Importance of culture, personality and environmental awareness in automotive purchasing behavior

Abstract

While the automotive industry is in a historical transformation phase, it is essential for affected manufacturers to meet the associated challenges. Today, more than ever, established automotive groups are required to address the prevailing demand mechanisms as precisely as possible to remain competitive in the market. In this context, market research and the analysis of customer behavior are becoming increasingly important. Behavioral analyses offer the opportunity to accurately identify the demands of international mobility customers, to implement these needs in the form of products or brand strategies, and thus to satisfy both customer and company interests. The present cumulative dissertation consists of three research projects. The central and comprehensive objective of the individual essays was to contribute to the behavioral analysis of automotive customers and to investigate the influences of culture, personality and environmental awareness. Moreover, the relevance of behavioral theories in automotive marketing practice was assessed, and differentiators of automotive brand management were examined. Against the background of the research questions raised, partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) offered a very practical methodology. This analysis technique served to illustrate significant moderating characteristics of the investigated constructs such as culture, personality, and environmental awareness in the automotive/marketing-specific context and helped to investigate brand theorems (e.g., brand personality, self-congruity, and green marketing) in connection with established consumer metrics such as perception and behavior.