METHODS IN BUSINESS RESEARCH

The Role of Shopper marketing on shopper behavior

SUBMITTED BY:

AbdurRehmanShahzaib 20530

Abdullah Noor Khan 20497

Acknowledgement

We are thankful to Almighty Allah for granting us this auspicious opportunity to learn something new
and useful for us. This interesting piece of work is the outcome of the continuous efforts and complete
devotion of all the group personnel. We got a chance to learn something different and new while
making this report. We are very much thankful to our Instructor Sir Adnan Bashir for being a constant
support throughout the research work. It was due to his guidance we were able to learn how to do
research and what are the key points necessary for conducting research in a better way. However, we
acknowledge full responsibility for any lacks in this report

Abstract:
The aim of this research is to investigate the consequences of Shopper marketing on buying behavior.
Shopper marketing is a great tool to attract the customer and make them to buy new products.. Primary
data was collected by floating questionnaires comprising of close ended questions which were filled by
the students of different universities It was based on shopper behavior during purchase of goods in
store. Data was collected from more than 150 respondents and Non Probabilistic, Convenient technique
for collection of data. Descriptive statistical model of frequency distribution were used to gauge the
consequences shopper marketing on the buying behavior of general public.

Key words: Shopper marketing, buying behavior and promotion

The Role of Shopper marketing on shopper behavior

Introduction:
Shopper marketing is the array of products in a physical or online store to exploit the sales. The purpose
of shopper marketing is to lock the sale after advertising campaigns bring customers into the store.
Good shopper marketing helps in making the selling process simpler, boosting the buying experience for
consumers, frees up the time of consumers‟ and drives sales growth. Shopper marketing is the course of
action of presenting products for sale in a retail environment in the way that it can influence shoppers'
buying decisions. In this we determine the optimal shelf location for each product, structure eye-
catching displays that catch the attention of potential buyers, and using signage etc. to provide pricing
and other product information.

Background:
Today retailers are facing a keen competitive market and are finding it increasingly difficult to create a
differential advantage on the basis of product (merchandise), price, promotion, place, people and
location and at this point the store itself becomes a fertile and last opportunity for market
differentiation. Today’s customers have many shopping choices, as the merchandise is available easily.
Some make purchases on the internet they don’t have to worry about the long hours of operation,
parking or getting large purchases home. So as compared to the past with development in technology
retailers job have become more difficult. Retailers need to create an exciting store design with
innovative merchandising techniques to make people come and visit the stores. Here comes the role of
shopper marketing which creates the store design. A shopper marketer likes to think of their store as
theater. The walls and floors represent the stage. The lighting, fixtures, and visual communications such
as signs represent the sets. And the merchandise represents the show.

Problem statement:
The present study is based on investigating the problems associated with the display of product whether
it is subsequent to the manufacturer level promotions or the store level promotion itself and current
inventory management practices to increase the customer’s satisfaction and retailer’s margin of profit
by increased foot-fall

Study Objectives:
1. To discover the shopping satisfaction of shoppers
2. To get out the customers and Retailers opinion about merchandising techniques.
3. To evaluate the extent to which the used merchandising techniques affects the customer
satisfaction
4. To find out whether the change will increase the number of shoppers or not.
5. To find out the relationship between adopted method of merchandising and retailer’s margin.

Literature Review:

Berretto Anton (2007) pointed out in his article

“Tricks of the trade”
that the basic components of store design are color,
texture, light and
music which can enhance store appeal and
ultimately invites the
customer to touch the product
Berretto Anton (2007) pointed out in his article “Tricks of the trade” that the basic components
of store design are color, texture, light and music which can enhance store appeal and
ultimately invites the customer to touch the product.Gibson G. Vedamaniin his bookRetail
Management:Functional Principle and Practices, mentioned about three roles of Visual
Merchandising. First is presentation of products in a way that can lead them to be sold quickly
with highest possible margin. Second role is the visual seduction charms the customer which
leads to the add-on sales. Third role is to create merchant's individual retail image. Gibson
also mentioned about three challenges to be faced by Visual Merchandisers. First challenge is
to balance the store atmosphere as per the store image. Second challenge is to influence
customer buying decision with the help of VM tools and design elements. Third challenge is
to balance the cost associated with store design elements with sales and profits. Gibson in his
book also mentioned about roles of a Merchandiser. According to him, a Visual Merchandiser
helps in enhancing sales and customer experience. He gave a list of duties for a Visual
Merchandiser, some of which are – planning and executing VM theme and displays,
arrangement of propos for di plays, arrangement of required fixtures and lighting, working
on floor plans, training personnel on the sales floor to create displays, organizing racks
and shelves where merchandise is kept.

Andrew J. Newmen and Peter Cullen (2007) in his book Retail Environment and Operation
defines the role of merchandiser is to target right customers, with right merchandise at the
right time in the right place. A term 'Merchandising' involves stages like Planning, sourcing,
buying, arranging , displaying and space management of products,

Dependent and Independent Variables:

Dependent Variable:
Shopper Behavior

Independent Variable:
 Merchandising
 Promotion on store
 Packaging
 Store Layout
 Conceptual Framework:

store Layout

Shopper
Behaviour

Promotion on
store Merchendising
Packaging

Hypothesis:
  Merchandising has a positive effect on shopper behavior
 Promotion on store has a positive effect on shopper behavior
 Packaging has a positive effect on shopper behavior
 Store Layout has a positive effect on shopper behavior

Methodology:
We will be conducting a quantitative study. The findings of this research will be empirical and can be
generalized to a larger population. Furthermore, this will be finding the relationship between factors like
promotion on store, Packaging, merchandising and store layout.

This will be a survey research and we will be sending the questionnaire through electronic means.

Population:
According the worldometer, the population of Pakistan is approximately 220 million. Our target
candidates will be the ones who uses internet as we will be sending the questionnaire through
electronic means and many people cannot access internet neither we would be able to do the random
sampling since it will be a small scale research. So, we will be doing non-probability convenience
sampling. 150 questionnaires will be distributed among general public.

Data Collection:
We will be using a questionnaire that is developed after reading the literature. We have taken
questions from the questionnaires used in previous researches for better credibility. We will be
asking close ended questions by using an ordinal likert scale having five points. The
questionnaire has sections about each of the construct.

Additionally, we will be using Google forms for collecting responses from the interested
candidates. All the respondents will be doing voluntary participation.
Additionally, we will be analysing our data through by performing statistical tests through SPSS.
STATISTICAL MODEL
The data of the research will be analyzed by Frequency Distribution

Result:
In the market of 20th century the consumer is not attracted or influenced by only marketing, the
companies are targeting and investing on shoppers because they know that the real revenue stream is
shopper who is coming to store to buy goods. They invest in store to attract the customer, promotion,
merchandising, store layout and packaging increasing the cost of company but they are giving profits to
company.
The primary research was conducted by floating questionnaires among students of universities.
The questionnaire had 21 questions. We have used likert scale. They were concerning about the
effect of shopper marketing on buying behaviour and the factors like merchandising, promotion,
store layout and packing.

QUESTIONNAIRE:
Age Group
 20 and less
 20-30
 30-40
 40 and above

Gender
 Male
 Female

Marital Status
 Married
 Unmarried
 Separated

Occupation Respondents Percentage

 Private Sector
 Public Sector
 Self Employed
 Student

Income
 Up to 20000
 20001 to 40000
 40001 to 60000
 60001 to 100000
 100,001 to 300000
 Above 300000

1. Packaging
  Attractive packaging always grabs your attention to buy the product rather than
ingredients and quality.
 You buy products (e.g. snacks) which are easy to carry.
 The quality of wrapper also assists in making buying decision.
 Do you switch to another brand in case of change in the packaging of your
current brand? (Yes, no or sometimes)

2. Promotion
 The promotion area is always visited by you.
 While shopping in large store, you buy products because you had watched the
ads before.
 Despite of the fact that you like your brand, you often buy discounted products.
 In store sampling encourage you to buy the brand right now if you like the brand

3. Store layout
 The environment in stores (lighting, music etc.) affect your shopping behavior.
 You feel confused if store layout of your grocery store changes.
 If the distance between racks is of about 3 meters, so it allows you to take
enough time to think. (yes or no)
 You choose to shop in an outlet with good layout, moving /browsing space and
ambiance?

4. Merchandising
 When you are in grocery store, you buy products size what you can see easily so
that you can get it easily too.
 Product range which are placed color wise on the shelves, grabs your attention
 Do you notice price talkers near merchandise and mannequin displayed at the
entrance window while entering the store? 
 Do you think in store communication elements like tent cards, banners, floor
vinyl, and graphics enhance merchandise display and affect customer purchase
decision?
Analysis:

Demographic Profile
Frequency Percentage
Gender Male 68 45.33
Female 82 54.67
Total 150 100.0

Frequency Percentage
Age 18-20 49 32.7
21-25 88 58.66
26-30 8 5.33
Above Than 31 5 3.33
Total 150 100.0

Frequency Percentage
Education Bachelor’s 135 90
Master’s 12 8
PhD 3 2
Total 150 100.0

Frequency Percentage
Income Up to 50000 22 14.66
50000-75000 25 16.66
76000-10000 39 26
Above 10000 64 42.66
Total 150 100.0
Interpretation

Cronbach Alpha test is used to test the reliability of variable in the questionnaire. It aims to
highlight the extent to which the items are connected to one another. The value above 0.6 or
higher is considered to be acceptable. The commutative construct of Merchandising. Store
layout in store promotion and packaging are higher or approximately 0.8 therefore these can be
considered reliable..

Interpretation

Mean is the average score of the variables while standard deviation shows how much data is
deviated from its mean. We used Likert scale of 1 to 5 for collection of data where 1 represent
the strongly disagree to 5 which represents strongly agree. Variables having mean value 3 will
be considered as neutral. Since the table above shows most means value for all the variables is
more than 3 which shows the most respondents are agree with variables

One-Sample T test

Test Hypothesis

H0 : Independent Variable has an insignificant impact on dependent variables / the difference

between the true mean (μ) and the comparison value (4) is equal to zero.

H1 : Independent Variable has a significant impact on dependent variables / the difference

between the true mean (μ) and the comparison value (4) is not equal to zero.

Level of Significance
Null Hypothesis is rejected if mean value is less than comparison value (4) or sigma value is
less than 0.05.

Interpretation

Pearson Correlation in the above test is used to highlight the extent to which there exists an
association between the variables. The correlation value approaches to zero is considered as
weakly correlated and value around 0.5 shows moderate correlation between variables while
the value equals to 1 represent variables are highly correlated. The positive sign highlights the
direction of association that is to say that the positive value shows that there is a positive
relation where as a negative value shows that there is a negative relation

Decision
Since mean value < 4 (agree) and p value < 0.05, we reject the null hypothesis and conclude
that the independent variable has a significant impact on dependent variable and the difference
between the true mean (μ) and the comparison value is not equal to zero.

Conclusion
From the above statistical tests, we may conclude that packaging, store layout, promotion on
store and merchandising effects the shopping behavior of shopper keeping other variable
constant and vise versa.

This research was carried out to analyze and evaluate the impact of factors such as
merchandising, promotion on store, store layout and packaging effect of shopper’s behaviour.
Shopper behavior is impacted by factors to varying degrees. The outcome of the literature
review has revealed that through the course of time the impact of various factors shifts however
all these factors do have an impact on the Shopper behavior to some extent. The results from
the research conducted and the data collected revealed varying results. The statistical test
when conducted showed that it was not such statistically significant. The reasoning behind the
statistical insignificance of the test could be the notion that the sample size was very small due
to the time constraint and non-availability of resources, however a similar research on a bigger
sample size could rule in favor of the alternative hypothesis.

Limitations:
Our research is focused on only shopper marketing and not included in other form of marketing
and it is obvious that other form of marketing also have an impact on shopper like consumer
marketing, trade marketing etc.

The sample size was restricted, we were able to send the questionnaire to different people and
we are not able to involve in other kind of research methods.

Recommendations:
The companies should start investing on shopper marketing because the majority of the
customers don’t have an idea which brand they should purchase but when they see the good
packaging, good merchandising, they are more attracted to these brands and they easily buy
these products.