Coursework Assignment - Theme A and Theme B

The coursework comprises two parts; each part is worth 50% of the marks. Part 1 of the coursework relate to Theme A (covered by Professor Smith) and Part 2 relates to Theme B (covered by Professor Hibbert). The two parts of the assignment are not directly connected and will be marked separately, although you should submit them together and in the same document.

Your coursework needs to be submitted electronically to Moodle. See the Student Services website for further details of this process. The deadline for coursework submission is 3pm (UK time) on Wednesday 12^th January. Late submission will attract a mark penalty unless an extension has been approved by Student Services. Please familiarise yourself with the extenuating circumstances policy and process for submitting a claim.

Referring to the table for seminar 1: write a scholarly commentary based on a revised version of the table you prepared for seminar 1. The use of academic references is expected. Please write in third person, use Harvard style referencing and provide a reference list in alphabetical order of first author. 

Fill out the Table 2. ‘Bring’ the completed table and your notes to the tutorial and be ready to discuss and  justify/share you work. Chapter 2 (Smith, 2019) covers most of the concepts and research required for an informed and intelligent attempt at this task.  The table is provided in Word format online. You can write as much in the table as you like.

In column one you should carefully consider the anatomy of repeat purchase and behavioural loyalty. For example, what will constitute a high rate of repeat purchase? How likely is sole brand loyalty? What is a likely average repertoire size for that market in a given time period? How likely is variety seeking or situational switching? You should also define the period that you are considering (e.g. a month, a year, a lifetime…). In column two you need to think about what underpins the behavioural manifestation of loyalty. What are the likely causes and what factors will tend to sustain the behaviour over time? Why might they remain speciously or compositely loyal? In column three you must now think about the interventions that a analytics driven marketer might employ in order to encourage the consumer to remain loyal whilst in column four you need to think about how a rival provider might encourage switching. This cuts to the heart of marketing – retention and capture of customers.

Part 1: Referring to the table for seminar 1

Evaluate how digital technology can motivate and enable sustainable consumer behaviour. You must follow the guidelines provided on Moodle to complete this assignment (do not simply write an essay). Please write in third person, use Harvard style referencing and provide a reference list in alphabetical order of first author. 

Topic: Can digital technology motivate and enable sustainable consumer behaviour?

1. Select a form of consumer behaviour which has implications for sustainability. Be specific about:

the type of behaviour (e.g., purchasing, making, using, doing, disposing, repairing, adapting, participating in a service process),

the behavioural domain (e.g., food & drink, health, personal hygiene/care, care of children/elderly/sick, philanthropy, travel, energy, water, fashion, mobile technology, home appliances, cosmetics, restaurants, travel, holidays)

the country context.

2. Describe (supported with evidence) the consumer behaviour which is currently predominant and the implications and the sustainability concerns. Consider changes to this behaviour that would improve the sustainability impacts.

 

3. Review literature that has examine this type of behaviour previously to critically appraise the factors that shape the behaviour and barriers to behaviour change. This will allow you to identify factors that your intervention could target to promote behaviour change. Depending on your selected context, the theory in the body of literature that you review might reflect processes of decision making, habit, learning, experience, identity, reference group, sharing, collaborative consumption, social capital, etc. NB. You should be selective in the theory you apply to your chosen form of behaviour change – don’t be tempted to apply lots of different theories or you will not be able to develop an intervention with a coherent logic.

 

4. Identify one or more digital technologies that can motivate and enable behaviour change. Specify the behaviour change objectives. Describe the design of a ‘digital technology intervention’ to be used by a particular organisation (i.e., what are the specific features & functions that an organisation might incorporate into a digital technology selected for this purpose and how would they motivate/help consumers to use it?).

 

5. Justify why you have selected this technology and your proposed intervention design (with reference both to the factors shaping the behaviour and objectives for behaviour change). Critically appraise the likely effectiveness of this/these technologies with reference to academic and/or grey literature and consider how its limitations might be addressed.

 

6. You may choose to critically appraise a case in which digital technology has already been applied to change behaviour, but you MUST propose and appraise at least ONE MORE digital technology that could advance this innovation further.