A Research Proposal Essay

1. IntroductionA farseeing with economy and technology be all told developing rapidly in recent historic period, it is signifi basist that globalization has experience an overwhelming trend in allwalks of life. Benefit from this treat above, the global marts house be bounded to masturbateher in multi- hea past environments and make out to a greater extent complicated than ever forwards (Park and Reisinger, 2009). Thus, it is important for companies to conduct faultless trade divider before access to a sore trade nowadays (Schmitt, 1997). The research aims to find out the difference of opinions in customers attitudes to prodigality mugs in china and UK, under motley cultural backgrounds. To be exact, as cultural vicissitude volition lead to differences in consumers needs, consume behaviour and values, I decide to write the research proposal in view of polish section.In terms of religion and country, objective factors such as various geographical environments, t he heritage of history and culture, the outside culture and so on, all of these impart bring nigh cultural difference (Schmitt, 1997). In addition, from a companionable perspective, cultural differences will be cause by peoples occupation, education and economic term, etc. As the largest developing country, chinaw ar has become a huge potential grocery store. Besides, since China is a vast country, itself has the contribution of cultural diversity. In addition, the effect of foreign culture to China has been for a long time, Chinese cultural constitution is much more complicated. chiefly speaking, look at a right reorganization of the customers perception differences betwixt China and UK will be beneficial to British sumptuousness crosss enter Chinese trade.Since there is a wealth gap between inland and easterly constituent in china, and the latter has a stronger economic strength, it will be the major opulence goods market (Schmitt, 1997). Therefore, this research wil l be conducted at several main cities in eastern China and costal argonas, they atomic number 18 Beijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Guangzhou and Shenzhen, separately. In UK, we will launch the subject atomic number 18a at five cities in England, they are London, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and Sheffield. The in plaster bandageants who are selected should match several conditions, for instance, on the one hand, the respondents token(prenominal) annual income should above 40,000GBP/400,000CNY. They should be 35 years old to 40 years old, on the new(prenominal) hand. In this proposal, I will utilize the manner of combining qualitative research and duodecimal research.Before quantitative research, I catch to jazz lavishness market situation in these two countries and relevant theories and fundamental imageion aboutcultural diversity in breakdown, demographic segmentation and so on. First of all, I should lift up and analyse alive relevant document and entropy, it main ly consist of micro-economic environment, industrial policy and social environment. To be specific, stolon, micro-economic environment includes several sections such as the operation of national economy (GDP), households incomes and Engel coefficient. Secondly, the policy of sumptuosity industry has a station effect on the ease or complexity of luxury market entry.Therefore, I should analyse industrial policies, the situation of market pattern and the last go bad, the systems of customs and tax. Thirdly, social environment is influenced by regional culture, thus, cultural context analysis is critical. Moreover, the analyses of demographic environment, education environment and overpowering concept are integral expounds, too. Then, as qualitative research method has croak the research question, quantitative research will be carried out by 1000 copies of questionnaires, both China and UK bugger off 500 copies of questionnaires each, and every city share 100 copies of questi onnaires. The questionnaire will be launched in the ground level of network, which is efficient, comfortable and low-cost.By comparing these two countries customers perception head of luxury goods and near another(prenominal) aspects such as their education level, the purpose of purchase and customers preferable buying channel, we may find that the Chinese consumers consuming behavior of luxury take up some more signifi abidet characteristics than British customers. To be precise, a hatch of Chinese customers buy luxury goods may get under ones skin three reasons basically. The first reason is flaunting their rich. They requisite to essay their sense of identity and social status by wearing luxury clothes, bags and shoes.The guerrilla reason is following the crowd. repayable to various factors, for example, literacy level, most Chinese consumers have low cognitive degree of luxury goods and low sensitive to fashion trend. They alship messal buy luxury blindly and witho ut thinking independently about how to mach clothes, colours and choose accessories appropriately. The trine reason is characteristic consumption. Luxury attire grass usually have unique brand concept and distinctive brand image. Beside, luxury clothing brand has excellent design and mellow quality, so it can show amazing tastes of wearers. Furthermore, as its heights price positioning, luxury clothing brand has less awkward situation ofoutfits clash. only in all, after the research, we will have a clear agreement of the different attitudes to luxury clothing brands of consumers in China and UK. Due to this, British luxury clothing brands can know target market well and regard this as wing when they formulate selling strategies.2. Literature reviewIn recent 20 years, global luxury markets are getting more considerable, because of this, luxury brands have drawn a lot of researchers attention (Atsmon et al., 2011). In this section, there are several parts as below. The first part is general backgrounds. The second part is a review of theories on segmentation and motivation. The third part reviews those documents which from different perspectives to compare consumers different attitudes to luxury brands in China and UK and finale at last.2.1 General backgroundsAlong with the gradual development of luxury markets these years, a softwood of luxury brands are growing rapidly and have a share in markets. They have established corporate image and brand conception in the public. This can be clearly illustrated in a research which was conducted by Verdict question (2007), as the largest and most mount luxury market, Europe would experience a growth of $ 62bn from 2007($ 101bn) to 2012($163bn). Followed by the Statesthe second largest luxury market would be replaced by Asia Pacific region (exclude Japanese luxury market) in 2012. What is more, Asia Pacific area would be the luxury market which developing the fastest, and the Middle East would come the next. Before teaching the luxury market, it is necessary to have a clear understanding of luxury concept.In accord with Phau and Prendergast (2000), luxury should be unique, outstanding, magical, and sensual. A more honest commentary of luxury was put forward by Mandhachitara and Lockshin (2004) that luxury stood for high price. While Danziger (2005) argued that luxury was from class to mass, which meant that the luxury goods would finally be popular and of civilian, though itused to be high-class. In a methamphetamine shell, it is important for companies to understand luxury concept and luxury market properly, and then they can find out the critical factors which will affect customers consuming behaviour of luxury goods.2.2 Theories on segmentation and motivesFirst of all, the theoretical backgrounds of market segmentation. In contemporary market, Wedel and Kamakura (2000) argued that due to the diversity of consumer needs and the complication of marketing techniques, the mass marke ting method cant be utilize in many market situations. According to Dibb and Simkin (1996), market segmentation could garter marketers to cope with kinds of customer needs in a resource-efficient carriage. In harmony with Lindridge and Dibb (2002), the ultimate principle of market segmentation theory was that the discrimination of mathematical product needs and consuming behaviour could benefit from the possibility of customers can be grouped using variables. Second, the concept of market segmentation. Second, the original definition of market segmentation was put forward by Smith (1956), he argued that a condition of growth when core markets have already been developed on a generalised basis to the point where additional promotional expenditures are yielding diminishing returns.In line with Kotler and Armstrong (1980, p291-306), market segmentation variables could be dissever into iv crucial fieldsgeographic segmentation, demographic segmentation, psychographic segmentation and behavioural segmentation. According to Beane and Ennis (1987), geographic segmentation referred to factors such as area, creation density and climate. Besides, customer demands and requirements solutions would be different as a market was divided up geographically. Demographic segmentation included basic variables standardised age, sex, size and type of family, income educational level, race and nationality (Beane and Ennis, 1987). In addition, Demographic segmentation could be utilise excellently as the segments were obvious.Third, the motive of consumer purchasing. In accordance with Leibenstein (1950), there were basically three kinds of motivationsmass psychology, uniqueness and exclusiveness. To be more exact, first of all, mass psychology means people who want to assimilate social value by trying to get the recognition of otherpeople in the group they belong. Next, uniqueness means that individuals in groups want to be particular and outstanding, and can be easily disc riminated from the crowds. In other words, everyone wants to be a Triton of the minnows. Finally, exclusiveness can be explained as people who like to flaunt their wealth, highlight the status and identity finished wearing luxury clothing, bag and so on.What is more, found on previous studies conducted by other researchers, Vigneron and Johnson (1999) considered that consumer purchase motivations could be distributed to five partsmass psychology, uniqueness, exclusiveness, hedonism and perfectionism. Hedonic consumption is about the whole experiences in purchasing goods. Perfectionism is considered to have kinds of dimensions fundamentally. Additionally, Danziger (2005) carried out a luxury survey in American soaked classes and labeled the consumers into four groupsthe iconoclastic butterflies, the indulgent X-fluent (extreme affluent), the luxury cocooners and the luxury aspirers.2.3 authorized researches about the similar topic of the proposalAs cultural difference has an impa ct on the way of purchased merchandise and how much money a consumer spend (Thomson and Cutler, 1997), the consumers purchasing behavior appears to vary from country to country. According to Schmitt (1997), he carried out a consumer behaviour survey in China which was based on demographic segmentation. The author considered age and sex as variables, divided the samples into four segments, namely, two female groups consist of women aged 19 to 25 and aged 30 to 45 two male groups consist of the akin two ages as womens. He found that in old groups, women move to products value and convenience, while men bought goods they need or the requirements of family members. On the contrary, young females among young people had a poor concept with money, they direction brands and over-spent. Besides, they are easily effected buy some fashion movies.another(prenominal) similar survey was launched by subsidiaries of Louis Harris in 2005 (Schmitt, 1997), three variables of demographic segmentati onincome, educational level and occupation were considered. What is more, Hauck and Stanforth (2007) considered that the most potential consumers of luxury market in China would be those who were born in 1980s, and there cogency have 300 million rich menamong them. Thus, the main pinch of luxury goods consumption should be at the age of 20 to 40 years old in China. However, the mainly consumers of luxury goods in UK were old(a) than those in China, they were aged from 40 to 70years old. Beside, as young consumers, especially those who are rich and well-educated, tend to accept new goods more easily than older customers (Schmitt, 1997), Chinese consumers of luxury goods are more willing to try new products than British consumers relatively.2.4 ConclusionThe cultural diversity will affect consumers different consuming behaviour, perception of luxury and so on (Park, Reisinger, 2009). As a large luxury market, China has attracted more foreign investiments as well as some British lux ury brands. Theories of segmentation, motivation and consuming behavior are relevant to culture. It is important for British luxury brand to have a clear understanding of Chinese market and form feasible marketing strategies. However, there are several shortcomings in some existing studies.First, a majority of current researches lack of data support. Second, though some studies have find outed relevant data, the data is not good and scientific. Because luxury market survey needs a huge list of data appeal and its scale is large, most studies do not have enough data proving. This research aims to stack up primary data by questionnaires and then analyse the differences of customers consuming behaviour between China and UK. Finally, a further theoretical field can be constituted.3. Methodology and FeasibilityThis section is divided into three parts. The first part is the introduction to the methodologies which is applied in this proposal. The second part relates to research proce dure, description of sample and data collection. The last part is about proposal feasibleness analysis.3.1 MethodologyIn this study, I combine qualitative research method with quantitativeresearch method to collect second-hand sources and first-hand data.First of all, qualitative research. It derives from the social science, tend to study problems, recognize kinds of social phenomenon, analyse peoples behaviour and then give answers to those questions (Sandelowski, 1986). It is a way to definite an uncover and address it. According to Shank (2002, P5), qualitative research is a form of systematic empirical inquiry into meaning. Moreover, quantitative research can identify intangible factors clearly, for example, social norms, gender roles and so on Sandelowski (1986).In line with Mays and Pope (1995), the methods of qualitative research include focus group, in-depth interviews, Delphi technique, direct observation, courting study, etc. In addition, there are three ways to generate dataindividual interviews, group interviews and contextual data. Contextual data mainly consist of observations, reports and other written data and oral data. I apply the literature research method, namely, literature review, to aim up cloth of theories. As a result, I can have a clear organize of the research and better understanding of relevant theories.Secondly, quantitative research. It can be described as a procedure about accumulate valid data and analyzing valid numerical data scientifically. Then, we can get generalisable conclusions (Pekrun, et al., 2002). According to Luborsky, etc. (1971), quantitative research is suitable for survey about comparing two groups, thus, we can use it in the research. as the samples are large in the research, questionnaires should be a good method to collect original data which belongs to quantitative research method. Since I do the questionnaire survey on the internet, there is no time-and-space restriction.3.2 Research design and data collection methodsThere are mainly two data collection methods used in this researchstatistical data (secondary data) and questionnaire. refreshing previous findings by others are a low-cost way to information and get an entire understanding of the research field we work in. Questionnaire is a convenient and efficient way to get raw data from markets, as I undertake it via internet, the cost are low. Next, I will explain how these two methodsare applied in the research.As the research needs to compare the consumers attitudes to luxury in China and UK, the size of samples and the scope of survey are large. Before structure a questionnaire to collect first-hand data from potential target customers, we have to know what the problem is, what intangible influencing factors are and so on. Therefore, we need to look up and quote amounts of secondary materials from websites, books, journals and authoritative organizations. These academic data should relevant to existing correlation theorie s, luxury market environment both in China and UK which involves policies like tax and customs, income level, current purchasing channels, etc. It would be a strong support for further survey after the data are classified into categories.The questionnaires can be constructed on the base of previous qualitative research I mentioned above. All the questions in questionnaire are based on two themesthe motivation of consumers luxury consuming, the pattern of consumers luxury consuming. In methodicalness to carry out the questionnaires, we follow the method of quota sampling to select samples by several variables as below age 3540 years oldincome above 40,000GBP/400,000CNYregion chinaBeijing, Shanghai, Hangzhou, Guangzhou and Shenzhen UKLondon, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and SheffieldAfter the sample selection, we can conduct a hundred pieces of questionnaires in those cities separatelyone yard pieces in total. After getting the questionnaire feedbacks, the data need to be summa rized and then, analysed by the software SPSS.3.3 Feasibility StudyFirst, in terms of schedule, this research serve up consist of 12 sections which clearly be illustrated in table 1. In order to complete the whole research, I will take 4months long to run it. In terms of time arrangement,in particular, I set aside one week in case some of the xii sections may not be finished on time. Besides, I will use the payback method in online questionnaire survey. Thus, respondents feedback can be collect in a short time.Second, financial feasibility analysis. As I mentioned above, I will carry on a paid survey. To be specific, in UK, I will pay 1pound per questionnaire on the website surveycompare. In China, I will conduct the survey on the website opinionworld and pay 0.6 pound each. All in all, the general expenditure is 800 pound.Third, in terms of universal scope, as the 1000 respondents are selected from 10 cities in China and UK, the field of investigation is wide and the samples are dispersive. However, we do questionnaire survey online which is not limited by region.General speaking, as China is the largest luxury market in Asia and deviation to be the core market in the whole world (Verdict Research, 2007), it is high time that British luxury brands developed Chinese luxury market. As analysed feasibility in schedule, expenditure and universal scope above, the research is worthy being taken into practice.4. TimetableThis research project will last four months long to carry out a serious of activities. I work up up a table as below to explain the research time schedule.Table 1 time schedule for the researchAs the table shows, there is a week time left before report submission, it is in order to avoid any previous sections streak out of time.List of References daybook articalsBeane, T. P. & Ennis, D. M. (1987) grocery Segmentation A look into European Journal of merchandise 21 (5), 20 42.Hauck, W. & Stanforth, N. (2007) Cohort acquaintance of Luxury Go ods and Services Journal of Fashion Marketing & prudence 11 (2), 175-188.Leibenstein, H. (1950) Bandwagon, Snob, and Veblen Effects in the Theory of Consumers Demand The Quarterly Journal of economics 2 (64), 183-207.Luborsky, L. et al (1971) Factors influencing the outcome of psychotherapy A review of quantitative research Psychological Bulletin 75 (3), 145-185.Lindridge, A. & Dibb, S. (2003) Is culture a excusable variable for market segmentation? A cross-cultural example Journal of Consumer Behaviour 2 (3), 269286.Mays, N. & Pope, C. (1995) Rigour and qualitative research British medical exam Journal 311 (6997), 109-12.Mandhachitara, R. & Lockshin, L. (2004) Fast moving luxury goods Positioning strategies for Scotch whiskey in Thai department stores International Journal of Retail and diffusion Management 32 (6), 312-319.Park, S. & Reisinger, Y. (2009) Cultural differences in shopping for luxury goods Western, Asian, and Latino tourists Journal of Travel & Tourism Marketin g 26 (8), 762777.Phau, I. & Prendergast, G. (2000) Consuming luxury brands The relevance of the Rarity Principle Journal of Brand Management 8 (2), 122-138.Smith, W. R. (1956) Product differentiation and market segmentation as alternative marketing strategies Journal of Marketing July, 21 (1), 38.Sandelowski, M. 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Retrieved 14 June Website Available fromhttp//csi.mckinsey.com/Knowledge_by_region/Asia/China/chinaluxury2011.aspx Accessed 1st January 2013Bain study (2011) INSIGHT online Bain & Company. Available from http//www.bain.com/publications/articles/2011-china-luxury-market-study.aspx Accessed 1st January 2013Verdict Research (2007) Business keenness online United Kindom. Available from http//www.verdict.co.uk/Marketing/dmvt0388m.pdfAccessed 1st January 2013