The Cost of Convenience : How marketing of convenience influences young adult consumers
Mutanen, Joona (2023-05-09)
The Cost of Convenience : How marketing of convenience influences young adult consumers
(09.05.2023)
Julkaisu on tekijänoikeussäännösten alainen. Teosta voi lukea ja tulostaa henkilökohtaista käyttöä varten. Käyttö kaupallisiin tarkoituksiin on kielletty.
suljettu
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on:
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi-fe2023051043003
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi-fe2023051043003
Tiivistelmä
Convenience, the action of saving time or effort, is omnipresent in every consumer’s life, whether it be in an individual decision or the formation of habits. Due to its context-dependence, it comes in many forms, but the underlying motivations that different people have are often similar. When it comes to modern society, technological innovations provide more and more convenience to their users, the most prevalent group of who are young adults.
This thesis utilizes mixed methods to find general patterns in young adults’ consumer behavior. Quantitative analysis on a household survey showcases how young adult consumers’ consumption choices are controlled by criteria that very often relate to convenience either directly or indirectly. The results from qualitative interviews combined with past research expand on this, showing that young adults feel increased pressure with how they manage their time as well as physical and mental resources. This is due to their phase in life being highly transitional because of factors like increased independence and the need to re-form routines and habits, as well as all the options that they have available to themselves.
This suggests that most young adults look for ways that they perceive as more convenient and optimal for themselves, which can be related to almost anything, whether it be modes of transport, store preferences, or the utilization of remote technology. This makes them ideal targets for marketing of new innovations and convenience-related products and services. These solutions have gained further traction due to the recent COVID-19 pandemic, which leads one to think of what the hidden and alternative costs of these innovations are.
The interviews also show that the ways young adults act as consumers are varied due to context-dependence, yet many of their decision-making processes share the underlying factor of convenience in some form. Nearly every choice that they make has its alternative costs, whether it be giving away personal data to use a mobile application or paying money to get food delivered to one’s doorstep. Young adults are often aware of at least some of the downsides associated with seeking convenience, and brought up downsides related to personal health, finances and life skills in the interviews. At the same time, though, they also do not wish to give up on these solutions as they provide them with large benefits, which can over time lead to path dependence. While seeking convenience is not a bad thing in and of itself, if consumers keep fixating too much on one thing, it may end up causing them more harm than good in the long run.
This thesis utilizes mixed methods to find general patterns in young adults’ consumer behavior. Quantitative analysis on a household survey showcases how young adult consumers’ consumption choices are controlled by criteria that very often relate to convenience either directly or indirectly. The results from qualitative interviews combined with past research expand on this, showing that young adults feel increased pressure with how they manage their time as well as physical and mental resources. This is due to their phase in life being highly transitional because of factors like increased independence and the need to re-form routines and habits, as well as all the options that they have available to themselves.
This suggests that most young adults look for ways that they perceive as more convenient and optimal for themselves, which can be related to almost anything, whether it be modes of transport, store preferences, or the utilization of remote technology. This makes them ideal targets for marketing of new innovations and convenience-related products and services. These solutions have gained further traction due to the recent COVID-19 pandemic, which leads one to think of what the hidden and alternative costs of these innovations are.
The interviews also show that the ways young adults act as consumers are varied due to context-dependence, yet many of their decision-making processes share the underlying factor of convenience in some form. Nearly every choice that they make has its alternative costs, whether it be giving away personal data to use a mobile application or paying money to get food delivered to one’s doorstep. Young adults are often aware of at least some of the downsides associated with seeking convenience, and brought up downsides related to personal health, finances and life skills in the interviews. At the same time, though, they also do not wish to give up on these solutions as they provide them with large benefits, which can over time lead to path dependence. While seeking convenience is not a bad thing in and of itself, if consumers keep fixating too much on one thing, it may end up causing them more harm than good in the long run.