Page 31 - DMGT506_CONSUMER_BEHAVIOUR

Consumer Behaviour

Notes According to the company's marketing vice president, the role of consumer research is of
vital importance for their business. "Continuous consumer research is a way of life for us,
considering the fact that our clients are high profile individuals who have tested the best
and thus, it is of great importance that they perceive us as the ultimate in retailing. We use
research for a variety of reasons - what customer segments we should focus on; to get the
feedback on our merchandise and concepts; to learn what our customers expect from us
instead of making any assumptions about these important issues. For this purpose, we ask
them a number of questions such as; are they aware of a particular brand, what is their
perception of its value, and do they expect us to keep the brand with us. We then map out
their responses and look for brands enjoying high awareness, which customers perceive
as valuable and expect to find in our stores."
The two basic areas of interest in conducting research are consumer preferences and,
attitudes, and customer service. The experts feel that this is the best way they can anticipate
customer preferences and expectations. The research at the company is integrated into an
information system linked with strategic planning. "The research must be closely linked
to strategic aspects of our business and none of our business planning is completed without
doing a comprehensive research," observes the company vice president, Hemant Anand.

Question
Prepare a small questionnaire for Wish-n-Shop to identify new products for its women's
section.

Answer: You may include questions like which products you would like to see more on
our shelves, which products you wish to buy but do not easily get them.

2.3 Ethics

Ethics is often misunderstood and generates controversies. There is need to examine the concept
and support its application to marketing decisions that are acceptable and beneficial to society.
The difficulty is that what is ethical for one individual may be unethical for another. Ethical
conduct may also differ in different societies. In business context, employees are expected to live
up to a set of laid down ethical standards. The real test of ethics people face is when things are not
going well and pressures build. According to Andrew Stark, ethical challenges are mainly in
two situations: (1) decisions in situations commonly called 'grey-areas' where the right decision
is debatable, and (2) decisions for issues where the right course of action is clear but individual
and company pressures, and circumstances force good-intentioned marketing managers in the
wrong direction.

Ethics refer to values and choices and focuses on standards, rules and codes of moral conduct that
control individual behaviour. Erik N. Berkowitz et al. maintain that: ethics are moral principles
and values that govern the actions and decisions of an individual or group. In the marketing
context, ethics is the moral evaluation of marketing activities and decisions as right or wrong.
Whether a marketing behaviour is ethical or unethical is determined on the basis of commonly
accepted principles of behaviour established by the society's expectations of conduct, various
interest groups, competitors, company's own management, and personal and moral values of
the individual. Each individual decides how to behave on the basis of these principles, and the
public at large and various interest groups evaluate if the actions are ethical or unethical.
Ethics in marketing practices is an important issue and needs developing understanding and
awareness to bring improvement in its application. Ethical issue refers to some situation, problem,
or opportunity that can be recognised and requires a person or organisation to select from
among different actions that must be evaluated as right or wrong, or ethical or unethical. For
instance when marketing managers or consumers feel manipulated or cheated, it becomes an
ethical issue, irrespective of the fact that the action happens to be legally right.

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