Research Project Report

On

Effect of Digital Marketing on Consumer Buying Behaviour

Submitted in the partial fulfilment of requirements for the award of Post

Graduate Diploma in Management
Batch (2021-2023)

ANKIT SINGH
GNIOT/GIMS/21/240
TRIMESTER - V

Under the Supervision of

Submitted By
Prof. Manpreet Singh
Ankit Singh
Assistant Professor
00921DM

GREATER NOIDA, UTTAR PRADESH-201306

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 Declaration

I, Ankit Singh of GNIOT Institute of Management Studies (GIMS), Greater Noida hereby submit this report
in particle fulfilment of the requirement for the award of the Post Graduate Diploma in Management (PGDM)
from GIMS, Greater Noida. I declare that the work presented in this report is my original and is not submitted
anywhere else for the award of any other degree/diploma by any other institution/university. To the best of my
knowledge and belief, this report contains no material previously published or written by any other person,
except where due reference is made.

Date: Sign. of Supervisor

Name: Ankit Singh Manpreet Singh

Countersign. Assistant Professor

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

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 I offer my sincere thanks and humble regards to GNIOT Institute of Management
Studies, Greater Noida for imparting us very valuable professional training in Post
Graduate Diploma In Management (PGDM)

I pay my gratitude and sincere regards to Prof. Manpreet Singh my project Guide for
giving me the cream of his knowledge. I am thankful to him as he has been a constant
source of advice, motivation and inspiration. I am also thankful to him for giving his
suggestions and encouragement throughout the project work.

I take the opportunity to express my gratitude and thanks to our computer Lab staff and
library staff for providing me an opportunity to utilize their resources for the completion
of the project.

I am also thankful to my family and friends for constantly motivating me to complete the
project and providing me an environment, which enhanced my knowledge.

Date:

Name: Ankit Singh

Enrollment No.: GNIOT/GIMS/21/240
Course: PGDM (V-Trimester)

Table of Content

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CHAPTER TOPIC PAGE NUMBER

1 INTRODUCTION

2 LITERATURE REVIEW

3 RESEARCH METHADOLOGY

4 DATA ANALYSIS

5 FINDING

6 CONCLUSION

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 Introduction

The internet as we know it took off during the early 1990s, when the World Wide
Web (WWW) protocol was invented, and has since then become incorporated as the
backbone of advanced economies such as North America and major parts of Europe
and Asia. Around 1.3 billion people were estimated to use the Internet at the end
of 2007 (Internetworldstats, 2008). In relation to the world’s population, this gives
20 % as a total amount of the world’s Internet users. While the less developed
countries show a very low percentage, the developed countries have shown a 120 %
annual growth in Internet use during the past seven years.

Ever since the creation of the Internet, the world of business has changed greatly with
a redefinition in areas like marketing and customer relations. This medium opened up
the doors for the conditions of conducting business through electronic methods. The
growth of the internet eventually lead to hundreds of thousands of companies
setting up shops online, gaining millions of consumers worldwide as their
customers. In the early days, the average computer user might not have been able to
use the Internet as we use it today. With the arrival of easy-to- useweb browsers, this
medium went from being an advanced, text-oriented, and specialized application into
a massive multimedia tool on a global scale. Some early speculators like Hein and
Rich (1997) quoted in Goldsmith and Lafferty (2002) suggested that advertising on
this medium would be more effective due to its interactive nature. At that time, the
most used marketing channels were banner advertisements. Although the Internet
users click through-rate of this marketing method went from 30 % in 1994 to 0.3 % in
2002, marketers still spent many billions of dollars each year on internet advertising
with banners.

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However, a web site purely presenting the business will not add any value for the
potential consumer. According to Cronin (1994), traditional marketing e.g. sending out
raw advertisements through e-mail accounts,is not the online way of reaching out to the
customers. Online marketing is just like its regular offline counterpart about sales
promotion, public relations and direct marketing to customers, mainly through
advertising. Online advertising has the crucial role of persuading and informing
consumers of the available selection of products and services (Goldsmith and Lafferty,
2002). During the past decade, companies have learned this procedure to be difficult
without information about the consumers. Through the use of various customer databases
and the location of surfing habits, firms have been able to evolve their marketing strategy,
becoming more customized and personalized for each user. As a result, they are adapting
products and messages through the study and analysis of each user’s demographics,
preferences and purchases (Maclaran and Catterall, 2002). A great knowledge of the
clients is of essential use for a firm’s success.

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 Literature review

In today’s technology-driven world, social networking sites have become an avenue

where retailers can extend their marketing campaigns to a wider range of consumers. Chi
(2011, 46) defines social media marketing as a “connection between brands and
consumers, [while] offering a personal channel and currency for user centered
networking and social interaction.”The tools and approaches for communicating with
customers have changed greatly with the emergence of social media; therefore,
businesses must learn how to use social media in a way that is consistent with their
business plan (Mangold and Faulds 2099).“It is much more to do with what people are
doing with the technology than the technology itself, for rather than merely retrieving
information, users are now creating and consuming it, and hence adding value to the
websites that permit them to do so” (Campbell et al. 2011, 87). Web 2.0 has evolved from
simple information retrieval to interactivity, interoperability, and collaboration (Campbell
et al. 2011).According to AMA (American Marketing Association 2013) it is defined as
such: “Marketing is the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating,
communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers,
clients, partners, and society at large.” The twofold goal of marketing is to attract new
customers and keep and grow current customers by delivering satisfaction. It is a process
by which companies create value for their customers and build long-lasting and strong
customer relationship in order to gain value from customers in return. (Armstrong 2012:
8).Scott states (2010: 6) that the web has created a huge opportunity to reach niche buyers
directly with targeted information that costs a fraction of what big-budget advertising
costs. As such, smaller companies can even reach their target market via digital
marketing without necessitating huge marketing budgets. They only have to find the best
and more suitable digital marketing tools such as newsletters, social media, online
banners, blogs, and pay-per-click marketing. Only problem is that digital marketing
requires innovation, since it can reach millions of people with well-planned marketing, or
only few. Creative campaigns usually get the most attention and sometimes even have to

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be a bit bold and annoy the public.According to Garbey’s survey (2013), the top priority
in digital marketing investment will be to improve commerce experiences through social
marketing, content creation and management and mobile marketing. Key findings also
revealed that a companies’ marketing success relies mostly on their website, social
marketing, and digital advertising, which are all parts of digital marketing. In addition,
savings made by using digital marketing can be reinvested elsewhere. Normally,
companies spend 10 percent of their revenue on marketing and 2.4 percent on digital
marketing, which will increase to 9 percent in the future. (Garder 2013)

Online retail firms buy products and resell them online. Physical products are delivered
by using traditional transportation methods and digital products, such as software and
music, can be delivered via the Internet. (Strauss and Frost 2009: 33).According to Kril
(2013) online shopping can be considered to be a sub-category of ecommerce as it
strongly refers to business-to-consumer transactions such as online retail or online
auctions. Online shopping also refers to online purchases from bricksand-mortar retailers
or from online retailing corporations. Online shopping has increased significantly in
recent years and therefore many traditional department stores have expanded to include
online sales. In addition, some new companies have concentrated on selling only through
online store.Ryan and Jones state in their book (2011: 14) that the shift towards social
media is perhaps the most significant recent development in online marketing. It can be
seen that social media represents a great opportunity for companies and brands to gain
positive favor with consumers.

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 ResearchMethadology

Research methodology is a way to systematically solve the research problem. It may be

under stood as a science of studying how research is done scientifically. It is a system and

in-depth study for any particular subject. Its purpose is to find out answer to questions
through the application of scientific methods. It involves collection, analysis and
interpretation of data. It deals with the application and utilization of data.

3.1) Objectives of the study

Primary objective
 The main objective of the study is to understand the impact of Digital
Marketing on the consumer buying behaviour.

Secondary objectives
 To know affinity in customers for collecting information before
purchase.
 To understand the media consumption of Indians.
 To understand post-purchase behavior of Indian

3.2) Scope
This study is useful for determining the consumer buying behavior of Indians. It will
also help brands to reach their target group through appropriate media. It will present an
idea to brands, based on where to invest to achieve their marketing objectives.

Universe
Universe means the total population available for the study. In this study, the universe
constitutes all Indian, who have online presences.

3.3)Research Design

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A research design is the arrangement of conditions for collection and analysis of the data
in a manner that aims to combine relevance to the research purpose with economy in
procedure. The research design used for this study is of the descriptive type.

Descriptive research studies are those studies which are concerned with describing the
characteristics of a particular individual or a group Research design is broadly classified
into three types as-

 Exploratory Research Design

 Descriptive Research Design
 Causal Research Design

For the purpose of the present project the Descriptive and experimental type of research
design can be said to be most effective and most suitable, because in descriptive type of
study the main emphasis is laid down over the existing situations and experimental helps
in finding the behavior of the consumer. Thus for that purpose Descriptive type of study
has been selected as it seems to be most appropriate to fulfill the objective of the project.

3.5) Sample
Sample means a representation of the whole universe by a small population. Samples for
this research are under Indian youth and young Indians, who come under 17 to 45 year
age groups and who have online presences.

Sample size
The number of sample units selected from the total population is called sample size.
Sample size selected for this study is 200. Among them 146 are males and 54 are females

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 Data Analysis and Interpretations

1) How do you get information about new Products?

Other Sources 7%

News 13%

Advertisements 40%

Family 10%

Friends 30%

Interpretation
The above chart shows that 40% of responded are get information from advertisement,
and 30% from friend, and 13% from news, and 10% from family, and 7% from other
sources.
2) Do you Collect information before purchasing the products?
5%

Yes
No

95%

The above information shows that 95% collects the information before purchasing any
product.

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 3) What type of information do you collect?

Customer's
21%
Experience
Quantity 11%

Attributes 10%

Quality 32%

Price 26%

Interpretation:

Samples are highly information seekers, 95 % of the sample will do reach before
purchase. Only 40% of the samples saying they get to know about a product through
advertisements, 30% get to know from friends and 10% from family. 32% of samples are
collecting information about quality of product the and 26% about price and 21% about
customer experience

4) Did you ever purchase from an online site?

19%

Yes
No
81%

The above information shows that 81% people had purchased from an online site and
19% people had not purchased in their lifetime.

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 5) If yes, then what type of product / services did you purchase from online?

Electronic 22%

Books 11%

Travel products 17%

Fashion accessories 19%

Kichen an home items 2%

Toys 2%

Sport equipments 11%

Gifts 13%

Automotives 3%

Interpretations for 4 and 5: 81% of the sample did make online purchases and mostly
they purchased electronic products, followed by fashion and travel accessories through
online.

6 Do you watch television?

7%

YES
NO

93%

The above data shows that 93% have watched television and 7% have not watched
television.

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7 Do you watch television programs through online?

47% Yes
53% No

(8). Do you read the News through online?

26%

YES
No

74%

Interpretation

93% of the samples are watching T.V. 53% of the samples is watching T.V programs
through online portals. 74% are reading newspapers through online portals.

6%
(9). Do you have
mobile phone or
smartphones? YES
NO

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94%
The above data shows that 94% use mobile phone and 6% people do not have mobile
phone.

(11). Do you have an internet connection in any of the above mentioned gadgets?

4%

YES
NO

96%

Interpretation

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 22% of samples will do research on online and purchase from retail shop, 21% of
the samples will do research in mobile and purchase from retail shop. But 19% of
the samples will purchase directly from a retail shop only.
 67% of the samples will like to express their experience with others; it may be a
nice deal, good experience or bad experience with product.
 37% will share their experience through face to face talk, 32% through social
networking sites and 24% through messaging.

FINDINGS

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 Indian customers are highly information seekers. They collect more information
about quality, price and refer customer’s experiences before purchasing a product.
 Advertisements have high impact for creating stimulus in Indian customers. But
this stimulus will get in to action only through opinion leaders.
 Indian consumers have high tendency to go for online purchase. They have high
affinity to go online for electronic products and apparels.
 One of the current trends in Indian youth and young Indians are watching the T.V
programs via online portals. May be the main reason is convenience of time, they
can watch programs which they had skipped due to some reasons.
 The same thing is happening for the newspaper also, people have more affinity
towards online news portals. Here's the reason may be they can get news updates
very early; they don’t need to wait for daily newspapers.
 In both of these cases, one opportunity is lost for marketer and one opportunity is
emerging for them to reach their T.G.
 More than 90% of the samples have a mobile or Smartphone and laptops or PC.
96% of samples have an internet connection is any of these gadgets, this showing
the penetration of internet in India.
 If we take tablet, penetration in Indian is low. But it doesn’t mean that no one is
using tabs. More than 30% of samples have tablet. For brands they are getting
three more platforms to reach their T.G and engage them.
 33% of the samples are using these gadgets while they are with their friends, so
just think about the reach. If one person noticed something which is cool and
awesome they will surely communicate to others.
 25% of the samples are using these gadgets while watching T.V; it’s again a
barrier for brands which use TVC only. 21% of the samples are using this gadget
for chatting and 16% are using for surfing. What they are surfing? It can be about
a product, local events or locations...etc.
 In this situation, one opportunity is again losing to brands and one opportunity is
emerging for brands to reach their T.G.
 More than 90% of samples are noticing ads, among them 35% of samples noticed
ads through online media, followed by TVC and Newspapers.

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  48% of samples are telling they give more importance to online ads and 34 % of
samples give importance to T.V.C.
 From the first part of this research itself, we know that customers are highly
information seeker. It may be the reason for high trust in online ads. They can
search for more information after seeing an ad or online is the only two way
communication channel for customers.
 22% of the samples do research through their lap or PC before purchasing a
product from the retail shop and 21% do research via mobile.
 Most of the Indians prefer to purchase from a retail shop only, but before going
to retail shop they will seek information about the product through an online
platform. Here is actually change happens in consumer buying journey, early
times consumer belief a product only after seeing the product in a retail shop.
 But now Indian customers want to get conviction about a product before going to
retail shop. So from a marketers view they want to convince their customers
before going to a retail shop.
 Brands want to build a cool presence over digital platforms because the customer
will do research about the product after seeing an ad or after getting stimulated.

CONCLUSIONS

The successful completion of this internship indicates that the future of marketing is in
the hands of digital. Digital marketing is not only concerned with placing ads in portals, it
consists of integrated services and integrated channels. Marketers want to use these

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components in an effective way to reach target groups and to build a brand. In this digital
era marketer is not the custodian for a brand, people who are connected across the digital
platforms are the custodians.

Brands want to build their presence over digital platform, because customers have high
affinity towards digital media than other media’s. More than that customers are highly
information seekers and digital media is the only platform for two way communication
between brands and customers.

Digital media is the best platform to convert a product to a brand. Because it is more cost
effective and it provide lot of touch points to marketer. Brands can able to engage their
target group in an effective way through digital platforms. Digital media is not only for
engagement, brands can increase their customers or they can retain their existing
customers. Digital platforms help to increase the impact of brand recall in target groups.

The research focused on the consumer buying behavior shows that, Indian consumers are
highly information seeker and they will do research about a product before going to a
retail shop. So brands want to give platforms to consumers to understand their product or
to get a really feel of that brand.

I honestly believe that this project report will be at most useful for marketers to
understand the digital marketing and also to plan for future strategies.

I conclude my research by quoting again that “Brands can’t sustain without digital
presence”.

Bibliography
Appendix : Questionnaire
Understand Consumer Buying Behavior of Indians

This questionnaire will be used to understand the consumer buying behavior of Indians.
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1) How do you get information about products?

 Friends
 Family
 Advertisements
 News
 Other sources

2) Do you collect the information before purchasing the product?

 Yes
 No

3) What type of information will you collect?

 Price
 Quality
 Attributes
 Quantity
 Customer's Experience

4) Did you ever purchase from an online site?

 Yes
 No

5) If yes, then what type of product/ service did you purchase online?

 Apparels
 Electronic
 Books
 Travel Products
 Fashion accessories  
 Kitchen and Home items 
 Toys
 Sports equipments 
 Health and Beauty Products
 Gifts
 Automotive 

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 6) Do you watch television?

 Yes
 No

7) Do you watch television programs through online?

 Yes
 No

8) Do you read newspaper?

 Yes
 No

9) Do you read News through online?

 Yes
 No

10) Do you have mobile phone or smartphones?

 Yes
 No

11) Do you have internet connection in any of the above mentioned gadgets?

 Yes
 No

BIBLIOGRAPHY

BOOKS

 Marketing Management – Philip Kotler

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 Online Marketing - A Customer Lead Approach - By. Richard Gay / L.N.
Charlesworth& Rita Esen.
 The Online Customers: New Data Mining and Marketing Approaches - ByYinghui Yang.
 Marketing Research - By C.R. Kothari, Vikas Publications.

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