Susan Whelan

The attractiveness and connectedness of ruthless brands: The role of trust

Purpose – The paper aims to investigate the impact of ruthless image on the attractiveness and connectedness of corporate brands. It proposes a model that trust mediates the influence of a ruthless image on these outcomes. The study aims to build upon previous theory which suggests that not all brands with negative aspects to their images are destined to receive negative consumer responses.Design/methodology/approach – A mixed method approach was adopted to examine consumer responses to ruthless brand image, including five focus groups to uncover successful brands with strong ruthless associations and 680 personal face‐to‐face surveys in which respondents were interviewed about one of four brands.Findings – The paper provides empirical support that the mediating role of trust is critical to the development of favourable outcomes where negative brand associations exist. No significant direct links between ruthlessness, attractiveness and connectedness were identified – only an indirect effect via trust.Res...

Gifts and Gifting

The terms gift and gifting are rarely formally defined, but are associated with something given without receiving payment, often in the expectation of reciprocation and of changing the relationship with the recipient. Extensive prior work across a number of disciplines tends to focus on gifting as a process and shows a broad conceptualization of the gift construct to include actions as diverse as charitable giving, tipping, self-gifting and volunteering, where relationship development and reciprocation are largely irrelevant. As a way to develop the area, two proposals are made: first, that gifting research should recognize two different types of gift, transactional and relational; and second, that the exchange paradigm and its underpinning social exchange theory should become central in developing understanding of relational gifting. The authors argue that empirical researchers may usefully revisit the relational paradigm, but by adopting a more quantitative, modelling approach, and the paper illustrates how this might be achieved.

Event-Marketing as Innovative Marketing Communications: Reviewing the German Experience

As a result of significant changes in their marketing environments and in consumer behaviour, marketers are confronted with the decreasing effectiveness of their classic marketing communications (Kroeber-Riel 1984) and, consequently, in need of new ways to position their brands in consumers’ minds. Because nothing is more convincing than personal experiences (Nickel 1998), event-marketing creates new brand-related realities by staging marketing-events with which consumers interact. This would result in an emotional attachment to the brand (Zanger and Sistenich 1996). However, while event-marketing as an experience-oriented marketing communication strategy has become very popular among German marketing professionals and academics, researchers and marketers in English-speaking countries have widely ignored this innovative communication strategy so far due to a different understanding of the term (Cornwell 1995). Nevertheless, some European companies have successfully launched in recent years their first event-marketing campaigns in Ireland, the UK and the US, suggesting a much broader appeal than previously recognised. Thus, this paper is introducing event-marketing to an international audience by outlining its constitutive features and discussing its role in marketing communications, based on the lessons learned from the German experience, that are presented using mini-case studies.

Like Being a Guinness Drop in a Freshly-Poured Pint: Consumer Motivations to Participate in the Guinness Storehouse

Due to the decreasing effectiveness of class marketing communications, event-marketing has enjoyed a growing popularity across Europe among marketers and customers alike. While event-marketing strategies in earlier years were primarily built around marketing-events, brand lands have nowadays become a popular and more permanent alternative. The Guinness Storehouse in the centre of Dublin is such a brand land, which was designed to reconnect the Guinness brand with an increasingly alienated younger target audience and to rejuvenate the brand image. The current study investigates what exactly motivates over 1 million consumers each year to experience the hyperreality of the Guinness brand by feeling oneself like a drop in a freshly-poured pint of Guinness. Using Wohlfeil and Whelan’s (2006a) conceptual model, four predispositional involvement dimensions are identified and tested to what extent they predicted the situational involvement in the Guinness Storehouse and the subsequent motivation to participate. The surprising results are then discussed.

When employer brand image aids employee satisfaction and engagement

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to test whether employee characteristics (age, gender, role and experience) influence the effects of employer brand image, for warmth and competence, on employee satisfaction and engagement. Design/methodology/approach Members of the public were surveyed as to their satisfaction and engagement with their employer and their view of their employer brand image. Half were asked to evaluate their employer’s “warmth” and half its “competence”. The influence of employee characteristics was tested on a “base model” linking employer image to satisfaction and engagement using a mediated moderation model. Findings The base model proved valid; satisfaction partially mediates the influence of employer brand image on engagement. Age, experience gender, and whether the role involved customer contact moderate both the influence of the employer brand image and of satisfaction on engagement. Practical implications Engagement varies with employee characteristics, and both segmenting employees and promoting the employer brand image differentially to specific groups are ways to counter this effect. Originality/value The contexts in which employer brand image can influence employees in general and specific groups of employees in particular are not well understood. This is the first empirical study of the influence of employer brand image on employee engagement and one of few that considers the application of employee segmentation.

Brand personality: theory and dimensionality

Purpose This paper aims to critique human personality as a theory underpinning brand personality and to propose instead a theory from human perception, and by doing so, to identify universally relevant dimensions. Design/methodology/approach A review of published measures of brand personality, a re-analysis of two existing data bases and the analysis of one new database are used to argue and test for the dimensions derived from perception theory. Findings Existing work on brand personality suggests 16 separate dimensions for the construct, but some appear common to most measures. When non-orthogonal rotation is used to re-analyse existing trait data on brand personality, three dimensions derived from signalling and associated theory can emerge: sincerity (e.g. warm, friendly and agreeable), competence (e.g. competent, effective and efficient) and status (e.g. prestigious, elegant and sophisticated). The first two are common to most measures, status is not. Research limitations/implications Three dimensions derived from signalling and associated theory are proposed as generic, relevant to all contexts and cultures. They can be supplemented by context specific dimensions. Practical implications Measures of these three dimensions should be included in all measures of brand personality. Originality/value Prior work on brand personality has focussed on identifying apparently new dimensions for the construct. While most work is not theoretically based, some have argued for the relevance of human personality. That model is challenged, and an alternative approach to both theory and analysis is proposed and successfully tested.