MARKETING. 2. : MARKETING. Marketing. Name of the Stude

Running head: MARKETING
Marketing
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author Note

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Executive summary
The purpose of this report is to analyse as well as evaluate the 5 steps of the Consumer decision
making process. The organization on the basis of which this evaluation will be conducted is
Zara. The company offers the consumers with products that include clothing, footwear,
accessories, swimwear, perfumes as well as beauty products. It is considered to be the largest
company in the Inditex group which is the world’s largest apparel retailer. The report will
include segmentation table of Zara along with targeting. Along with this, the 5 stages of the
CDMP on the basis of three CDM theories will be discussed in the context of Zara. Lastly, three
recommendations to enhance the consumer base and satisfaction will be provided in this report

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Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................3
Consumer Decision Making Process...........................................................................................3
Segmentation and target Table of Zara........................................................................................3
Discussion on each step of the CDMP............................................................................................4
Need Recognition........................................................................................................................4
Searching and gathering Information..........................................................................................5
Evaluating the Alternatives..........................................................................................................7
Actual Purchase of the Product or the Service............................................................................8
Post Purchase Evaluation.............................................................................................................8
Marketing recommendation.............................................................................................................9
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................10
Reference List................................................................................................................................11

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Introduction
Zara is a highly renowned Spanish apparel retailer. The company offers the consumers
with products that include clothing, footwear, accessories, swimwear, perfumes as well as beauty
products. It is considered to be the largest company in the Inditex group which is the world’s
largest apparel retailer (Chu 2016). The organization is present in almost all the developed as
well as developing countries of the world. In the following paragraph, the Consumer Decision
Making Process (CDMP) while purchasing products from Zara has been discussed. Along with
this the segmentation of the consumers along with the target market of the company has also
been evaluated.
Consumer Decision Making Process
In order to ensure a sustainable business strategy, the management of Zara have decided
to make clothes from 100 percent sustainable practice by the year 2025. The company have
decided to reduce 80 percent of the energy consumed along with ensuring production of 0
percent landfill waste (Panwar et al. 2019). The sustainable decision of Zara posses direct
relationship with the CMDP. This is because, in this era where consumers are highly aware of
environmental sustainability, incorporating sustainable technique should enhance the consumer
base and ensure consumer loyalty (Wang and Yu 2017). The five stages of the CMDP includes
need recognition, searching and gathering information, evaluation of alternatives, actual
purchase of the product and post purchase evaluation.
Segmentation and target Table of Zara
Demographic
segmentation
Psychographic
segmentation
Geographic
segmentation
Target consumers

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Gender: both men and
Women
Age: 15 to 45 years
Income: Mid range
income
Lifestyle:
1. Hectic
lifestyle
2. Small Sized
consumer
3. Plus Sizes
shaped
Consumers
 Highly interest
in fashion
trends
 Prefers to wear
branded cloths
 Educated (Oke
et al. 2016)
1. Majority of the
metropolitan
cities across the
world
2. In highly
populated, Urban
areas
3. Zara have more
than 2000 outlets
across the gloves
while more than
200 outlets in
Australia
 Woman or
men of age
ranging
between 15 to
45 years
 Educated and
highly fashion
conscious
 Middle class
as well as
upper middle
class
population of
the society
 Consumers of
shapes and
size

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Discussion on each step of the CDMP
Need Recognition
As mentioned earlier, the CMDP is constituted of five steps, the first step being Need
recognition. The term ‘need’ is the intrinsic or extrinsic motivation that triggers the desire of the
consumer to buy a specific product or opt for a specific service. While going through the first
step, that is need reorganization, a consumer feel the absence of the product and the need to
address it in order to get back to the feeling of normal. Both extrinsic and intrinsic motivation
influences the consumers in this step (Huang and Benyoucef 2017). While extrinsic motivation
includes discounts and additional offers, intrinsic motivation includes benefits like looking good
in a particular dress. According to the Utility theory coined by von Neumann and Morgenstern,
consumers makes decision based on the expected outcome of their decision (Ajzen 2015). Thus,
according to the mentioned theory consumers are seemed as concerned design makers who are
also concerned with self interest (McCabe, Li and Chen 2016).
When it comes to Zara, the extrinsic factors that motivate the potential consumers of the
organization to purchase the products include the organization remains are up to date with the
ongoing fashion trends. Along with this, the product differentiation process of Zara also
provides intrinsic motivation to the consumer. Now-a-days, personal styling in one of the chief
criterions of the consumers. It in a major need of the target consumers of the apparel industry.
The sales associates of Zara are specially trained to encourage personal style while dressing the
mannequins and merchandising the products. Each and every apparel offered to the consumers is
unique and this in turn provides the consumer a feeling satisfaction (Anwar 2017). Thus the need
of looking stylish and having a personal style that in unique from the population can be

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considered as two major factors that motivates the consumers to buy products from the
mentioned organization.
Searching and gathering Information
After identification of the need to purchase a specific product, the second step of the
CDMP includes searching and gathering information about the product or company before
purchasing product. According to researchers, human nature is sceptical and therefore for
selecting between the alternatives available for purchasing, they try to gain information in order
to ensure optimum investment of their money. In this stage, the consumer evaluate the
consumers evaluates both the positive as well as the negative aspect of the purchase based on the
information that are available to them. According to Karimi, Papamichail and Holland (2015),
due to the changing trends, emergence of internet and online shopping, now a days consumers
are far more informed and are able to make better purchasing decision. The major sources of
information in this stage includes personal contacts, commercial information sources are
electronic media, advertisement and internet, printed sources as well as previous purchasing
experience.
Considering the fact that information about the quality and the price of the products of
Zara are highly available over internet, this can be considered as a major source of information
for consumers who wants to buy Zara products. Along with this, another major source of
information includes the “word of mouth” promotional technique. Considering the fact that that
the consumers of Australia are highly sensitive about environmental sustainability, it is expected
that the decision taken by the organization to ensure sustainable production of the apparels along
with the usage of 100 percent sustainable fabrics, posses the potential to enhance the urge of the
consumers to opt for the product (Viardot and Nylund 2017). This information will enhance the

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good will of the consumers. However, it has been noticed that the mentioned strategy was not
promoted by the company to an extend that it can reach to each and every potential consumers.
For instance, while Zara has been promoting its new clothing range in popular social media
platforms and YouTube, no mention of the one strategy of enhancing the sustainability of the
business has been addressed (Ajzen 2015). Thus in order to make the consumers informed about
the sustainable strategy taken by the management, Zara needs to opt for enhanced promotion of
the same.
Evaluating the Alternatives
The third stage of the CMPD includes evaluation of the alternatives available once they
have identified the need along with the source that possesses the potential to satisfy their need. In
this stage, the consumers are found to evaluate multiple options on the basis of the price, quality
as well as the value added features of the products. Thus in this stage the consumers behave in a
highly rational way. According to researchers, for behaving in a rational way in the economic
sense, it is highly crucial for the consumer to be aware of all the available options along with
developing the capability to rate each of the alternatives in an effective way and select the
optimum course. However in this era, consumers lack the time, motivation or information to
make the perfect decision and they seek for satisfactory product instead of optimum chose a
highlighted by the Satisficing Theory coined by Herbert Simons (Salah et al. 2018.). As per the
theory, consumers are more prone to make choice based on the factor that the product thy have
selected possess the potential to satisfy their needs or not instead of expending effort as well as
resources on the finding the optimal choice (Karimi et al. 2015).
When it comes to the products offered to the consumers by Zara, majority of the target
consumers lead a fast spaced life and thus lack time to compare the product through prolonged

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research with the help of internet. However, considering the fact that majority of them belongs to
the Gen Z and Millennial community, consumers of the brand are more prone to social media
platform and are highly concerned about the fact that that the products they are using are
sustainable or not (Oke et al. 2016). Zara, in order to make the consumers aware of the quality
and price range, make the consumers aware of the highly affordable yet high end and stylish
apparel that they offered to the consumers through social media platform. However, lack of
promotion about the sustainable strategies taken by the organization has been noticed.
Enhancement of awareness about the sustainability of the product will ensure a feel good
emotion among the consumers.
Actual Purchase of the Product or the Service
The fourth stage of CDMP includes the decision made by the consumers about what
product to buy and where to buy after going through the previous stages. When a consumer
reaches this stage, he or she has assessed all the negative as well as positive prospects of the
products to be purchased and have made the decision on the basis of the same. According to the
Prospect theory that has been coined by Kahneman and Amos Tversky, an item when owned by
a consumer is considered to be more precious by him or her compared to the same thing owned
by others (Häckel, Pfosser and Tränkler 2017). Consumers make decision based on the potential
value of losses and gains rather than the final outcome (Zhang et al. 2016). Zara provides the
consumers with effective product purchasing facilities. A good number of offline stores are
present in Australia. When it comes to online stores, Zara possess its own official site where
consumers can buy products. However, it lacks e-commerce presence in a good number of
markets like South Africa.

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Post Purchase Evaluation
In this final stage of the consumer, a consumer evaluates as well as analyse the purchased
products, usefulness of the products and the post purchasing behaviour of the organization.
When it comes to Zara, the quality of the product compared to its price range is high enough to
ensure effective consumer loyalty. However, the organization needs to revise its after service
care facilities.
Marketing recommendation
1. Highlighting its sustainable strategy: As being discussed earlier, majority of the target
consumers of Zara are highly inclined towards companies that ensures a sustainable
business. While the products offered by most of the competitors of Zara like H&M,
URBN, Reformation and others are promoting the strategies adopted by them in order to
provide the consumers with sustainable apparels, lack of promotion about the sustainable
strategies implementing is resulting in competitive disadvantage for the Zara (Viardot
and Nylund 2017). In order to deal with this, Zara needs to develop effective
advertisement that will be focused on the 100 percent sustainable fibres used by the
organizations to ensure a sustainable business. The management should promote
strategies like 80 percent reduction of energy consume and other sustainable steps though
social media platforms. Along with this facts should also be highlighted in campaigns and
TV commercials of the mentioned organization.
2. Lack of ecommerce presence: One of the chief factors that instigate the consumer buying
behaviour is the presence of the product they wants to purchase. While a good number of
offline stores are present in developed countries, the organization should expand its
business by enhancing its offline as well as online stores in developing and under

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developed countries like China, India and South Africa (Huang and Benyoucef 2017). As
per the market trends, the disposable income of the middle and higher middle class
population of the developing countries are increasing. Thus this strategy will help the
organization to enhance it consumer base.
3. After service care: In order to gain competitive advantage and maintain its consumer base
it is highly crucial for the organization to upgrade its after service. For instance, in case of
any exchange of products, the organization needs to physically collect the product from
the consumers instead of requesting them to drop the product to a Zara outlet (Karimi et
al. 2018). Along with this, a 24*7 helpline should be there so that consumers can resolve
their queries whenever they want to.
Conclusion
From the above discussion, it can be clearly understood that the brand possess the
potential to maintain as well as enhance its consumer base over the period of time. However,
some of the weaknesses of the brand have been noticed on the basis of which the above
recommendations have been discussed. Zara needs to develop effective advertisement that will
be focused on the 100 percent sustainable fibres used by the organizations to ensure a sustainable
business. The organization should also expand its business by enhancing its offline as well as
online stores in developing and under developed countries like China, India and South Africa It
is expected that by implementing the above discussed strategies, Zara will be able to ensure an
effective consumer satisfaction along with enhanced consumer base in near future.

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Reference List
Ajzen, I., 2015. Consumer attitudes and behavior: The theory of planned behavior applied to
food consumption decisions. Rivista di Economia Agraria, 70(2), pp.121-138.
Anwar, S.T., 2017. Zara vs. Uniqlo: Leadership strategies in the competitive textile and apparel
industry. Global Business and Organizational Excellence, 36(5), pp.26-35.
Chu, P., 2016. Excellence in European Apparel Supply Chains: Zara (Doctoral dissertation).
Häckel, B., Pfosser, S. and Tränkler, T., 2017. Explaining the energy efficiency gap-expected
utility theory versus cumulative prospect theory. Energy Policy, 111, pp.414-426.
Huang, Z. and Benyoucef, M., 2017. The effects of social commerce design on consumer
purchase decision-making: An empirical study. Electronic Commerce Research and
Applications, 25, pp.40-58.
Karimi, S., Holland, C.P. and Papamichail, K.N., 2018. The impact of consumer archetypes on
online purchase decision-making processes and outcomes: A behavioural process
perspective. Journal of Business Research, 91, pp.71-82.
Karimi, S., Papamichail, K.N. and Holland, C.P., 2015. The effect of prior knowledge and
decision-making style on the online purchase decision-making process: A typology of consumer
shopping behaviour. Decision Support Systems, 77, pp.137-147.
Karimi, S., Papamichail, K.N. and Holland, C.P., 2015. The effect of prior knowledge and
decision-making style on the online purchase decision-making process: A typology of consumer
shopping behaviour. Decision Support Systems, 77, pp.137-147.

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McCabe, S., Li, C. and Chen, Z., 2016. Time for a radical reappraisal of tourist decision making?
Toward a new conceptual model. Journal of Travel Research, 55(1), pp.3-15.
Oke, A.O., Kamolshotiros, P., Popoola, O.Y., Ajagbe, M.A. and Olujobi, O.J., 2016. Consumer
behavior towards decision making and loyalty to particular brands. International Review of
Management and Marketing, 6(4S), pp.43-52.
Panwar, D., Anand, S., Ali, F. and Singal, K., 2019. Consumer Decision Making Process Models
and their Applications to Market Strategy. International Management Review, 15(1), pp.36-44.
Salah, F., Henríquez, R., Wenzel, G., Olivares, D.E., Negrete-Pincetic, M. and Weinhardt, C.,
2018. Portfolio design of a demand response aggregator with satisficing consumers. IEEE
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Viardot, E. and Nylund, P.A., 2017. Conquering the Digital Customer: How Zara Is Confronting
the Digital Innovation Revolution. In Socio-Economic Perspectives on Consumer Engagement
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Wang, Y. and Yu, C., 2017. Social interaction-based consumer decision-making model in social
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Information Management, 37(3), pp.179-189.
Zhang, H.Y., Zhou, R., Wang, J.Q. and Chen, X.H., 2016. An FMCDM approach to purchasing
decision-making based on cloud model and prospect theory in e-commerce. International
Journal of Computational Intelligence Systems, 9(4), pp.676-688.