The influence of consumer mood state as a contextual factor on imagery-inducing advertisements and brand attitude

An experiment was conducted to examine the effects of consumer preexisting mood as a contextual factor on consumers' response to imagery-inducing advertisements. The results showed that positive mood seemed to be the most productive context for an imagery ad. Positive mood increased consumers' positive affective state and increased their subsequent brand attitudes. In addition, the results showed that consumers' mood state can also affect the processing mode consumers actually adopt while viewing an ad, and thus indirectly affect brand attitude. Positive mood state was shown to facilitate the induction of mental imagery processing, and at the same time distract detail-oriented analytical processing. As a result, evaluation of the ad was enhanced. On the other hand, negative mood was shown to reduce the intended mental imagery processing, but it appeared to encourage a detail-oriented analytical processing. As a result, consumers remembered more accurately the specific ad claims, but were not affected as much by the imagery-inducing appeals.     

The impact of emotional appeal and the media context on the effectiveness of commercials for not-for-profit and for-profit brands

This study investigates the impact of emotions, both ad- and context-evoked, on the effectiveness of commercials for not-for-profit vs. for-profit brands. Two types of emotional impact are taken into account: firstly, the emotional appeal of the commercial itself and secondly, the emotion evoked by the context in which the commercial is embedded. Effectiveness is made operational by both rational (recall, recognition) and emotional measures (likeability, understanding of the ad and reduced intention to switch the ad). The main research uses a 2 × 2 between subjects design where the context (warm vs. sad film fragment) and the type of commercial (warm vs. sad) were manipulated for not-for-profit and for-profit brands. The appropriate stimuli were identified in a preliminary study. The results indicate that, overall, sadness as an execution approach works better for commercials. This is in particular the case for the rational impact measures of the for-profit brands. For the not-for-profit brands, the emotional measures have significantly higher scores. Moreover, a context-evoking sadness proves to be the most responsive for the for-profit brands.     

The impact of product knowledge on consumer product memory and evaluation in the competitive ad context: The item‐specific‐relational perspective

Research evidence to date suggests that the combined presence of item‐specific and relational processing is necessary to induce higher memory performance of the target ad and proper evaluation of the target brand. This elaborative processing, however, requires cognitive capacity. In this paper, an item‐specific‐relational processing framework was employed to explain the roles of consumer product knowledge in the competitive and non‐competitive ad contexts. Findings from an experimental study suggest that high‐ and low‐knowledge consumers differed in product memory and evaluation in competitive and non‐competitive ad contexts. Such differences could be explained by consumers' engaging in item‐specific and/or relational processing depending on whether target brand information was presented with or without information on competing brands. It appears that competitive ad context would benefit low‐knowledge consumers by serving as a reference. In contrast, high‐knowledge consumers did not seem to be affected by ad context. Both theoretical and managerial implications are discussed. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The role of medium content and ad format congruity in influencing advertising outcomes

This study examines how (in)congruence regarding the format of the ad and the context in which the ad is placed influences ad recognition, perceived advertiser sensitivity, ad comprehension, and persuasion. Highly visual or informational ads were placed congruently or incongruently within a(n) highly visual or informational surrounding context. There was some positive support for mismatching the format of the ad and surrounding context in terms of ad recognition. Specifically, a highly visual ad placed within a highly informational setting resulted in the greatest ad recognition. However, in terms of the audience's perceptions of advertiser sensitivity, subjective ad comprehension, and ad persuasion, there was more positive support for matching the format of the ad with that of the surrounding context. In this regard, it is better to place visual ads congruently within visual contexts. Theories from information processing and hemispheric lateralization are drawn on to support this research.     

The effects of gender on processing advertising and product trial information

Consistent with past research and theory explaining gender differences in information processing, the empirical study reported here showed that men process two forms of marketing information (advertising and product trial) differently than women. Specifically, women are more sensitive to the comprehensiveness of the trial information, recognizing manipulated differences in trial diagnosticity. In contrast, men tend to use readily available information to form brand judgments and are less likely to notice that other attribute information is unavailable in the product trial.     

The effects of salesperson mood, shopper behavior, and store type on customer service

This paper proposes that salesperson mood, shopper behavior, and store type have significant effects on the level of customer service provided by a store. Results from a laboratory experiment reveal that salespeople enjoy unpleasant shoppers less but serve them more. Salespeople in a good mood are more uniform in their delivery of customer service, while those in a bad mood are more likely to provide poor service to pleasant than to unpleasant customers. The study also reveals that department-store salespeople provide a more uniform level of customer service than discount-store salespeople. Conclusions and management implications are discussed.     

Health-related ad information and health motivation effects on product evaluations

This study tests the effect of health-related ad information on perceived product healthfulness and purchase intention. Also, the study investigates whether consumers' health motivation moderates the effects, because of the way health motivation affects processing of health-related information in ads. Three types of health-related ad elements are distinguished: functional claims, process claims and health imagery. These elements were combined in mock ads and an online experiment was run to test the study hypotheses. Results show that health imagery has the largest impact on consumers' product evaluations, while functional claims and process claims have much smaller effects. Health motivation shows significant interaction with process claims on product evaluations.     

The moderating effects of gender roles on service emotional contagion

This study attempts to examine how service personnel's appearances, attitudes, and behaviours affect customers' emotions and thus their satisfaction and loyalty; it also considers gender roles an important moderator, in that customers with different gender roles may detect and feel differently when they are exposed to personnel's appearances, attitudes, and behaviours. Empirical data were collected from customers in clothing shops in Taiwan. The results suggest that customers with androgynous role more sensitive to the emotional contagion process. Managerial implications and future research directions are also discussed.     

The effects of competitive context on consumer response to price changes

ABSTRACT

This paper aims to understand how a brand’s price level, relative to its competitors, will affect consumers’ responses to price changes of the brand. The study uses experiments to examine brand choice responses to price increases and decreases across contexts differing in competitor brands and their respective prices. These experiments are conducted with six consumer goods categories. The research identifies three key factors that affect the size of responses to brand price changes – (1) passing a competitor brand’s price, (2) narrowing versus widening the price gaps with competitors, and (3) whether competitors are predominantly higher or lower priced brands.     

Impact of narrative versus factual print ad copy on product evaluation: The mediating role of ad message involvement

The relative impact of narrative versus factual message strategies on product evaluation was explored. The role of ad message involvement (AMI) as a mediator was also investigated. Narrative versus factual print ad copy resulted in more favorable product evaluations for two fictitious brands, one each from the cell phone and sunglasses product categories. Narrative print ad copy also elicited higher ad message involvement which, in turn, mediate the differential effect of narrative versus factual copy on product evaluations. The study demonstrated one of the major pathways through which the relatively more persuasive effects of narrative versus factual print ad copy appears to operate. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The influence of college students' shopping orientations and gender differences on online information searches and purchase behaviours

Using the data collected from a survey of 1277 US college students, this study investigated college students' shopping orientations, and examined the relationships between their shopping orientations and searches for information about and purchases of apparel products online and the differences between male and female students in their shopping orientations, online information searches and purchase experiences. Seven shopping orientation constructs were identified: shopping enjoyment, brand/fashion consciousness, price consciousness, shopping confidence, convenience/time consciousness, in‐home shopping tendency and brand/store loyalty. Results showed that participants' shopping orientations were significantly related to their searches for information about and purchases of apparel items online. In addition, male and female participants showed significant differences in their shopping orientations, online information searches and purchase experiences. This study provided suggestions for apparel e‐tailors to develop effective marketing strategies to reach their target market, for consumer educators and for educators in the retail merchandizing area to prepare their students for future careers.     

The Trade-off Between Quantity and Quality of Information in Gender Responses to Advertising

Unlike females, males tend to process informational ads in a heuristic manner and form their judgments based on the mere number of product assertions presented in a message. Consistent with this prediction, there was a positive linear relationship between argument quantity and message persuasiveness for males, and it persisted even when brand attributes conveyed in an ad were relatively unimportant. Alternatively, females' responses exhibited an S-shaped relationship between argument quantity and advertising effectiveness, and were affected by the strength of message claims. The author argued that this pattern occurred because females engaged in more detailed yet selective processing of advertising information.     

Advertising for extensions: Moderating effects of extension type,advertising strategy,and product category involvement on extension evaluation

This paper investigates how advertisements for extensions contribute to consumers’ attitudes towards new line and brand extensions of highly familiar brands. We investigate the relative importance of attitude toward the advertisement (Aad), parent brand quality, and fit between the extension and the parent brand for extension evaluations with a sample of 754 Belgians. Hierarchical regressions showed that Aad is the major influencer of extension evaluation. The importance of Aad, quality, and fit on extension evaluation is moderated by extension type (line or brand extension), advertising strategy (informational, positive emotional, negative emotional), and product involvement (low or high involvement). Quality transfer from the parent brand was more outspoken for line than for brand extensions; Aad was relatively more important for low product involvement and fit for high involvement conditions. Informational appeals, compared to emotional appeals, reduced the effects of parent brand quality and fit, but Aad was all the more important.     

User-generated product reviews on the internet: the drivers and outcomes of the perceived usefulness of product reviews

This study examines how people cope with the user-generated product reviews (UGPRs) found on various websites where anonymous web users post and share their personal product usage experiences. Based on information processing model of communication, we postulate that there are source, message, media, and receiver factors to influence individuals' psychological processing of the UGPR messages, and its subsequent behavioral outcomes. A survey was administered by a professional market research firm to 262 randomly selected US residents from 18 to 55 years old. Consistent with the predictions, the results of the structural equation modeling analysis showed that the perceived source expertise, message objectivity, website credibility, and receiver–source similarity had positive and direct impacts on the perceptions of UGPR usefulness, which, in turn, positively influenced individuals' willingness to share product reviews with others. A series of causal model invariance tests also confirmed that the findings were statistically invariant across different subgroups divided by such factors as product categories, websites, subjective product class knowledge, past UGPR experience, and the susceptibility to informational influence.     

The effects of product knowledge on the evaluation of warranteed brands

This study explores the effects of consumer knowledge on respondents' evaluations of both known and unknown brands that include either a 2-year or a 20-year warranty. Both experts and nonexperts evaluated warranty as more important than brand name in their product quality decision. Warranty length was positively correlated with product quality perceptions for both known and unknown brands. With the unknown brand, nonexperts perceived significant improvement in product quality when the warranty length was increased from 2 to 20 years. For the known brand, nonexperts perceived little difference in quality for the two warranty lengths. Experts indicated no significant differences in perceived quality, given the four brand/warranty-length conditions. The results indicate that warranty length is most heavily weighted as a cue to product quality when consumers are not highly knowledgeable, and the brand name is not well known. © 1996 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Right metaphor,right place: choosing a visual metaphor based on product type and consumer differences

This research examines the effectiveness of different metaphor types (juxtaposition vs. replacement vs. fusion) while taking into account the potential impacts of product type, consumer gender differences, and consumer cognitive capacity. The experimental results indicate that ads with metaphors are more effective than those without, regardless of the type of metaphor being used. For females, a replacement metaphor is more effective in ads for ‘search products’, while a juxtaposition metaphor is more effective in ads for ‘experience products’. Juxtaposition metaphors are more effective for males, regardless of product type. When the focus is narrowed to the cognitive capacity of female participants, metaphor type and product type are found to have an interactive effect on females with high cognitive capacity. Fusion metaphors have the advantage when promoting a search product to high cognitive capacity females. The results suggest that practitioners can more effectively promote their products by choosing the right type of metaphor.     

An examination of materialism,conspicuous consumption and gender differences

This paper examines gender differences in terms of materialism, conspicuous consumption, brand loyalty and impulse buying. We build our hypotheses based on both existing marketing and consumption literature with an additional integration of historical and gender studies literature in order to further augment the study of materialism and its related variables. Our study used survey data from 1180 Americans living in four northeastern states. Results show that significant differences between the genders were found in terms of materialism, conspicuous consumption and impulse buying. No significant difference was found in terms of brand loyalty.     

The influence of gender on the effectiveness of probability markers in advertising

The results of two studies reveal that gender plays a moderating role on the effects that the use of probability markers (hedges – e.g., possibly, could help; and pledges – e.g., definitely, without a doubt) in advertising copy has on consumers' attitudes towards the brand advertised and purchase intentions. Women, as comprehensive processors, are not particularly sensitive to probability markers, which function as heuristic cues. Men, on the other hand, display higher levels of sensitivity towards probability marker usage; more precisely, their responses show preference towards the use of hedges over both pledges and no probability markers in advertising copy. Interactions with product category involvement, buying motivation (hedonic or utilitarian), and familiarity with the brand advertised are also explored.     

Consumers' response to promotional gifts: The role of gender,transactional value,and reciprocity

Gifts received with the purchase of a focal product are widely used as a tool aimed at incentivizing sales. Yet, marketers still face many questions related to the effectiveness of this promotional technique. In this paper, we examine whether customer's gender—a variable that is managerially relevant and often collected for targeting and positioning purposes—influences the success of gift promotions. Using novel data from a car rental company, we show that promotional gifts have a stronger positive impact on subsequent purchase behaviors for women (vs. men). Two follow‐up experiments demonstrate that this gender effect is driven by the fact that women obtain greater transactional value from the promotional purchase than men do, leading to enhanced reciprocity motivation among women. Taken together, these findings first argue for a more targeted use of promotions involving gifts and second, raise questions about whether we should carefully consider potential gender differences in predicting the effects of many common marketing tactics that are presently discussed as if universal.     

Sharing product harm information: The effects of self-construal and self-relevance

Product harm information spreading in the marketplace may have profound consequences for companies, public policy makers and consumer well-being. However, limited research is available on what makes consumers share such information with others. This paper examines how self-relevance and self-construal affect the sharing of product harm information and the underlying processes that shape sharing. Five experiments demonstrate that under independent self-construal, highly self-relevant product harm information is less likely to be shared. The reluctance to share highly self-relevant information is attenuated under interdependent self-construal. The differential effects of self-construal are related to self-serving processes and motivations for sharing product harm information with others. The results apply to the sharing of negative information, but not positive information. Companies may use these findings to manage the diffusion of product harm information.