IMPACT OF TELEVISION COMMERCIALS ON RURAL MEN’S BUYING HOUSEHOLD PRODUCTS

Abstract

Understanding consumer perception and the impact of Television Commercials on buying products are well recognized in developed countries. With the growth of electronic media, e.g. television, it has created a wide range of opportunities for marketing and consumer analysts to improve existing practice in this area. Given that all documented literature on the impact of TV commercials on consumers' perceptions has been conducted internationally, this research is motivated by a gap in advertising literature. Not much research has been done on TVCs that influence on consumer perception in Bangladesh. Whatever research has been done on TVCs’ influence in Bangladesh, those were done on consumers’ perception of urban areas, on women, students or, on teenagers. However, impact of TVCs on rural men buying household products that identifies the responsible perception factors has not been done. In view of this fact, the perception of consumers with regard to TVCs should be explored in particular since there is no emphasis placed on their effect on Rural Men's perceptions in Bangladesh. In view of these gaps in knowledge, the research question explored here is as follows: How do television commercials (TVC) influence the factors of rural men’s buying decisions towards household products? This research problem has not been adequately explored in the current literature. However, literature from the relevant discipline was integrated and synthesized to develop a frame- work about impact of TVCs on rural men’s perception of buying decisions and thus arrive at following broad objective and three specific objectives: Broad objective: To understand how Television Commercials (TVCs) influence the perception and buying decision of Bangladeshi rural men towards household products. Specific objectives: 1) To identify the factors of rural men’s perception of buying decisions influenced by TVCs. 2) To identify the outcome factors of rural men’s involvement with TVCs towards buying decisions. 3) To develop and test a model of the rural men’s buying decisions toward household products in Bangladesh. xvii These research objectives have been investigated by a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods, the sequential mixing method. The first phase included two focus groups, which discussed the establishment of an existing literature and further clarifying and refining a theoretical framework. In the second stage, the test of the proposed model of the impact of TVCs on rural men's perception and involvement outcome factors was carried out using a survey methodology. The data, as well as eleven hypotheses proposed in the main model were analyzed by this study using a structural equation modelling technique. In the primary model, through qualitative analysis, we had total of 10 Factors/complex variables and 50 scale items/Simple Variables under the perception Domain and Involvement outcome Domain. We have used reliability statistics, KMO sampling adequacy measures, Bartlett's sphericity test and the data obtained from a field survey to check their compatibility. From Cronbach’s Alpha, KMO and Bartlett’s test, we found that all 50 variables are reliable and can be treated as a scale item. However, when EFA & CFA were done and communalities for all the variables were checked , we found that out of 50 variables total 45 variables are greater than 0.4 except 5 variables which are below 0.4. Hence, among the 50 variables, except for 5 unacceptable variables, all the remaining 45 variables were treated as scale items. The proposed revised model has shown that Cronbach coefficient values for all factors are more than 0.8, and KMO values of the sampling adequacy test have also been above 0.7. We may conclude that the scale reliability of our data is good, and therefore, our data is internally consistent and adequate for our model. From regression weight and standardized regression weight analysis, we found that the p values are significant and the estimate values are acceptable. We have found out from the model fit indices, that our revised model is more significant and well-fitted than the primary model. Therefore, the proposed model and all the eleven hypotheses are not rejected. Hence, we may conclude that TVCs significantly influence the selected five factors of perception and that TVCs' involvement has substantial impact on the selected five xviii outcome factors. It has also been proved that “Perception towards TVC” domain has a great impact or statistically significant effects on the “Involvement Outcome with TVC” domain. From all the above analysis and findings, we may conclude that the revised model along with all the eleven hypotheses and factors (complex variables) are established except for a few simple variable, which were discarded according to test analysis. These findings have an impact on the three research objectives. The development and confirmation of a final theoretical model concerning the impact of TV commercials on rural men's perception as well as their involvement outcomes has been an important contribution to this research. That model is a contribution because it is the first intensely researched step forward regarding the impact of TVCs on rural men’s buying household products. This thesis has both theoretical and practical implications in the area of consumer’s perception and consumer’s involvement outcome factors. In order to reflect the process and give a basis for future research, this model has been developed from theory and empirical studies carried out in that study.