Advertising and consumer purchasing behavior : A case of Mukwano Group of Companies

Abstract

In a highly competitive environment, creating awareness among customers has become a universal practice by firms aimed at increasing their market share. Although some research indicates that advertising increases purchasing behavior, other studies disagree and instead conclude that advertisements have less effect on the audience. Using the case study of Mukwano, this study seeks to find out whether advertisements impact the consumers’ attitudes towards the advertised product, their purchase decision process and actual purchasing behaviour for the products of Mukwano group of companies. The research followed a cross sectional design in collecting primary data from 145 respondents in Kampala central using a questionnaire. The main statistical procedures used in testing the hypotheses included an independent samples t-test and ANOVA test. The study’s findings show that attitude formation of consumers is significantly (p<0.05) influenced by frequency of exposure to an advert. It is also noted that consumers’ purchase intention is significantly (p<0.05) associated with the number of times a person is exposed to an advert. In addition, actual purchasing behavior of consumers is significantly (p<0.05) associated with exposure to the adverts. The findings provide some insights and feedback for the industry and media in drafting various advertising strategies on how to increase the favorable consumers’ attitude towards advertising, intention to purchase and actual purchasing behaviour.