Determination of Awareness Level for Green Marketing Among Dealers and Customers in 800CC-2000CC Segment of Cars

Determination of Awareness Level for Green Marketing Among Dealers and Customers in 800CC-2000CC Segment of Cars

Shweta Dubey Kamlesh Gurjar

Asst Prof. SAIT,Indore Asst Prof. SAIT,Indore

ABSTRACT: Green marketing incorporates a broad range of activities, including product modification, changes to the production process, packaging changes, as well as modifying advertising. Yet defining green marketing is not a simple task. Indeed the terminology used in this area has varied, it includes: Green Marketing, Environmental Marketing and Ecological Marketing. Green or Environmental Marketing consists of all activities designed to generate and facilitate any exchanges intended to satisfy human needs or wants, such that the satisfaction of these needs and wants occurs, with minimal detrimental impact on the natural environment. The objective of the present study is to explore the awareness level among the customers and dealers of various segments of cars about green marketing particular, for that a survey had been done on 800cc-2000cc cars customers and dealers of the city.

The push for green cars comes from people looking for ways to lessen their impact on the environment and become less dependent on oil. The research into alternative and more efficient energy is ongoing, but there is technology available for those who are willing to help. At the individual level, personal automobiles are one of, the easiest ways for people to help with the movement. As more people are becoming informed and taking action, companies are feeling pressure from the government and customers to make changes. The change process has been relatively slow and not all countries feel passionate about making changes. In Greece, the change has been slow to sell more green cars.

1. INTRODUCTION:

   Since the beginning of the 1990s [1], with the increasing awareness of the importance of environmental protection in various countries, there has emerged a "green" trend all over the world. New concepts like green food, green appliance, green factories and so on have emerged with growing frequency, and the total volume of green consumption has increased dramatically. It can be asserted that the next century will be a "green century" and we are now entering into a "green era". In this context, as a new phenomenon in contrast to traditional marketing, green marketing is penetrating into various areas of international marketing and is becoming a new trend which will certainly have tremendous influences on the development of international trade. Hence we ought to pay great attention to its significance. Although environmental issues influence all human activities, few academic disciplines have integrated green issues into their literature. This is especially true of marketing. As society becomes more concerned with the natural environment, businesses have begun to modify their behavior in an attempt to address society's "new"

   concerns. Some businesses have been quick to accept concepts like environmental management systems and waste minimization, and have integrated environmental issue in to all organizational activities.

   Some evidence of this is the development of journals such as "Business Strategy and the Environment" and "Greener Management International," which are specifically designed to disseminate research relating to business' environmental behavior.

   One business area where environmental issues have received a great deal of discussion in the popular and professional press is marketing. Terms like "Green Marketing" and "Environmental Marketing" appear frequently in the popular press.[7] Many governments around the world have become so concerned about green marketing activities that they have attempted to regulate them. One of the biggest problems with the green marketing area is that there has been little attempt to academically examine environmental or green marketing. This project will attempt measuring awareness level of the youth customers and their purchase behavior with reference to the price hike due to green design. To understand

   the project better some of the important terms have been explained below.

2. WHAT IS GREEN?

   Green products are typically durable, non-toxic, made from recycled materials, or minimally packaged. Of course, there are no completely green products, for they all use up energy and resources and create by-products and emissions during their manufacture, transport to warehouses and stores, usage, and eventual disposal. So green is relative, describing those products with less impact on the environment than alternatives. Ask the question, "What is green?" If any certainty exists at all, too often the answer is "It depends." That's because the factors that make a product "green" often depend upon the specific product or product category, where it will be used, how often, by whom, and for what reason. [2]

3. WHAT IS GREEN MARKETING?

Unfortunately, a majority of people believes that green marketing refers solely to the promotion or advertising of products with environmental characteristics. Green marketing incorporates a broad range of activities, including product modification, changes to the production process, packaging changes, as well as modifying advertising. Yet defining green marketing is not a simple task. Indeed the terminology used in this area has varied, it includes: Green Marketing, Environmental Marketing and Ecological Marketing. Green or Environmental Marketing consists of all activities designed to generate and facilitate any exchanges intended to satisfy human needs or wants, such that the satisfaction of these needs and wants occurs, with minimal detrimental impact on the natural environment. [3]

Therefore it ensures that the interests of the organization and all its consumers are protected, as voluntary exchange will not take place unless both the buyer and seller mutually benefit. The above definition also includes the protection of the natural environment, by attempting to minimize the detrimental impact this exchange has on the environment. This second point is important, for human consumption by its very nature is destructive to the natural environment. (To be accurate products making green claims should state they are "less environmentally harmful" rather than "Environmentally Friendly.") Thus green marketing should look at minimizing environmental harm, not necessarily eliminating it.

1. RESERCH METHODOLOGY

2. RESEARCH OBJECTIVE:- The objective of the present study is to explore the awareness level among the customers and dealers of various segments of cars about green marketing in particular.

3. PROBLEM DEFINITION:- There are various segments of automobiles like 800-1100cc, 1100cc and above, petrol and diesel segments. Apart from this the customer segment include professionals, business men etc. The problem is to conduct an exploratory study among the various players in various segments as regard to their opinion about green marketing of the automobiles and to research this segment.

4. RESEARCH HYPOTHESES:As related to the problem under consideration two hypotheses were developed for dealers of automobiles and two hypotheses were developed for customers. Based on this two separate questionnaires were evolved, One for each category

1. Hypotheses for dealers

   Null Hypotheses H01 There is no significant difference between the awareness level of Dealers of 800-1100cc and 1100-2000cc petrol cars for Green Marketing.

   Null Hypotheses H02: There is no significant difference between the awareness level of Dealers of 800-1100cc and 1100-2000cc Diesel cars for Green Marketing.

2. Hypotheses for customer

Null Hypotheses H03: There is no significant difference between the awareness level of service class and business class customers of 800-1100cc and 1100-2000cc petrol cars for Green Marketing.

Null Hypotheses H04: There is no significant difference between the awareness level of service class and business class customers of 800-1100cc and 1100-2000cc Diesel cars for Green Marketing.

1. RESEARCH DESIGN

   Research design for this project is, exploratory research with an objective to provide insight into, and an understanding of, the problem confronting the researcher. The research design can be understood as mentioned under:

   The data used in the project is secondary data. The data are collected by means of questionnaire.

   The sample size has been taken as; 75 for customer and 100% population of the city for dealers.

   Statistical tool is being used for analysis.

   Discriminant analysis method and T-test is applied for analysis.

   SPSS is used for discriminative analysis method and T-test.

2. COLLECTION OF DATA THROUGH QUESTIONNAIRES

   Collection of data through questionnaire in this project is done by personal interview method in which the respondents are contacted directly. [Appendix1, 2]

3. THE SAMPLE

   The sample size refers to the number of element to be included in the study, the important factors that should be considered in determining the sample size includes:

   1. The importance of the decision

   2. the nature of the research

   3. The number of variables

   4. The nature of analysis

   5. Sample size used in similar studies

   6. Incidence rates

   7. Completion rate

   8. Resource constraint.[17]

      The sample size selected in the survey for customers is simple random sampling , which is a probability sampling technique in which each element in the population has known and equal probability of selection. Every element is selected independently of every other element and the sample is drawn by a random procedure from sampling frame [17].

      Sample for customer consists of 75randomly selected respondent from the infinite population. The respondent includes professionals i.e. Doctors, Engineers, Bankers, Lecturers, and Business man. Sample size in this study is 75 for the customer because analysis is done through discriminant analysis in which there should be 5 respondents over each variable and the number of variables in questionnaire is 15.

      For dealers sample consist 100%population of city that deals in 800cc-2000cc cars

      Sample size for dealers is 100% population in the city because of presence of 13 dealers (respondents) in the study which has undertaken for the survey.

4. TOOLS FOR DATA COLLECTION

   After reviewing relevant literature on the subject the self designed two different questionnaires was developed for car dealers and car customers. The questionnaire for customers consists of 15 statements and questionnaire for dealers consists of 19 statements, to check the awareness level of the

   respondent. The questionnaire was implemented on 5 point Likert scale mostly (1= strongly agree and 5= strongly disagree), Which requires the respondents to indicate a degree of agreement or disagreement with each of series of statement. The Likert scale is chosen because it is easy to construct, Respondents readily understand how to use the scale, making it suitable for personal interviews, and some other scales are also used.

5. TOOLS FOR DATA ANALYSIS

   The collected data was analyzed with different statistical tool.

   1. T-test was applied for dealers hypothesis testing

   2. Discriminant analysis method was applied for customer hypothesis testing

   3. SPSS (Statistical package for social sciences) was used for T-test and discriminant analysis

6. TOOLS FOR ANALYSIS

1. T-test for dealers sample

   When there are two are more sample t-test is used, T- test is based on t-distribution and is considered an appropriate test for judging the significance of sample mean or for judging the significance of difference between the mean of two sample in case of small sample when population variance is not known.[17].

   For dealers t-test is used because the sample size is less then 30, and as described above t-test is used when the standard deviation is unknown as sample size is small or less then 30

2. Discriminant Analysis

   It is a technique for analyzing marketing research data when the criterion or dependent variable is categorical and the predictor or independent variables are interval in nature. The objectives of discriminant analysis are as follows:

   1. Development of discriminant function of predictor or independent variable, which will best discriminant between the categories of the criterion or dependent variable.

   2. Examination of whether significant difference exist among the groups, in terms of the predictor variable

   3. Determination of which predictor variable contribute to most of the intergroup difference

   4. Classification of cases to one of the group based on the values of the predictor variables

   5. Evaluation of the accuracy of classification [17]

3.0 RESULT AND ANALYSIS: 31 ANALYSIS OF DEALERS

1. : 1 Response clearly indicates that the dealers are mostly aware about green marketing

   Fig3.1 Representation of awareness level of dealers

2. Representation of strategies of green marketing

   The response of dealers clearly indicate that most of the companies should adopt the strategy which minimize the direct environmental impact to design and produce green automobiles

   Fig3.2 Representation of strategies of green Marketing

3. Representation of price for green marketing that customer willing to pay according to dealers

   The response of dealers clearly indicates that very few customers are ready to pay price for green automobiles

   Fig 3.3 Representation of price for green marketing that customer willing to pay according to dealers

4. Representation of value customer place on green marketing according to dealers

What value does customer place on green benefits? Respondents were asked to give their opinion

The response of dealers clearly indicates that customers perceives green automobiles as eco- friendly non polluting product

Fig3.4 Representation of value customer place on green marketing according to dealers

1. ANALYSIS OF THE CUSTOMERS

   1. Representation of customer awareness level for green marketing

      The response clearly indicates that, the customers are mostly aware of green marketing

      4

      Fig 3.5 Representation of customer awareness level for green marketing

   2. Representation of customers careness level for green marketing

      The response clearly indicates that, customers care for the environment

      Fig 3.6 Representation of customers careness level for green marketing

   3. Representation of customers support for green automobiles

      The response clearly indicates that, the customers shall support green automobiles up to 5% increase in cost from present cost of their vehicle

      Fig 3.7Representation of customers support for green marketing.

   4. Representation of value that customers place on green benefits

What value do you place on green benefits?

The response indicates that the customer take green automobiles as ec-friendly product

Fig 3.8 Representation of value that customers place on green benefits

4.0 CONCLUSION OF THE STUDY:

1. Hypotheses I for dealers clearly indicates that there is significant difference among the two segments, the dealers of 1100cc-2000cc petrol cars have much favorable attitude towards the view that green automobiles decrease the rate of environmental damage. As they are more aware about green marketing and know what damage petrol can cause to the environment.

2. Hypotheses II for dealers clearly indicates that there is significant difference among the two segments, the dealers of 1100cc-2000cc diesel cars agreed that the green automobiles protect the environment and decrease the rate of environmental damage .Since they are more aware of green marketing and think that diesel cars cause more pollution. Therefore they feel that the green automobiles are more beneficial.

3. Hypotheses I for customers clearly indicates that there is significant difference among the two segments, the service class customers of 800cc- 1100cc & 1100cc-2000cc petrol cars agreed that the green automobiles be a part of solution to energy conservation . They are more innovative as well as well versed with the technology. The service class customers include doctor, engineers, lecturers, bankers who are open minded and always try to find out solution rather then complicating the issues and are aware about analysis and can find out the impact of cost vis-à-vis benefits.

4. Hypotheses II for customers clearly indicate that there is no significant difference between the awareness level of service class and business class customers of 800cc-1100cc and 1100cc- 2000cc diesel cars.

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