This article shows that consumers who are willing to spend money on perfume products had a high level of advertisement appeals, perceived social status, materialism tendencies, and a moderate level of spending tendency. This results aid marketers in understanding perfume consumers’ purchasing behaviour and market segmentation for competitiveness.
Past study by Nielsen shows that consumers are striving for good looks and will spend fortunes to achieve them. Consequently, this leads to positive effects on the market. However, consumers’ decision to purchase a product depends both on internal and external factors. In this context, advertisement is the external factor that influences consumer’s purchasing behaviour.
This article identified that factors like advertising appeals, tendency to spend, perceived social status, and materialism have significant influence on consumers’ purchasing behaviour of perfume products. In this regard, it is necessary for marketers to understand these factors and their effects on consumers’ decision to purchase perfume products. Marketers can identify different market segmentations and their behaviours, improve market positioning, and utilise their target markets.
Advertisement appeals have significant influence on consumers’ purchasing behaviour. Consequently, marketers should increase advertisement and promote their perfume products. The study also shows that female consumers have tendencies to spend more money on perfume products than their male counterparts. Therefore, marketers should use their promotional tools to target more female consumers than male consumers.
However, this research did not take into account cross-cultural factors and their influence on perfume products and consumers’ behaviour. Therefore, the study does not show how diverse cultures may influence the consumers’ buying behaviour of perfume products.
The Naked Truth: Revealing the Affinity for Graphic Sexual Appeals in Advertising
Most advertisers shock the world with the use of sexually appealing advertisement e.g. designer, Tom Ford with his erotic advertisement of men’s fragrance in 2007. However, how sexual appeals offend consumers and generate negative comments about a brand remain an issue for discussion.
It leads to the issues of how far nudity can go without evoking negative reaction from consumers. The main concern is that research has generally failed to provide favourable and receptive responses to advertisement using sex appeals.
Studies suggest that sexually charged advertisement does not need increased use of nudity to achieve its effects on consumers. In fact, this study shows that nudity is not a key determinant in advertisement.
Instead, advertisers should first determine the level of their target audience in terms of moral equity or relativism, sensation seeking, and sexual self-schema. However, individuals’ personalities determine their levels of reactions to an advertisement than the use of nudity.
Most advertisement pundits recommend the avoidance of using nudity or sexual content or using it with extreme caution in advertisements. Courtney and Whipple note that advertisers should avoid the use of overtly seductive, nude, or partially clad models in their advertisements.
Conversely, current research shows that there are elements of consumers who like and respond favourably to nudity and sexually explicit advertisements. This segment is mainly high-sensation seekers. This segment also has positive sexual self-concepts and is a moral relativist who considers sexual appeals as culturally appropriate.
At the same time, gender also has influence on sexually appealing advertisements. However, putting a sexual appealing advertisement to appeal to either gender will not work and is oversimplifying the issue. This article provides guidelines and strategies for marketers who intend to use sexual appeals in their advertisement.