Louise Kelly

AVOIDANCE OF ADVERTISING IN SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES: THE TEENAGE PERSPECTIVE

ABSTRACT Technology has provided consumers with the means to control and edit the information that they receive and share effectively, especially in the online environment. Although previous studies have investigated advertising avoidance in traditional media and on the Internet, there has been little investigation of advertising on social networking sites. This exploratory study examines the antecedents of advertising avoidance on online social networking sites, leading to the development of a model. The model suggests that advertising in the online social networking environment is more likely to be avoided if the user has expectations of a negative experience, the advertising is not relevant to the user, the user is skeptical toward the advertising message, or the consumer is skeptical toward the advertising medium.

Tracking brand positioning for an emerging destination: 2003 to 2015

Surprisingly, there have been few published studies monitoring a destination’s brand image over time. This temporal aspect of destination image is an important gap in the literature, given consensus around the role perceptions play in consumers’ decision making, and the ensuing emphasis on imagery in destination branding collateral. Whereas the majority of published destination image studies have been in the form of a snapshot of perceptions at one point in time, this paper presents findings from a survey implemented four times between 2003 and 2015. Brand image is the core construct in any modelling of destination branding performance, which has emerged as a relatively new field of research in the past decade. Using the consumer-based brand equity hierarchy, the project has benchmarked and monitored destination brand salience, image and resonance for an emerging regional destination, relative to key competitors, in the domestic Australian market; and the survey instrument has been demonstrated to be reliable in the context of short break holidays by car. What is particularly interesting to date is that there has been relatively little change in the market positions of the five destinations, in spite of over a decade of branding marketing communications by the regional tourism organisations and their stakeholders, and more recently, the mass of user-generated travel content on social media. The project did not analysis the actual marketing communications for each of the destination marketing organisations. Therefore, an important implication is that irrespective of the level of marketing undertaken, the destination marketing organisations seem to have had little control over the perceptions held in their largest market during this time period. Therefore, it must be recognised that any improvement in perceptions will likely take a long period of time, and so branding needs to be underpinned by a philosophy of a long-term financial investment as well as commitment to a consistency of message over time, which given the politics of destination marketing organisation decision making represents a considerable challenge.

Travel insurance: the attributes, consequences, and values of using travel insurance as a risk-reduction strategy

ABSTRACT Risk seems all too often to be a travel companion. The purchase of travel insurance is one way to mitigate this, yet only a small body of research has examined consumer decision-making in this context. Using the Repertory Test and Laddering Analysis, this research examines the attributes of travel insurance, the consequences of its purchase and the terminal values that this satisfies. It presents a Hierarchical Value Map which tracks the customer journey. The study contributes to academic knowledge by identifying that not all attributes of travel insurance are brand-controlled and not all values are about reducing risk.

Privacy concerns on social networking sites: a longitudinal study

ABSTRACT This longitudinal cohort study examines whether privacy concerns have changed on social network sites (SNSs), in particular Myspace/Facebook, as both the users and the medium have matured. Tracking a cohort of 15–17-year olds at three points across an 8-year period, it uses focus groups and self-determination theory to investigate the perceptions of control and vulnerability of 45 participants. The findings suggest that while consumers appear to trust SNSs to protect their private information, they are reluctant to trust advertising or brands on these sites. Over time, users’ autonomy, connectedness and competence have shifted from experimenters, who have nothing to lose, to acceptors who felt their social life was more important than their privacy concerns, to managers who strategically controlled their information in order to reduce their vulnerability.