Impact of Social Media Marketing on Consumer Behavior: A Study with reference to the Clothing Industry in Colombo, Sri Lanka

Abstract

This research aims to investigate how social media marketing affects clothing related consumer behaviour in Colombo, Sri Lanka. The study with the objective to examine the historical development of Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and YouTube, assess the influence of social media on customer behaviour in the clothing industry, and provide guidance to clothing firms on enhancing their social media marketing tactics. The study specifically targeted active social media users in Colombo, with a focus on 100 consumers as samples from the clothing industry who utilize social media through random sampling. The data were collected through questionnaire which was distributed via WhatsApp groups using Google Forms and through QR codes distributed in shopping malls, starting on December 20, 2023. The data collected underwent reliability analysis to assess its dependability, while additional statistical techniques such as Pearson correlation, multiple linear regression, simple linear regression, and descriptive statistics were employed to examine the proposed hypotheses. The results of this study showed that customer purchasing behaviour towards the clothing industry is positively impacted by social media marketing. The empirical evidence gathered from this study unequivocally supports the notion that social media marketing plays a significant role in shaping consumer behaviours. It is worth noting that the impact of social media marketing varies from country to country. The collected results indicate that Facebook is the most frequently utilized platform, with an average social media usage of 1 to 3 hours identified. Additionally, there is a higher representation of females compared to males, and the age group of 21 to 35 years has the largest number of respondents.