The Impact of Attitudes toward Branded Products on Consumer Purchase Behavior (Case Study: Rice)

مجله اقتصاد و توسعه کشاورزی

Article 3, Volume 31, Issue 2 - Serial Number 36, July 2017, Pages 149-156   

Document Type: Research Article

DOI: 10.22067/jead2.v31i2.59724

Authors

H. Aghasafari^* ; A. Karbasi

Agricultural Economic, Agricultural Department, Ferdowsi University of Mashhad

Abstract

Introduction: The consumer has an important situation in a market. Therefore, the adoption and success of developed marketing strategies, marketing mix, and other marketing programs among consumers strongly depend on the company’s ability to correctly understand consumer’s needs and expectations as well as on properly detection and identifying individual factors and stimuli influencing consumers when purchasing products for the purpose of reaching their satisfaction. Brand is a tool to position a product or a service with consistent image of quality to ensure the development of repeating customer preferences. Companies spend a lot of money and time on the branding and thus they need to evaluate the effect of brand on consumer buying behavior. Several factors influence the choice of a brand by consumers. In this study, attitudes toward branded rice and their interaction impact on consumer purchase behavior are assessed.
Materials and Methods: This study has used the qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) has been derived from the classical comparative methods that John Stuart Mill theorized in 1843 and Ragin developed and popularized the method in his seminal work. Rather than estimate the net effects of single variables, QCA employs Boolean logic to examine the relationship between an outcome and all binary combinations of multiple predictors. The advantage of QCA is that it allows the researcher to find distinct combinations of causal variables that, in turn, suggest different theoretical pathways to given outcomes. Traditionally, QCA was considered appropriate for relatively small samples, but a QCA with larger samples is technically possible and can produce meaningful results. QCA might be considered an alternative to regression analysis for samples of any size. QCA is better than regressions when the links are complex, i.e., when they are anticipated to involve conjunctural causation, asymmetric links, and equifinality. QCA is also better than regressions when you try to estimate how much a particular factor influences the outcome. As the variables are metric, the appropriate variant of QCA is fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). To analyze the complex causality in the data, essentially you need to proceed in five steps. In the present study, in order to assess the effect of consumer attitude toward branded rice on purchasing of this kind of rice, was used questionnaire tool to collect data through simple random sampling method.
Results and Discussion: Results show that 27 combinations from different attitudes indicate 20 percent of consumer according to ABCDE combination are strongly agree with all attitude toward branded rice and their agreement cause to purchase branded rice. After this, the highest percentage is related to 16% consumers with AbcDE combination. This means that consumers’ agreement with better flavor, better packaging and availability of branded rice cause to purchase branded rice. Finally, 32 combinations have been collapsed into three combinations. In the first and second combination, high agreement with better flavor of branded rice and low agreement with better packaging of branded rice effect on branded rice consumption. In the first combination, these two conditions have been combined with low agreement with enhancing the social status by consuming branded rice that obtained combination explain 26 percent probability of branded rice consumption. In the second combination, these two conditions have been combined with low agreement with availability of branded rice that explain 30 percent probability of branded rice consumption. However, the third combination only by low agreement with overpriced of branded rice or in other words high agreement with proper price of branded rice explains 53 percent probability of branded rice consumption.
Conclusions: The Findings indicated that high agreement with proper price of branded rice with the highest rate of coverage effects on purchasing of branded rice. Therefore, it is suggested that producers of branded rice, in order to increase market share, offer better prices than their competitors. The combination of attitudes high agreement with desirable flavor of branded rice, low agreement with proper packaging of branded rice and low agreement with availability of branded rice with a 30% coverage rate is in the second place in influencing on the tend to buy branded rice. So, it is recommended that producers of branded rice have more attention to the flavor of rice, try to design packaging coordinated by needs of consumers and take action to better distribution of branded rice in the city.

Keywords

Branded rice; Fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis; Mashhad city

References

1- Ajzen I., and Fishbein M. 2008. Scaling and testing multiplicative combinations in the expectancy-value model of attitudes, Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 38 (9): 2222-2247.

2- Chovanova H.H., Korshunov A.I., and Babčanova D. 2015. Impact of brand on consumer behavior, Procedia Economics and Finance, 34: 615 – 621.

3- Cooper B., Hammersley M., Gomm R., and Glaesser J. 2012. Challenging the qualitative-quantitative divide: Explorations in case-focused causal analysis. Continuum, London & New York.

4- Dehdashti Shahrokh Z., Salehi Sedghiani J., and Ghasemi V. 2012. Analyzing the influence of customer attitude toward brand extension on attitude toward parent brand, Journal of Contemporary Research in Business, 3(9): 1133-1148.

5- Fianto A.Y.F., Hadiwidjojo D., Aisjah S., and Solimun S. 2015. The influence of brand image on purchase behavior through brand trust, Business Management and Strategy, 5(2): 58-76.

6- Fiss P.C. 2007. A set-theoretic approach to organizational configurations, Academy of Management Review, 32 (4): 1180-1198.

7- Fritzsche E. 2014. Making hermeneutics explicit: How QCA supports an insightful dialogue between theory and cases, International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 17(4): 403-426.

8- Goertz G., and Mahoney J. 2012. A tale of two cultures: Qualitative and quantitative research in the social sciences. University Press, Princeton.

9- Greckhamer T., Misangyi V.F., and Fiss P.C. 2013. The two QCAs: From a small-N to a large-N set theoretic approach. p. 49-75. In Research in the Sociology of Organizations. Part 3. 3nd ed. Emerald Group Publishing Limited.

10- Hess J.S., Singh J., Metcalf L., and Danes J. 2014. The impact of consumer product package quality on consumption satisfaction, brand perceptions, consumer investment and behavior, Journal of Applied Packaging Research, 6(1): 23-39.

11- Hsiao Y.H., Chen L.F., Chang C.C., and Chiu F.H. 2016. Configurational path to customer satisfaction and stickiness for a restaurant chain using fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis, Journal of Business Research, 69(8): 2939-2949.

12- Hosseinzadeh A., Azad N., and Seyed Ali Akbar S.M. 2014. A study on the effect of brand experience on consumer purchase experiences: A case study of food industry, Decision Science Letters, 3(1): 93–102.

13- Isik A., and Yasar M.F. 2015. Effects of brand on consumer preferences: A study in Turkmenistan, Eurasian Journal of Business and Economics, 8(16): 139-150.

14- Kathuria L.M., and Gill P. 2013. Purchase of branded commodity food products: Empirical evidence from India, British Food Journal, 115 (9): 1255-1280.

15- Kordnaeij A., Askaripoor H., and Bakhshizadeh Postgraduat A. 2013. Studying affecting factors on customers’ attitude toward products with halal brand (Case study: Kuala lumpur, Malaysia), International Research Journal of Applied and Basic Sciences, 4(10): 3138-3145.

16- Kurajdova K., and Taborecka-Petrovicova J. 2015. Literature review on factors influencing milk purchase behavior, International Review of Management and Marketing, 5(1): 9-25.

17- Lamba B. 2012. Influence of brands on consumer’s buying behavior, National Monthly Refereed Journal of Research in Commerce & Management, 2 (11): 28-33.

18- Longest K.C., and Vaisey S. 2008. Fuzzy: A program for performing qualitative comparative analyses (QCA) in Stata, The Stata Journal, 8 (1): 79–104.

19- Malik M.E., Ghafoor M.M., and Iqbal H.K. 2013. Impact of brand image and advertisement on consumer buying behavior, World Applied Sciences Journal, 23 (1): 117-122.

20- Mozas-Moral A., Bernal-Jurado E., Medina-Viruel M.J., and Fernandez-Ucles D. 2016. Factors for success in online social networks: An fsQCA approach, Journal of Business Research, 69(11): 5261-5264.

21- Navarro S., Llinares C., and Garzon D. 2016. Exploring the relationship between co-creation and satisfaction using QCA, Journal of Business Research, 69(4): 1336–1339.

22- Ragin C. 2000. Fuzzy-set social science. University of Chicago Press, Chicago.

23- Ragin C. 1987. The comparative method: Moving beyond qualitative and quantitative strategies. University of California Press, Berkeley/Los Angeles/London.

24- Rihoux B., and Ragin C.C. 2009. Configurational comparative methods. Sage, Los Angeles.

25- Rizwan M., Qayyum M., Qadeer W., and Javed M. 2014. The impact on branded product on consumer purchase intentions, Journal of Public Administration and Governance, 4 (3): 57-47.

26- Schiffman L.G., and Kanuk L.L. 2007. Consumer behavior. Prentice-Hall of India Private Limited, New Delhi.

27- Schneider C.Q., and Wagemann C. 2012. Set-theoretic methods for the social sciences: A guide to qualitative comparative analysis. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

28- Schulze-Bentrop C. 2013. Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) and configurational thinking in management studies. PL Acad. Research, Frankfurt am Main New York.

29- Sinthamrong P., and Rompho N. 2015. Factors affecting attitudes and purchase intentions toward branded content on webisodes, Journal of Management Policy and Practice, 16(4): 64-72.

30- Toth Z., Thiesbrummel C., Henneberg, S.C., and Naude P. 2014. Understanding configurations of relational attractiveness of the customer firm using fuzzy set QCA, Journal of Business Research, 68(3): 723-734.

31- Urueña A., and Hidalgo A. 2016. Successful loyalty in e-complaints: FsQCA and structural equation modeling analyses, Journal of Business Research, 69(4): 1384-1389.

32- Woodside A.G. 2013. Moving beyond multiple regression analysis to algorithms: Calling for adoption of a paradigm shift from symmetric to asymmetric thinking in data analysis and crafting theory, Journal of Business Research, 66(4): 463–472.