CHAPTER-2

THEORATICAL FRAMEWORK

1. Introduction

People were communicating with other people without a language in olden days.
There is a massive change in the method of communication in modern days. Social Media
have become a convenient way to communicate among all age clusters. The Internet and
particularly social media have modified the shoppers and marketers communicating medium.

The Internet has characteristics such as - the power to inexpensively store huge
amounts of data at different locations - the powerful search engines, organizing and
disseminating of data - the power to function a physical distribution medium as software -
relatively low prices. With the help of net and the presence of various social media sites it is
now possible for business people to meet worldwide customers at single click of the button.

Thanks to the internet technology, which helps the consumer to search the product on
the web, view the review and ranking of existing customers for the product before he
purchased the product. Consumers use the technology now a days too much as computer is
used by many consumers so use of online marketing.

Consumer purchase decision is influenced by social media through group

communication. The web platform is a new method for developing the business. Social media
modifies the communication methods between sellers and buyers. E commerce influences the
consumer in their purchase decision. Communication through social media is a new platform
to exchange information about product and services. The analysis of consumer behavior is the
core activity for selling product and service since most consumers are using the internet and
on-line social media tools. Social media become an important media to introduce and market
products and also to do surveys. Nowadays Social media is an important marketing tool for
promotional activities. Hence it becomes necessary to perceive how Social media is affecting
consumer behavior.

Advertising

Advertising refers to "the means of providing the most persuasive possible selling
message to the right prospects at the lowest possible cost". Philip Kotler and Armstrong
(2003), provide an alternative definition: "Advertising is any paid form of non-personal
presentation and promotion of ideas, goods and services through mass media such as
newspapers, magazines, television or radio by an identified sponsor".

According to the American Marketing Association, Advertising is the ―the placement

of announcements and persuasive message in time or space purchased in any of the mass
media by business firms, non profit organization , and government agencies and individuals
who seek to inform and or persuade members of a particular target or audience about their
products ,services , organizations, or ideas ‖. Advertising involves the use of media like print
media (Magazines, Newspapers) ,Electronic media(Television, Radio) and outdoor
Media(Billboards, Hoardings).

Advertising is a form of communication intended to persuade an audience (viewers,

readers or listeners) to purchase or take some action upon products, ideals, or services. It
includes the name of a product or service and how that product or service could benefit the
consumer, to persuade a target market to purchase or to consume that particular brand. These
brands are usually paid for or identified through sponsors and viewed via various media.

Advertising can also serve to communicate an idea to a mass amount of people in an

attempt to convince them to take a certain action, such as encouraging 'environmentally
friendly' behaviors, and even unhealthy behaviors through food consumption, video game and
television viewing promotion, and a "lazy man" routine through a loss of exercise . Modern
advertising developed with the rise of mass production in the late 19th and early 20th
centuries.
 Mass media can be defined as any media meant to reach a mass amount of people.
Several types of mass media are television, internet, radio, news programs, and published
pictures and articles.

Definition

Advertising is a paid form of non personal presentation and promotion of ideas,

goods, or services by an identified sponsor.

The institute of Practitioners in Advertising (IPA) , the body which represents

advertising agencies, defines advertising as: ‖The means of providing the most persuasive
possible selling message to the right prospects at the lowest possible cost.‖

According to Stanton, ―Advertising consists of all activities in presenting to a group a

non personal , oral or visual, openly sponsored message regarding a product, service or idea.‖

Features of Advertising

1. It is a paid form of communication:

Advertising appear in newspapers, magazines, televisions, or cinema screens

because the advertiser has purchased some space or time to communicate information
to the prospective customer.

2. It is a non-personal presentation of message:

There is no face-to face contact with the consumers. That is why ,it is
described as non-personal salesmanship. It os a non-personal form of presenting
products and promoting ideas and it supports personal selling.It simplifies the task of
sales- force by creating awareness in the minds of potential customers.
 3. The purpose of advertising is to promote idea about the products and
services of a business:

It is directed towards increasing the sales of the products and services of a

business unit.

4. Advertising is issued by an identified sponsor:

The identity of the businessman issuing the advertisements must be disclosed.

Non-disclosure of the name of the sponsor in propaganda may lead distortion
.deception, and manipulation.

Advertisements should disclose the sources of opinion and ideas it presents.

Benefits of advertising-

Advertising is directed to a large number of people and not to one individual.

That is why we call it non-personal. Advertising is communication about products or
ideas. It may inform us about the features of iPod or new smart phone or spell out the
need to have a cancer check-up.

 Increases the sales

The main object of the manufacturer in advertising his products is to promote the sale
of his products. Goods produced on a mass scale are marketed by the method of mass
persuasion through advertising.
Repetition of advertisements, the manufacturers are not only able to retain existing
markets but are also able to expand the markets both by attracting more people to their
products and also by suggesting new uses for them. Advertising is a helping hand to selling.

 Improvement in quality products

 Usually, goods are advertised under brand names. When a person is moved by
the advertisement to use the product, they proceeds on the hope that the contents of

the particular brand will be better than the other brands of the same goods.

 Facility of Purchasing

Purchasing becomes easy for the consumers after advertising. Generally, the re-
sale prices (prices at which the goods are to be sold by the retailers) are fixed and advertised.
Thus, advertising offers a definite and positive assurance to the consumer that they will not
be overcharged for the advertised product. The consumer can make his purchases with utmost
ease and confidence.

 Education of Consumers

Being an educational and dynamic principle, the prime objective of advertising is to

inform and educate the customers about new products, their features, prices and uses. It also
convinces them to adopt new ways of life, giving up their old habits and inertia and have a
better standard of living.

 Acts as Salesman

What a travelling salesman does for this organization is done by the advertising at
least cost. This is the reason that most of the retail organization‘s do not employ large army
of travelling salesman, rather they are willing to spend on advertising which attracts
consumers to the sores where the counter salesmen cater to their needs.

 Change in Motivation
 Radically advertising has changed the basis of human motivation. While
people of earlier generations lived and worked mainly for bare necessities of life, the
modern generation works harder to supply itself with the luxuries and semi-luxuries
of life

Demerits of Advertising

 Adds to costs

An organization has to spend large amount on advertising. It increases the cost

of the products. To meet this expenditure, price of the product is raised. No
manufacturer pays for the advertising expenses out of his pocket. Advertising,
therefore, leads to unnecessary rise in prices. In this reference it is said that
advertising costs are passed on to the consumers in the form of high prices.

 Undermines Social Values

Advertisement is a sort of day-dreaming for the people. These days it is taking the
people away from reality and into the realm of artificiality. Through its medium people get
information about new products.
Only very few products are of any use for them. The brilliance of new products really
gets on their nerves. They want to buy them but have no resources at their command.
Consequently, they start feeling upset with their present status. Taking it as a social evil, it
can be said that advertisement undermines social values.

 Confuses the Buyers

Many a time distorted version of reality is shown in the advertising. Believing

in advertising, consumers buy the product. On its use, they feel cheated.
They come to realise later that the information given in the advertisement was
something else whereas the actual product was quite different from it. Thus, people
 lose confidence in advertising because of wrong presentation. In this reference it is
said that advertising confuses rather than helps.

 Encouraging Sale of Inferior Products

Every manufacturer projects his product as superior one in the advertisement.

Therefore, the buyer is unable to decide as to which product is really good.
Consequently, it is difficult to get good quality product even after paying a handsome
price for it. If a seller gets good price for some inferior product, it becomes a habit with him.
It affects other sellers also. Therefore, it is said that advertisement encourages the sale of
inferior products.
 Some Advertisement is in Bad Taste

Many times, foul language and objectionable pictures are used in advertising
in order to attract a particular class. They may be insulting to a particular class.
It causes decay of social values.
Such kinds of advertising are generally opposed by the people as it hurts their
feelings. In this reference it is said that some advertisements are in bad tastes.

CLASSIFICATION OF ADVERTISING

Advertising can be classified on the basis of four main bases these are on the
basis of:

a. Geographical spread based Advertising: Advertising can be divided on the

basis of geographical area covered by advertisements, coverage may be global
,national or local.
b. Target Group Advertising: A Company can focus one or more target group in
their advertising campaign, if a company manufactures generators then the
target group would be households, industry and institutions.
c. Advertising on the basis of impact: Primary demand advertising is aimed at
increasing the demand for all the brands of a product within a specific
 industry. For example, advertising for the promotion of gold and diamond
jewelry.
d. Non Product Advertising: Advertising of services like banking, transportation,
insurance, hospitality , tourism and education is different due to lack of
tangibility.

Social Media

Definition of social media

It is termed as the collection of online communication of various inputs which may be

community-based or individual, interactions, intercommunications, contents sharing,
websites and many more among different users‖. Whereas various social media specialists
define the term Social Media and their definitions on the various points: it's

on-line medium powered by the net for social communication.

-way communication medium.

, Social Gaming, Blogs, Social Bookmarking,

etc.

Evolution of Social Media

The first and foremost purpose of social media is to communicate; People were
interacting even before communication tools were fancied. Discussions have always existed
however the speed to that the connections happened modified eventually that gave rise to
social media platforms. Traditionally these discussions used to unfold through Word of
Mouth. Social Media has become part life, thoughts, culture and business world wherever
folks have started exploitation digital technologies for networking, socializing, information
gathering and spreading.

Social media, in one form or another form has been presence since the 1970„s. The
look and feel has modified greatly since the early days, the communication concept remains
the same. Today technology permits for a larger interaction and period of communication
however similar to its roots; social media allows people to broadcast to the lots.

Social Media Marketing

It is a method by using social media site to attain the attention of people. These
programs concentrate on developing a content which will attract the attention of the readers
in social media and make them to share the contents in their social networking site.

Any statement that is shared in the social networks, which included short messages,
information about a product or service, brand or a company is termed as electronic word of
mouth. When the information about a product / service / brand / company is shared in a social
media by a user, it is reshared by many users in other social networks and when the
information is shared by a trustworthy source, it becomes appositive promotion for the
product than the promotion done through paid sources. This shows the power of social media
marketing.

Benefits of Social Media Marketing

 Increased Exposure

Now a days the importance of Social Media Marketing have increased. Consumers and
Marketers are using the Social Networking too much.

 Develops Loyal Fans

 Brand Loyalty is the another is most important advantage of social networking
sites. Taking an example if a consumer is satisfied with any product he or she will
never go to any other company to buy the product. This creates brand loyalty.

 Provides Marketplace Insight

Social networking sites provides information about product and is available

clearly. That means its Features, Functions, Price etc. Consumers will get full
information about product only on websites and customers don‟t have to go to
anywhere.

 Improved Sales

In the present scenario where 4600 photos are shared, 600 websites are created
every day. 1,00,000 tweets are sent. Now a days different social networking sites are
created so differently as customers can purchase the goods online at any time. No
doubt now a days revenue has increase online as compare to earlier days.

Demerits of Social Media

Social Media is a powerful tool for reaching audience at a relative low cost.
However, it takes savvy and practice to run a successful social media campaign.
Know your audience , and make sure you are devoting sufficient resources to the
effort, because a poorly runned social media advertising campaign can be worse than
no campaign at all.

 Negative Feedback

One viral negative feedback can hit a business harder than knockout punch. This is a
pressingly important factor to consider for business owners. Almost everything in the social
media platform is shareable which means that one negative feedback can impact almost
everyone. This could break customers trust and ruin brand perception for both business
owners and their businesses .

 Time-Consuming

It may sound like an easy task , but social media advertising requires a lot of time and
patience .You may also need like a year worth of luck just to get immediate results . Social
media marketing is a gradual processes and requires high consistency in order for the
business to be known.

 Susceptibility to Misleading information

It is not a sescret that social media contains a lot of fake news and contents. This
could possibly mislead multiple numbers of users. In a real case scenario , negative feedback
can trigger these types of misleading information‘s to be spread. These can eventually destroy
a business reputation on a large scale.

 High Volume of Contents

Due to heavy amount of contents from other social media users , searching for
particular business is like finding a needle in haystack. For business owners , this means that
increasing brand awareness is not as easy as it actually sounds.

CONSUMER BEHAVIOR

Meaning of Consumer Behavior

Consumer behavior is the study of how individual customers, groups or organizations

select, buy, use, and dispose ideas, goods, and services to satisfy their needs and wants. It
refers to the actions of the consumers in the marketplace and the underlying motives for those
actions.
 Marketers expect that by understanding what causes the consumers to buy particular
goods and services, they will be able to determine—which products are needed in the
marketplace, which are obsolete, and how best to present the goods to the consumers.
According to Engel, Blackwell, and Mansard, ‗consumer behavior is the actions and
decision processes of people who purchase goods and services for personal consumption‘.
According to Louden and Bitta, ‗consumer behavior is the decision process and
physical activity, which individuals engage in when evaluating, acquiring, using or disposing
of goods and services‘.
Consumer behavior has been defined as ―the acquisition, consumption and disposition
of products, services, time and ideas by decision-making units.‖(Institute of chartered
analysis of India)
In other words, it is the body of knowledge which studies various aspects of purchase
and consumption of products and services by individuals with various social and
psychological variables at play.
Buyer behaviour is an important tool in the hands of marketers to forecast the future
buying pattern of customers and devise appropriate marketing strategies to create long-term
customer relationships. A vital part of the marketing process is to understand why a customer
or buyer makes a purchase.
Consumers

A Consumers is a person who purchases goods and services for personal use. The
consumer is the one who pays something to consume products. Consumers, in general, can be
referred as individuals who purchase or consume products and services; however, in terms of
buyer and consumer, there is a little difference. Buyers are the people who are acting either as
ultimate, industrial, or institutional purchasers. And the consumer refers to individuals who
are ultimate user of the product. Following are the steps in consumer buying process.
Consumer buying behavior

Inevitably, businesses face problems where the message is not reaching their
consumers, with the fact that, at times, consumers are facing significant blocks in their
decision process. If not, each of them should be fully committed, loyal, enthusiastic, repeated
consumers; however, this is not the case. Today the accessibility and transparency of
information has profoundly influenced the decision making process; therefore, it is important
to examine what are the hurdles and fiction points that hold prospects becoming consumers,
or keeps consumers hesitating from repurchasing.

 Need Recognition
The buying process starts with need recognition - the buyer identify need or
problem. A need can be triggered by internal or external stimuli such as hunger, thirst,
etc. Problem recognition takes place whenever a consumer recognizes a significant
difference between the desired and the actual state of affairs, which is in sufficient
magnitude to arouse and activate the decision process , or need triggered by internal
or external stimuli.

After the realization of a problem, it initiates the search for information before
any typical buying decisions. Nowadays, the mass media is no longer the only source
of information, which may promote ideas goods and services. As a result, consumers
are exposed to vast amount of information to identify a claim or promise about their
services or products, which are strongly penetrative.

 Information Search
If the consumer‘s drive is strong and a satisfying product is near at hand, the
consumer is likely to purchase the product to satisfy his need. If not, the consumer
may simply store the need in memory or undertake an information search. The final
purchase decision will not be made at once, even when individuals acknowledge,
recognize their problems, and pay attention to the available products; likewise, when
prospects have a certain interest in a product or service, they tend to go through the
following steps before carrying out any action – identifying available options,
studying information of selected options, and eventually judging which of these
options can most likely deliver the best outcome.

 Evaluation of Alternatives

How does the consumer choose among the alternative brands? The Marketer
needs to know about alternative evaluation. Once an option is identified as the best
 solution to fulfill the individual‘s needs after accumulating sufficient information,
they undertake alternative evaluation. Depending on their motives or goals,
consumers establish criteria for evaluating choice alternatives, for instance which
alternative is the simplest to use or to arrange, or what are other users‘ experiences,
because there is a need to confirm whether or not the information is reliable and to
verify that the product will work out as anticipated. In order to ensure the outcome
within the expectation, individuals require relevance of experience.

 Buying Decision
During the course of evaluation, consumer eventually forms preferences among the
brands in the choice desk, however, there are two factors, which can interfere between the
purchase intension and purchase decision – attitude of the others and unanticipated situational
factors.
Attitudes of others is the extent to which another person‘s negative attitude towards
the preferred alternatives or reluctance to meet the terms of supporting the purchase intention,
this may result in a readjustment of the consumer‘s purchase intention. Likewise, consumers
are influenced by the info-me-diaries who publish their evaluations (e.g. customer reviews on
Amazon.com, blogs, bulletin boards, and so on).
. A consumer‘s decision to change, postpone or avoid a purchase decision is
influenced heavily by perceived risk. The amount of perceived risk varies with the amount of
money at stake. A consumer takes certain actions to reduce risk, such as avoiding purchase
decision, gathering more information and looking for various brands and therefore there is
need to understand the factors that provoke feelings of risk in consumers and try to reduce
those risks with strategic marketing offers.

 Post Purchase Evaluation

After purchasing the product, the consumer will experiences certain levels of
satisfaction or dissatisfaction, and evaluates the wisdom of the choice made in
selecting the alternative. Two potential outcomes are derived from this phase –
satisfaction or dissatisfaction.

When consumer experiences dissatisfaction towards the purchase, the choice

is ‗devaluated‘ and the consumer begins the process of searching, obtaining
information and evaluating other options for future buying decision, in which triggers
new behaviour. It is a phase when the consumer decides whether or not to move from
merely implementing the product to a full adaption; that is, whether to use the product
repeatedly or repurchase or not.
Since consumer always has a choice regarding the products priority, frequency
of usage, and new circumstances of new uses. When individuals are comfortable in
using a specific product regularly, they will recommend it to others from using the
product as well.

CONSUMER BEHEVIOR AND ADVERTISING

i. Cognitive psychology Learning Theory: The cognitive school views

learning as problem solving and focuses on changes on the consumer‘s
psychological set (the consumers attitudes and desired benefits) as a
result of learning.However the concepts are relevant to habit since
complex decisions making may lead to routinized purchases when the
consumer is satisfied with the brand and repurchases it over a period of
time.
ii. Product and Brand Image
Cognitive approach to Brand Loyalty
Researchers have proved that to be truly loyal the consumers must hold
a favourite attitude towards the brand in addition purchasing it
repeatedly. It is recognized that consumers might continue to buy the
same brand because other brands are not repeatedly available.

Tools of Media Advertising

Daily more than one lacs different types of tweets are sent, nearly Seven lakhs
contents are posted on facebook, millions of information are searched in google,
thousands of photos are sent through instagram, six hundred websites are hosted.
There were lot of business opportunities due to development and advancement of
social media.
In the business environment, consumers become the focal point because of the
powerful presence of social media. Several studies were conducted to find out the
 influence of social media and results of these studies helps the firms to maintain a
good position in the market with the help of social media.

 Mobile Phones
Mobiles phones with social networking facility are a powerful platform for
selling products. With the help of mobile phones people came to know about the
recent changes, happenings and discussions in the social media. Mobiles phones
enable continuous connection with social networking sites and firms are using this
chance to update their product and services to their customers through social sites.

Firms are using QR codes to make easily available to their customers about
their websites and other services. Smart Phones are enabled with QR code readability
with helps the customer to know the information in an easier and quicker way.

 Engagement
When the customers of the product become the participant in social media for
promotion of the product, then it is termed as engagement. With the help of social media,
user can post or comment on a product or service. With the concept of engagement, the client
of the company promotes the product by way of posting a comment, whereas the viewers will
see the comment. By engaging the existing customers for marketing the product through
social media, selling becomes more successful.

 Twitter

Twitter permits the users to post one hundred forty characters to advertise and
promote about their product or service. This message can be a text, website link, photo etc.

 Facebook

It helps to post information about a product and enables to post comment on the post.
It facilitate the user to like the page r post and also share the page or post to other users in the
facebook. The information posted includes text, audio, video and website links. Facebook is
designed in such a way it will connect with twitter page.
  Google

Google + contains some of the features of facebook and is associated with google
adwords and maps. Google + includes location based search, navigation services, location
based selling etc.. Google+ helps in marketing activities.

 Linkdeln

It is a social networking site which enables the firms to develop for professional and
business profiles to network with people. Twitter can be merged with linkedin page. It helps
the users by providing opportunity by way of generating leads. The pages are similar to
facebook pages which can be used to promote their product and services.

 YouTube

Youtube permits the users to upload videos. Youtube is used to upload

advertisements for target their customers by firms. The taste and style of the
customers can be reflected in the commercial ad‟s developed by the companies and it
can be used as medium to market the products by way of advertisements. Youtube
videos can be downloaded anytime on request. Sponsoring of video is possible on
youtube.

 Delicious, and Reedit

These are well liked social sites used for marketing activities. These sites are the
targets of social media marketers to advertise their websites and to share the links to their
customers.

 Blog
Blogs are webpages developed by companies that contains information about
products and allows consumers, employees to post comments, view and share
information to others.
 There are some positive impacts as well as some negative impacts are there of
social websites which are doing the job of marketing. Some of them are as follows:-

Positive Impacts:-

1. Social media which is doing the marketing helping to businessmen to

understand their customers by understanding their likes and dislikes

2. It helps various firms to understand how different types of activities

can be done.
 3. Social websites are helping to make not only to old customers but also to many
new customers to attract them.

4. it increases awareness for consumers how to use branded goods and services.

Negative Impacts:-

1. Social websites are not fully protected. Anybody can misuse the websites
information like Facebook anybody can take the image of any person can
create problem for consumers.

2. Social websites are sending many advertisement mails, messages to

customers due to those customers are thinking as unsought goods.

3. Wrong type of brand advertisement can create a big problem for the
company.

4. Many companies are not getting feedback from the customers though it is
a free of cost. But still consumers are reluctant to share ideas and thoughts.

Nature of Consumer behavior

It is important to learn about consumer behavior the consumer behavior is the study
of how an individual decides to purchase a particular product over the other and what the
underlying factors that mould such behavior are.
Most of our time is spent directly in the marketplace, shopping or engaging on social
media, we spend large time about thinking about products and services while talking to
family and friends and watching advertisement and now a days most of the people
(consumers) spend their valuable time on social media, which affect their buying behavior.
The nature of consumer behavior is briefly stated as follows:
The various factors that influence consumer behaviour are as follows
 Marketing factors such as product design, price, promotion,
packaging, positioning and distribution.
 Personal factors such as age, gender, education and income level.
 Psychological factors such as buying motives, perception of the pro
 Situational factors such as physical surroundings at the time of
purchase, social surroundings and time factor duct and attitudes towards the product.
 Social factors such as social status, reference groups and family
 Cultural factors, such as religion, social class—caste and sub-castes.
 Consumer behaviour model includes various motivational factors such
as marketing and environmental forces, consumer buying process, buyer‘s
characteristics buying decision process and buyer‘s response.
 Here in our study we mainly focus on the age element which comes
under the Personal Factors when we study the influence of Media Advertisements on
College Students.
Personal Factors
 Personal factors include age, gender, educational qualification, income
etc. of the consumer. The Personal Factors are the individual factors to the consumers
that strongly influence their buying behaviors. These factors vary from person to
person that result in a different set of perceptions, attitudes and behavior towards
certain goods and services. Followings are various personal factors that affect
consumer behavior.
 Age
Age decides the buying behavior and needs and preferences of the customers.
Such as children will definitely demand toys and chocolates whereas grownups will
demand fashion products as well as clothing. Age affects the buying behavior of the
customers. Teenagers would be more interested in buying bright and loud colors as
compared to a middle aged or elderly individual who would prefer decent and subtle
designs. A bachelor would prefer spending lavishly on items like beer, bikes, music,
clothes, parties, and clubs and so on.
A young single would hardly be interested in buying a house, property,
insurance policies, gold etc. An individual who has a family, on the other hand would
 be more interested in buying something which would benefit his family and make
their future secure.
 Gender
Gender also affects buying behavior of customers. The consumer buying
behavior varies from gender to gender.
 Income
The income of the person influences his buying patterns. The income decides
the purchasing power of an individual and thus, the more the personal income, the
more will be the expenditure on other items and vice-versa.
 Educational Qualifications
Education level of the consumer also affects their buying behavior. Highly
educated customer will spend on books and luxuries whereas less educated people will
spend more on basic necessities.