Brand Switching Behaviour Of Consumers In The Hair Care Service

Introduction

1.1 Background Of The Study

Brand switching is perhaps one of the most ignored and undiscussed issues underling branding decision which are regularly encountered by manufacturers and products of brand products. This situation may exist due to the nature of produces or brand owner’s goals of objectives. One of which usually Is to generalize a positive and sustained brand preference and loyalty.

Mc Carthy and Perrault (1990:235), defined branding as the use of a name, term, symbol or design or a combination of these to identify a product it includes the use of brand names, trade-marks and practically all other means of product identification. The advent of branding in the middle ages was according to them as a result of medieval guide efforts to require crafts people to put trade work on their products to protect them and their customers from inferior quality. Today, branding is such a strong force that hardly anything goes unbranded. In developing marketing strategies for products branding has become a major products strategy facing manufacturers and markers of hair care services market in Enugu metropolis.

Semenik and Bamossy 1993, as noted earlier, the most Obvious aim of manufacturers and owners of Hair care services in Enugu metropolis from branding their products has been to develop brand loyalty or positive brand associations which to a great extent explain the influence on a consumer to repeatedly choose a particular company’s product over competing products. In building loyalty Hair care services manufacturers, over the years have emphasized products benefits attributes through advertising messages sales promotional activities integrated marketing communication and efforts coupled with recent effort at applying the social marketing concept. All these are aimed at applying the social market concept. All these are aimed at getting the consumer past the point of brand non-recognition, product test or trial to the points of brand adoption.

The consumer testing a particular brand and consequently adopting it, most probably makes a conscious decisions to test and use the new brand and thus abandons or discards the previous brand. By so doing the consumer exhibits a behaviours that is crucial and is the subject matter of this study and that behaviour is brand switching. Consumer brand switching behaviour should be as important as their brand preference to Hair care service manufacturers because any overt promotional appeal or overture aimed at generating brand preference among existing consumers inadvertently produce brand switching tendencies on response, within the same group of consumers. Therefore, it should be clear to brand owners that if their brand is not generating brand loyalty then it is attracting little loyalty and thus provides a high tendency for consumers to switch to other brands. An inquiry into the nature of causative factors that give rise of brand switching among consumers or users of Hair care services will provide an opportunity to manufacturers to guard against vulnerability to brand loyalty-encouraging activities of competitors so it is the task of this study to reveal the factors and variables which, directly or indirectly gave rise to brand switching among consumers of Hair care services with emphasis on.

1.2 Statement Of The Problem

Studies of consumer behaviour revealed that consumers generally exhibit three different kinds of purchase behaviour. They include expensive problem solving, limited problem solving, routine problem solving and these buying behaviour have important marketing implications. The routine problem solving or habitual purchase behaviour connotes a situation where a consumer does not devote much attention to his purchase task, often refered to as low involvement behaviour. According to Howard (1998). This behaviour gives rise to states of decisions repeat purchase and brand loyalty. This is a desirable position for most if not all hair care services manufacturers in Nigeria.

Conversely, in deciding to try a new brand other than a current brand or respond to emotional appeal or environmental appeal as point of purchase display, the consumers is placed with limited problem solving. This situation according to Hawkins et al (1992) gives rise to consumer-exhibtion of brand switching behaviour. The response of the consumer to another marketing mix stimuli such as pricing of different brands, distributional strategy impact and effort, product design and quality interplay may also give rise to brand switching behaviour.

1.3 Objective of the study

With the discovery and identification of the twin consequences of short, medium and long term marketing strategy overtures towards the consumer namely; brand loyalty and brand disloyalty (switching), it therefore becomes the prime purpose of this study to:

• To examine the consumer awareness of hair care service usage.
• To study the reasons for consumer switching to other brands.

1.4 Research questions

1. What is the consumer awareness of hair care service usage?
2. What are the reasons for consumer switching to other brands?

1.5 Significance of the study

It is believed that the findings of this study will be of immense help to hair care service manufacturers and marketers in the following ways.

It will enable the producers to identify the factors that will give rise to brand switching among consumers.

It will expose the importance of continuous consumers research and market monitoring in an expanding and increasingly competitive consumer market.

The study will also help brand owners to develop marketing strategies which will enable them reduce the impact of brand switching by repositioning their products to attain loyalty, it is also the hope of the research that the study would be relevant to other consumers goods manufacturers engaged in competition with producers of close substitutes a similar goods such as cosmetics and beverages.

Finally, the findings of this study should also be helpful to retailers, particularly in articulating and remodeling their purchase and merchandise policies so as to stock in relative depth and breath, different goods and their close substitutes.

1.6 Scope of the study

This study is carried out on the brand switching behaviour of consumer in the Hair Care Service Market in Enugu Metropolis.

1.7 Limitations Of The Study

The gathering of all needed data for a research study is usually met with a number of constraints. The researcher encountered multiple of problems in the course of this work.

Firstly, some consumers thought that the research was a staff of Nigerian breweries and always demand for a tip before accepting to fill the questionnaire.

Secondly, the researcher could not gain access in to AMA Breweries due to some bottleneck bureaucracy though he was later supplied with relevant materials.

Finally, time and financial constrain also derailed the study.

1.8 Definition Of Terms

The beginning of wisdom is the definition of terms” (Socrates, 470?-399BC)

Consumer

A consumer is one who buys good or uses a service. Onyeke and Nebo (2000:42) defined a consumers as people acting as individuals or in small groups who purchase goods and services to satisfy their personal and household consumption needs as opposed to individual or people who buy and use items for commercial, business, organizational, government or institutional purpose.

Product

Kotler and Armstrong (2008:225) defined a product as anything that can be offered to a market for attention, acquisition, use or consumption that might satisfy a want or need. Products include more than just tangible goods.
Broadly defined, product will include physical objects, services, events, persons, places, organization, ideas, or mixes of these entities.

Consumer Product

Having defined consumer and product, in extension consumer products are products and services bought by final consumer for personal use or consumption. This set of product are classified further based on how consumers go about buying them.

The consumer product includes:

• Convenience goods
• Shopping goods
• Specialty goods
• Unsought goods.

Brand

The American marketing Association defined a brand as a name, term, sign, symbol or design, or a combination of them intended to identify the goods or services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from those of competitors.

Brand loyalty

Brand loyalty is the ultimate goal a company set for a branded product. Nancy and Hofmann (2007: File C5-54) defined brand loyalty as a consumers preference to buy a particular brand in a product category. It occurs because consumers perceived that the brand offers the right product features, images, or level of quality at the right price.