IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2019) 10-2

Research articleerd

Content of Online Marketing that Influence Customers`
Decision: A Case on Buying Indigo-Dyed Clothing
SARANYA SAETANG*
Kasetsart University, Thailand
Email: saranya.sa@ku.th
Received 4 February 2019

Accepted 27 August 2019(*Corresponding Author)

Abstract Nowadays, technology plays a significant role in business success. Technologies,
including the Internet, web application, and social media can help to grow business byexpanding distribution channels to reach customers, even in rural areas. In addition totechnology, an online place to promote trade and the content of the products should beconsidered to help customers in buying decision processes. This research is conducted tounderstand how to create a proper content to promote online marketing. Consequently,
good content can help to decrease the burden of web administrators who have to answer all
frequently asked questions from customers. This paper begins with a literature review.
Then, by using the focus group method, the customers’ factors were identified on buying
experiences of indigo-dyed clothing, which is a popular product in the Northeastern regionof Thailand. Moreover, the interview of an administrator of an indigo-dyed clothing’s web
page as a purposive sample was summarized. By using content analysis, the results suggest
some broad guidelines to present the content to promote products to gain the customers’
response and interest. The conclusion and future work will be mentioned to contribute to
the academics and the sellers to sustain online businesses.
Keywords impact, content marketing, buying decision, e-commerce, indigo-dyed clothing

INTRODUCTION
E-commerce or online marketing could reduce economic inequality for people in a rural area to set
up their businesses with limited marketing resources. However, e-commerce itself could not be areason that a product could be sold. One factor that has an impact on the buying decision-making
process is product content. It affects customer satisfaction (Saetang, 2017). In turn, it will influence
the consumer buying decision, especially the process of information search (Stankevich, 2017).
This paper aims to study on what content that customers’ interests for helping them to make such abuying decision. The paper will begin by reviewing previous studies as follows.
Consumer Decision Making Process
From a critical literature review of Stankevich (2017), consumer decision making processes
compose of 5 main processes, including need recognition, information search, evaluation ofalternatives, purchase, and post-purchase. The information search process is a crucial process forgathering information about the description of products, promotion, recommendations, and reviews
from other customers and the experience of using the products. All these pieces of information
have an impact on the buying decision-making process.
Indigo Dyed Clothing
Indigo dyed clothing was chosen to be a case study as this local product is very famous inNortheast Thailand mainly, in Sakon Nakhon province. Indigo dyed clothing helps agriculturists
generate more income apart from farming. In 2001, the Thai government encouraged local
communities to apply their local knowledge and create a product that represents their localⒸ ISERD86

IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2019) 10-2

communities through the campaign called “One Tambon (sub-district), One product.” Thiscampaign is to boost local economies for each community (Chanjittra Chanorn, 2016). Indigo dyed
clothing was selected as one product for the Sakon Nakhon province since it uses local wisdom
inherited from generation to generation to produce cloth and can increase household income. Its
fabric has its unique indigo color, odor, and properties, which make it unique and famous. It wasdyed with an indigo tree and can help prevent Ultra Violet rays (Phuphat, 2012).
Indigo dyed clothing is one of the experience goods that customers should have experience
with the products before buying. Otherwise, they will not recognize the quality and will not beinterested in buying. However, there are many online stores and communities that sell indigo dyed
products such as scarves, shirts, skirts, and bags. The example could be seen as the following Fig. 1.

Fig. 1 An example of online stores (Ban Non Ruea, Sakon Nakhon) for indigo dyed products
Even though village product promotion has many advantages and brings more income tocommunities, one major problem that arises for this campaign is that village producer groups haveno experience with product development and marketing (Chanorn, 2016). Therefore, somecommunities failed to sell their products in spite of the support from governments.
Marketing is the key to success, which villagers, including indigo-dyed clothing sellers, haveto deal with. One problem is they are naïve to business and do not know how to sell their products
or how to communicate with customers. Content marketing could be an inexpensive way to sell
products online. Creating the right content could reduce the workload upon answering theircustomers ’ frequently asked questions and can have more time to develop products.
This study focuses on this indigo-dyed clothing to assist naïve sellers who want to start their
online businesses, but still not know what content or information that customers needed the most in
particular, for experience goods such as indigo fabric. Some results of this study could give someguidelines for creating interesting online content for customers.
Content Marketing
Content marketing could be defined as the pull strategy that provides consumers about themarketing information that is relevant, educational, helpful, engaging, needed, and sometimes
entertaining without hard-sell advertising (Lieb, 2011). Nowadays, hard-sell advertising is notselling. The companies should give only a piece of content or information that serve theircustomers’ need. In turn, it will make a customer return to the companies for that helpful
information and have more intention to buy their products. Then, some questions were raised inmind; for example, what is the information that customers need or what kind of information weshould provide for customers.
The work of Resnik and Stern (1997) has defined what is considered to be useful information
for advertising in general. They identified 14 criteria for evaluating advertising content as 1. Priceor value 2. Quality 3. Performance 4. Components or contents 5. Availability 6. Special offers 7.
Taste 8. Packaging or Shape 9. Guarantees or warranties 10. Safety 11. Nutrition 12. Independent
research, 13. Company-sponsored research, and 14. New ideas.
Additionally, the work of Gupta et al. (2004) shows that the factors that influence consumer
switching from offline to an electronic channel are the ease of online price and information searchⒸ ISERD87

IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2019) 10-2to evaluate the products. Moreover, delivery time and free express delivery are considered foronline consumers. Furthermore, the study suggests that trust has an impact on purchase intention,
especially for the experience goods (i.e., Ones that consumers would rather physically examine
before making a buying decision).
Moreover, the global online consumer report (KPMG International cooperative, 2017) showsthat reasons that consumers buy things online instead of in stores are the convenience and theability to compare and gain a better price. Moreover, it suggests that the information thatconsumers are looking up for information about products are price comparison, productinformation or specification, reviews, product options (e.g., color, size, style, etc.) and store
inventory/ availability. The report also shows that when consumers decide where to buy products
depends on the best price, preferred website, best delivery options or price, stock availability, peeradvice, and returns policy.
From the previous work above, it can be identified the essential and relevant content thatshould be included to promote experience products like indigo-dyed clothing to facilitate thebuying decision making are: 1. Prices 2. Quality and product information 3. Availability 4. Specialoffers 5. Reviews 6. Packaging or Shape 7. Guarantees or warranties / Return policy, and 8.
Delivery time and fee.
OBJECTIVE
This research is conducted to study how to create content to respond to customer’s needs and could
help customers on buying decision processes by using indigo-dyed clothing as a case study. The
good content, in turn, could help to reduce the workload of the online products’ owner to answer all
frequently asked questions. This study tried to identify the ways to create content that supports
customers in their buying decision making. The methodology will be presented in the next section.
METHODOLOGYThis study referred to previous work, applied focus group, and interview as research methods.
A focus group was used to identify the customers’ factors on the experiences of indigo-dyed
clothing’s buying decision. Indigo dyed clothing is an experience good which people have been
buying experience before. A focus group is a useful tool used in marketing to collect peoples’
opinions, attitudes, and feelings on a given topic (Dilshad and Latif, 2013). A group of 10 persons
who used to buy indigo-dyed clothing was asked questions about what information they used tomake a buying decision on indigo dyed clothing and what channels (online/ offline shops) that theyused to buy.
Moreover, the interview of an administrator, who is experiencing online selling of indigo-dyedclothing, on what information she used to be asked the most from customers was summarized inTable 1.
Sample groups in this research were selected using purposive sampling because of the limited
numbers of customers and web administrators (sellers) and a group of people who experience andwant to give information for the research. Thus, this research has a sample limitation and could befurther expanded to collect more samples.
The results using content analysis suggest some ways to present the content to promote
products in order to gain the customers’ response and interest.
RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
The content that was considered when buying indigo-dyed clothing from previous work wasanalyzed and presented as in Table 1. Which is (unordered data): 1. Prices 2. Quality and productinformation 3. Availability 4. Special offers 5. Reviews 6. Packaging or Shape 7. Guarantees orwarranties/Return policy, and 8. Delivery time and fee.
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IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2019) 10-2

Table 1 The information that was considered when buying indigo-dyed clothingfrom the literature review
1234567
8

Literature review
Prices
Quality and product information
Availability
Special offers
Reviews
Packaging or Shape
Guarantees or warrantees / Return policy
Delivery time and fee

Additionally, the results from the focus group summarized by content analysis are presented inTable 2. The group of purposive samples indicates that the styles (e.g., patterns, appearance), texture
and smell of indigo plants, shop name or brand, and price are important information that focus groupmembers considered when they make an indigo-dyed clothing buying decision, respectively. Oneof the samples said, “styles of the cloths” is the most crucial factor in buying them.
Table 2 The information that was considered when buying indigo-dyed clothing
Importance
123
4
56

Interview an administrator of online indigoclothing seller
Products’ information (i.e. Dimensions)
Patterns and Styles
Buying channels/methods
Fabric care methods
Price
Address and Map of shops

Focus group“Styles” (e.g. Patterns, appearance)“Texture and smell of indigo plants.”“Shop name/ Brand.”“Price”“Friends’ recommendations.”

From interviewing an administrator of a web site that sell indigo-dyed clothing, theinformation that was asked most frequently about indigo-dyed products are products’ informationsuch as dimensions and color, patterns and styles, buying channel or methods to buy, fabric care or
how to take care the indigo-dyed clothing, price, address and map of the shop, respectively.
The results from the focus group and the interviews indicate that styles and patterns are the mostimportant information (more than price) that customers will use to make their buying decisions since
it will make customers happy and confident when wearing it. They will pay for cloth if it makes themgood looking. Therefore, as an online shop, photos of the products and information needed to beprepared carefully. They have to be a clear picture with natural light and make people appreciatedwith.
Moreover, it can be seen that as an online shop where we cannot see each other face to face,some factors that increase trusts such as shop name or brand, address and map of shops, and friends’
recommendations are also important. All in all, from the above literature review on the section ofcontent marketing (summarized in Table 1.), focus group and interview (summarized in Table 2.),
information that should be provided for customers is all information as follows: 1. Prices, 2. Styles,
patterns, texture, and product information, 3. Availability, 4. Special offers, 5. Reviews, 6.
Packaging or Shape, 7. Guarantees or warranties / Return policy, 8. Delivery time and fee; 9. Shop
name/ Brand, 10. Address and map of shops, 11. Buying channels/ methods, and 12. Fabric caremethods.
All information (altogether from table 1 and 2) that should be provided for customers to help
them make a buying decision for indigo-dyed clothing could be separated into 2 groups: 1.
Information that is related to products including prices, styles, patterns, texture and productinformation, availability, special offers, packaging or shape, guarantees or warranties/return policy,
delivery time and fee, buying channels/ methods, and fabric care methods, and 2. Information that
increase trust including reviews, shop name/ brand, and address and map of shops. These kinds ofⒸ ISERD89

IJERD – International Journal of Environmental and Rural Development (2019) 10-2

information could help customers accelerating a decision on buying processes and reducing
workload to answer all frequency asked questions from customers.
LIMITATIONSThe samples of the interview were selected using purposive sampling since there was little time toconduct this study. However, some lesson was learned and gained some guidelines for an
administrator of any website to create content and provide some helpful content and information for
their customers.
CONCLUSION
Online marketing could help people in rural areas sell their products with limited resources andinvestment. However, nowadays, hard-sell advertising could not gain a high purchasing demand
anymore; some marketing techniques have to be adopted. This study focuses on how to provide
practical content that is useful and helpful for customers to make a quicker buying decision onindigo-dyed clothing. From previous work, focus group, and interviewing an administrator whosells indigo dyed fabric online, there are 2 kinds of information that should be provided forcustomers to facilitate indigo-dyed clothing’s buying processes online, which are 1. Informationthat is related to products ,including prices, styles, patterns, texture and product information,
availability, special offers, packaging or shape, guarantees or warranties / return policy, delivery
time and fee, buying channels/ methods, and fabric care methods and 2. Information that increase
trust, including reviews, shop name/ brand, and address and map of shops.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This paper is grateful to Kasetsart University and the Ministry of Science and Technology for being
sponsors and facilitating the work.
REFERENCES
Chanorn, C. 2016. Self-transformation strategies of development: The emergence of indigo-dyed textile
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Dilshad, R.M. and Latif, M. I. 2013. Focus group interview as a tool for qualitative research: An analysis.
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Gupta, A., Su, B.C. and Walter, Z. 2004. An empirical study of consumer switching from traditional toelectronic channels: A purchase-decision process perspective. International Journal of Electronic
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KPMG International Cooperative. 2017. The truth about online consumers. The 2017 Global Online
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