Brand Messages Research Articles

Colour meaning and consumer expectations

AbstractDeciding a colour for a product is a significant task for designers to attract consumer attention and communicate brand messages. It requires an initial analysis that explores consumer expectations within the sector, and this information is then used to inform development of a product design. This article discusses the application of the product colour development process during the initial phase of product design. Using a case study approach, one particular product category—a dishwashing liquid product was selected based on the suggestion from a leading U.K. consumer goods manufacturing company that colour is a major design factor for this product category. In the first phase of the study, interviews and an online survey were carried out with consumers (to explore what elements are important when they purchase a washing‐up liquid product). In the second phase of the study, a colour meaning experiment was conducted to explore possible colours for dishwashing liquid packaging using a semantic differential method. The results show that yellowish and bluish green colours evoke positive responses while saturated and dark green colours are perceived more negatively.

Second Person Pronouns Enhance Consumer Involvement and Brand Attitude

Online brand messaging, e.g., blogging or posting on social media platforms, has an important role in digital marketing strategy. Such messaging is largely text based and provides an opportunity for brands to interact with many consumers simultaneously. The marketing literature, however, has yet to provide sufficient guidance on effective online brand messaging strategies. In particular, research has yet to address how the inclusion of second person pronouns in online brand messaging affects relevant consumer outcomes. The present research proposes that second person pronouns should work to enhance consumer involvement and brand attitude as a result of increasing the extent that consumers engage in self-referencing. A field study involving actual brand posts on Facebook and two subsequent experiments provide support for this hypothesis. In addition, drawing on cultural dimensions theory, individual levels of collectivism are identified as a boundary condition. The presence (vs. absence) of second person pronouns in online brand messaging enhances involvement and brand attitude for consumers that are lower, but not higher, in collectivism. The results provide marketers with needed guidance for creating effective online brand messaging.

Brand choice via incidental social media exposure

PurposeThe paper seeks to establish the effectiveness of social media advertising and participation by brands through incidental exposure. Using experimental design, in a social media environment, this paper aims to extend incidental exposure research in the context of social media.Design/methodology/approachThis paper uses an experimental design with controlled image durations using MediaLab and DirectRT, allowing for precise image display times and randomization of screens. Participants were split between high-involvement and low-involvement product categories, and the brand choice exercise was administered in an on-screen experiment.FindingsThe paper provides support that incidental exposure influences brand choice. Further, it indicates that for low-involvement product categories, the type of social media exposure does not influence brand choice significantly between types. For high-involvement product categories, ads perform better than sponsored story executions; consumer-generated brand messages perform better than brand-generated messages; and the influence of reference group affects brand choice.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper tests one social media environment using a desktop Web environment. Additional studies would be needed to test other social media environments and mobile technology.Practical implicationsThe paper provides evidence that brands benefit by simply participating and advertising in social media, but the execution style matters to a greater extent for high-involvement product categories in influencing brand choice.Social implicationsMere exposure to a brand message may influence consumers unknowingly. Repeated exposure as short as 5 s per viewing is related to increases in brand choice.Originality/valueThis paper extends research on incidental exposure and establishes a key positive brand outcome for practice and research, and it provides the first exploration on the outcome of incident exposure to brand messages in social media. The results suggest that social media and advertising by brands have positive impacts beyond traditional measures of success online.

Hotel social media marketing: a study on message strategy and its effectiveness

PurposeThe purpose of this study is to develop a typology of social media messages to compare the effectiveness of different message strategies.Design/methodology/approachIn total, 1,837 messages from 12 hotel brand Facebook pages were content-analyzed. Applying both correspondence analysis and multivariate analysis of variance, the study compared message strategy across hotel-scale levels and explored the effectiveness of different message strategies.FindingsA typology of four-type message format and six-type message content was developed. The picture message was the best message format. Product, brand and involvement messages were shown to be more effective than information, reward and promotion messages. Promotion message was the least effective message content type.Research limitations/implicationsThe major limitation of this study is the generalizability owing to the sample selection process. There is also the limitation on exclusion of control variables, selection of the three effectiveness measures and evolving social media technology.Practical implicationsThe typology of Facebook message strategy developed in the study provided guidelines for hotel marketers to create messages on Facebook pages and track effectiveness. Hotels should also take full advantage of the picture format and product, brand and involvement contents.Originality/valueThis study created a new typology of social media message strategy consisting of two dimensions. It also provided empirical evidence to support the application of message strategy theory in the hotel social media marketing area.

Examining the dilution of the consumer-brand relationship on Facebook: the saturation issue

PurposeBrands have been progressively using social networking sites, namely, Facebook, as part of their strategy to engage their consumers and ultimately build long-term relationships with them. Nonetheless, with the overuse of “engagement ads” by brands, saturation related to information overload is expected to be reached leading to the dilution of the consumer–brand relationship. The purpose of this paper is to fill a gap in the literature which has predominantly focused on the positive side of social networking sites, and hence still lacks a thorough understanding of the potential risks brands face when using Facebook. Accordingly, this research examines the different risks brands would be facing from saturated consumers on social networking sites such as Facebook.Design/methodology/approachA qualitative study was conducted, with a total of 40 respondents using face-to-face semi-structured interviews over two stages. While the first stage of the study focused on examining the saturation risk and its potential negative effects, the second one explored these risks specifically on the consumer–brand relationship on Facebook. The interviews were recorded, transcribed and then coded for analysis using NVivo 8.FindingsBrands are overloading their followers with passively endorsed brand messages, which are negatively affecting consumers’ experience on Facebook, as well as the relationship with these brands. This overall dilution of the consumer–brand relationship on Facebook was hence found to be affecting interaction, similarity with friends, the system quality of the social networking site, as well as information quality. Furthermore, this dilution was found to be affecting brand likability, brand trust and brand association.Originality/valueThe negative implications are still scarcely examined in the literature where social media engagement is predominantly discussed through a positive lens. Hence, this study has the peculiarity of discussing the risks that companies would face with Facebook’s engagement model along with their implications on the consumer-brand relationship.

Appetizer or Main Course: Early Market vs. Majority Market Go‐to‐Market Strategies for Radical Innovations

Different views exist in the literature regarding which adopter group to target with a go‐to‐market strategy: early market consumers or consumers in the majority market. Particularly when radical innovations are launched, the approach to the market becomes a critical success factor for firms seeking to recoup their significant investments in these innovation endeavors. Four experimental studies investigate whether and how to differentiate the design of go‐to‐market strategies, represented as bundles of marketing mix elements consisting of brand name, launch price, message content, and distribution intensity, for different consumer groups. Using the concept of consumer innovativeness, this study distinguishes between the early market of innovative consumers and the majority market populated by consumers low in innovativeness. Applying a signaling framework, the results indicate that the early market can be targeted with a go‐to‐market strategy signaling exclusive innovativeness; the majority market should be approached with a strategy signaling security. Further, at a signal vehicle level using specific marketing mix elements, the study demonstrates the relevance of adapting the go‐to‐market strategy for a radical innovation with regard to message content, distribution intensity, and launch price in line with consumer innovativeness. The results also indicate that the adaptation of the two signals and their signal vehicles to the targeted consumer markets is generally not necessary for incremental innovations. The authors discuss the implications of their study for future research and provide managers with recipes of go‐to‐market strategies for radical innovations when targeting consumers in the early versus majority market.

Leveraging the Subconscious Mind: Transgressing Advertisement

Marketers always try different marketing techniques to realize an extra mileage in their efforts. It has been evidenced that customers end up in buying things that may not be of their choice. With advanced technology coupled with creativity, they are travelling through the new waters of marketing, which involves reading minds and hitting product concepts into sub-conscious minds. Subliminal marketing is one such tool that is all about passing messages below the limen which further would have the capacity to influence customer behavior. The current study was conducted to understand the effectiveness of the subliminal message brand retention and the consumer choice that follows

Too Good To Be True? Effect of Consumers’ Brand Schemas on Apparel Brands’ Fair Labor Marketing Messages

In this study, researchers provide a comprehensive model of how consumers process, remember, and evaluate positive fair labor-related brand messages that are congruent/incongruent to their existing brand expectations using both psychophysiological and self-reported measures. Data were collected across two different studies. Results indicated that consumers paid more attention to and better remembered messages for incongruity than congruity. Also attitude toward message was highest for congruent messages, followed by incongruity resolution and lowest for incongruity nonresolution. The combined study findings bridge the gap in literature between human attitude and cognition, helping both brands and consumer researchers understand consumers’ reaction to brands schema-message congruity/incongruity and guide decisions when brands hope to revitalize or reinvent a brand’s image.

Emotional and sensory profiling by children and teenagers: A case study of the check‐all‐that‐apply method on biscuits

AbstractSensory and emotional profiling by consumers is gathering interest among scientists and companies as it could help to better understand the motives for food choice. Although children and teenagers are important food consumer groups, they are underrepresented in sensory research and little is known on how children and teenagers perform on these tasks. Therefore, this study investigates the emotional and sensory profiling of a traditional biscuit product among 122 children and teenagers (10–14 years old). The check‐all‐that‐apply (CATA) approach has been applied for conducting the emotional and sensory profiling task using an age‐appropriate protocol. Children and teenagers evaluated four different samples (market leader, store brand, small producer, and local bakery) and assessed their overall liking under three conditions: blind, expected (brand logo) and informed. Overall liking differed significantly among the samples and brand information influenced the informed liking scores. Samples were associated with different emotional profiles and sensory attributes by the children and teenagers.Practical applicationsThis study illustrates the potential of using CATA questions for obtaining emotional connotations and sensory attributes of food products with children and teenagers. Together with the insights regarding their attitudes toward traditional food products and store brands, this could help producers when developing promotion initiatives to bring their traditional food products to a potential market of young consumers. Including both sensory and emotional measurements yield interesting insights for the product development if companies want to produce products in alignment with the brand message. Further, this study shows that branding influences not only the overall liking but also the sensory perception of the food products. Therefore, this study adds to the discussion on the need and importance of a more realistic product presentation during sensory testing.

Unilever's Mission for Vitality

Dove and Axe were two highly successful brands owned by Unilever, a portfolio company. Dove was a female-oriented beauty product brand that exhorted “real beauty” and not the unachievable standards that the media portrayed. In contrast, Axe was a brand that purportedly “gives men the edge in the mating game.”□ Their risqué commercials always portrayed the supermodel-type beauty ideal that Dove was trying to change. Unilever had always been a company of brands where the consumer knew the brands but not the company, but recently there had been the idea to unify the company with an umbrella mission for all of its brands. This would turn Unilever into a company with brands, potentially increasing consumer awareness and encourage cross-purchases between the different brands. However, this raised questions about the conflicting messages between the brands' marketing campaigns, most notably between Unilever's two powerhouse brands, Dove and Axe. The case begins with COO Alan Jope anticipating an upcoming press meeting in New York City to discuss Unilever's current (i.e., 2005) performance and announce Unilever's decision to create an umbrella mission statement for the company. This case focuses on the central question of whether or not consistency between brand messages is necessary or inherently problematic.The Unilever's Mission for Vitality case was created to help students and managers develop an appreciation for how the values underlying a marketing campaign can affect and alter an organization's culture. The case focuses on how two products and marketing campaigns that express conflicting underlying values (as reflected in the Dove Real Beauty and the Axe Effect campaigns) within the same corporation can give rise to a number of unintended organizational and marketing complications.

The branded skyline? A socio-semiotic critique of Johannesburg’s architectural adverts

ABSTRACTThis article critically analyses the semiotics of ‘architectural adverts’ (massive scale outdoor billboards that cover the entire facades of city buildings) in Johannesburg, South Africa. Drawing on critical advertising studies and scholarship critiquing neoliberal visual culture in cities of the Global South, the article critiques the visual landscape created by brands writ large across the cityscape. The critique is from two vantage points: the highway and the pavement. These are theorised as intersecting levels of geosemiotic meaning-making, shaped by structures of neoliberal power. We argue that architectural adverts colonise public sensibility by cloaking the realities of urban neglect and inequality with dazzling brand messages, and by making these visible at the expense of citizens’ visibility (and their view). We argue that the city government is neglecting its public mandate by allowing such advertising to be placed in public spaces, and that this failure exposes the neoliberal value set that dominates in post-apartheid culture.

Consumers' Social Media Advocacy Behaviors Regarding Luxury Brands: An Explanatory Framework

ABSTRACTConsumers can take advocacy actions on social media websites that validate and amplify brand messages and brand meanings. But why do some consumers choose to become brand advocates in social media while others do not? We propose and test an exploratory framework for the likelihood of consumers' social media advocacy behaviors (SABs; e.g., “Liking” brand pages, share brand postings) using the context of luxury brands. We posit that brand-level, social-influence, and individual-difference variables will influence the likelihood of SABs. Further, the effects of these independent variables will be mediated by three motivating variables—consumer perceptions of self-enhancement benefit, community identification benefit, and utilitarian benefit from SABs—and one inhibiting variable, social-evaluative anxiety from SABs. A study with 413 nonstudent, female participants supported our framework.

Leonardo: Indianizing Olive Oil

This field-based case works as a solid introduction to new product positioning in a nascent market with an opportunity to define the product category. At the start, the brand creates a new category product line with an entry-level cheaper product with plans to later move up the value chain. The position the firm takes in the beginning sets out to change consumer's perceptions of the product's use and convince consumers that the value of olive oil is in cooking. While the market for healthy cooking oils is large, the brand should overcome entrenched consumer beliefs about the best oil to use for cooking, and develop strategies for repeat purchase beyond just trial. From the humble beginning of his first taste of olive oil in Australia, VN Dalmia, chairman of Dalmia Continental Pvt. Ltd. (DCPL), in New Delhi, India, had created an INR40 crore brand by the end of 2012. As he worked on future directions, Dalmia thought about where the company had been and where he believed it should go. The major issues before the company were how to generate volume by converting the mid-segment consumer, attaining exponential growth, and setting strategy for future distribution to feed this exponential growth. Was the company doing all it could to inform the masses about the benefits of cooking with olive oil? And between its two channels—traditional, unorganized retailers and modern, organized retailers—was it getting its brand message through? Would future direction include adding more olive-based products beyond oil? Or would selling the brand to a more entrenched consumer-products company that could take Leonardo to the next level make sense? Excerpt UVA-M-0904 Rev. May 4, 2016 Leonardo: Indianizing Olive Oil VN Dalmia (MBA '84), chairman of Dalmia Continental Pvt. Ltd. (DCPL), in New Delhi, India, announced plans to invest INR60 crore toward expansion of DCPL's distribution network. This investment was more than its revenues of INR40 crore even as late as 2011 and 2012, and was expected to generate growth of about 150% within a year. Launched in 2003, Leonardo was the leading olive oil brand and had a market share estimated between 22% and 25% of the 6,000 tonnes per annum olive oil market in India by 2011. The tastes and food preferences among the people of India were as varied as the influences that shaped each region's history and religious beliefs. Some regions preferred fish and rice, others added coconut and potatoes, but the one common ingredient among vegetarians and meat eaters countrywide was spice. Dalmia wanted to introduce olive oil as another common food staple. “Olive oil in India was used for massaging babies,” he said, “Not for cooking.” The major issues before the company were how to generate volume by converting the midsegment consumer, attaining exponential growth, and setting strategy for future distribution to feed this exponential growth. Was the company doing all it could to inform the masses about the benefits of cooking with olive oil? And between its two channels—traditional, unorganized retailers and modern, organized retailers—was it getting its brand message through? Would future direction include adding more olive-based products beyond oil? Or would selling the brand to a more entrenched consumer-products company that could take Leonardo to the next level make sense? . . .

The Effect of Online Supporter's Review Directions on Consumers' Brand Attitude and Purchase Intention: The Role of Brand Awareness

Online supporters are the group of people selected by companies for the online promotion of their products or services and focus on generating messages that are conducive to stimulating hands-on experiences with companies' products and services to create advertising effects. This study examined how reviews offered by blogs operated by fashion brands' online supporters influence consumer's brand attitudes and purchase intentions. Specifically, this study examined how brand awareness and directions of review messages influences consumers' brand attitudes and purchase intentions. This study employed a 2 (brand awareness: high awareness vs. low awareness) <TEX>${\times}$</TEX> 3 (review direction: one-sided positive, two-sided positive & negative, one-sided negative) between-subject factorial design. In total, 180 respondents participated, thus garnering 30 responses for each of the six conditions. The results of two-way ANOVA revealed the significant main effect supporters' review message direction on consumers' brand attitudes and purchase intentions. Two-sided messages were rated high for brand attitude and purchase intention compared to one-sided positive or negative or positive directions. The interactions between brand reputation and message direction were significant for brand attitude, but not for purchase intention.

Retention marketing tips part 2: Keeping them engaged keeps them there

In last month's column, we discussed some ideas about how internal communication matters to internal marketing efforts. Spending more time on the simplest email exchange with current students can help with retention because the communications reinforce the brand message you spent so much time on when you recruited students.

Deciphering Word-of-Mouth Marketing Campaign Reach: Everyday Conversation Versus Institutionalized Word of Mouth

ABSTRACT Agencies routinely report word-of-mouth marketing (WOMM) campaign results in terms of reach but do not deliver insight about the people who are reached and the types of conversation in which the WOMM message is embedded. Using a specially designed Facebook app and social-network analysis, the current authors revealed that approximately half of campaign-related conversations are initiated intentionally by campaign participants—individuals who deliberately create opportunities to talk to conversation partners in ways aligned with the campaign sponsor9s commercial objectives. The other half emerge in everyday conversation. Participants also deliver the brand message into about half of the social-network clusters to which they belong. For a higher proportion of network clusters to be activated, everyday conversation should be facilitated.

The persuasive power of advergames: A content analysis focusing on persuasive mechanisms in advergames

This paper's purpose is to analyze how persuasion mechanisms are applied in current advergames. The study's rationale is that brand position and integration, the autonomy of the brand message in the game and the game-goal–message-goal overlap, entertainment as well as word-of-mouth and social integration are essential persuasive mechanisms of advergames. A sample of 195 advergames was taken from several popular advergames sites and was analyzed by two independent coders for the identified persuasive mechanisms using a developed coding manual. The content analysis revealed that advergames in general apply all six persuasive mechanisms. Logos are shown and used more often than products. Additionally, results suggest a high autonomy of the message (e.g. most applied placement tactics displayed the logo and product name as well as showing corporate colors). Furthermore, a high congruence of logos and products with the game content was observed. The results reveal that more than a third of games were well liked and included several mechanisms to increase competition. Word-of-mouth and social aspects were integrated to a small extent. The results are useful for researchers, game developers and companies, as well as for gamers. Implications for consumer researchers as well as industry professionals are provided.

Continuity in travel information

This article discusses the contrast between the information transportation companies provide to travellers and that of their brand messaging. Companies’ brand messaging often portrays the service they provide as pleasant, stress free and perfect. Customers and users of the service, on the other hand, often describe their experience of the service as a negative one. This article suggests that the brand value would be greater if transportation companies paid more attention to the users’ experience when designing their information systems, particularly in worst case scenarios.

Categorizing Humorous Employer Brand Message in a Small Company’s Online Job Ads

This study creates a framework for defining the employer brand message to understand an understudied phenomenon: how small companies use humour in online job ads. The originality of the framework is based on three issues. First: categorizing employer brand content into symbolic attributes: staff, applicant and other stakeholder, and instrumental attributes: company and job. Second: categorizing humour, informal and formal as communication styles. Third: investigating the thematic relatedness of communication style to employer brand content attributes to understand using humour in employer brand message. Illustrative empirical findings indicated that a small company focused more on symbolic attributes rather than instrumental attributes in its employer brand content. Humour was used typically when it was thematically related to symbolic attributes: applicant or staff. Humour was used less when it was thematically related to instrumental attributes: company and job. A framework offers new insights for researchers in the conceptualizing of the employer brand message. For marketing practitioners, it offers a method for evaluating and planning a company’s employer brand message.

Predicting the effects of eWOM and online brand messaging: Source trust, bandwagon effect and innovation adoption factors

This study examined the integrative effects of a brand’s online product description, eWOM content, digital retail platforms and innovation adoption factors on a consumer’s decision-making process. Results from a between-subject experiment (N=231) suggest that consumer perceptions of product-description usefulness, technology fluidity, product usefulness, product-use ease, consumer-review trustworthiness, consumer-review usefulness, user ratings of consumer reviews and retail-platform trustworthiness have a direct or indirect effect on their attitude and purchase intention toward the technology product.