Sustainable Consumption Behaviour of Young Consumers: Gender-Based Approach From an Emerging Market

Introduction

Marketing strategy is defined by Varadarajan (2015: 89) as “an organization’s integrated pattern of decisions that specify its crucial choices concerning marketing activities to perform and the manner of performance of these activities in the chosen markets and market segments, and the allocation of marketing resources among markets, market segments and marketing activities toward the creation, communication and delivery of a product that offers value to customers in exchanges with the organization and thereby enables the organization to achieve specific objectives”. Based on theories of marketing strategy's basic promises, a firm should apply market orientation strategy, marketing segment strategy, relationship marketing strategy, and brand equity strategy to gain competitive advantage. Market segmentation strategy entails targeting specific segments of the market and developing a marketing mix specific to the targeted market. Market orientation strategy requires obtaining information systematically about both current and potential customers and using this information strategically (Hunt, 2018).

Sustainable marketing is identified as one of the major trends and forces driving the marketing environment and challenging for marketing strategy (Kotler and Armstrong, 2021). Furthermore, delivering unique customer value is essential for building and sustaining competitive advantage (Eti & Mızrak, 2020). The design of marketing strategy is therefore based on a more responsive approach that involves identifying customer needs and developing offerings that outperform competitors (Sozuer et al., 2020). Customer value-oriented marketing strategy is recommended as one of the current core marketing principles (Kotler & Armstrong, 2021). Customer orientation is also recognized as a promising perspective, and value creation for the customer is put forward as a new and valueable research field in marketing strategy discipline. Thus, customers are also addressed as the focus of new research areas of marketing strategy (Sheth, 2021; Mızrak, & Cevher, 2023).

Emerging markets are also determined as a hot topic and a new area of research in marketing strategy (Sheth, 2021). These markets are seen as the most essential actors of responsible consumption and production in the field of sustainability, as well as being an important economic power in the near future (Mızrak, 2023). Although the consumers in these markets are claimed to be more interested in sustainable consumption, it is claimed that there are still many issues that need to be revealed about these consumers (Yarimoglu & Binboga, 2019; Dermondy et al., 2018). Research on sustainable consumption is mostly conducted in developed countries, whereas sustainable consumption patterns of emerging market consumers are different and understanding them is crucial for sustainability. Therefore, examining the behavior of these consumers is recommended as an important research agenda for future research (Sesini et al., 2020). Also, an important future research question in marketing strategy is suggested by Sozuer, Carpenter, Kopalle, McAlister and Lehmann (2020: 170) as “How can marketers leverage their understanding of consumer behavior in emerging markets to increase brand awareness and sales?”.