Impact of Social Media on Consumer Buying Behavior in Woolworths Limited, Australia

Running head: INDUSTRY RESEARCH PROJECT
Impact of social media on consumer buying behavior in the case of
Woolworths Limited, Australia
Name of Student-
Name of University-
Author’s Note-

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Acknowledgement
I would like to express the deepest appreciation to my committee chair Professor _________,
who has the attitude and the substance of a genius: he continually and convincingly conveyed a
spirit of adventure in regard to research and scholarship, and an excitement in regard to teaching.
Without his guidance and persistent help this dissertation would not have been possible.
I would like to thank my committee members, Professor _______ and Professor _______, whose
work demonstrated to me that the impact of social media in enhancing the customer buying
behavior in Woolworths with comparative literature and modern technology, should always
transcend academia and provide a quest for our times.
In addition, a thank you to Professor _________, who introduced me to social media analysis,
and whose enthusiasm for the “underlying structures” had lasting effect. I thank the University of
_______ for permission to include copyrighted pictures as a part of my dissertation.

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Abstract
This research study deals with the case study of Woolworths. The social media implementation
in Woolworths enhances the customer buying behavior with the company. Woolworths Group
Limited is a retails store that operates through the Australian Food, Endeavour Drinks, Hotels,
Big W, New Zealand food and many more. The main aim of this research report is to declining
retention rate of consumers and gaining the turnover of the consumer because of a lack of
effective marketing strategies. This paper details the impact of social media on the buying
behavior of the customer and states different ways of social media that are adopted by
organizations to increase their sales. Many authors have stated the details of social media on the
customer buying behavior which are analyzed in this research paper. For analyzing the
importance of the social media, a survey has been conducted whose result are analyzed by
Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) method.

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Table of Contents
Table of Tables................................................................................................................................3
Table of Figures...............................................................................................................................4
1. Introduction and Research Problem.............................................................................................5
1.1 Background............................................................................................................................5
1.2 Problem Statement.................................................................................................................6
1.3 Research aim..........................................................................................................................6
1.4 Research Question.................................................................................................................6
1.5 Outline of the study:..............................................................................................................7
2. Literature review..........................................................................................................................7
2.1 Conceptual understanding regarding social media and consumer buying behavior: A case
study of Woolworths Limited, Australia.....................................................................................7
2.2 Impacts of social media on consumer buying behavior: A case study of Woolworths
Limited, Australia......................................................................................................................12
2.3 Social media strategy to enhance the consumer buying behavior towards the products and
services: A case study of Woolworths Limited, Australia........................................................14
2.4 Research Gap:......................................................................................................................18
3. Methodology..............................................................................................................................18
3.1 Introduction..........................................................................................................................18
3.2 Research Philosophy (Post Positivism)...............................................................................18

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3.2 Research Approach..............................................................................................................19
3.3 Research Design..................................................................................................................19
3.4 Data Collection Method.......................................................................................................19
3.5 Sampling Method and Sample Size.....................................................................................20
3.6 Data Analysis Method.........................................................................................................21
3.7 Summary..............................................................................................................................21
4. Findings.....................................................................................................................................21
5. Discussion..................................................................................................................................37
6. Limitations and Conclusion.......................................................................................................48
7. Reference...................................................................................................................................51

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Table of Tables
Table 1: Tool, technique and process of data collection...............................................................19
Table 2: Sampling Technique and size..........................................................................................20
Table 3: Survey Response from the Respondents.........................................................................36
Table 4: Representing response of the respondents that specifies gender.....................................36
Table 5: Representing response of the respondents that specifies the age group..........................37
Table 6: Response regarding the social media use for gaining information..................................38
Table 7: Representing response about main reason for using social media..................................39
Table 8: Representing response about how social media helps to gain depth awareness about the
product or service..........................................................................................................................40
Table 9: Representing response of the respondents about impact of social media in purchasing
decision..........................................................................................................................................41
Table 10: Representing response showing social media affects the respondents for moving
towards the competitor brand........................................................................................................43
Table 11: Representing response showing which social media is highly used by the respondents
.......................................................................................................................................................44
Table 12: Representing response getting their beliefs about fast service of the company using
social media...................................................................................................................................45
Table 13: Representing response showing their believes about hiring celebrities or sportsperson
for promoting their brand...............................................................................................................46

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Table of Figures
Figure 1: Five stage model of purchasing behavior of customer...................................................10
Figure 2: Influence of Social Media that enhances purchasing decisions.....................................15
Figure 3: Gallup Influence of Social Media for Purchasing Decisions.........................................16
Figure 4: Customer Expecting Quick Service from Social Media................................................17
Figure 5: Response of the Respondents.........................................................................................38
Figure 6: Response of the Respondents.........................................................................................39
Figure 7: Response of the Respondents.........................................................................................40
Figure 8: Response of the Respondents.........................................................................................41
Figure 9: Response of the Respondents.........................................................................................42
Figure 10: Response of the Respondents.......................................................................................43
Figure 11: Response of the Respondents.......................................................................................44
Figure 12: Response of the Respondents.......................................................................................45
Figure 13: Response of the Respondents.......................................................................................46
Figure 14: Response of the Respondents.......................................................................................48

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1. Introduction and Research Problem
1.1 Background
The case study that is taken is the Woolworths Group Limited that operates on the retails
stores. This organization actually operates through the Australian Food, Endeavour Drinks,
Hotels, Big W, New Zealand food and many more. The Australian Food segment mainly
engages with the procurement as well as resale of the food products to all the customers who
lives in Australia (Woolworths.com.au, 2018). This organization has 1,008 supermarkets as well
as Metro stores. New Zealand Food that is involved in this helps in procurement and reselling of
the food and the drinks to the customers who lives in New Zealand. This New Zealand Food
segment mainly operates on total of 181 Countdown supermarkets and also are engaged in
wholesale operations. The segment of Endeavour Drinks mainly resells as well as procures liquor
products to the customers residing in Australia. The Endeavour Drinks has 1,545 liquor shops
under BWS brands and Dan Murphy. Endeavour Drinks also has online platforms that has
Summergate stores, winemarket.com.au, Cellarmasters and the Langtons. The segment of Big W
procures as well as resells the products of the general merchandise to all the customers residing
in Australia. There are 183 BIG W stores under this segment. The segment of the hotels mostly
offers hospitality as well as leisure services that includes drinks and food, entertainment, gaming,
as well as accommodation in Australia. This hotels segments of Woolworths operates almost 323
hotels that includes dining, gaming, and operations of venue hire, accommodation, and bars
(Woolworths.com.au, 2018). There is one other segment that is involved in the business of
property leasing. The Woolworths Group Limited generally has strategic alliance with Caltex
across convenience, food wholesale, fuel supply, loyalty, and redemption. Previously, the