Understanding luxury brand perception and consumer behavior evolution

luxury brands Digital marketing and sales for What does the word "luxury" exactly mean? Majority of the people can identify a luxury product however, when it comes to describing the characteristics or qualities that give the product that luxurious feel it becomes hard for us to pin point them. The main reason behind this is the fact that every individual has his/her own perception of luxury; some might go for the quality or rareness while others might think of luxury in terms of comfort (Chevalier, and Mazzalovo, 2012).

Why do we take out our best suit when we have to attend a significant interview or meeting? Why do we ensure that we are wearing some good quality perfume rather than a cheap one while going out on a date? In case of luxury, self-indulgence concept is very closely related to socially directed motives (Chevalier, and Mazzalovo, 2012).

Since the start of civilization the luxury concept has been there in different forms. The role play by the concept of luxury was as significant in the ancient eastern and western societies as it is today in the modern societies. Due to the clear differences that were present among the social classes in the earlier civilizations, it was majorly the elite that consumed luxury in those times. Therefore, at that time luxury had a relatively clear definition. In those times luxury was identified as something that the elite had and the poor couldn't (Chevalier, and Mazzalovo, 2012).

There has been a continuous evolvement in the customers who buy luxury products and the meaning of luxury. But the drastic evolvement seen in the last 20 years has never been seen before. The rate at which the luxury sector is increasing in the world today is approximately 2 times the rate of the world's wealth. The main reason behind this much growth of the luxury sector is the increase in the number of potential customers (Chevalier, and Mazzalovo, 2012).

There is a unique aspect to the luxury goods' industry mainly because they have a very particular customer base and target market that they target with the help of promotions and marketing. This industry is also guarded very well and it is very hard to get any information regarding it. The products being manufactured by this sector do hold a certain amount of prestige and status and eventhough the market segment that can afford these products is very small but the huge number of people who are exposed to their advertisementshave hopes of one day being able to buy these products as well (Chevalier, and Mazzalovo, 2012).

This paper has a very topical theme in the light of the present scenario since today brand image, the services being provided by the brands and their performance has become very important to the brands as these factors are the key to not only attracting new customers but to achieve customer loyalty from the new and existing customers as well. Customers are the basis for the success or failure of any company or business therefore, today marketing plays a very important role in attracting and retaining customers and for these reasons companies are coming up with new marketing strategies everyday (Chevalier, and Mazzalovo, 2012).

The main purpose of conducting this study is to find out that in this digital age of marketing what are the methods that can help in winning the attention of customers. In accordance with this purpose the major objective of the study is to explore the methods which, in this age of digital marketing can help in attracting new customers (Chevalier, and Mazzalovo, 2012).

Background of the study

Promoting brands by making use of all kinds of digital advertising is known as digital marketing. Today, this includes mobile, Television, Internet, Radio and any other kind of digital media. The practice which is used in the promotion of services and products by using the digital distribution channels so that the customers are reached in a cost-effective, timely, personal and relevant manner is known as digital marketing.

Although there are a lot of practices and techniques that are a part of digital marketing which come under Internet Marketing but digital marketing goes beyond internet marketing. Therefore, it is because of this that there are a number of host elements through which products can be marketed with the help of the digital technology and without the requirement of Internet such as sms/mms, digital outdoor, mobile phones, display/banner ads (Danziger, 2005).

In the past digital marketing was seen more as a stand-alone service however, today it is seen more and more as a domain which covers majority - if not all - of the traditional areas of marketing like Direct Marketing as, it provides the audience with similar communication methods but in digital fashion. In order to provide support to the "engagement" and "servicing" of the customers digital is now being broadened (Danziger, 2005).

There are a number of channels that a person can choose from in the present digital media space. Every channel has its disadvantages as well as advantages. A company can achieve its goals even by making using of a channel that it finds cheaper to use provided that it makes use of the channel in the right manner. If paid search is costing more than the display advertising than initially the company should opt for the cheaper option. It's all about checking out various options to see which one works the best. The more number of channels that you can conduct your tests on the quicker profits will start getting generated (Danziger, 2005).

Search advertising is a very effective manner through which message can be sent to the active online users whereas, strong brand awareness is provided by the display advertising. Highly effective and integrated media solutions can be found that can help in meeting the advertising goals as well by combining both display as well as research (Danziger, 2005).

Search is now being chosen by the online marketers as their customer acquisition tool since "searching" is today the most famous internet activity among the people who use internet. However, improvedbrand awareness, higher offline and online sales and better search engagement can be achieved by the marketers if they make use of the display marketing efforts along with the search options (Danziger, 2005).

Since customers are targeted at the key touch-points while making the purchase decision therefore, display and search perform better when they are coupled together. A Pull and Push mechanism is created by it with the help of which the customers are guided without the disruption of media and ultimately higher conversion rates are achieved by this (Danziger, 2005).

The advantages related to combining display and search marketing has been shown in different studies. One reason why display ads should be included in the campaign is the fact that it is a lot cheaper to make use of the display advertisements as compared to search as they will eventually help in getting the brand noticed even if they don't convert immediately (Kapferer and Bastien, 2012).

It will be more advantageous to make use of both of them as today more and more people have been making use of search and if there are search results being displayed by the search ads then it will result in a more targeted marketing. This way the chances of people clicking on the search ads to find out what they are looking for will increase immensely. Also, brands are provided with the opportunity to be more creative with the display advertising in order to attract more users to their own websites. Sophisticated targeting and campaign reach together makes the banner advertising a very strong driver of traffic (Kapferer and Bastien, 2012).

The products that are recently seen by the people in the display ads are often searched for by them as we. Similarly, search activity can result in sites where the readers get exposed to the display ads for the subjects or products that they had just performed the research for. In either of the cases there exists the opportunity to have display and search work on the target their successive impact (Kapferer and Bastien, 2012).

There exists no doubt in the fact that combining search and display will help in achieving better results as compared to if they are kept separate. However, in order maximize the conversions of intelligent timelines and to reinforce the brand and offer there exists a need for constant messaging (Kapferer and Bastien, 2012).

Digital Marketing Media

There are a number of various digital marketing media channels that are being used by the digital marketing sector like (Kapferer and Bastien, 2012):

* Podcasts

* Cell phone Short Message Service (SMS) also known as text messages

* Voice Broadcast

* Really Simple Syndication (also known as RSS) feeds

* Banner ads on affiliate websites

* Video E-mails

* Outdoor digital displays

* Blogs

* Websites (Kapferer and Bastien, 2012).

Digital Marketing Solutions for Luxury Brands

Various delivery channels along with the use of Pull as well as Push digital marketing techniques are included in the digital marketing solutions. Both these channels are made use of in order to deliver the information andmessages regarding the services and products to the customers along with anyone else who had submitted an inquiry.

Greater conversion rates have been achieved by the digital marketing campaigns for affiliates as compared to solely using the e-marketing strategy since, it is not restricted only to the Internet. It might be very hard to believe but the fact is that there are a lot of people in this country who don't have access to a computer or Internet. Whereas, almost all of us do have an MP3 player, cellphone or an iPod and view the digital displays outdoors.

With these crucial economic conditions and the increasing recession the trend of customers shopping online is still continuing as they hope to find good deals that could help them in saving some money. Online tools are being given a lot of importance by the companies as a crucial part of their marketing strategies. The digital marketing is expected to continue its rapid rate of growth in the coming years as well. The fact that the marketing and media landscape has changed in a long-lasting and fundamental manner can't be denied.

Purpose of the study

Exploring the methods that would help in winning the attention of customers in a more effective manner in this digital marketing era is the main purpose of this study. Following are the research questions that this aim can be translated into:

How is the digital marketing being used by the luxury brands in order to draw customers?

Are they getting the results that they hoped for by making use of these digital marketing campaigns?

How can the effectiveness of digital marketing for the luxury goods be increased?

Significance of the study

Today there is a compulsion that can be seen in the businesses to stay on top of the arising technologies in the present market scenario where today there are so many choices when it comes to the various brands and choices. The Luxury Brands are being continuously pressurized by this phenomenon as well. The sales of a business are defined by its business plan in exactly the same way as the quality of the materials defines the power that the Luxury Brands hold.

More and more businesses are today looking at e-business as an important tool for the business plan. The power of Web 2.0 is today being realized by the Luxury Brands industry as a very important tool to improve the profitability as well as productivity. The potential for gain is very high and the progress momentum is revolutionary and rapid.

Also, with the increase in the digital consumers, internet has proved to be an important medium in influencing the decision making process of consumers went it comes to buying a Luxury Brand. This study gets even critical as, the methods which are effective in winning the attention of customers in this digital age of marketing are explored in it.

Methodology

The main elements of this research study scheme are explaining the methodology which is used in this study that will help the researcher in finding his target, recognizing the resources as well as backup which will be required in the analysis, collection and interpretation of data (Saunders et al., 2012). The most appropriate method to conduct this type of research seems to be Survey method in which both the deduction as well as induction methods are made use of. Two main methods are provided to the researcher to choose from depending on the type of research that is being conducted. These methods are as follows:

1.

Interviews

2.

Questionnaires.

The interview will be conducted in the explanatory and standardized format while there will be well-formed as well as close-ended questions that will be asked in order to carry out the research.

Research Design

Mixed methodology, questionnaire and research are used in this research. Semi-structured format will be used to conduct the interviews. There will be 100 digital consumers that the questionnaires will be given to. The member of the online social networking sites will be the participants. The reason behind this is the fact that studies have shown that 45% of the top-end luxury buyers are users of Facebook, 14% of Twitter and 12% of Pinterest. The major statistical technique used is the "regression analysis."

Conclusion

This study will be conducted to find out the methods that can win the attention of the customers in a more effective manner in this digital age of marketing. Furthermore, it will also be the scope of the study to further explore the digital marketing processes rather than just satisfying the researcher's interests. It is being expected by this research that it will help in shedding more light upon the information regarding the current situation and will also provide us with a platform for the developments and discourses for the future.