension that your group is suggesting the company launches in the market.

Present to the class the most important points that are related with the course content (you should retrieve

the information and feedback gave by the professor on Deliveries 2 and 3.

Describe how you expect your current customers to go through the process involved in moving from

being loyal users of the original product to (you hope) being loyal users of your product line extension

including attempts you make to change their attitude toward a new product. Be specific; think of this

partly as a summary of what was most important to you in the book, in terms of your project.

The presentation will be evaluated for:

• Clarity of presentation: the actual product and the product extension proposed by your group should be clear and easy to understand;

• Level of relatedness of the presentation with the most important points in the course content;

• The quality of the proposal to attract actual loyal customers to the new product proposed using Costumer Behaviour concepts (process involved in moving from being loyal users of the original

product to (you hope) being loyal users of your product line extension);

• Persuasiveness of the presentation to senior management.

• Creativity, organization and presentation of relevant information, dress, manner, and speaking style of the presenters.

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Each group’s member should take part on the presentation. If a student doesn’t present with his/her group,

it won’t receive the grade for this part of the Project.

The group doesn’t need to deliver a written report on this part of the project.

During all the semester, each group should be prepared to make a short presentation before each delivery.

I should give each group the opportunity to share about its project, or could choose one or two groups

instead to do so.

The evaluation criteria of the presentation is found below

MKT 3230 A02 (3 CH) CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR

Dr. Marcio Coelho 108 Drake, MW 2.30 -3.45 pm

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Summary of Final Project Analysis Evaluation Criteria

Category High Proficiency Some Proficiency No/Limited Proficiency Alloc atio

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Clarity: Level in what the new idea is easy to understand

Clearly presents information about the actual product and suggested product line extension, that doesn’t need further explanation

Successfully presents good amount of information about the actual product and make suggestions to the product line extension that needed some explanation else

The product presented and the product line extension suggested are hard to understand without clarification

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Analysis: Level of relatedness of the presentation with the most important points in the course content;

The group shows high interpretational skill on the concepts studied during the term, correctly relating them with the product line extension suggested.

The group show some proficiency in analyzing the concepts. Most of the time these concepts were correctly related with the course content.

The group failed in correctly analysing and relating Consumer Behaviour’s concepts and applying them to the product extension proposed.

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Proposal to attract customers: to the new proposed product

The Consumer Behaviour project shows a feasible and consistent proposal on how to turn loyal customers to the actual product into customers to the new product line extension proposed using concepts studied in this term

The project shows interesting ways to try to turn loyal customers to the actual product into customers to the new product line extension proposed using concepts studied in this term, but lacks support to the strategy

The Consumer Behaviour project is wear in terms of how to turn loyal customers to the actual product into customers to the new product line extension proposed using concepts studied in this term

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Persuasiveness of the presentation to senior management.

The group present clear information and concepts that would likely convince the firm’s senior management to adopt the product line extension proposed.

The group present good information and concepts on Consumer Behaviour, but lacks evidence and reasons to convince the firm’s senior management to adopt the product line extension proposed.

The presentation fails in persuade the Senior Management to adopt the product line extension because missed some important concepts or clarification

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Creativity, organization; Dress, manner, and speaking style of the presenters

The group presented the final report in a creative manner, well dressed, with loud, clear and proper speaking style, and could be done to senior management in a real firm

The group made a good presentation, but could have improved the creativeness, the dressing, the voice style and the persuasiveness.

The presentation lacks in creativity, group dressing, voice style and persuasiveness

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