Consumer Behavior

This study was intended to explore more about the responses and consumer motivation and buying intention (Consumer behavior) of the consumer during the Sime Darby's roadshow/ events or showcase. In the recent years, Sime Darby's marketers face extensive challenges in their marketing communications, for example, increased media and audience fragmentation, greater competition in the media market, and decreased effectiveness of traditional advertising and promotion. Therefore, marketers constantly look for new ways to communicate with consumers. So afterwards, new marketing communication strategies are emerging with a communication structure that often differs significantly from those of established strategies by their tendency to offer interactive dialogues instead of monologues (Sistenich and Zanger 1999). In light of these developments, event-marketing is becoming a popular alternative for marketers. Therefore, Sime Darby Company decided to use roadshows and events s their marketing strategy to deliver the message and also introduce the new products to the public. Based on the research, feelings and emotions are important in most consumer choices, and recently there has been an increasing interest in studying the area and documenting the importance here of in a marketing context.

One "official" definition of consumer behavior is "the study of individuals, groups, or organizations and the processes they use to select, secure, use, and dispose of products, services, experiences, or ideas to satisfy needs and the impacts that these processes have on the consumer and society. In this research, it will be more focus on the consumer as an emotionally acting consumer, which has led to a growth in creative and emotional media. According to the journals, Desmet (2005) studies emotions in a product design perspective and states that:

"Creating differential advantage through emotional benefits is one of the keys to market eedsuccess".

Hence, the above conditions are some of the reasons that why events have become a more widespread tool in marketing communications. Events are to a higher extent about creating experiences and hereby activate emotional responses. As it creates 3-dimensional brand-related realities by staging marketing-events in which consumers are actively involved on a behavioral level, event marketing can be regarded as a pull strategy within marketing communications. Previous research in event-marketing has proven that consumers, because of their voluntary participation in marketing-events, generally show a high event involvement. In reference to research in the effectiveness of advertising (Vakratsas and Ambler 1999; Petty et al. 1991), media involvement in combination with the motivation and ability to process brand-related information is seen as a crucial prerequisite in determining the effectiveness of any communication media in influencing brand images. Therefore, an understanding of consumers' motivations and experiential needs is a key factor in the design and, subsequently, effectiveness of event marketing strategies.

The purpose of Sime Darby using events/roadshows as their marketing strategy compare to advertising is in order to deliver more product knowledge to the target consumers. Besides that, Sime Darby marketers thinks that direct communication (face to face) between the professional sales consultant with the target consumers can create more positive emotion of the consumer towards to the brands or services. On the other hands, it also can deliver the right information to the consumer in order to successful deliver the awareness to the target market.

1.2 Background of Sime Darby Company.

Sime Darby was incorporated in 1910 by businessmen William Sime, Henry d'Esterre Darby and Herbert Mitford Darby to manage 500 acres of rubber estates in Malacca, Malaysia. From such humble beginnings, Sime Darby has grown into one of Malaysia's biggest multinational corporations.

Today, Sime Darby is a key player in the Malaysian economy as well as a diversified multinational, with businesses in key growth sectors namely, plantations, property, motors, industrial equipment, energy & utilities and healthcare, with operations in more than 20 countries. Sime Darby is one of the largest companies listed on Bursa Malaysia and has a market capitalization of RM59.07 billion (USD18.92 billion), as at 31 July 2012.

Sime Darby recognizes the importance of balancing economic performance with social responsibility. Committed to developing a sustainable future, Sime Darby strives to maintain an equitable balance between increasing value for shareholders and being responsible to society and the environment.

1.3 What characterizes an event?

An event can be defined as a 'live' themed activity for examples, music festival, sporting event, and etc. in order to achieve marketing objectives. According to Ornbo et al. (2004), he considered that events as a part of the somewhat broader concept of experience marketing where events are a part of this experience communication. Thus, an event is a marketing communication activity and can be looked at as an activity with a high level of involvement. Because events involve their target group and involve it in the company and the products as well as they give the target group an experience that appeals to all senses. In other words, events appeal to the feelings and emotions that arise in the individual and the event-based communication becomes differently visible and "alive". The message may therefore be able to create a stronger effect than through traditional communication channels. The event-based communication also has a tendency to stimulate word of mouth, and in this way influence others than those involved in the event.

Event-marketing is aimed at positively influencing customers' familiarity, image, attitude and emotional attachment to the brand by staging self-initiated marketing-events as 3-dimensional brand-related realities. . The fact that consumers are encouraged to actively experience the brand by becoming part of this 3-dimensional brand reality is the major peculiarity of event marketing in comparison to classic marketing communications, where consumers generally remain passive and distant recipients of brand messages. However, in order to develop their full potential, event-marketing strategies must be designed in a fashion that target audiences do not want to miss being part of these experiential brand related realities. Thus, marketers must have an understanding of what needs consumers seek to satisfy by participating in marketing-events or visiting brand lands.

1.4 The purpose of the study.

The main objective