UGB310 Consumer Psychology: Social Media Marketing Report

This report delves into the realm of consumer psychology, examining key psychological variables like perception and personality and their influence on consumer buying behavior, with a specific focus on how companies leverage social media platforms to engage with consumers. It analyzes the impact of social media engagement on the consumer decision-making process, exploring how companies such as Zara use social media for marketing and advertising. The report also investigates the role of social media in the diffusion of innovation and evaluates the effectiveness of engaging consumers through social media. The study emphasizes the significance of authenticity, honesty, and open dialogue in social media interactions and their effects on building consumer relationships, trust and loyalty. The report concludes by assessing the overall effectiveness of social media engagement and how it can influence consumer behavior.

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Consumer Psychology
Consumer psychology
Companies leveraging social media
MAY 29, 2019
Student Details:

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Consumer Psychology
Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Companies leveraging social media................................................................................................3
Critical evaluation of the key psychological variables of consumers to influence their buying
behavior.......................................................................................................................................3
Evaluation of the impact of “engaging consumers through social media” on the consumer
decision-making process..............................................................................................................7
The influence of “engaging consumers through social media” on the process of “diffusion of
innovation”................................................................................................................................10
The effectiveness of engaging consumers through social media...............................................13
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................15
References.....................................................................................................................................16

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Consumer Psychology
Introduction
Social media is the way to provide interaction between individuals. By using social media,
peoples would be able to generate, communicate, and/or swap over figures and concepts in the
computer-generated peoples and associations. Social media is engaged with Facebook, Twitter,
Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube and Vimeo accounts. It would be helpful in enhancing
connections with the audience and building relationships. Key points of the social media are
authenticity, honesty and open dialogue. By the help of social media, it is not only that someone
can about any person, but the person would also be able to reply to the messages written or speak
about him. It can be used by organizations like governments, businesses, education
organizations. It is very useful in the marketing and advertisements of the products in the
business. In the business, it would be useful in the interactions with the peoples (SI, 2015).
Engagement on social media would consider the involvement of the peoples on the media
showing their interest in the advertisement of any brand by the use of like, share, comment. By
increasing communication and interaction, limitless market potential, boosting website traffic,
increasing referral rate and by obtaining sales leads to increment in the engagement on social
media. It would help to the business in the increment in competitive benefits, finding in a
potential business partner, increment in the business exposure, increment in more consumer
engagement (Dessart, et al., 2015).
In the discussion enlighten below, a psychological variable named perception and personality of
the consumer in the decision making process. It would be followed by the role of social media in
engaging customer with the retail company named Zara, their impacts and diffusion of
innovation and effectiveness of engaging with the consumer through social media would be
described.

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Consumer Psychology
Companies leveraging social media
Critical evaluation of the key psychological variables of consumers to influence their buying
behavior
Consumer behavior depends on the psychological variable like perception and personality to buy
the offered services or the products. The perception in the psychological variables of the
consumers would be described as the impression, awareness, and consciousness about a
company or about the services of the company. Perception of the consumers would be affected
by the advertisement of the company and their services, reviews, public relations, social media
and personal experiences of the consumers about the company and their services. Processing of
the perception would be done by selecting the information, processing of the information and by
doing interpretations of the information consumed from the environment. For this consumers
search about the product, select the information about that product, then analyses the information
and then interpret the information about the products and the company. Due to this, a marketer
would be alert that how the information would be captured by the consumers. Because a wrong
pathway may impact the perception of the consumers in a negative way and may deplete the
reputation of the company and their products (Felix, et al., 2017).
Perception would be able to influence the decision-making of the consumers about the company
and their products. For the interpretation of the perception of the consumers, Gestalt theory was
described by the theorists. In this, they describe that the perception interpretation would be
organized as a whole in a meaningful way. It would describe the way of interpreting stimulus
from inside the consumers and from the surroundings of the consumers. This theory would
describe that consumers would interpret their perception by holistic conditions. It means that

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Consumer Psychology
when a consumer interprets perception about the situation then they would evaluate the situation
as a whole, not in the parts during the making of a decision about the company and its products.
So the company would evaluate and consider the possible situations and the outcomes of the
perceptions considered by the consumers. So that the company would be able to evaluate and
enhance the efficacy of the product as per the perceptions of the consumers (Hamlyn, 2017).
For example, the clothing company Zara which is clothing and Fashion Company get counted in
the largest international fashion companies. It provides fashion clothing for men, women, and
children. It works on the perception of the consumers and enhances the quality of products. They
have worked on the perception of the consumers that the consumers needed the high quality of
the product with different styles which would be attractive and ethical towards the community.
Consumers consider effective cost pricing with high-quality product and needed products which
would be right to wear. So the Zara had started providing advertisements for their products on
social media like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram. They started advertisement of
their products that the products would be ethical, enhanced design, effective production and time
managed the distribution of the products. They also provide information about the effective
quality and pricing of the products in the description box. They provided quality information
about that product on social media platforms with descriptions like that the product would be
suitable during the season. They would provide information about the suitability of the products
during the occasion and after wearing the products how they would be look alike. They provided
loyalty to their consumers. By providing information about approaching sustainability goals, the
company would be able to enhance perception with holistic terms. By the help of this, they
would be able to enhance the positive perception of the consumers towards the clothing product
of Zara (Spellings, 2018).

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Consumer Psychology
The perception of the consumers would get affected due to the negative feedback about the
company like Zara. Because sometimes the company would not be able to provide the product at
the time of needs of consumers. Sometimes low quality and defective products get delivered to
the consumers. This feedback sometimes would be provided on the social media platform like
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube by the peoples. So to maintain the company ethics
and values and to maintain the trust and loyalty with the consumers, the company would have to
continuously active on their social media platform to cope with the situations faced by the
consumers and to provide quality products at the right time to the consumers (Schivinski &
Dabrowski, 2016).
The personality of the consumers is the factor that would affect the choice of products and the
brand of a consumer. When the consumers think of buying products then they think about the
products which would be able to enhance their personality. They would buy the products from
any company which would be suited to their personality (Islam, et al., 2017). For example,
consumers having dogmatism and brand personality they would buy products on behalf of their
personal traits. Before buying any product from the Zara company brand, they would think of
their personality that it would suit their personality or not. Due to dogmatism, consumers would
not be able to use those products which would not be suited with their ethics and their
personality. Because of dogmatism, they would not buy that product which would not maintain
the moral values of the consumers. Due to brand personality, consumers adopt product of the
Zara Company because it would provide the same personality traits as of the consumers. In this
consumers wants to buy products which would fulfill their requirements of having excitement,
sincerity towards their family values, kindness, ruggedness, competence and prestigious (Tho, et
al., 2015).

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Consumer Psychology
Due to this, Zara started advertising to Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube for
campaigning of the right to wear slogan having goals for enhancement of consumer personality.
For this, they improve the quality and quantity of the product as per the ethics of the people and
maintain the personality of the consumers by maintaining their cultural wearing ethics. By
approaching sustainability development goals, Zara would be able to maintain the moral values
of the consumers. Brand personality of Zara focuses on the stylish and fashionable consumers
with sincerity towards the family values of the consumers. They provide advertisement on
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube for their product having a high quality of designs
and production (Hardy, 2018).
Consumers would get those products from the company brand like Zara which would enhance
their personality with respect to their ethics, values and attractive effective looks. Due to this
consumers are getting influenced and trust the brand named Zara that it would provide effective
products and design with maintaining their ethics, values and effective designs according to their
looks. Due to this peoples started following Zara in the millions at social media platform like
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube (Viardot & Nylund, 2017).
It would be more effective when the consumers must follow their ethics and family values during
the making of a decision about any product. Consumers would have to focus on the products
which be easily capable in the enhancement of their personality. They would also have to focus
on the quality of the product for the enhancement of the personality. Sometimes due to
dogmatism, consumers would not get understand that the product would not deplete their product
so that they would have to provide advertisement that how they would maintain their ethics and
family values (Banerjee, 2016).

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Consumer Psychology
Evaluation of the impact of “engaging consumers through social media” on the consumer
decision-making process
Engagement of consumers through social media would be helpful for the consumers during
making a decision about the buying product. Due to social media platforms like Facebook,
Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube, the decision of the consumers would get affected. Because
clothing company like Zara would establish advertisement about their product on social media
platforms (Shareef, et al., 2018). The consumers would initiate with their perception about the
company brand like Zara and its product, during decision-making process by using like or
dislikes, comments and shares done by the other consumer on social media account of that
company. If the consumers provide like and positive comment and shares about the product that
would provide a positive impact on the decision-making process of the other consumers. While if
any consumer provides dislike and negative comment on the Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and
YouTube about the product then it would provide negative impact during the decision-making
process of those consumers who would think about the buying of that product. By the help of
these positive and negative reviews about the company and its product would impact the
decision-making process of the consumers. By the help of social media, consumers would be
able to find the things of their needs during the adoption of the products. By the help of a social
media platform like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube clothing company brand would
be able to build trust between the consumers and the company (O'brien, 2018).
Social media would be helpful for the companies to establish a connection between the
consumers and the company. Clothing and fashion companies brand like Zara would advertise
their products on the social media platform by using different attractive ways like by the help of
any brand personality, by organizing a live fashion show, by posting videos of their products

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(Cao, 2018). During this advertisement, companies would provide their production quality, cost-
effectiveness, design and the effective sense of wearing clothes. By the help of social media
platforms, the companies would show consumers how the products would have the quality of
maintaining their ethics, values (Ahmad, et al., 2015). Through this advertisement by the help of
brand personality, they would be able to engage consumers with them. Because these brand
personalities already would be followed by a lot of peoples, they would advertise products with
personality and effectiveness in quality, design, and maintenance in the values of consumers
(Wilberg, 2018). During this, they would provide information about the cost-effective and high-
quality products of the company through the media which would match the personality of
consumers (McCuo, 2018).
Clothing and Fashion Company like Zara brand of clothing and fashion would provide
information about their company brand and their clothing on social media platforms like
Facebook. With this information, they would provide information about their contacts to reach
easily to the company brand of the clothing and fashion for any query about the company brand
and its products. By the help of social media accounts, consumers would easily get in touch with
the clothing and fashion company brand to communicate about the products if they have any
problem or any query for their products (Lee, et al., 2018).
Due to social media, consumers easily get influenced by the advertisement of the products of the
company brand. Consumers easily getting engaged with the company brand like Zara. They
would start following Zara on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. By the help of this,
Zara brand company of clothing and Fashion making trust between the company and the
consumers. This would provide effective profit to the company and provide effective cost and
quality product to the consumer with the effective designs of the products (Thorisdottir &

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Johannsdottir, 2019). Consumers would get engaged with the company brand named Zara
because they focus on the sustainability goals approaches to maintain the ethics and values of the
consumers. They would provide products to the consumers in the as a possible minimum time to
fulfill their requirement at the time of need (Moise, 2018).
Consumers react in a different way at the different platform of social media. Consumers would
investigate about the brand and its products, advocacy with the brand, and the blocking of the
content of the brand. When they investigate the brand, they would try to learn about the brand
and follow, like, subscribe, and buy from the account or channel of the company. They would
also follow and like the company channel or account on the other social media platform. They
would advocate about the company brand to engage with the company brand by sharing the
material and information about that company to other peoples, tagging of the brand on the social
media platform, by writing a review about the company brand. Consumers would block the
content of the brand on their social media account so that they would not receive advertisement
and content of any company brand on their social media account. This would happen due to the
different perception of different peoples (Barger, et al., 2018).
Due to these things, the company brand would face challenges on the social media platform in
the understanding of the perception of the consumers. So that they would be able to provide an
effective advertisement to the social media for engaging consumers with them. For this, they
would have to choose their target of consumers. Then they would have to choose the right social
media platform and right content for the advertisement of their product according to their
targeted consumers. They would have to provide content which would be effective according to
the ethics of consumers, family values, and educational aspects like the effectiveness of the
product making on the environment. They would have to provide the ability of commitment to

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Consumer Psychology
the consumer and affordable cost for the consumers. So that they would be able to overcome the
challenges during engaging with consumers through social media (Barger, et al., 2018).
The influence of “engaging consumers through social media” on the process of “diffusion of
innovation”
The diffusion of innovation is the process which helps in the adoption of the product by the
targeted consumers of the company brand. According to the theory of Diffusion of Innovations
by Everett M. Rogers, it would be consists of four elements named innovation, communication
channels, social system and the time. These are the four main elements through which a product
would be invented and would be adopted by the consumers. In the innovation process, they
would invent new products with improvement from the last products. It would contain
advantages, compatibility, complexity, the ability of testing, and observability for providing
effective innovations to the adopters of that innovation (Pashaeypoor, et al., 2016).
The communication channels would provide awareness in the consumers about the new
invention through the social media platform like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.
Through these social media platform, the inventor of the products would provide advertisement
for the invented product to the consumers. The social system would be environment having
social, cultural and physical aspects by which an invented product would be accepted or rejected.
The time is the factor in which an invented product would get stable in the market and would be
consumed by the consumers (Dearing, 2015).
The diffusion of innovations would be accepted by the adopters or the consumers. These
consumers would be considered in the different categories on behalf of their adoption pattern
towards the innovations of the new products. These categories are innovators, early adopters,

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early and late majority, and laggards. The innovators would be the adopters who adopt new
innovations without evaluating inventions and try the new products. They would cover 2.5% of
the whole of adopters. Early adopters would adopt newly invented products by making a
decision after considering a careful thought about the invented product with the 13.5% of the
adopters and would lead others as opinion leaders in their family and friends. In the early
majority stage, adopters would adopt innovations when the innovations become socially
acceptable with 34% of whole adopters. In the late majority stage, adopters with 34% of whole
adopters would adopt innovative product at the late stages of the life cycle of the product when it
would be accepted by the majority of the adopters. The laggard stage would consist of 16% of
whole adopters. In this, adopters would buy products when the product would get its lower cost
in the market (Beever, 2016).
The process of adoption would take place in the stages named awareness, interest, evaluation and
trial and adoption of the product. Firstly, the product would get introduced in the market and
through social media, platform awareness would be spread till the consumers or adopters by the
advertising of the product. Then interest in the product would be maintained in the adopters or
consumers through the social media platforms by advertising the uniqueness, effective value and
complete information about the product. Then the consumers would make the decision about the
product by getting information about the product by evaluating reviews about the product
through like, share, comments, and followers of that company and its products on social media
platforms. The product would be used by the consumers on the basis of the trial to evaluate that
it would be fitted as per their perception and personality. After this, the product would be
adopted or rejected by the consumers that it would be as their needs or not. If it would be as their