With increasing restrictions, saturated advertisement markets and advanced technology, the conditions of the communication politics have significantly changed and outdated the classical instruments. In order to bypass these developments, marketers started to strategically promote their products through appearances in movies and television than through conventional commercial spots. Additionally, social media has developed to one of the latest and most effective communication tools, especially among Generation Y, which businesses try to take advantage of. The combination of these two instruments created product placement on social media. Extensive market research on product placement in movies and television has shown that it can be an effective marketing tool if applied correctly. However, the research on product placement on social media is limited. Therefore, this paper will investigate whether product placement on social media is as effective as in movies and television, by answering the following research question: What is the impact of product placement on social media on the end-consumer’s brand perception and purchase intention? To address this issue we developed an online survey based on the theoretical background and methodology. The target group was set to social media users of the Generation Y worldwide. Subsequently, within a timeframe of three weeks we collected 217 valid responses that were analyzed with SPSS in order to answer the research questions and give managerial implications. Our analysis shows that product placement on social media can have a positive influence on consumer brand perception and purchase intention. This is particularly compounded if the celebrity is liked. However, the analysis also indicates clear signs that the Generation Y perceives product placement on social media as unethical. However, all in all, it can be said that product placement on social media is a good marketing tool if several suggestions and restrictions are taken into account.

Aim Companies around the world are making sizeable investments into CSR initiatives, but ensuring appropriate returns on these investments remains challenging. Therefore, it is of value to study the communication of corporate CSR efforts. The purpose of this study is to investigate how consumers react to rational versus emotional message strategies in CSR communication. Two categories of consumer reactions were considered: trust and purchase intention. Methods Qualitative research with four focus groups was conducted. Participants discussed three texts regarding a CSR project, utilising a rational, emotional and a hybrid rational-emotional message strategy respectively. The conversations focused on trust towards the communication and purchase intention. Results Trust - All of the respondents viewed the rational text over the emotional text as more trustworthy, but they most positively reacted to the combined strategy. Rational information was viewed as more reliable by many participants, with emotional cues adding value by better holding their attention. Purchase intention – Participants more positively reacted to the rational CSR communication strategy, compared to an emotional strategy. For approximately half of respondents, the hybrid strategy targeting both rational and emotional cues was the most successful in terms of purchase intention. Upon further analysis, it was identified that this division in respondents’ opinions may reflect a gender difference, where men portrayed the more task oriented and women the socially sensitive consumers. Conclusions The findings support previous research championing the use of rational strategies over emotional strategies in CSR communication. A number of managerial implications that can be used by companies in order to better communicate their CSR activities and increase returns on CSR-related investments are provided.

Background: Agricultural activities occupy a significant part of the world’s land area and the food systems are comprehensively reliant on fossil fuels, resulting in that the sector is responsible for a large percentage of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. Changes are needed in order to meet the challenges of developing sustainable food systems. One change strategy would be to replace parts of animal proteins with greener plant substitutes. This thesis is part of a four-year transdisciplinary research project with the aim to, within four years, develop domestically produced products based on Swedish legumes. This paper will focus on exploring significant components affecting health-conscious consumers’ attitudes and purchase intentions regarding legumes-based products. By the thesis, valuable information and insights regarding legumes as a protein substitute will be gathered amongst the growing consumer group of health-conscious consumers.  Purpose: The purpose of this study is to explore the attitudes regarding legumes, and underlying key components affecting health-conscious consumers purchase intentions towards legume-based products. Additionally, two research questions have been developed to reach valuable findings for this investigation.

Social networking sites are a major networking tool for consumer interactions as they provide a platform for communication, socialization, and learning activity. Subsequently, social media has become an important marketing tool for advertising companies’ messages. As a result, fashion brands such as H&M and Victoria’s Secret started to show more brand ads on Facebook. Facebook is one of the most powerful social networking sties due to its ability to reach to broad consumer groups through a brand page. However, research regarding this topic is limited as the social networking sites is relatively a new phenomenon. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to examine the effect of the brand’s comments in attenuating (enhancing) negative (positive) influence of other consumer’s postings on brand trust and purchase intention of other consumer’s postings on social media. Findings from this study revealed that there is no moderating effect of brand comments of the relationship between other consumer’s postings and brand trust, while positive other consumer’s postings has a significant effect on consumers’ brand trust. Also, there were no significant differences among other consumer’s postings, brand comments and purchase intention relationships. These findings add to the previous literature explains that brand should interact with consumers frequently in order to induce positive other consumer’s postings to develop brand trust. By using the consumer socialization theory to investigate Facebook marketing, this study provides insights and information on consumer attitudes and behaviors related to Facebook brand page.

Thesis (M.M. (Strategic Marketing))--University of the Witwatersrand, Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management, Graduate School of Business Administration, 2015. / The remarkable and apparent growth in the use of mobile technology in society is eccentric. Mobile technology brought about a swift change on how business is conducted and how individual communicate and interact. The increasing number of mobile applications available in app stores could be a challenge for developers as they will be required to stay innovative in order to acquire and maintain a competitive edge. For the mobile application businesses to succeed, owners of these applications need to know and understand their customers and their requirements to be able to meet their demands. Due to the currency of this trend, there seems to be scarcity in terms of academic literature and information intelligence for businesses on the subject. The purpose of the study is therefore to investigate the influence of systems quality, user trust and user satisfaction on purchase intention of mobile applications users in South African. A quantitative survey was conducted using a sample of 500 internet user in Gauteng Province. The survey questionnaire was designed on Qualtrics. A project manager was appointed to roll out the project that lasted two weeks. After collecting 353 responses, the survey was closed. The results were statistically analysed using the IBM SPSS to draw descriptive statistics. The construct reliability and validity was assessed by conducting Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) using AMOS version 22. The model fit was also assessed by conducting path modelling. The results of the study indicated some level of significance on all the relationships. However, the results showed a very weak significance level between user satisfaction and purchase intention. In the concluding chapter, a number of recommendations are provided where it was suggested that business should invest and channel their resources towards building trust and reliance with their customers. The limitations of the study were highlighted and the chapter concluded by making suggestions for future research. Key Words: System Quality, user trust, satisfaction, purchase intension, Technology Acceptance Model (TAM)

Problem/Purpose: Internet celebrities have shown huge commercial value by operating their E-commerce in the Chinese market. This article aims to research How Chinese internet celebrity influences consumers’ attitude to purchase on E-commerce. Method: The Primary data is collected by semi-structured interviews with consumers who followed the internet celebrity and bought products from her online stores. Meanwhile, word frequency analysis of posted context and comments on the internet is proceeded to conduct secondary data to support findings. Findings: Our findings show that the traditional source attractiveness, expertise, and involvement of celebrity are important to impact on the consumers’ attitude and drive to purchase behavior. However, source trustworthiness is not essential, and the perceived trustworthiness is limited in specialized fields (e.g. fashion) and is hard extend to other areas (e.g. cosmetics). Furthermore, perceived authenticity will reinforce trustworthiness and intimacy, and perceived interconnectedness will result in frequent and regular buying habit. Implementation: This research can serve to internet celebrities who are running or intend to start their E-commerce in China. Moreover, it is hoped this study of internet celebrity Ecommerce in China can serve for future comparative studies of internet celebrity globally.

Background Worldwide, one-third of all produced food is going to waste, and the number is increasing every year which consequently calls for action. A substantial share of the food waste is the outcome of grocery stores throwing away suboptimal food which yet is eatable but due to the date labeling, damaged packaging or in terms of appearance standards cannot be sold. Throughout the last years, numerous unique businesses have been formed in Sweden to offer suboptimal food both online and in physical stores. Still, Swedish grocery stores stand for 30 000 tons of food being wasted which is directly linked to the still evident unwillingness to offer, purchase and consume suboptimal food. By no means, this is a significant problem and need to be changed in order to reach a more sustainable world. Till this day, qualitative research on the topic is scare. Purpose The purpose of this thesis is to understand which components that affected Swedish grocery shoppers’ attitudes and purchase intentions towards suboptimal food in-store. Method In order to fulfil the purpose of this study, a qualitative methodology has been utilized. The qualitative data has been collected through semi-structured interviews amongst Swedish grocery shoppers. To explore the attitudes and purchase intentions towards suboptimal food product, an abductive research approach was applied to strengthen previous research findings and attempt to discover possible new theory.  Conclusion The empirical findings revealed that Swedish grocery shoppers in this research study hold an overall positive attitude towards suboptimal food. The study further reports four prominent barriers towards Swedish grocery shoppers’ purchase intentions of suboptimal food. In result, even though an overall positive attitude presented, the intention to purchase suboptimal food could be severely weakened by substantial restrictions encountered in grocery stores.

Building on the stimulus-organism-response model, this paper aims to fill the considerable research gap by developing a deeper understanding of social commerce as a global emerging phenomenon and investigating the effectiveness of social commerce marketing stimuli and its consequences on consumer behavior on Instagram. The study adopts a mixed-methodology approach, including a web-based survey and a focus group interview, to build a deeper understanding of the phenomenon and account for the social aspects of social commerce. Based on a sample of 317 international consumers, the analysis demonstrates that all dimensions of social commerce marketing stimuli have significant effects on online brand engagement on Instagram; which consequently positively influences brand trust and online purchase intention. Moreover, the focus group interview complements the findings and provides potential explanations for the discovered relationships.

The purpose of this study is to further explore the modern phenomenon of COO, brand image, and online influencer marketing as they relate to consumer's purchase intention online. This empirical study employs a mixed method approach with quantitative exploratory factor analysis through a survey as well as qualitative exploration through focus groups and in-depth interviews. Quantitative data analysis revealed that online influencers have a significant effect on consumers’ purchase intent as well as their perception of COO or brand image. Qualitative data analysis further revealed that when consumers do not follow online influencers, they have a less than significant effect on the consumers’ perception of COO. However, if consumers actively follow online influencers, the probability of them adhering to the recommendations of purchasing from an unfamiliar COO is high. This results in the recognition of the need for further research, as well as some insightful avenues to investigate.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate the influence of social media marketing activities on customer equity and how that drive affects purchase intention in the context of the hotel industry with the perspective of Y-Generation. Design/methodology/approach: An explanatory, deductive, quantitative research approach and cross-sectional research design were utilized within this research, where self-completed questionnaires were distributed online with a number of 136 valid responses collected. Findings: The research found that social media marketing activities positively affected customer equity in the context of hotel industry. Brand equity and relationship equity had positive influence on customer’s purchase intention. Finally, information richness negatively moderated the relationship between social media marketing activities and purchase intention. Research implications/limitations: The main implication of this research is social media marketing activities should be utilized as an effective marketing strategy to enhance customer equity. In addition, for hotel managers, creating emotional tie with brands and building bond with customers are supposed to take priority. The main limitation of this research is the language barriers and the research is considered not to be generalized since most respondents are students. Future research: Further research could investigate how social media marketing activities influence other industries and also investigate other different consumer groups such as X-Generation. Sociodemographic variables such as gender, income, backgrounds could be used as moderators in future. Cultural difference is  interesting to go depth regarding to this topic.