Integrated Marketing Communication on Consumer

Question: Discuss about the Integrated Marketing Communication on Consumer. Answer: Introduction: In the present competitive business environment, organizations look to initiate innovative strategies to create favourable decision-making process of the customers. Purchase decision reflects the process utilized by the customers regarding the transaction of the market during, before and after the purchase of a product or service. It has been assessed that several factors can actually affects the purchase decision-making process of the customers. In this study, the focus will be on one of the most popular sports equipment provider organization namely Puma. The focus organization was established on 1948 and maintained consistent growth in the global market. In 2015, Puma revenue level was accounted around $3.38 billion that establish at one of the prime brands in sport equipment manufacturing department (puma.com 2017). However, Puma is also facing massive competition from different other prime sports equipment manufacturing provides like Nike and Adidas for keeping the profit at the desired level. For that reason, customers always have many alternative options at the time of purchasing any sporting equipment. For assessing the purchasing decision of the customers, the study has choose two respondents namely Catherine and Mack for collecting information about the purchasing decision about Puma footwear. Now, Catherine is 18 years old New South Wales college student whereas Mack is 42 years old Victoria based working personnel. The study has selected these two individuals for collecting data, as they have recently purchased footwear products from Puma outlets. The study has consciously tried to select respondents with huge differences in age and career to understand different perspective of purchasing decision. The study aims to analyze the kind of impact external factors can have on the purchasing decision making process. The study would also focus on assessing the influence of costumer habit on the purchase decision process. Therefore, it would certainly help Puma to initiate different changes in the business process for fulfilling business objectives. Description of the purchase decision-making process: Purchase decision-making process reflects a systematic procedure that customers go through at the time of purchasing products. Many studies have highlighted the significance of performing all the steps associated with the purchasing decision for fulfilling all the needs and wants of the customers (Jang, Prasad and Ratchford 2012). Therefore, the interview process have primarily tried to focus on assessing whether the selected respondents have performed all the necessary steps of not. During the interview process, Catherine has mentioned that she is a regular member of the college team. For that reason, she had to play in different leagues and tournament on regular basis. It has induced Catherine to purchase different sports equipments and apparel on regular basis. For that reason, Catherine has always focused on performing all the five steps mentioned in the purchasing decision-making process. Firstly, Catherine has tried to identify exact needs for fulfilling the entire requirement associated with the games. Catherine has mentioned that identification of need has allowed identifying the exact product or footwear to be purchased from the market. Thereafter, Catherine has focused on searching relevant information regarding all the brands related provides sports shoes. After that, Catherine has mentioned that she focused on evaluating all the possible alternatives brands in shorts shoes department in an effective manner. In this section, Catherine has tried to utilize different reliable secondary sources for assessing the best-suited product for fulfilling all the requirements. Fourthly, Catherine focuses on purchasing the best-suited shoes, which has come up to be Puma shoes for fulfilling all the needs. However, Catherine has mentioned that she still has not used a Puma product until now. For that reason, she is expecting that Puma footwear will fulfil all the requirements comprehensively. On the contrary, the study has also collected information from other respondent Mack to understand the way he has taken purchasing decision of buying Pumas sport shoes. During the interview process, Mack has expressed his trust and loyalty towards all the sporting equipments and apparels produced by Puma (Mihart 2012). In fact, Mack has highlighted that he does not consider of purchasing other brands at the time of purchasing sports shoes. Mack mentioned that all the products of Puma have able to fulfil all the needs and wants in an effective manner until now. Therefore, Mack does not see any reason to switch brands at the time of purchasing sports shoes. For that reason, Mack has tried to assess all the sports shoes provided by Puma for identifying the best-suited products in the market. Mack also mentioned that he is stopped playing sports many years from now. Thus, Mack purchased this sports shoes for morning walk and exercise purpose. Discussion and comparison with academic literature: Bakshi (2012) has illustrated the fact that purchase decision-making is an extremely crucial concept that all the organizations need to evaluate in an in-depth manner. Proper understanding of purchase decision is critical, as it can allow organizations to make some necessary changes in the business procedure. Thus, proper understanding of the purchase decision will help organizations to reduce the risk level associated with the business procedure. Many studies have highlighted decision-making as a psychological construct that induce people to behave in a specific manner (Mallen 2013). For that reason, proper understanding of the psychological construct has become essential for the organizations to fulfil all the goals and objectives in an appropriate manner. Now, Godey et al. (2012) have highlighted that customers follow a systematic procedure at the time of purchasing any product or service. The systematic procedure regarding purchase decision include five steps like recognition of needs, information search, analysis of alternatives, purchase decision and post purchase decision- making process. The data collected from the above interview has highlighted that Catherine has focused on following all the mentioned steps about the purchase decision-making process. On the other hand, Mack has not focused too much on performing all the steps at the time of purchasing selected product. Hudson and Thal (2013) have highlighted the fact that it is essential to use all the five steps at the time of taking any purchase decision. Otherwise, the purchased product might not able to fulfil the needs and requirements of the customers (Kelley, Cranor and Sadeh 2013). It allows customers to conduct an effective cost benefit analysis, which is likely to cre ate positive impact on the fulfilment of all the requirements. From this perspective, Catherine is likely to fulfilling its objective of purchasing new sports shoes in an appropriate manner (Katawetawaraks and Cheng 2013). On the contrary, Mack is likely to face huge amount of challenges in fulfil all the needs in an effective manner. In addition, it might also eliminate the possibility of consuming best available product for Mack. As per the article by Kuvykaite, Dovaliene and Navickiene (2015) teenagers and young people are more likely to check all possible alternative at the time of purchasing any product or service. Majority of the teenagers does not have huge amount of money to purchase anything they want. For that reason, they are likely to be more specific and want to buy the best available products for fulfilling the needs. From the evaluation of the collected data, it can be mentioned that Catherine was also very tentative at the time of purchasing any product. For that reason, Catherine has tried to evaluate all the available products in an in-depth manner for selecting a product for purchase. For that reason, it can be mentioned that purchasing decision-making process of Catherine represents a high involvement process. It highlighted the fact that Catherine is looking to achieve high value for the money invested in purchasing a particular product (Powers et al. 2012). It has been assessed that high i nvolvement decision-making process allows customers to gain in-depth knowledge about the alternative product options. Therefore, it has allowed Catherine to understand exact amount of benefit she will receive after purchasing Puma branded sports shoes (Gidlf et al. 2013). It will also help Catherine to have a clear idea regarding the areas where Puma product is better compared to other branded products. Thus, it will help to satisfy the needs of Catherine in a convincing manner. On the other hand, from the evaluation of the connected data given by Mack, it can be assessed that purchasing decision not necessarily have to follow all the mentioned steps. In fact, many people purchase products of specific brands out of habits and experience (Reza Jalilvand and Samiei 2012). For that reason, it influences all the organizations to maximize the quality of the provided products and services. The purchasing process of Mack has highlighted extreme low involvement at the time of selecting any products. In fact, the interview has identified the fact that Mack has not even considered of assessing the quality of the other products. For that reason, Mack does not have any idea about the kind of product range other brands like Adidas and Nike have in the footwear department, which might able to satisfy the needs of the customers even further (Wang, Yu and Wei 2012). For that reason, Mack purchasing decision-making process does not guarantee selection of best products availa ble in the market. In addition, low involvement purchase decision also does not increase the knowledge level of the customers, which might affect the post purchase behaviour as well. Conclusion: From the above discussion, it can be assessed that Mack and Catherine have performed two different processes at the time of purchasing same product. Catherine has focused on performing traditional approach whereas Mack has focused on following unconventional way to select a particular sports shoe. It has been assessed that Catherine purchase decision-making process required relatively higher time compared to Mack. It requires intense use of secondary and primary sources for identifying best possible product for fulfilling the needs of the customers. On the other hand, Mack purchasing decision-making process requires lesser time but it can be influenced by several other external factors. It has been examined that Mack has purchased Pumas sports shoes out of habit and personal experience. For that reason, it has high probability that provided product might not able to fulfil all the requirements in an effective manner. Therefore, it can be recommend for Mack to focus on following conve ntional approach to cover all aspect of the purchase decision-making process. 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