Buyer & Consumer Behavior

Assignment - Part B
Measuring & Interpreting Brand Performance
Measures
Executive Summary
The Marketing Director for Smiths company has provided us with some
quantitative data regarding consumers purchasing behavior within the
snack food category. The Data reports information across 5 different chips
brands relating to their brand performance measures, competition, and
attitudinal response across various demographics. The company wants to
understand its comparative position in the market and some key findings
from the analysis. Brand performance measures allow marketers to
predict future behaviour by analysing known patterns especially within
repeat purchase markets. Smiths stands with the highest market share of
34% within the category followed by Kettle, Doritos and so on. Penetration
and all other measures are seen to decrease in line with size except the
category buying rate which only increased. Sole loyalty for Smiths is
unusually high though. Its important to note that repertoire markets
follow the patterns established by Double Jeopardy. This law states that
big brands have more customers that are slightly more loyal compared to
smaller brands. The duplication of purchase law allows us to determine
how much a brand shares with its competitors, and from our analysis
Kettle and Jumpys shared slightly more and less with Smiths than the
expected respectively. Similarly Kettle shared higher than the expected
with Smiths, indicating that perhaps these items had similar pricing
schemes, similar categories in which they were placed as well as being
similarly distributed and placed (in superstores) which is why they shared
more than expected. In terms of brand salience and attitude analysis, it
was concluded that brand salience was necessary for brands to focus on,
in order to create top of mind awareness of a brand for customers to
consider purchasing it in the future. Attitudes were not indicative of future
purchases as behaviour precedes attitudes and hence it was crucial to
target the mass market, by promoting the brand and creating positive
experiences. Lastly, when analysing trends within segmented brands
according to demographics, it was seen that brands did not vary in terms
of how customers purchased them across the category and differences
were insignificant. So much that there was no need to target specific
marketing action as all categories tended to behave the same, therefore
the focus was again on the mass market by effectively advertising and
distributing their chips to many stores, making it readily available. In
addition, for sales volumes to increase, they must differentiate their chips
category from the rest by developing a variety of flavours for the
customers.
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Brand Performance
Brand performance measures are used to identify and evaluate the
performance of brands within a market. They allow one to predict future
behaviour by analysing known patterns especially within repeat purchase
markets (Ehrenberg, 2004). The data set provides us with important
information regarding peoples chips buying behaviour within the snack
food category.
Its been noted that Smiths has the highest market share, accounting for
34% sales of the entire category. Kettle competes with Smiths with
second largest brand size of 24% and they keep decreasing for each
following brand. According to its brand size, the proportion of people who
bought Smiths brand at least once in the period was 72%, meaning that
they were most successful in attracting new customers and as the brand
sizes decreased, so did the penetration for each brand. The Average
purchase frequencies did not vary much amongst the brands as one
wouldve thought in relation to market shares and were close to the
expected average. Smiths had the highest purchase rate of 2.2 whereas
Jumpys was at 1.2 which was much lower than the average. Its important
to note that considering this as a repertoire market, the patterns showed
double jeopardy at play, with big brands having more customers buying
their brands more often and vice versa (Sharp 2010). The category buying
rate showed an unusual trend, increasing with the decrease in brand size.
Jumpys had the highest proportion with 8.3 category purchases made of
the total purchases made of the brand. So it was above the expected
average.
In terms of the share of category requirements, the values again
decreased in line with the market shares indicating double jeopardy
(Goodhardt 2002). Smiths chips had a 40% share of purchases made by
its customers towards the brand out of all the purchases they made but it
was considerably higher than the expected average, as well as Kettle at
37%. Jumpys had a share of 14% which was fairly lower than all other
brands in the category and the average of 28%. This was indicative of a
change of pace brand. In addition, Smiths brand had an unusually high
loyalty of 22% which was 15.1%, greater than the average and kettle by
14%. Doritos stood at a 4.2% whereas Red rock deli and Jumpys laid at
0%. Henceforth, Sole loyalty greatly varied within the distribution.

(Q2)
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The duplication of purchase law suggests that in an unsegmented market,

the percentage of buyers of one brand who also buy another brand vary in
constant proportion with the size of the other brand (Ehrenberg 1991). So
big brands tend to share less customers with small brands and the
converse is true for smaller brands. Therefore this law allows us to
determine how much a brand shares with its competitors.
Table 2 shows the competition between different chips brands in the snack
food category. The rows with values corresponding to each column
indicates the percentage of customers that also bought their brand. Kettle
and Doritos were seen as Smiths main competitors due to their
comparative penetration figures. 77% of Kettles buyers bought Smiths
chips as well. 71% of Doritos buyers also bought Smiths and this value
gradually decreased as the brands sizes decreased. On average, 71% of
competitors customers bought Smiths. In addition to this, it was
identified that 72% of Smiths customers also bought from kettle. 65% of
Doritos buyers also purchased kettle and this trend decreased with very
minor change, at 64% of Jumpys customers also purchasing kettle.
Therefore 67% of all other brands customers bought Kettle as well.
Similarly, with decreasing trend values, 62% of Smiths customers were
seen to purchase Doritos as well. This is evidence of the Duplication of
Purchase Law. That is, stores share more of their customers with the
biggest stores in the market and less of their customers with the smaller
stores in the market. Therefore double jeopardy also holds. According to
their research paper, Sharp and Allsopp (2002) highlighted that brands of
differing market share differ mainly in terms of the size of their customer
base.
But some brands shared at unusual proportions from the average,
highlighted as partitions (deviations). For instance, 77% of Kettles
customers also bought Smiths chips which were 6% higher than the
average, whereas jumpys shared at 65% which was lower than expected.
Smiths sharing 72% customers with kettle, and kettle sharing 50% with
Red Rock were higher than expected. Its suggested that those who shared
greater than the average may have had similar pricing schemes, similar
categories I which they were placed as well as similarly distributed, i.e in
supermarkets or convenience stores.

Brand Attitude
(Q3)
An attitude is a positive or negative, evaluation towards an object, person
or event which tends to remain stable over time (Franzen, 1999). It is
essential for brands to understand their customers attitudes, and
preferences, because some researchers assume that they can predict
their future purchasing behaviour. Various methods are used to record
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users attitudes towards brands by providing them a list of options which

require them to state their preferences, mainly the yes/no method, pick
any methodology and rating scale. Henceforth, according to such
empirical research based on the link between attitude and behaviour
suggests low correlations between attitude and future behaviour.
Consumers buy from a repertoires of brands, occasionally. It also seems
that they give a positive attitudinal response only occasionally too. This
therefore suggests that behaviour drives attitudinal response, which in
turn implies that attitudes change as behaviour changes (Cunningham
1956, Ehrenberg 1988). It only makes sense to say that for an attitude or
opinion about a particular brand to develop, one must have had prior
experience with the brand in order to form a preference or disliking
towards it. Therefore behaviour precedes attitudes and not the other way
around. Bem (1968) described attitudinal responses as a person's
description of their own behaviour, i.e. when someone says "I like apples"
what they are really saying is "I'm often eating apples therefore I must like
them".
Salience is like the size of the brand in the markets collective mind.
Romaniuk and Sharp (2004) define it as the propensity of a brand to be
thought of by buyers (i.e. stand out from memory) in buying situations,
impacting individuals brand repertoire. When all or most brands are
present at the point of choice (e.g. at a supermarket), consumers retrieve
information based on strong cues from their memory and only notice
specific brands, as evidenced by the little time taken to choose brands
despite wide ranges on offer (Dickson and Sawyer, 1990). This reflects the
fact that buyers tend to purchase products that theyve had prior positive
experiences with. Another concept emphasises on the fact that brands
with bigger sizes in the market are more likely to be considered or
noticed. The more a brand is promoted, advertised or available, the more
mental and physical availability. Cues that customers use in buying
situations vary considerably and extend beyond the product category cue.
This suggests that a brands salience is better reflected in the propensity
for the brand to be recalled across a range of cues likely to be used by
buyers in buying situations.
It is well established that attitudes have only a weak influence on future
behaviour and thus brand choice (Kraus, 1995; Wright and Kln, 1998)
because they are weakly motivational. In contrast, salience differentials
have a huge impact on individuals brand repertoires, and at aggregate
level they do much to explain the market share differences between
brands. We see the influence of brand salience as being quite different to
that of brand attitude. Attitudes are about evaluating the brand whereas
salience is largely about having a chance of being thought of. Indeed,
brand attitudes are, we think, often largely a function of salience, in that
we have a tendency to like the familiar (Harrison, 1968; Zajonc, 1968).
Therefore brand salience is more important to measure.

(Q4)
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Table 3 provides us with statistical data relating to attitudinal responses

by users and the total sample towards the 5 different brands ordered by
size. The attitudes that customers hold are split into mainly its
unhealthy and its my favourite brand. These attributes are then further
categorised by total sample statistics and users only.
Descriptive research shows that evaluative attitudinal responses mirror
market shares of brands. So the proportions of the population who say
that they like a brand depends directly upon the proportion of the
population who have used that brand recently (Barwise and Ehrenberg
1985). Also, attitudinal responses by users only across different brands
varied very little. Therefore, key patterns establish that bigger brands
have more customers to express an attitude and therefore have higher
scores. And users are more likely to express their attitude towards a brand
than non-users.
If we note the scores for the Smiths brand, (in line with penetration) it is
seen that 68% of the total population sample said that Smiths was
unhealthy, whereas 75% of its users stated it was unhealthy. Similarly,
56% of the total respondents believed that Smiths was their favourite
brand, whereas 65% of Smiths users believed the same. When discussing
only users of the brands responses, we are looking at very similar
proportions as 71% users of kettle, 64% of Doritos, 69% of Red rock deli
and 65% of jumpys say its unhealthy. But in terms of the attitudinal
responses across the total sample for different brands, the trends are seen
to decrease. Therefore, Smiths followed the brand attitude pattern as
expected.

(Q5)
As far as changing the attitude of people towards our brand is concerned,
it is important to note that very few people tend to hold negative attitudes
towards brand i.e. less than 10% of the responses (East et al. 2013) so I
disagree with the statement. Its more probable for non-users to just not
think of that brand at all. Behaviours precede attitudes, so in order to
change negative attitudes, its important to create positive behaviours
and experiences, make their brands noticeable to consumers so they can
include them in their buying repertoire by providing positive reinforcement
(Kostadinova, 2013). Advertising and creating price promotion schemes
will allow mental availability which will be effective.

Demographics and Segmentation

(Q6)
Segmentation is the process of dividing a market up into distinct subsets
of consumers and then targeting them according to their common
interests and needs. Demographics refer to the identifiable and
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measurable statistics of a population. In tables 4 to 6, quantitative data

about the relationship status, income and gender of the customers has
been provided in relation to brand usage. In order to determine whether
Smiths customer profile is different to that of the competition, the
average profile of Smiths customer base is compared with the average
profile of the entire categorys customer base. The Mean Absolute
Deviation (MAD) is used to quantify the difference between Smiths
customer base and the category average.
In table 4, 22% of customers were singles, 62% were couples and 14%
were divorced people who bought Smiths chips. The deviations from the
average of the categories were 2.5, -3.2 and 0.7, giving an average MAD
value of 2.2%. This data was provided for all variables, namely income
and gender. The MAD values were recorded as 5.5 and 4.0 respectively
across Smiths brand. Similar MAD averages were noted across all the
different brands. So according to relationship status, the brands in the
market only deviated by 2.3% on average. These values were small and
closer to zero, indicating that there wasnt a significant difference
between the brand user profiles of Smiths to the competition.

(Q7)
These deviations were insignificant as they were within 10% of the
relative average. This henceforth showed that theres very little difference
between the brands in terms of the types of customers they attract and
certainly not enough of a difference to target specific marketing action.
Smiths shouldnt restrict itself to serving a particular segment. It should
attract and focus on the mass market through better products, powerful
advertising, more effective distribution and pricing and higher demands
from consumers who can choose from a growing variety of products.

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Maria Maimoon Zafar (110137340) Taylah Andrews/Wednesdays (1011am) | UniSA

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