Purchasing Intentions among Undergraduate Students towards Men’s Skin Care Products 1. Introduction Traditionally, the cosmetic industry has focused on an association with women consumers more than men consumers. The composition of cosmetic market is consisted of four competitive segments: hair care, perfume, make-up, and skin care. Most of the products that were emerged in the market are cosmetics and personal care product for women.
(Pitman, 2005) According to U. S.Commercial Service (2007), Malaysia is one of the Asian countries that have a highly competitive cosmetic market. Many firms and brands do a lot of investment for their promotional campaign in order to maintain their market share and encourage the industry. In addition, many marketers would like to focus on a new target due to the slow growth rate of women’s product in Malaysian cosmetic industry.
(U. S. Commercial Service, 2007) As Audrey, Cyrielle, & Quentin (2007) have argued, the business of men cosmetic is booming due to the increasing demand of men cosmetic products.According to research firm men’s behaviour is becoming more likely women shopping behaviour (Teather. 1995).
Bocock (1993) noted that men are now as much a part of modern consumerism as women. Their construction of a sense of who they are, of their identity as men, is now achieved as much through style of dress and body care, image, the right look, as women (Bocock, 1993). However, the consumers would concern not only on product value, but also on salesperson, service, business image, and brand equity during their purchase decision (Chi, Yeh & Chion, 2009).Therefore, the business marketers have to seek for their competitive advantages in order to operate and growth continuously.
The authors found from previous studies that many factors could affect the consumers’ behaviour towards purchasing such as self-concept (Sirgy, 1982), brand equity (Cobb-Welgren et al. , 1995; Myers, 2003), attitude (Farquhar, 1989; Souiden & Diagne, 2009) and brand preference (O? Cass & Lim, 2011). However, brand is one of the most valuable assets and be a company’s competitive advantage (Tong & Hawley, 2009).Purchasing the same products or brands or showing favour to a particular brand is a way consumers do to response to brands.
The latter issue can lead a firm to have high market share and high profits (Chang & Liu, 2009). In addition, the company, which has a strong brand image, will lead to a positive influence on purchasing behaviour (Gordon et al. , 1993; McEnally and de Chernatony, 1999). Most of the researchers and practitioners have emphasized how to create and manage strong brands (Keller, 1993; Aker, 1996; Helman et al. 1999; and Chang & Liu, 2009). As Yoo, Donthu & Lee (2000), and Kim, Knight & Pelton (2009) pointed out that “brand equity is the incremental utility or value added to a product by its brand name”.
Chi et al. (2009) supported that business marketers should focus on increasing brand equity to create a value of particular brand into customer mind to gain a profit and market competitiveness when the business confront with intense competitive market. However, it is not meaningful if the brand has no meaning to the consumers (Cobb-Walgren et al. , 1995).Furthermore, many marketers rely on advertising as primary tool to develop and contribute brand equity (Walker, 2002).
Using celebrities in advertising for brand building is definitely affect consumers brand preference, brand attitude or brand awareness, brand association, brand loyalty and purchase intentions (Joshi and Ahluwalia, 2008; Ohanian, 1991; White, 2000 as cited in Nelson, 2010). Therefore, it is necessary to study how brand can build the value to consumers mind, how it relates to purchasing intentions among consumer choice, and this currently research.
