Factors Influencing Consumer Behavior Analysis

This assignment analyzes the various factors that influence consumer behavior, including in-store environment, social media, and post-purchase behavior. The report provides a comprehensive review of research articles and books related to consumer behavior, highlighting key findings and recommendations for retail stores to improve customer experience and purchase decision-making. Specific details include 4 types of consumer buying behavior, factors influencing consumer behavior, and the impact of social media on consumer behavior in the low-cost airline industry.

CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
PART 1............................................................................................................................................1
Summary of the purchase............................................................................................................1
PART 2............................................................................................................................................2
Customer Journey and Experience..............................................................................................2
PART 3............................................................................................................................................7
Recommendations for store manager..........................................................................................7
REFLECTION.................................................................................................................................9
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Consumer Behaviour is referred as the actions of individuals consumers or groups that
takes place in the marketplace. The organisation aims at understanding the behaviours of
customers as how they opt for buy, or dispose the products and services. Organisation focuses on
understanding their experience in order to satisfy their needs and wants. JD Sports Fashion PLC
is a fashion retail company that is based in Bury, Greater Manchester, England. The JD Sports
operates its retail shops through out in UK. This company mainly deals in clothing and
sportswear accessories and provides employment to 32,125 employees. The present report aims
at analysing the behaviour of consumers in a selected market place. Then report focuses on
explaining about the customer journey and experiences. Further some recommendations are
made for store manager in order to bring improvements in customer journey and purchase
experience.
MAIN BODY
PART 1
Summary of the purchase
The present report is based on the research that is done in order to identify the behaviour
of consumers and their experience in JD Sportswear which is located in Westfield Shopping
Centre in Stratford. The Westfield Shopping Centre has many stores such as Accessorize, 3,
Adidas, HMV, Next Home, Mothercare, Clarks and many more. Different store provides
different products and services that leads to provide satisfaction to different customers and also
completes their purchase experience. Different types of customers such as potential consumer,
new customer, loyal customer, impulsive or discount customer have different behaviours while
shopping. The behaviour of customer while shopping may include habitual behaviour,
dissonance behaviour, variety seeking behaviour and complex behaviour (4 types of consumer
buying behavior, 2012).
The research is based on one of the customer that is exploring for buying shoes from JD
Sports. The statement of purchase includes the details of products bought by customers and price
of the product. The researcher analyses and the behaviour of consumer and focus on his
experience for JD sportswear store and states that his experience and purchase situation was low
involvement. Low involvement purchase refers to consumer's level of interest and involvement
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while buying the products. The shoes from JD Sportswear Store are bought by consumer which
are inexpensive and also posses low risk therefore, it is considered as low involvement purchase
and product (Nguyen, de Leeuw and Dullaert, 2018).
JD Sportswear is located at the Westfield Shopping Centre in Stratford. There are
competitors for JD Sportswear within the shopping centre also, such as Adidas, Boot Barn and
Odd Molly. Therefore, JD Sports aims at making it marketing strategy in a way that it positions
itself away from the competitors in order to give competitive advantages. The high profile
manufacturers brands will release their products to JS Sports as it will likely to bring effective
results by selling more products and also protect brand's positioning (Stávková, Stejskal and
Toufarová, 2018). The JD Sports aims at maintaining effective and efficient staff at its retail
stores so that they can provide best services to customers and enrich their shopping experience
and also satisfy them. The store displays maintained by JD sports is excellent and eye catching
that leads to attract more customers. The store has installed a three-by-two metre moving display
that delivers immediate visual impacts to visitors and customers.
The Westfield Shopping Centre have many shops that provides number of products and
services and satisfies needs and wants of different customers. 3 Store, Accessorize, Adidas,
Amorino, Beauty Base, Card Factory, Sunglass Hut, etc. that deals in bags, banks, cards, books,
gifts, food and beverages, groceries and many more items. The main target market refers to the
segment or part of marketplace that provides best chances of selling. The JD sports aims at
effectively using all the elements of marketing that can provide satisfaction to customers and also
enrich their purchase experiences.
PART 2
Customer Journey and Experience
Customer journey is considered as the sum of different experiences from which
customers goes through while shopping and interacting with different shops, or brands. The
consumers gets influenced by many elements and factors of market that brings changes in their
perspectives. Customer Journey also means as identifying and analysing the factors that can
influence or impact the perspectives of customers while shopping (Bigne and et.al., 2018). The
organisation aims at fully satisfying customers and also providing them with the best shopping
experience so that it can lead to create everlasting relationship between customer and the store or
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brand. The buying procedure involves various steps such as pre-purchase consideration, e.g.
recognizing needs or wants, then searching information and evaluation of options and choice,
and then purchasing consideration and finally comes post-purchase considerations. Following are
given the different experiences and behaviours of customer while shopping and purchasing
products.
Pre-purchase considerations and issues
Pre-purchase considerations refers to the factors that are considered by consumers before
buying the products from marketplace. The perception and decision making process have a
continuous flow of interactions with various influencing factors and behavioural actions. Pre-
purchase considerations may involve analysing and comparison of product alternatives or
variations, its quality and product brands.
Illustration 1: factors Influencing consumer behaviour
Source: (Factors Influencing Consumer Behavior, 2019)
There are many factors that can bring influences on the consumer's perspectives for
shopping and their behaviours. Factors are referred as the motives that brings influences on the
behaviour of consumers (Factors Influencing Consumer Behavior, 2019). The human
psychology plays important role for designing the consumer's preference, likes, dislikes
regarding particular products or services. Learning, perceptions, motivation, beliefs and attitudes
are important psychological factors that bring changes in consumer's perception. The present
report aims at analysing the experience and behaviour of a person that focus on buying shoes
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from JD Sportswear. The person selects JD Store for shopping and purchasing shoes as gets
influenced by the psychological factors. If the consumer is shopping with someone, then their
perception can also bring influences in consumer's preferences and perception.
The perception of consumer can also get influenced by social factors as well such as,
family or reference groups. It also involves roles and status of different people as person chooses
JD Sports store because it matches with his status. Cultural factors includes social class,
subculture or culture that can also bring influences in human perceptions. The major factor that
can bring influences in consumer behaviour is considered as the personal factors which includes
age, income, lifestyle or occupation of consumers. The consumer chooses the JD Sportswear
store as it matches with his lifestyle and occupation (Fall Diallo and et.al., 2013). The products
provided by JD Sportswear store are affordable and modern wear that meets needs of consumers.
Factors like consumer credit, family or personal income, available liquid assets, savings or
income expectations are included in economic factors that may also bring influences on the
consumers perception. The person will choose the shop that provides use of credit or ATM card,
as he is not having enough liquid asset or cash with him.
Purchase considerations and issues:
After getting influenced by many different factors and element the consumers selects a
store for having a purchasing and shopping behaviour. The behaviour and perception of
consumer is also influenced by the in-store environment. The purchase experience and behaviour
of consumers also gets influenced by many factors that are present in the store. During the
purchase, consumer may also think and compare the online shopping experience and store
shopping experience. Price shoppers customer may get influenced by online shopping whereas,
premium shoppers chooses to have in-store shopping experience.
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The store managers aims at providing rich shopping experiences to its customers and also
satisfies them (Kyrdoda, Baltas and Hammami, 2018). There are various elements used by store
manager in order to provide unique and rich shopping experience to consumers. They also hosts
different events at the stores in order to attract and influence customers. Staff focus on
effectively providing the services to them and also creates a environment that provides
satisfaction to customers. The store manager of JD Sports aims at improving the speed and
quality of services and also makes kid-friendly store so that it can lead to provide complete
satisfaction and rich experience to customers. Therefore, all these factors leads to create
confusion for the consumers as he gets attracted towards the product and purchases a pair of
shoes from JD Sportswear store.
The purchase consideration and issues regarding consumer's shopping behaviour can be
explained using theory of perceptual process and sensory factors. Perception process refers to an
intellectual process that transforms sensory stimuli to a meaningful information (Mugge, 2018).
This is the process of interpreting something that person sees or hear and then use it later for
judging and giving verdict on a situation. The sensory experience also provides satisfaction to
consumer behaviours during purchase process. The online shopping experience does not provide
sensory experience as the store environment can provides. For e.g. the music played in the store
can lead to influence the perception or behaviour of employees. In-store shopping also provides
the benefit of trying the products to check if it fits or not and whereas online shopping can not
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Illustration 2: in-store environment
Source: (JD Sports, 2019)

provide this. The JD Sports also provides the facility of trying clothes or shoes and focus to
enrich the shopping experience of customers. Therefore, customer purchases a pair of shoes and
one pair of sportswear clothing.
THE JD Sports also focus on developing the in-store environment in such a way that it
leads to provide satisfaction to customers. The staff of JD Sports is very friendly and supportive
that aims at meeting the needs and wants of customers. The purchase decisions can be also
influenced by the person's shopping partner.
Post-purchase considerations and issues:
The post-purchase experience refers to the stage of consumer's decision process where
consumer takes additional action which based on their purchasing satisfaction or dissatisfaction
(Nguyen, de Leeuw and Dullaert, 2018). The experience, behaviours and activities that follows
purchase are involved in post-purchase behaviour. Generally, after shopping or purchasing some
product the behaviour and experience of consumer is dissonance. If the customers regret for the
product purchase their post-purchase experience is considered as the dissonance. It may happen
because of the confusion or wrong perception of the consumer's behaviour. There are number of
choices and options are available for customers which may confuse them and it may lead to
regretting the shopping decisions.
Illustration 3: Post-purchase Behaviour
Source: (Post-purchase Behavior, 2019)
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The consumers may feel cognitive dissonance when they have to select between equally
attractive things or products and then post-purchase experience may bring confusion and
dissatisfaction. After actually consuming the purchased products, the customers may feel
dissonance and it may also to bring questions like, if got good value, if he chose the right
product, if his decision is right or not, etc.
The post-purchase behaviour may also provides happiness and satisfaction to customers,
if they feel satisfied with the products purchased. The purchased products provides value to
customers and they feel satisfied after purchasing (Papista and et.al., 2018). Happy and satisfied
customers may also do advertising of the product, brand or store using word-of-mouth
promotion. The satisfied customers also provides online reviews on store or brand websites in
order to do promotion and give recognition. The post-purchase behaviour of customers may also
creates value of the store and customer may fell to revisit the shop.
The customer who bought the pair of shoes and pair of clothing sportswear fell
dissonance and feel regretted with the shopping experience. This may lead to create inner tension
for consumer after recognizing that there is an inconsistency between values, behaviour and
opinions. The consumer also feels to return or exchange the product.
PART 3
Recommendations for store manager
The Store manager needs to focus on improving the customer journey and purchase
experience so that it can also satisfy them. The store manager of JD Sports needs to focus on
improving its in-store facilities and environment so that it can lead to make customers more
satisfied and also enrich their customer journey. JD Stores can improve the customer journey and
purchase experience by justifying the sale with social proof (Peter, Olson and Grunert, 2019).
This means that store can provide customers with social proof and make customer satisfied that
they have made a good decisions and it leads to justify their purchase experience with logic.
The JD Sports can also provide the customers with gifts and offers as it will lead to bring
happiness and satisfaction to customers and they will not regret their purchasing experience.
Giving gifts and offers is considered as the long-established way for boosting sales as well. The
store manager can also improve the customer journey by providing effective training to staff for
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handling different types of customers such as disgruntled ones. Staff treating customers
effectively and also treating them as if they are boss will lead to provide more satisfaction to
customers and improves purchase experience. In-store environment needs to be developed in
order to make it more beautiful, attractive and satisfied so that it leads to improve the customer's
purchasing experience.
Employees and staff who are more focused on providing effective services and are
service-oriented can provide satisfaction to customers and also helps in improving their purchase
experience (Rani, 2014). The employees and staff needs to be trained in a way that they treat
each customer with respect and aims at meeting their needs and wants. Customer's may also face
some problems during their shopping, which needs to be resolved by staff of the store in order to
improve the purchase experience of customers. Creating customer satisfaction surveys will help
JD Stores to get the information and reasons regarding the dissatisfaction of customers and their
shopping experience. These surveys allows store manager to track the progress, identify the
issues and problems and also to create frictionless customer's purchase experience. The JD
Sports needs to make a questionnaire sheet which includes different questions related to the in-
store experience, products, staff, services, etc. of the store. This will lead to bring the steps of
improvements within the store and results in improving the services and also customer journey.
JD Sports can also improve the purchase experience of customers by setting up self-
service checkouts that will avoid long lines (Stávková, Stejskal and Toufarová, 2018). The long
lines for checkout or manned checkout creates frustration feeling in customers and their purchase
experience may also gets affected. Therefore, by enabling and setting up self- service checkout
will enrich the purchase experience of customers. The JD Sportswear can also improve the
purchase experience of customers by using Customer Relationship Management software that
can manage the customer experience. For e.g. the installed CRM software helps in managing the
customer data and experience effectively and also it alerts that if a regular customer has not
visited the store since a month or two. This information can be used effectively by store manager
in order to effectively manage the customer journey and experience.
All the above recommendations provided can help JD Sportswear to bring improvements
and provide improved customer journey and purchase experience.
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REFLECTION
From the feedback and resubmission process, I came to know that I need to bring
improvements in my skills and knowledge regarding consumer behaviour so that it can lead to
bring better outcomes in my future works. Feedback form tutor helped to receive the comments
that needed to be improved. It helped me to understand that there are many factors that may lead
to bring influences and changes in the behaviour of customers during shopping (Torres‐Ruiz,
Vega‐Zamora and Parras‐Rosa, 2018). Consumer behaviour refers to the action of individual
customers that takes place in the process of purchasing. The resubmission process helps students
to improve the report by making necessary changes.
The presented reports was focusing on identifying different factors that includes in the
customers purchase and shopping journey. Behaviour of customer's are of different kinds such as
complex, dissonance, habitual and variety seeking behaviour. The feedback suggested that I
needed to come up with better opinions and assessments for finding out or identifying the
affecting factors. The tutor aims at guiding me for bringing improvements in my work. The work
improvements can be brought by gaining more knowledge, using better sources, etc. All theses
things can also further be used in making future reports or works.
There are two types of feedback that can be provided to students. Both the type of
feedback helps in improving the task and works of student. Feedback are intended for explaining
how final grade needs to be assigned. Whereas, feed-forward are made earlier the process and it
is intended for pointing out student to put efforts in the right directions and completing the task
in right way (Stávková, Stejskal and Toufarová, 2018).
The feedback acts as an response for student's efforts. Sometimes feedback are in written
form or it is provided face-to-face in sessions of tutoring. Marks, comments and reports are the
most obvious feedback that help students to bring improvement in their future works. Instead of
taking feedback and resubmission process as a negative factors, students needs to take it is as a
positive one. The quality of work needs to be improved and increased as per the tutor's feedback.
As the feedback helps in bringing improvement in skills and knowledge of students.
The tutors provide feedback to students all the time through facial expression during
tutoring sessions, through tone of voice or through words used. And these methods describes the
expectations of quality that needs to brought in the works by students. The feedbacks and
resubmission process directs students to make necessary changes in the presented report or work.
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CONCLUSION
The consumer behaviour and purchase experience are most important factors that are
analysed by business stores in order to attract more customers and increase sales. Customer
journey refers to the total of experiences which consumers faces while interacting with different
companies, brands and products. There are different factors such psychological, economic,
social, cultural and personal that brings influences in the consumer's behaviour and perception
while shopping. Customer journey needs to be improved by the retail stores in order to provide
them with more satisfaction and enrich their purchase and shopping experience. There are also
some recommendations provided in the report that can help retail stores for improving customer
journey and their purchase experience.
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REFERENCES
Books And Journal
Bigne, E. and et.al., 2018. The impact of social media and offline influences on consumer
behaviour. An analysis of the low-cost airline industry. Current Issues in Tourism. 21(9).
pp.1014-1032.
Fall Diallo, M. and et.al., 2013. Factors influencing consumer behaviour towards store brands:
evidence from the French market. International Journal of Retail & Distribution
Management. 41(6). pp.422-441.
Kyrdoda, Y., Baltas, G. and Hammami, A. M., 2018. Analyzing Consumer Impulse Purchasing
Behaviour Using Observational Data. International Journal of Food and Beverage
Manufacturing and Business Models (IJFBMBM). 3(2). pp.16-28.
Mugge, R., 2018. Product Design and Consumer Behaviour in a Circular Economy.
Nguyen, D. H., de Leeuw, S. and Dullaert, W. E., 2018. Consumer behaviour and order
fulfilment in online retailing: A systematic review. International Journal of Management
Reviews. 20(2). pp.255-276.
Papista, E. and et.al., 2018. Types of value and cost in consumer–green brands relationship and
loyalty behaviour. Journal of Consumer Behaviour. 17(1). pp.e101-e113.
Peter, J. P., Olson, J. C. and Grunert, K. G., 2019. Consumer behaviour and marketing
strategy (pp. 329-48). London: McGraw-Hill.
Rani, P., 2014. Factors influencing consumer behaviour. International journal of current
research and academic review. 2(9). pp.52-61.
Stávková, J., Stejskal, L. and Toufarová, Z., 2018. Factors influencing consumer
behaviour. ZEMEDELSKA EKONOMIKA-PRAHA-. 54(6). p.276.
Szmigin, I. and Piacentini, M., 2018. Consumer behaviour. Oxford University Press.
Torres‐Ruiz, F. J., Vega‐Zamora, M. and Parras‐Rosa, M., 2018. Sustainable consumption:
Proposal of a multistage model to analyse consumer behaviour for organic
foods. Business Strategy and the Environment. 27(4). pp.588-602.
Online
4 types of consumer buying behavior. 2012. [Online]. Available through:
<https://managementation.com/4-types-of-consumer-buying-behavior/>
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Factors Influencing Consumer Behavior. 2019. [Online]. Available through:
<https://businessjargons.com/factors-influencing-consumer-behavior.html>
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