Sabine Einwiller

Enough is enough! When identification no longer prevents negative corporate associations

Negative publicity has the potential to create negative corporate associations. However, consumers’ identification with a company might moderate the extent of this effect. This article examines the impact of consumer-company identification on reactions to variable levels of negative publicity about a company. Exposing consumers who had strong identification with a company to moderately negative publicity was found to result in less negative corporate associations than for consumers who had relatively weak identification. In contrast, consumers’ levels of identification did not affect reactions to extremely negative information, resulting in equally negative corporate associations for those with strong versus weak consumer-company identification. Thus, strong identification mitigates the effects of moderately negative publicity but does not attenuate the effects of extremely negative publicity. Consumers’ perceptions of and thoughts regarding negative information about a company partially mediated the effect of identification on attitudes and behavioral intentions.

Towards an integrated approach to corporate branding – an empirical study

Based on the findings of an empirical study among communication executives in 11 multinational companies we propose an increasingly integrated approach to corporate branding. Key aspects which support our claim are the growing importance of the financial community, the augmenting skills shortage driving competition for current and future employees, and the enhanced transparency of corporate activities being greatly supported by the particular characteristics of the Internet. In order to achieve greater integration and eventually a favourable reputation we propose an organisational model combining centralisation and team organisation which particularly aims to support integration across the various functions responsible for stakeholder relations.

Accuracy Motivation, Consensus Information, and the Law of Large Numbers: Effects on Attitude Judgment in the Absence of Argumentation

This study examined the influence of majority opinion on attitudes in the absence of persuasive argumentation. Participants who were either high or low in accuracy motivation were presented with an opinion poll that conveyed consensus information and the sample size of the poll. According to the law of large numbers (LLN), large polls provide more reliable estimates of consensus than smaller polls. Results generally supported predictions. Less-motivated participants tended to be influenced by consensus regardless of poll size, whereas highly motivated participants based attitudes on this information only if the poll was reliably large. Thus, participants who were highly motivated seemed to appreciate the LLN when making their attitude judgments. Consistent with the heuristic-systematic model, process measures indicated that consensus influenced attitudes through both heuristic and biased systematic processing under high motivation, but it influenced attitudes only via heuristic processing when motivation was low.

When Small Means Comfortable: Relations Between Product Attributes in Two-sided Advertising

The processes that mediate the effectiveness of 2-sided advertising were studied. We predicted that (a) 2-sided (vs. 1-sided) advertisements increase perceived source credibility and that (b) the logical relation between the negative and positive product attributes mentioned in the 2-sided ad (e.g., little space, implying a cozy atmosphere) facilitates favorable inferences about the positive attributes, especially when recipients have sufficient time to process the message content. Results supported these predictions. However, the effects of message type and processing time on attitudes were mediated by inferences about positive attributes but not by perceived source credibility. Implications of these findings for consumer judgment and decision making are discussed.

Processing Minority and Majority Communications: The Role of Conflict with Prior Attitudes

The authors studied the effects of recipients’ prior attitudes on message scrutiny in minority and majority influence situations. Based on the objective consensus approach and on conversion theory, the authors derived the hypothesis that cognitive effort dedicated to the processing of minority and majority communications depends on recipients’ prior attitudes. In Experiment 1, prior attitudes were experimentally induced, and in Experiment 2, prior attitudes were measured. Both studies found that majority messages were processed more extensively than minority messages when recipients held a moderate prior attitude. When recipients held an opposing prior attitude, however, the minority message was processed more extensively than the majority message. These findings supported the authors’ predictions and reconciled seemingly contradictory findings in the literature. Theoretical implications as well as avenues for future research are discussed.

Motivational determinants of systematic processing: Expectancy moderates effects of desired confidence on processing effort

Extending the motivational assumptions of the heuristic-systematic model (Chaiken, Liberman, & Eagly, 1989), the authors hypothesized that a discrepancy between desired and actual judgmental confidence raises processing effort only if the expectancy that processing will increase confidence is high. In Experiment I, university students expected to review information for upcoming social judgments. Desired confidence was varied through low versus high task importance. To manipulate expectancy, low versus high perceived processing efficacy was induced via feedback. As predicted, high- (as compared to low-) importance participants expressed greater interest in receiving information and selected more information when perceived efficacy was high, and this effect was mediated via a heightened discrepancy between desired and actual confidence. These effects were not obtained under low perceived efficacy. In Experiment 2, students processed a persuasive message. Only high importance conditions were studied; processing efficacy and argument strength were manipulated. As predicted, high- (but not low-) efficacy participants processed the message systematically, as indicated by a different impact ofargument strength and by mediational path analyses. It is argued that the precision ofsocial judgment models would benefit from an explicit consideration of processing- and outcome-related expectancy variables.

Examining the link between integrated communication management and communication effectiveness in medium-sized enterprises

On the basis of a framework for integrated communication management (ICM) derived from perspectives in the integrated marketing communications and communication management literature, we tested various hypotheses concerning the link between ICM and communication effectiveness. The hypotheses were tested on a sample of 642 Swiss-based companies, with a focus on medium-sized enterprises. The data yielded insights as to the role of ICM in respect of both ‘soft’ psychological and ‘hard’ economic measures of communication effectiveness. Results include that aligning communication with the corporate strategy and mission, scripting communication concepts and having a designated function for marketing communications correlates significantly not only with ‘soft’ measures of communication effectiveness but also with selected ‘hard’ measures of corporate performance. We furthermore find support for the imperative of aligning communication instruments with respect to content, form and timing. Finally, those companies whose leadership supports communication management and values its contribution to corporate performance score higher on ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ measures than those businesses whose leadership is less supportive. The research contributes to reducing the research gap on demonstrating the link between ICM and business performance; it also contributes to remedy the dearth of research on small and medium-sized enterprises.

Media coverage about organisations in critical situations: Analysing the impact on employees

Purpose – This research aims to investigate how critical media coverage of an organisation affects its employees. The authors expect the effects to be similar to the way media coverage about an individual would affect this person, termed “reciprocal effects”. Design/methodology/approach – Drawing on a framework for the analysis of reciprocal effects of mass media by Kepplinger and qualitative interviews among employees of 14 different organisations undergoing a crisis, the authors develop an employee-model of reciprocal effects for the context of organisational crises. Findings – This qualitative research shows that employees are affected by media coverage on a critical issue about their employer. Mass media are an important source of information for employees in critical situations. The data indicate interpersonal conversations with colleagues are also important for obtaining information and coping with the situation. Employees show emotional reactions, such as helplessness or shame, and a tendency to de...

Towards an integrated approach to corporate branding - findings from an empirical study

Based on the findings of an empirical study among communication executives in eleven multinational companies we propose an increasingly integrated approach to corporate branding. Key aspects which support our claim are the growing importance of the financial community, the augmenting skills shortage driving competition for current and future employees, and the enhanced transparency of corporate activities being greatly supported by the particular characteristics of the Internet. In order to achieve greater integration and eventually a favourable reputation we propose an organisational model combining centralisation and team organisation which particularly aims to support integration across the various functions responsible for stakeholder relations.

Reputation und Image: Grundlagen, Einflussmöglichkeiten, Management

Die Konzepte Image und Reputation weisen trotz ihrer historischen Verankerung in unterschiedlichen Fachdisziplinen enge Verbindungen aber auch klare Unterschiede auf. In beiden Fallen handelt es sich um Wahrnehmungsphanomene, bei denen ein Unternehmen hinsichtlich bestimmter Attribute wahrgenommen und bewertet wird. Wahrend sich Images jedoch im Individuum manifestieren, entsteht Reputation erst dann, wenn viele Menschen ein Reputationsobjekt wahrnehmen und Wissen und Bewertungen daruber interpersonell oder medienvermittelt austauschen. Eine starke Reputation ist fur ein Unternehmen ein Vermogenswert, der Wettbewerbsvorteile verschafft. Um die Potenziale der Reputation als Vermogenswert zu erschliesen, muss die Reputation strategisch gesteuert werden, was im Rahmen eines Managementzyklus beginnend mit der Analyse, uber die Planung, Implementierung bis hin zur Evaluation erfolgt.