Browse Items (558 total)
Sort by:
-
-
-
-
A study on Celebrity endorsement as an effective tourism destination marketing tool with reference to Bangalore
Celebrity Endorsement is one of the major forms of advertising in which a business organisation makes use of famous individuals or well known organizations in order to boost consumer interest in the product and/or services that they want to sell. Now-a-days every company is trying to bring in a brand ambassador for their brands. Slowly the trend of tying up with a celebrity in promoting has moved towards promoting tourism destinations. This paper tries to find out the effect of celebrity endorsement as an effective marketing destination tool. The objectives framed to reach to this goal were to identify whether the consumers are consider the tourism advertisements that are endorsed by celebrities, to find out the various factors of celebrity endorsers that motivates people to visit the advertised tourist destination and to determine whether the use of celebrities have greater effect than the use of non celebrities when advertising a tourist destination. Data was collected from 250 respondents from Bangalore city in a questionnaire form. Some of the tools that are been used to test the hypothesis are One sample t- test, ANOVA, Chi Square test, Friedman test and Tukey test . The major findings from the study are that the main factors that a celebrity has to have when endorsing a tourism product is the match between the product and the celebrity and the factor that is not at all looked into by the consumers in a tourism product is physical attractiveness. It was also identified that most of the respondents would have better brand recognition and recall when done by a celebrity endorsement but more weightage for the advertisement, more convincing, easy to choose from the different destinations is only possible with the help of if the advertisement that are not done by celebrity. It was found out that occupation of the consumers would have no impact in getting attracted to celebrity endorsers but students were one category that loved to see celebrity endorsers on screen. Key words: Celebrity Endorsement, tourism destination advertisements, Expertise, Trustworthiness, Similarity, Familiarity, Likeability, Match between the celebrity, transfer meaning, Physical attractiveness. -
-
A Study on Consumer Behaviour and Attitude towards Green Building in Bangalore An Exploratory Study
As we step into the era of green revolution, people are becoming more conscious towards the usage of eco-friendly products, starting from bio-degradable hardware products to hybrid automobiles. This change is not restricted towards social acceptance, but has become a conscience effort towards betterment of society as a whole. There have been a plethora of studies that have sprung up from this shift in societal paradigm, concentrating on the independent thought schools, like future and impact of hybrid automobiles, feasibility and necessity of bio-degradable cellular phones. This particular research covers one of the facets of such consciousness which is on the rise ?? Green Homes. The market for green building is at a nascent stage where the success of it depends on three elements: government, consumer and developer. The present study tries to focus on the end user of the product, the consumers. The major findings of the study are related to the demographic variables like age, income and education having positive impact on consumer attitude and behaviour towards green building. An understanding of consumer attitude and behaviour leads to the creation of better policies and marketing strategies. This study will help developers formulate a strong communication strategy in order to influence consumer attitude and behaviour towards green building. Developers can then convert these strategies into profit by making the consumer more aware and knowledgeable towards the benefit derived from the green building. Keywords: Green Building, Consumer Attitude, Consumer Behaviour -
-
A STUDY ON CONSUMER PERCEPTION TOWARDS ORGANIC FOOD PRODUCTS IN BANGALORE
Consumers worldwide are becoming health conscious and are concerned about nutrition (Hart, 2000) and the quality of food consumed. Consumers are also increasingly concerned with food safety issues taking into consideration, the recent salmonella case in Germany and elsewhere. Gil, Gracia and Sanchez (2000) have investigated that consumers are getting health conscious and are paying more attention to qualit y of food consumed. Therefore, food must deliver an added value that are sought after by consumers besides basic hedonistic and functional needs such as nutrition, taste, health, favorable price-quality ratio, etc in the selection of food. This added value may be perceived in the form of ecological, social and individual benefit. Consumer interest in organic and local foods has shown continued growth for the past two decades. Organic food sales in the U.S. have grown at a rate of approximately 20% per year from $1 billion in 1990 to $17 billion in 2006, currently representing about 2.5% of all food sales (Dimitri and Greene, 2002; Klonsky and Greene, 2005; Organic consumers Association, 2007; Organic Trade Association, 2007). In a report on US public opinion, organic food markets evolve at noticeably different rates. For example, the British and German markets have developed at a faster pace as has been investigated by Baker, Thompson and Engelken (2004). Fotopoulos and Krystallis (2002) studied the earlier Greek market which was considered to be a mature market to be lagging behind a decade when compared to the rest of the developed markets. Krystallis and Chryssohoidis (2005) have investigated that a total of 130 countries are engaged in producing certified organic food with 90 of them belonging to the developing countries having a favorable environmental condition for growing organic produce. The organic food market in India is at a nascent stage. Country specific research undertaken by A.C.Neilsen in 2006 has indicated that Indians are among the top ten buyers of food with health supplements but lack access to organic food products. Due to high logistic cost & low volume operation, organic food products are costly. The domestic market is driving organic market in India and 96.7% of Indias 5,85,000 MT of certified organic products produced in 2007 ?? 08 is used in domestic markets. An eight city survey in 2006 has indicated a potential demand to the tune of INR 5.6 billion for organic food products in India (Mukherjee,2008). However, the domestic market is characterized by limited retail presence, low certified branded produce and a small range of organic product offerings with respect to varieties though potential growth is becoming evident. Chen (2007) identified that awareness of organic food products are generally not promoted and public is not well informed. A study on consumer perception towards organic food products may add insight into the nascent but emerging organic food industry in India. The review of related literature in the area of organic food products and consumer perception studied has provided many insights for the study. It has also provided direction in designing the present study. A number of researchers have identified various factors that influence consumer perception of organic food products mainly in developed countries. Some studies have also been undertaken in Asian countries like Malaysia and Indonesia. Very few researchers have attempted to focus in detail the various factors that influence consumer perception towards organic food. Having reviewed several studies and having identified the gap, the investigator felt an imperative need to undertake the present investigation. The sample consisted of 246 respondents across the city of Bangalore. Convenience sampling technique was adopted for selecting the respondents. The questionnaire was developed by the investigator. Pilot study was conducted to test the reliability. The Cronbachs alpha reliabilit y for the scale was 0.790 which is considered as fairly good. The major findings of the study were: 1.Consumers of organic food products evaluate product quality with the price they pay. 2.Demographic variables namely gender has a positive impact on consumer perception towards organic food products while difference in educational qualifications do not have a significant impact. 3.There is significant impact of psychographic factors on overall satisfaction of consumers towards organic food products. 4.Consumers consider organic food products as safe for consumption. 5.The respondents have also felt that organic food products are healthy to consume 6.Consumers generally prefer to consume grain based organic food products followed closely by organic grains and organic fruits. The implication of the study will be to help marketers develop and strategize their offerings of organic food products more effectively and efficiently contributing to the overall well being of the society and the individual consumer. Key Words used in this study: demographic factors, organic food products and psychographic factors influencing consumer perception. -
-
A Study on Critical Success Factors for Successful ERP Implementation at Indian SMEs
ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning ) comprises of a commercial software package that promises the seamless integration of all the information flowing through the company??financial, accounting, human resources, supply chain and customer information (Davenport, 1998). Much has been written on implementation of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) in organizations of various sizes. The literature is replete with many cases studies of both successful and unsuccessful ERP implementations. Research on the implementation of ERP in certain European countries shows that, the job of implementing an ERP is a riskier business for Small and medium-size enterprises (SMEs) than for Large Enterprises (LEs), still SMEs have been receiving lesser focus from the software vendors and consultants than LEs (Shanks et al.,2000). There have been very few empirical studies that attempt to delineate the critical success and failure factors that drive the success and failure of ERP implementation at Indian SMEs. Much of the time, ERP software vendors and consultants are the targets for blame when anticipated results do not materialize. Are the ERP vendors and consultants that sold the software the real culprits for the lack of business performance improvement? (Rao, 2000).The failure rates of ERP implementations have been publicized widely but, this has not distracted companies from investing large sums of money on ERP implementation. Many companies in developing countries have implemented ERP to capture its benefits still there is a lack of examining Critical Factors (CFs) that contribute in the success and failure of ERP implementation at Indian SMEs(Ranganathan and Kannabiran, 2004). In this dissertation, a framework has been adopted to cover both the national (Indian) and the organization size (SMEs) aspects to identify and rank the CFs that contribute in the success and failure of ERP implementation at Indian SMEs. Four models (ERP model, ERP Implementation Success Model, ERP Implementation Failure Model and ERP Gap (Strategic ERP) Model) were developed to explore and rank the thirty Critical Success Factors (CSFs) along with the twenty Critical Failure Factors (CFFs) that contribute in the success and failure of ERP implementation at Indian SMEs. Key Critical Success Factors (KCSFs) and Key Critical Failure Factors (KCFFs) were identified by ranking of these CSFs and CFFs according to their importance to decide their priorities during the ERP implementation at Indian SMEs. Quantitative survey based method was used to explore what are the possible critical success and failure factors that contribute in the success and failure of ERP implementation at India SMEs .Three close ended questionnaire were used to collect the data from the 500 Indian ERP consultants those who are having experience of ERP implementation in India for almost all types of Indian industries including Indian SMEs. Sample was drawn from ten national and international well known IT (ERP) sector companies which are involve in world wide ERP implementation including Indian SMEs. The Indian ERP consultants have been selected for the data collection using non probabilistic sampling method. The data collected were analyzed using statistical techniques such as descriptive statistics, reliability tests, validity tests, exploratory factor analysis and non parametric tests. In order to explore thirty CSFs and twenty CFFs along with the KCSFs and KCFFs, three close ended questionnaires were customized with the help of literature reviews and experts opinions. Later on it has been standardized for this research with the help of Cronbachs Alpha readability and validity test (Guilfords formula) supported by exploratory factor analysis. Based on the Indian ERP consultants perceptions, literature review, and secondary data review it was found that an ERP implementation at Indian SMEs is not exactly same from the ERP implementations found in the existing literature for the worldwide Large Enterprises (LEs). When discussing the CSFs and CFFs for an ERP implementation at Indian SMEs, it was found that although the factors are more or less same but the importance of factors in term of their priorities (importance) are defiantly different from the ERP implementation of the LEs. -
A STUDY ON CUSTOMER PERCEPTION TO INTERNET BANKING SERVICES IN BANGALORE
In the last few decades, information technologies have changed the banking industry and have provided a way for the banks to offer differentiated products and services to their customers.The advent of technology made the banks which were used to branch based operations for over 200 years,change the nature of financial services offered to its customers. For instance, automated teller machines (ATM) displaced cashier tellers, telephone represented by the call centers replaced the branch banking, the internet replaced mail, credit cards and electronic cash replaced bank transactions. The changes occurring in the banking sector can be attributed to increasing deregulation and globalization, the major stimulus for rationalization, consolidation, and an increasing focus on costs (Ibrahim et al., 2006). Internet Banking also called as on line banking is the new age banking system. Internet banking used the internet as the delivery channel to conduct banking activities like transferring funds,paying bills, viewing account statements, paying mortgages and purchasing financial certificates of deposits (Haque et al, 2009). Banks know that the Internet opens up new horizons for them and moves them from local to global frontiers (Mavri and Ioannou,2006).Banks gain competitive advantage over their rivals by providing electronic banking services as technology induced services reduce cost of operations, removes geographical barriers, provides 24 hours banking, extended hours of business and efficiency in daily banking processes. Without even interacting with the bankers, customers can transact banking activity from any corner of the world. Electronic banking has experienced rapid growth and has transformed the traditional banking practices(Gonzalez et al.,2008).According to Broadie et al(2007) e-banking is leading to a paradigm shift in the marketing practices of banking industry. A professional banking service can be provided only if the background operations are efficient. The background operations can be effective only if it is integrated with an electronic system. The data, hardware, software, network; people are all the essential part of this system. Customers are happy with the system only when it provides them comfort and convenience while transacting with the bank. Internet enabled electronic system facilitate these operation to obtain the result. According to Christopher, E banking has become an important channel to sell the products and services and is perceived to be a necessity in order to stay profitable and successful. The perception is the result of interpreting the experience. There is a growing interest in understanding the users experience (Hiltunen et al.,2002), as it is observed as a larger concept than user satisfaction. From this it is inferred that assessing the user experience is essential for many technological products and services (Wilson & Sasse 2004). Dabholkar (2000) claims that very little are known about customer preference for self service options, particularly those which are technology based. Researchers have found that significant number of customers are either not aware of Internet Banking Services or do not trust IB as a channel to conduct financial transactions. They have also found that customers may adapt the IB services only if they perceive the technology to be useful. This research paper aims to find out the customers perception to internet banking and also tries to examine whether there is any relation between various demographic variables and customers perception about internet banking. The sample consisted of 200 bank customers, 54 from State Bank of India, 44 from ICICI, 27 from HDFC, 19 from other private sector banks, and 56 from other public sector banks. The convenience sampling technique was adopted for selecting the respondents. Tool for measuring the variables was developed by the researcher with the help of previous studies. A questionnaire was developed on a five point likert scale. The reliability and validity of the questionnaire was assessed and found to be 0.7501. The major findings of the study were: 1. There is significant relation between Age and Usage of Internet Banking Services 2. There is significant relation between Profession and Usage of Internet Banking Services. 3. There is no significant relation between Education and Usage of Internet Banking Services. 4. There is no significant relation between Gender and Usage of Internet Banking Services. 5. There is significant relation between Income and Usage of Internet Banking Services. 6. There is significant relation between types of Banks and Usage of Internet Banking Services. 7. There is significant relation between ease of use and satisfaction level of customers of internet banking 8. There is significant relation between operational advantage and satisfaction level of customers of internet banking. 9. There is significant relation between perceived risk and satisfaction level of customers of internet banking. 10. There is significant relation between infrastructure constraints and satisfaction level of customers of internet banking. 11. There is no significant relation between personal limitations and satisfaction level of customers of internet banking. 12. There is significant relation between IB users and their satisfaction level The implication of the study will help Banks to pay more attention towards creating awareness among its customers so that the usage of Internet Banking is increased. Strategies have been detailed in the study. -
A study on emotional intelligence and work life balance of employees in the information technology industry in Bangalore, India /
Emotional Intelligence is a set of qualities and competencies that captures a broad collection of individual skills and dispositions, usually referred to as soft skills or inter and intra-personal skills, that are outside the traditional areas of specific knowledge, general intelligence, and technical or professional skills. Emotions are an intrinsic part of our biological makeup, and every morning they march into the office with us and influence our behavior. Emotional intelligence consists of five factors: Knowing one's emotions, managing emotions, motivating oneself, recognizing emotions in others, and handling relationships Goleman (1995). Researchers today are interested in finding the effects of emotional intelligence on employees and thereby, organizations, and analyzing the various other facets of EQ. Emotional intelligence improves individual and organizational performance. -
A study on emotional intelligence and work life balance of employees in the information technology industry in Bangalore, India /
Emotional Intelligence is a set of qualities and competencies that captures a broad collection of individual skills and dispositions, usually referred to as soft skills or inter and intra-personal skills, that are outside the traditional areas of specific knowledge, general intelligence, and technical or professional skills. Emotions are an intrinsic part of our biological makeup, and every morning they march into the office with us and influence our behavior. -
A Study On Employee Retention Practices and Its Effectiveness In IT Sector
This project is done on human resource management topic in the area of A study on employee retention practices and its effectiveness in IT sector. The most challenging job for any present manager is to retain their employees. Employee retention involves taking measures to encourage employees to remain in the organization for the maximum period of time. Corporate is facing a lot of problem in employee retention these days. Hiring knowledgeable people for the job is essential for an employer. Employee recruitment and retention are one of the major issues facing the IT Sector. But retention is even more important than hiring. There is no end of opportunities for talented person. There is ample number of choice around employees. In olden days salary was all that matters, but today its just one among the components. Some of the other elements are like work environment, relationship, freedom to work etc. Due to high level of attrition it is important to know whether the employees are satisfied with their job and organization, if not the reason for leaving. This project will specify the effectiveness of various retention practices used retain the employees. The study also include various trends of practice followed by the organizations and its effect on the problem of attrition. Retention is a top business priority for more than one third of the organizations. More than one third of HR professionals in IT Sector views retention as one of their pressing issues. It is not very often that the management would be aware of the true reason as to why an employee would be leaving their organization. To be successful in knowing the reason, an effective exit interview procedure is very essential. This would help the organization to an extent to get a clear picture of what is going wrong. -
-
A Study on Foreign Direct Investment in Multi-Brand Retail to Develop a Business Model for Domestic Supermarkets in the Convenience Stores Format.
The main focus of this research is in the area of organised retail specifically in the convenience stores format in India. The Indian organised retail is growing rapidly but is still in the nascent stage. There are many challenges in terms of infrastructure, supply chain efficiencies, cost structure and customer adaptability to the emerging retail formats. India is perceived to be a lucrative destination for retail and with opening up of foreign direct investment imminent many multinational giants are eyeing India. Indian companies are grappling with many challenges and experimenting with many formats in retail. This study attempts to understand the present scenario and the preparedness of domestic companies in consolidating their existing position to evolve a business frame work model for domestic companies to not only consolidate their existing position but also counter threats from multinationals entering into India. The research revealed that there are not many integrated business models, though there are models on different components of supply chain and retail, Indian companies will certainly benefit from creation of integrated business model which can assist them in taking strategic decisions in terms of managing cost and revenue structure and expansion plans. Scope of this study is Grocery and staples and fruits and vegetables business as food contributes to almost 63% in the organised retail business and was bifurcated into back end and front end operations. This study is intended to understand the drivers and factors influencing the back end operations in the area of supply chain efficiencies and the front end operations particularly in respect of costs, revenues and key drivers to create an integrated business model frame work to drive optimisations at all levels. Sample of this study was two major organised retail companies in Bangalore catering to about seventy outlets in Bangalore and having distribution centres. Tools used in this study was data observation sheets for all the key parameters for both back end and front end operations, in addition to unstructured in depth interview with expert group. However the protocol for the interview was predetermined to capture all key data and elements and involved some qualitative aspect and Linear programming for simulation and trying out various permutation combinations. Some of the major findings were: Stock keeping units, cost of procurement and secondary freight emerged as significant drivers to be controlled for efficiency and optimisation link in the back end grocery and staples. Cost of procurement, net sales value and operations cost emerged as the key drivers of efficiency and optimisation link in the back end Fruits and Vegetables. Rentals, Sales, Cost of goods sold, Total personnel cost and Total facilities cost had significant influence on EBIDTA in the front end super market. Break even point for same size stores differed depending upon the location and other cost drivers. Sensitivity analysis revealed that manpower, rent and total facilities cost had significant impact on EBIDTA in the front end. Limitations and future areas of research have also been discussed. -
-
A Study on Identifying Causes for Non Institutional Deliveries among Beneficiaries of National Rural Health Mission
With the aim of ??Health for all and Health everywhere??, several health programs have been launched in the country and worldwide. National Rural Health Mission has been started in the country as well as Karnataka in order to improve our health care delivery system with a strong focus on improving health outcomes especially among women, children and vulnerable population. Bringing healthcare to the door steps of the poor rural population is one of the criticisms under National Rural Health Mission. The main goal of National Rural Health Mission is to bring down maternal mortality and infant mortality by promoting 100% institutional deliveries, this is also above goals of millennium development goal 2015. To reach this goals holistic approach is necessary. In Karnataka under National Rural Health Mission, many programs implemented in order to improve the health status of women and children. The programmes are Janani Suraksha Yojana, Prasuthi Arike, Thayibagya, 108 ambulance services, asha workers for every 1000 population and 24/7 Primary Health Centers have been initiated to promote institutional deliveries and to reduce maternal and infant mortality. Apart from the above programmes mother and child tracking system has been introduced in National Rural Health Mission in order to ensure 100% registration of pregnant women and status to ensure institutional deliveries of pregnant. Taking this as a background the study on ??Identifying Causes for Non- Institutional Deliveries??, was taken of by the researcher for identifying the researcher for identifying the reasons for Non-utilization of benefits provided by Government. There is increase of health services in terms of infrastructure, man power, drugs and equipment increase of health institution and other resources. Even though all health facilities are provided, the community is yet to encash the same due to several socio-cultural factors.This study encompass on religious, cultural, economical, infrastructural, medical causes/reasons for non-acceptance of Institutional deliveries which is critical for safe motherhood and child survival. Keywords: Non-institutional delivery, National Rural Health Mission, Pregnancy. -
-
A study on impact of celebrity endorsement on customer attitude towards the brand and purchase intention
Today celebrity endorsement has become a trend and been used as a winning formula and celebrities in India are the role models; people in the country are so influenced that they are attracted & follow the trends, styles also, consume the product they endorse and they associate the brand with the celebrity therefore the companies and the marketers believe that celebrity changes the purchase intention of the buyer. So this has been conducted to find out the impact of celebrity endorsement on customer attitude towards the brand and intention to purchase. To achieve the objective a questionnaire has been formed to collect the primary data of minimum of 200 respondents that will help to come to a conclusion about the impact if celebrity endorsement. The study also tries out to find out the various factors that affect a buyer purchase intention. For this study attributes of a celebrity and the brand have been studied also the attitude towards the brand. To acquire the required results the questionnaire was distributed to the target group aged 15-50 and the data collected was studied , analyzed to come to the conclusion whether celebrity influence the target group of consumers.