Internship Abstract

Title: Deodorant Penetration Study Based on E-commerce Shopper Behavior Name: Manqi Yang Preceptors: Vivian Li, Research Manager Agency: Kantar Retail Zdology Marketing Research & Consulting (GZ) LTD.

Purpose: To increase deodorant penetration in China via E-Commerce: first to raise purchase intention among potential users, and then to convert the penetration into regular and consistent usage. Significance: Unilever assigned the market research project to effectively broaden the target shopper groups for deodorant, which is a personal care product that has high potential growth in China. Rexona and Lynx, the two brands under Unilever were chosen for focussed target groups (18-25, university students and 1st jobbers) as a prime marketing reserach technique. These shoppers usually come into the category because of external pushes (e.g. 1st job, temperature, etc.), but then they drop out or use infrequently because of a lack of internal pulls. Therefore, the brands should do more than create superficial interests in the product, and instead, take longer to educate small target group to develop the ideal usage habit. Method/Approach: 96 qualified respondents, who are current users or potential users of deodorant, were selected in three main cities in China to participate in the long-term research process. The first step of the research is to tap into the shoppers’ needs, hobbies and interested topics/activities with an assigned self-introduction and a questionnaire. After that, a Wechat Listening is scheduled to promptly capture deodorant target shoppers’ daily routine, and to analyse their consumption attitude by observing their Wechat moments. Another important step is the Shopper Behavior Tracking on mobile and PC. Participants were invited to install mobile app ‘mTracker’ on their mobile phones, and to download PCTracker on their personal computers to enable passive observation of their online behavior. Outcomes/Results: The respondents have similarities in entertainment hobbies, interested topics and activities, but they hold different consumption attitudes and thus were divided into four groups: Quality Seeker, Smart Shopper, Promotion Seeker, and Economical Shopper. The shoppers chose various shopping channels to finish different shopping missions, including replenishment, promotion driven, replacement and occasional need. The key trigger for users’ first time usage is their psychological needs to leave a good impression on others when attending an important event, and the main barrier for non-users is the lack of physical need. Many of them have misunderstanding of deodorant's effect and wonder if the product would do harm to their skin. Shopper’s online shopping route includes four steps: trigger, review, engage, and purchase. Evaluation/Conclusion: Within shopper’s online shopping path, the three pages that most respondents stay are E-tailer Homepage, Product List Page, and Product Detail Page. The report thoughtfully analyses shopper’s online shopping process to effectively increase deodorant penetration on E-commerce in each step. It provides feasible suggestions for the brands under Unilever to design proper advertisement and promotion events to attract potential customers of deodorant.