Companies that raise prices might expect some unhappiness from customers, especially if the price increase is seen as deliberate profit-taking. The reaction to Marks & Spencer doubling the price of hand sanitizer during Covid is one example of a price hike consumers found particularly objectionable. The backlash from customers was compounded by the fact that […]
The Internet age, some argue, heralds “the death of distance.” For example, aside from occasional utilitarian factors, such as shipping costs, geography is irrelevant to a purchasing decision. Unlike physical stores, the geographic location of online vendors is irrelevant to the consumer. Along these same lines, one might assume that geographical proximity is even less […]
Read More… from Geography Still Counts for Electronic Word of Mouth
A study based on an exhaustive review of the research related to personalized marketing—marketing that is tailored to the interests or personalities of consumers—dissects the psychological and contextual factors that impacts how consumers react to personalized matching, including whether the marketing is more or less persuasive. In addition to individual personality traits or interests, marketing […]
Read More… from Why Personalized Marketing Succeeds or Backfires
Most major firms have online brand communities to reinforce their connections with customers and increase their reputation, brand patronage and customer spending. These online communities offer satisfied customers the ability to easily and widely spread positive word of mouth about the company. However, online brand communities offer dissatisfied customers the same ability to spread negative […]
Most people will agree – and academic research supports them – that men and women have different shopping styles. Women are more likely than men to see shopping as a leisure activity and an opportunity to socialize. They also take more pleasure in time–consuming comparison shopping. Men are more in a hurry, using brands and […]
Read More… from Why Gender Differences in Shopping Styles Are Stronger than National Differences
The typical customer referral program offers a monetary reward for customers of a product or service who find other customers to buy that product or service. In most cases, the referral program is public: that is, the recipient of the referral knows that the person who recommended the product is being compensated for the referral. […]
Some people have a greater desire for control than others. Specifically, they need to feel that they have control over their surrounding environment — that they are in control of producing the results they want to produce. Previous studies have shown that desire for control can guide certain consumer choices, such as a preference for […]
Read More… from Consumers Reject New Products To Stay In Control
Companies spend 12% of their marketing budget on social media, which is three times more than in 2009. And this trend is only going to accelerate: marketing leaders expect that in the next five years, companies will increase social media’s slice of their marketing budgets to 20% — representing an increase of more than 70%. […]
Read More… from CMO Survey: Value of Company Spending on Social Media
The steadily declining effectiveness of traditional marketing approaches — from advertising to direct mail in the mailbox to email blasts — has been well-documented. Traditional marketing is too often equated with ‘junk mail’ or ‘spam,’ or annoyingly long commercial breaks that take you away from your favourite TV program. As explained in a recent article […]
Traditionally, according to Tony Dyson of Tessera Consulting and Kevin Money of Henley Business School, companies and organizations engage in what they call ‘silo communication.” Different parts of the organization communicate with different stakeholders. Thus, for example, the Investor Relations department communicates with the financial community, Government Relations communicates with Government, Media Relations communicates with […]
