Marketing Research Consumer Goods Industry

Question: Discuss about theMarketing Research for Consumer Goods Industry. Answer: Introduction: Business has evolved over the years and there has been several attempts made by different business houses to organize the fast moving consumer goods industry. This is one evergreen sector which is fairly insulated from the seasonal volatilities or macroeconomic fluctuations. Therefore it emerged as one of the lucrative sectors for several companies and in the developed countries there have been numerous attempts to tap into this market through one-stop solutions of the daily needs of customers. One such perfect example is David Jones Ltd. of Australia which had established a successful business in the consumer goods section. It had set up several departmental store chains throughout Australia and made considerable breakthrough in this complex but profitable industry. Initially the founder David Jones had started the business in a partnership format but later established his own store throughout Australia. Consumer goods industry is highly dependent on the consumer preferences and the individual likings or disliking of the consumers. David Jones had successfully established its own formula for being profitable in this highly fragmented sector through the establishment of organized departmental stores. In this research report there has been attempt to understand the marketing principles employed by David Jones to understand and leverage the consumer behavior of Australian population to implement a successful business(Cox, 2009). Research Aims and Objectives: This research is aimed at understanding the marketing principles and objectives employed by David Jones Ltd. to leverage the Australian departmental store market. As this industry is highly fragmented and fierce competition exists among the peers David Jones had to establish targeted marketing communications and campaigns to allure consumers in their departmental stores. Moreover there needs to be appropriate distribution strategies in order to penetrate the market with right products at the right time at the right place. Attempt will be made to critically analyze and understand all these aspects in this research through the following questions: How David Jones developed its marketing mix to target the appropriate audience? How the marketing objectives were established by David Jones to leverage the consumer buying behavior in Australia? What all attributes established by David Jones in the departmental store business can be emulated by other such enterprises to be successful in this domain? Overall the main object of this research project is to map the end to end marketing innovations and process of David Jones to get insights about the departmental store chain industry so that it can be used as a best practice or benchmark to be emulated by other such organizations in the industry. Research Need: Consumer goods business is a highly complex segment from marketing perspective and is always evolving to grab the attention of its target audience. Departmental store chain industry has certain value propositions which are quite common among all the players. Therefore it is necessary to understand what are the drivers which motivate consumers to pick and choose a particular departmental store. The different schemes and promotional campaigns that are run by David Jones have to be critically analyzed since it has been able to capture the imagination of the consumers(Clark, 2008). Properly understanding the marketing strategy and overall corporate strategy of David Jones would help in understanding the typical activities that goes well with the consumers in the departmental store industry. This can then be emulated by other players may be in another geography to replicate a similar successful model. Understanding consumer behavior is a complex task in such an ambiguous environment and t herefore it is of utmost importance to critically analyze the success factors of David Jones with special reference to the marketing principles. Research Methodology Research methodology needs to be charted out clearly in order to have a clear sense of direction for the topic that is at hand. Any successful study has a well thought out research plan and similar is the case with the ongoing project. Since understanding consumer behavior requires interacting with the participants at a personal level there is a need for qualitative analysis. Apart from that quantitative methodology enables to gather data which can provide insights in a scientific way. Data gathered is subjected to statistical manipulations to generate meaning out of them which is used for further interpretations. Therefore the mythology used for this project is a mixed one which employs both qualitative and quantitative methodology in order to unearth the successful marketing strategies of David Jones Ltd. Quantitative methodology would require gathering data from a wide range of respondents who have been customers of David Jones or one of its peers. In depth interviews can be condu cted for qualitative insights. All these factors have been kept in mind in order to chart out the research methodology section for this study(C.R.Senthilnathan, 2011). Research Outcome This research is aimed at achieving several outcomes in the marketing domain which would add value to the existing literature on consumer goods departmental store. It aims at understanding the different approaches undertaken by David Jones to properly segment, target and position itself among the departmental store universe. This research will pave the path for understanding the consumer behavior which drives the buying behavior when it comes to choosing consumer goods at departmental stores. The attributes which have been established by David Jones as its trademark can be emulated by other similar organizations to establish a successful business(Boulding and Lee, 2012). The marketing strategy and objective adopted by David Jones can be benchmarked as best in class so that they can be recorded in the literature for future referral. Moreover the success factors of David Jones in Australia can also lead to revelations about its creativity and innovation in the departmental chain space which are extremely important to understand and replicate. These are some of the aims and outcomes that have been targeted through this research. Reference Boulding, W. and Lee, E. (2012) Differentiation via the marketing mix,Marketing Letters, 3(4), pp. 343356. Doi: 10.1007/bf00993919. C.R.Senthilnathan, C.R.S. (2011) Drivers of store choice in departmental stores,Indian Journal of Applied Research, 3(11), pp. 296298. Doi: 10.15373/2249555x/nov2013/96. Clark, L. (2008) Marketing courses and marketing research,Journal of Marketing, 12(4), p. 488. Doi: 10.2307/1246631. Cox, R. (2009) Current trends in chain store taxation,Journal of Marketing, 4(2), p. 215. Doi: 10.2307/1245423.