<p> Coupons are a marketing tool used to entice consumers to try a new brand or product in the hopes that they will then become loyal users after trial (Boundless, n.d.). Issuing coupons is a common practice for many businesses because it is relatively inexpensive to begin, and can be used for general advertising purposes in addition to attracting new customers. Digital coupons have been introduced in the last few years and their acceptance is growing, with redemptions in 2010 increasing by 10 times the 2009 rates and projected to increase exponentially with each year (Savings.com, n.d.). </p><p> Early coupon academic studies in the promotional literature examine profitability maximization through manipulating coupon characteristics or the coupon process such as the timing of release, length of expiration dates, amount of the cents-off, and other related monetary factors. Despite the ability to adjust coupon features to maximize revenue and redemption, the effect is not strong enough to generate the motivation required to elicit new use from non-users being targeted nor improve the overall low redemption rates. </p><p> Basic characteristics such as demographic and socioeconomic variables as well as some predisposing motivational characteristics have also been studied to predict coupon use. While some of these characteristics demonstrate differences between consumers who do and do not use coupons, characteristics provide little insight into why non-users choose not to coupon. Furthermore, the findings cannot be generalizable to the population as a whole when the redemption rate persists at 2%. With digital coupons a rapidly growing practice, it is important to determine whether or not this new coupon format might contribute to behavior change in current non- or infrequent users of coupons. </p><p> While most previous research has concentrated on characteristics of the consumer, characteristics of the coupon, and predisposing motivational constructs, this study examined why consumers rejected coupons by examining their narratives on the various stages of the coupon process to narrow down the factors contributing the most to deterring coupon use. </p><p> The Phase 1 study included 58 participants, 29 frequent users and 29 infrequent users. Participants completed a set of questionnaires measuring previously identified predisposing characteristics, given guidance on the selection of digital coupons loaded onto shopper loyalty cards and were provided with Sunday circulars. Each participant had 1 week to try and redeem the digital coupons and complete follow up questionnaires to determine any changes post-trial. Participants were invited to participate in 1 of 6 focus groups to determine themes related to the digital coupon trial. </p><p> The Phase 2 study included 10 individuals who participated in depth interviews focusing on the processes, motivations and decisions related to coupon use during grocery shopping. The interview was broken out into 5 stages: 1 is an ice-breaker introduction to the study; 2 involves rapport building and setting the tone; 3 is the depth interview that attempts to elicit understanding into the motivation, timing, and rationale behind rejection of coupon use; 4 presents some popular emerging technologies based on emerging applications of interest to the Association of Coupon Professional Board; and 5 includes a brief discussion of different type of coupon and verification. </p><p> Overall, , the consumer&rsquo;s perceived purpose of the coupon is to save money through item cost reduction whereas from a marketing perspective the coupon is intended to entice consumers new to the brand or to encourage trial of a new product (Boundless, n.d.). This difference in perception could be a major contributor to the valuation process and resistance/rejection themes of infrequent users. Interestingly, very few infrequent users rejected the practice of coupons outright and were far more likely to resist or postpone the practice. More research should be conducted to identify when, how and why infrequent users re-evaluate coupons or try the process again. </p><p> Coupon industry members should review the coupon practice and make a decision to either abandon or overhaul the process as it currently does not provide value to either the manufacturers issuing the coupons or the consumers, even those actively using coupons. If the decision is to overhaul the practice then a decision should be made whether or not to adapt to the current perceptions that coupons are a means to reduce product price or re-educate consumers and industry members alike on the coupon as a means to solicit trial. Lastly, many of the existing apps do not address any of the coupon-related barriers, incongruities, or infrequent user needs. A disruptive technology is needed to change consumer perceptions, encourage coupon use and provide value added utility beyond just bypassing the coupon process to make the practice relevant in today&rsquo;s mobile culture. (Abstract shortened by ProQuest.)</p>

<p> Although it is well established that people are motivated to maintain a positive self-image, choice researchers have largely ignored how this desire impacts what consumers choose. The current research investigates the notion that people's choices can serve as a signal that affects their beliefs about themselves. I explore a self-signaling framework to make unique predictions in two important substantive domains: prosocial giving and forfeiture choice. </p><p> The first essay shows that consumers are more likely to give to a charity when the donation appeal mentions a hedonic product. This occurs because the presence of a hedonic product changes the self-attributions, or self-signaling utility, associated with the choice to donate. I demonstrate the effect with real choice and field experiments, and provide evidence that the increase in donation rates occurs because the choice not to donate is a stronger signal of selfishness in the context of a hedonic product.</p><p> The second essay looks at forfeiture choices and finds that the structure of the self-concept can determine whether or not people give up an unused good. I develop a conceptual framework based on a known aspect of the self (self-concept clarity) to predict that when consumers are less clear about their self-concept they are more likely to self-signal. Four experiments show that people are more likely to keep an informative good or service they do not use (e.g. keep paying for a digital magazine subscription they do not read) when they are unclear about their self-concept.</p><p> Taken together these findings enrich our understanding of the role of self-signaling in choice, enhance our knowledge of how people use choice to manage their self-image, and link the behavioral findings of self-signaling in marketing to an established literature on self in psychology. The results have implications for choice theorists interested in understanding self-image motives and for marketing practitioners interested in understanding choice. </p>

<p> In social media settings, many firms issue commands to consumers&mdash;to post, share or like content&mdash;often using forceful and direct (vs. polite) language. However, prior research has shown that commands issued with assertive language elicit negative responses and reactance and also reduce the probability of compliance (Brown and Levinson 1987; Dillard and Shen 2005; Kellerman and Shea 1996; Quick and Considine 2008). In the present research, I show that brands benefit from using assertive language, specifically in the form of increased care and concern from consumers. This is because assertive language communicates an intention to control, and intentionality is one indication of a humanlike mind (Epley and Waytz 2009; Kozak Marsh, and Wenger 2006; Waytz et al. 2010b). Five experiments demonstrate the relationship between assertive language, mind attribution, and care and concern for the brand. Both statistical and experimental evidence of the mediating role of mind attribution are presented. Finally, a boundary effect of this relationship is also explored by examining the role of mind valence, which decouples the link between mind attribution and brand care and concern when a threatening or malevolent mind is attributed to a brand. Thus, this research contributes to the brand anthropomorphism literature by showing that mind attribution, which not only suggests the brand is humanlike but the specific manner in which it is humanlike, can be elicited with subtle linguistic cues and has beneficial effects for the brand. This work is unique in showing a benefit to assertive language. It also offers insights to the mind perception and brand relationship literatures. Finally this work is managerially useful as assertive language can be readily implemented by firms and fits with a wide variety of brand traits and associations. Additionally the outcome of brand care and concern is beneficial to firms. </p>

Social influence in marketing has generally been conceptualized in terms of conformity, where the individual's attitudes and behaviour are influenced by real or imagined group pressure. This is a one-way influence process where the group (majority) influences the individual. This research extends this conceptualization of social influence to include the influence of minority or deviant opinions. A simultaneous social influence paradigm is adopted, in which individuals may not only experience conformity pressure from the majority, but may also be subject to persuasion by minority opinions in the group. Such situations may arise in consumer groups as such organizational buying committees or families. Several conditions that may determine the extent of conformity or minority influence were delineated. It was hypothesized that the extent of social identification with a minority or majority source, i.e., source-similarity, would determine the extent of its influence. It was proposed that issue-involvement would play an important role in determining conformity versus minority influence effects, as well as interact significantly with source-similarity. The role of other mediating variables in this social influence process, such as source credibility and source feelings, were also explicated. An empirical test of the theory was undertaken through a 2 (high/low similarity) X 2 (high/low involvement) factorial design. Subject were exposed to persuasive communication from both a majority and a minority source, who advocated contrary positions. The two sources always assumed opposite social identities, and thus when one source was similar to the subject, the other was dissimilar. As anticipated, the minority opinion was more persuasive when the minority was similar, rather than dissimilar. However, this effect was dependent on the level of involvement. The results were generally consistent with the proposed model, with both similarity and involvement playing a crucial role in determining the extent of minority influence. Source credibility and feelings towards the source were both significant mediators in the social influence process. This research indicates a further need to explore the role of involvement in such simultaneous influence contexts using other consumer contexts, and it opens several avenues for future research.

Univ., Diss.--St. Gallen, 2006.

Submitted by Estagiário SPT BMHS (spt@fgv.br) on 2011-11-10T12:08:38Z No. of bitstreams: 1 000060193.pdf: 6208406 bytes, checksum: 339f6fac44fe61a66bf0231d6d5781e0 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Estagiário SPT BMHS (spt@fgv.br) on 2011-11-10T12:08:55Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 000060193.pdf: 6208406 bytes, checksum: 339f6fac44fe61a66bf0231d6d5781e0 (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Estagiário SPT BMHS (spt@fgv.br) on 2011-11-10T12:09:03Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 000060193.pdf: 6208406 bytes, checksum: 339f6fac44fe61a66bf0231d6d5781e0 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2011-11-10T12:09:40Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 000060193.pdf: 6208406 bytes, checksum: 339f6fac44fe61a66bf0231d6d5781e0 (MD5) Previous issue date: 1991 / Marketing as a social product, has been created, raised and spread alI over the world mainly as a tool to serve private, micro-economic, l?rofit, short run interests. Over the last twenty years,a steadly growing trend has been noticed in this field,due to the evidences that marketing has not delivered what it had promissed: society's needs fullfillment. Several American theorists and practioners marketino and non marketing specialists - are considered to have contributed to this evaluation of the marketing concept which has led to consolidate new 'sub-disciolines' in the core o f marketing, name ly: 'non business' (not for profi ti non orofit organizations, public services, government) 'political candidates', 'health, education, social services'; 'ideas and social causes' marketing. This paper deals with the latter marketing subdiscipline , that applied to social causes and i ts oocasional contributions to Brazilian socio-economic development, considering both marketing and moral/ethical frameworks. The work suggests that are, have been and will be several possibilities of applying social marketing as a planning and implementing tool for both theorists and practioners of administration.

<p> This research describes psychological values as they appear in social commerce related online marketing campaigns. Values are studied by their functional roles, which is what they do, rather than what they are (Gouveia, Milfont, &amp; Guerra, 2014). According to the functional theory of values, values guide actions and express needs. Marketing campaigns and values are explored because both marketing and values seek to guide actions and express needs. Exploring this calls for a qualitative study using content analysis. This research conducts two content analysis studies to verify accuracy. The first uses an open coding method, and the second uses a qualitative deductive analysis approach. The results retrieved throughout both studies use different word codes, but when listed together indicate that insightfulness, knowledge, and social support show the highest frequency and co-occurrence. Both studies also show that digitoral marketing campaigns rely much more on thriving needs than survival needs. Both studies confirmed, however, that survival needs are mostly expressed through displays of power, obedience, personal stability, and survival.</p><p>

<p> This dissertation presents three sociological essays analyzing advertising agencies through the lens of cultural economic sociology. Drawing on 12 months of ethnographic research and 81 interviews across four American advertising agencies, this dissertation presents three explorations of how meaning-making processes are central to the various processes of advertising production. </p><p> The first essay explores how market intermediaries help other market actors see the market and their opportunities for action within it. The essay article illustrates how advertising practitioners provide their clients with visions of what the market is and what opportunities for action lie within it, developing advertising campaigns to match that vision. These accounts of the market and its opportunities are dynamically negotiated, both reflecting and shaping the identities of the clients, their target audiences, and the intermediaries themselves. Because intermediaries dramaturgically perform these interpretations of the market for their client in micro-level interactions, they must also deal with disagreement, contestation, and negotiation over their visions of the market.</p><p> The second essay explores how advertising agencies consume and produce consumer research. Taking a relational approach to the production of advertising, this essay conceives of the work agencies do as part of establishing viable exchange relationships with their clients in which the client exchanges money for the agency's ideas for campaigns. The analysis shows how agency employees&mdash;in particular, account planners&mdash;first negotiate what kinds of consumers matter with their clients, then produce consumer research in ways that helps them generate particular types of qualitative materials. Agency employees then use those materials to craft aesthetic, material representations of the consumer that can serve as exchange media to facilitate the broader exchange of campaign ideas and money.</p><p> The third essay takes adopts a pragmatic sociological framework to examine conflict in advertising agencies, suggesting such conflicts can be better understood as inevitable clashes between different regimes for justifying the value of advertising work. The article examines three such regimes that advertising practitioners use to justify the work they do: the regime of <i> partnership</i>, the regime of <i>expertise</i>, and the regime of <i>brokerage</i>. Each regime supposes its own definition of what is good advertising work, how that work is evaluated, and how that work should be done, as well as what relationships there should be between the agents who do the work and their clients. Furthermore, each regime has its critiques of the others, and compromises between regimes are unstable and temporary. The different types of conflicts that arise from clashes between these regimes can be understood as the outcome of threats to the different social bonds supposed by each of those regimes.</p><p> These articles are prefaced by a broad discussion of the intellectual projects of economic sociology, in which the literature is divided into two camps: one that studies the economy <i>of</i> culture, and one that studies the economy as culture. After reviewing the different conceptualizations of production and consumption in each, as well as considering the role of materiality and the relationship between the economic and the social, this discussion concludes with a commitment to studying the economy as the enactment of cultural intentions, opting for an analytical strategy that preserves the relative autonomy of culture in exploring how narratives and codes structure economic activity.</p><p>

Social influence in marketing has generally been conceptualized in terms of conformity, where the individual's attitudes and behaviour are influenced by real or imagined group pressure. This is a one-way influence process where the group (majority) influences the individual. This research extends this conceptualization of social influence to include the influence of minority or deviant opinions. A simultaneous social influence paradigm is adopted, in which individuals may not only experience conformity pressure from the majority, but may also be subject to persuasion by minority opinions in the group. Such situations may arise in consumer groups as such organizational buying committees or families. Several conditions that may determine the extent of conformity or minority influence were delineated. It was hypothesized that the extent of social identification with a minority or majority source, i.e., source-similarity, would determine the extent of its influence. It was proposed that issue-involvement would play an important role in determining conformity versus minority influence effects, as well as interact significantly with source-similarity. The role of other mediating variables in this social influence process, such as source credibility and source feelings, were also explicated. An empirical test of the theory was undertaken through a 2 (high/low similarity) X 2 (high/low involvement) factorial design. Subject were exposed to persuasive communication from both a majority and a minority source, who advocated contrary positions. The two sources always assumed opposite social identities, and thus when one source was similar to the subject, the other was dissimilar. As anticipated, the minority opinion was more persuasive when the minority was similar, rather than dissimilar. However, this effect was dependent on the level of involvement. The results were generally consistent with the proposed model, with both similarity and involvement playing a crucial role in determining the extent of minority influence. Source credibility and feelings towards the source were both significant mediators in the social influence process. This research indicates a further need to explore the role of involvement in such simultaneous influence contexts using other consumer contexts, and it opens several avenues for future research. / Business, Sauder School of / Graduate

The integration of philanthropy into corporate advertising and sales promotion campaigns is becoming a popular persuasion tactic. Companies are now using product advertising to portray themselves as benefactors of charities and social causes. The underlying marketing premise is that a firm can do better by "doing good." Philanthropic advertising can be grouped into two basic categories. One category ties consumer purchases to the corporate donation while the other communicates the firm's benevolence without a purchase connection. Causes perceived by consumers as personally relevant receive more cognitive elaboration than those causes perceived to have little relevance. On the surface, philanthropic advertising appears to be a "win-win" situation. The firm achieves an additional sale, or enhances its image, and the charity receives needed financial support. However, little is known as to how these messages influence consumer perceptions, attitudes and purchase likelihood. This study examined the effects of different forms of philanthropic messages, with varying levels of personal relevance, on consumer perceptions and behavior. It addresses these issues from an attribution theory viewpoint. Specifically, this study suggests that, given varying combinations of philanthropic advertising and personal relevance, consumers form different perceptions of the firm's altruism. These attributions influence consumer attitudes and purchase intentions. The study used an after-only, with control group, experiment to investigate the differential impact of the experimental factors. Two hundred and seventy-five graduate students responded to randomly assigned advertising stimuli and answered a questionnaire that measured their attitudes and purchase intentions. The initial hypothesis tests failed to show any significant results. Overall, subjects did not perceive any difference between the two types of philanthropic promotions. However, some effects emerged when the blocking factors were introduced. These results indicated that those who had a less favorable attitude toward business tended to respond unfavorably to philanthropic advertisements. Additionally, non-users of the product had more favorable responses for philanthropic advertisements than non-philanthropic advertisements. Messages of high personal relevance also produced more favorable responses than low relevance messages. Individuals who were not active contributors responded favorably to the purchase-linked messages. The results imply that these messages may have a different impact on various consumer segments. This message strategy can be useful in stimulating brand switching among current non-users.