Personal Factors Influencing Consumers’ Buying Decision of Mobile Phone: A Case of Ethiopia, Dilla City

Abstract

Mobile phones have become one of the most important means of communication in Ethiopia. It enables people to keep in touch with their families and friends. Beyond personal communication mobile phones facilitate the day to day activity of its users. The objective of this study is to investigate personal factors influencing consumers’ buying decision of mobile phone in Ethiopia, Dilla City. This study focuses on studying consumers’ personal factors   such as age, education, income, and occupation of consumers’ that influence buying decision of mobile phone. The study surveyed 381 customers by using non probability sampling technique. Sampling was all from businessmen, employees in government office, teachers, as well as students. The primary data were collected by using structured questionnaire where as the secondary data were obtained from books, various published, and unpublished works of scholars, reports, and on line sources. Customers were studied at their motive to purchase new mobile phones on the basis of pre-purchase evaluation, post purchase evaluation, and personal factors.  Descriptive statistics and Chi-square test have been employed to analyze the data. Investigations of the inferential analysis revealed that significant associations exist between motivating factors and personal factors. Therefore, the findings of the study provide companies and active players in mobile phone production and marketing with practical suggestions as well as recommendations on how to meet consumers’ needs in Dilla town.

Keywords: Personal factors, Mobile phone, Consumer behavior, Dilla City.