Examination of word of mouth influence on consumer purchasing decision in private secondary education institutions

Nowadays, marketing activities are expanding as much as possible and companies trying various methods to affect people's purchasing decisions. As a matter of fact, there is an overload of information and advertising. Than to make a purchasing decision becomes difficult between these much alternatives. Consumers tend to take opinions of people that they feel close to them, trusted or with high knowledge about the related services and goods. These people accelerate the purchase decision process and make consumers more comfortable. In this regard, Word of Mouth Marketing has become a very important topic for companies and researchers. In this study, the effect of Word of Mouth Marketing on Purchasing Decision has been tried to examined for private secondary education institutions. Primarily, related information has been given about the Word of Mouth Marketing and Purchasing Decision Process. Afterwards, validity analysis, reliability analysis, regression analysis and t-test and ANOVA tables were prepared for the data obtained from 385 people by face-to-face survey method. Information about related descriptive statistics also given in this research. Besides, it was concluded that "Expertise of the Adviser", "Necessity to Approve the Decision" and "Importance of the Decision" factors affect consumer's purchase decision making. In addition, according to the socio-demographic characteristics of consumers the effect of Word of Mouth Marketing on Purchasing Decision is differentiated. Keywords: Word of Mouth Marketing, Purchasing Decision, Opinion Leaders, Viral Marketing, Private Secondary Education Institutions