Using consumers' perceptions for the cognitive analysis of corporate-level competitive structurse

Abstract

As the battle for future growth in saturated and post-saturated industries and markets intensifies, competitors must develop the means for ensuring that they maintain the loyalty of their existing customers, whilst seeking to attract new customers from rival firms. To this end, the present paper reports the findings of an empirical investigation which explored consumers’ mental models of competitive structures in the UK grocery retail industry. A similarity tree analysis was performed in conjunction with non-metric multidimensional scaling, in order to reveal the bases on which consumers differentiate various competitors. The findings suggest that consumers distinguish two groups of competing stores, primarily on the basis of quality and convenience. The competitive structure identified through the cognitive analysis was validated using various behavioural, attitudinal, demographic and socioeconomic indicators. It is argued that the analysis of consumers’ mental models of corporate level competitive struc...