The visual naturalness effect: Impact of natural logos on brand personality perception

A logo is a critical visual element that uniquely identifies a brand and can affect consumers' brand perceptions. Naturalness reflects the degree to which a sign depicts objects from the natural and sensitive world. The logo strategy literature identifies naturalness as a universal and critical design dimension influencing consumers' cognitive, affective and behavioural reactions. In practice, both high and low natural logos are frequently used by brands. However, the current understanding of the effects of logo naturalness is limited. This research thus investigates the influence of natural logos on consumer perceptions of brand personality. The data were collected in four experiments using a set of 10 manipulated logos as stimuli. Our results suggest that high (vs. low) natural logos positively affect the perception of brand sincerity personality and that this effect occurs because high natural logos are easier to process and elicit stronger impressions of authenticity. Moreover, we demonstrate that the positive effect of logo naturalness is enhanced among brands with products made from natural-made (vs. human-made) ingredients. These findings therefore suggest that brands should avoid using low natural logos if their sincerity perception is critical or if most of their products contain high levels of natural ingredients. Hence, our results reinforce the visual design and branding theories and offer marketing practitioners actionable insights.     

Resolving the complexity in Gen Z's envy occurrence: A cross-cultural perspective

Envy is an impactful emotion on consumer behaviors, yet envy is quite complex to be comprehended due to its two different forms (malicious and benign). Therefore, it is significant to find out the factors occurring envy to consume to understand the impact and consequences of envy. This empirical study improves our understanding of envy occurrence (malicious or benign) in Generation Z (Gen Z) consumers by comparing two countries (the United States and Mexico) as representing individualistic and collectivistic cultures. We apply complexity theory as a basis for the configurational model, which we test using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis. We use three configurations—personality, attitudes, and attached importance to participants on social networking sites—to explore causal recipes leading to malicious and benign envy. The findings of this study highlight the differences in Gen Z consumers' envy occurrence regarding configurational factors. In addition to said factors, this research indicates that culture plays a significant role in Gen Z's envy occurrence, thus contributing to the current knowledge set.     

Exploring the changing role of brand archetypes in customer-brand relationships: Why try to be a hero when your brand can be more?

For over 20 years, managers have been encouraged to leverage archetypal meaning to strengthen their brands. Prior research has studied archetypes as universal patterns present in the collective unconscious that trigger an instinctive response in customers, arguing that brands should evoke one archetype at a time. However, recent evidence seems to suggest that the single archetype view proposed in previous work may have lost its relevance in the marketplace. This article responds to calls for further research into brand archetypes by analyzing more than 2,400 brands and the archetypes they evoke in their marketing communications. The current findings support the continued relevance and importance of brand archetypes in marketing, showing that brands connect with customers by consistently evoking specific archetypes. Critically, however, strong brands tend to leverage multiple archetypes at a time rather than just one as previously believed. We explore key implications of our findings for theory and management, discuss avenues for future research, and provide actionable guidelines for managers wishing to leverage archetypal meaning to build strong brands.     

Consumer financial information processing: An integrated approach to examine individual differences

This study applied an integrated approach to construct a hierarchical framework for consumer financial information processing. Individual differences in customers' psychological, cognitive and motivational characteristics were examined as antecedents. Using data collected from a sample of 613 U.S. adults, this study used the structural equation modeling method to identify significant direct and indirect relationships amongst personality traits, financial self-efficacy, financial information-gathering ability, search motivation, financial information sufficiency and the utilization of heuristics and systematic financial information-processing modes. The results showed that consumers' information sufficiency (+) directly explained the application of the heuristic mode, whereas consumers' information gathering ability (+), motivation to search (+) and information sufficiency (+) directly explained the use of the systematic mode. Financial self-efficacy demonstrated positive indirect associations with both heuristic and systematic modes. The results also revealed that personality traits including agreeableness, emotional stability and extraversion indirectly explained the use of information-processing modes. Agreeableness (−) and emotional stability (+) were indirectly associated with both heuristic and systematic information processing modes, whilst extraversion (+) was only indirectly associated with the heuristic mode. Openness (+) was the only trait that was directly associated with the systematic mode. This study contributes to the literature on consumer financial information processing by connecting individuals' psychological, cognitive and motivational characteristics. The findings of this study provide valuable insights and policy and practical implications within the industry.     

Leveraging consumer personality and social media marketing to improve a brand's social media equity

Consumer personality traits impact consumer actions, preferences, online behaviour and shopping motives. This study examines personality traits as drivers of social media equity by addressing the mechanisms under which consumer personality traits influence social media equity. We aim to combine consumer-level information with brand-level metrics to advance our understanding of consumers' associations with brands on social media and how specific consumer personality traits can be leveraged to improve a brand's social media equity. Using a self-administered survey, a total of 418 respondents from an online consumer panel participated in this study. The results from structural equation modelling revealed that while extraversion, openness to experience and neuroticism personality traits are positively associated with brand engagement and brand advocacy, agreeableness and conscientiousness are significantly associated with brand advocacy and not with brand engagement. This study advances theory by examining how consumer personality traits influence social media equity via brand engagement and brand advocacy as mediators. The findings provide rich practical insights into underlying mechanisms through which marketers can increase social media equity using consumer personality traits.     

Enjoyment or autonomy? The interactive effect of brand ritual and brand personality on consumer purchase

The use of brand rituals is a pervasive tactic in business, but the marketing effectiveness of this practice largely remains unknown. In the present research, we postulate the contingent nature of brand rituals on consumer purchase. Based on the two countervailing processes—the enhancement of perceived enjoyment and the reduction of perceived autonomy, we suggest that the effectiveness of brand rituals is determined by the interaction between the degree of brand ritual (simple vs. sophisticated) and the brand personality (excitement vs. sincerity). By means of field and laboratory experiments in various product categories (i.e., fruit tea, juice, stationery, and hand cream), we show that for a sincere brand, a sophisticated brand ritual elicits higher consumer purchase than a simple brand ritual only via the process of enhanced enjoyment because its sincerity personality weakens the salience of the process of reduced autonomy. In contrast, for an exciting brand, a sophisticated brand ritual elicits lower consumer purchase than a simple brand ritual via the process of enhanced enjoyment but reduced autonomy (the autonomy route dominates the enjoyment route) because its exciting personality intensifies the salience of the process of reduced autonomy. In simple words, a sophisticated brand ritual benefits a sincere brand, but a simple one benefits an exciting brand. Our findings extend the research on ritual and brand ritual and offer implications for marketing practice regarding how to design a brand ritual more effectively.     

品牌延伸会影响品牌个性吗？——反馈效应的视角

品牌个性和品牌延伸都是品牌管理的重要内容，二者相互影响，过去的研究着重于品牌个性对品牌延伸的影响，但品牌延伸亦会影响品牌个性发展。选取我国医药行业老字号品牌云南白药作为研究对象，首先对云南白药的品牌个性进行探索性研究，通过四个定性研究确定云南白药品牌个性的项目词汇库，然后通过问卷调查获得的353份样本进行探索性因子分析，确定了云南白药的品牌个性的三个品牌个性维度，即经典真诚、可靠安全、独特神秘。在此基础上，针对云南白药向日化产品的品牌延伸如何影响其品牌个性提出理论假设，通过问卷调查获取205份样本，应用回归分析对假设进行检验，发现品牌延伸的两个维度情感延伸和功能延伸对品牌个性都有显著的正向影响，但功能延伸对品牌个性的正向影响更加显著，而且功能延伸和情感延伸对品牌个性各个维度的影响效果不一。     

企业社会责任对品牌个性的影响研究

随着我国综合国力的提升，市场经济得以迅速发展，但在企业不断的发展中，仅仅以经济收益为核心目标的价值观念受到了公众的挑战。同时公众消费呈现越来越个性化特点，使得企业品牌个性在企业各项能力中占据重要地位。进行实证研究指出企业社会责任影响品牌个性，检验了品牌态度在企业社会责任对品牌个性影响中中介作用显著。