What Is Important

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What is important

Nanachen666

is that all theorists agree that emotions

exist, that they alter how people perceive

the environment, and that they appear to

motivate behaviour. How exactly emotions

motivate behaviour, or behaviour change,

has been a thorny question for social

scientists for years.

This Importantly, it deals with

for consumers, the most important function of emotion is to make up for the insuffi ciency of reason when making choice decisions. To the customer, emotion is what provides the weighting among otherwise equal choices. What prompts that emotion is a matter of both the characteristics of the product (the advertising, the packaging, etc) and the context in which the product is presented -- the physical and relational qualities of the environment that surrounds the product -- that elicit reactions in the consumer. For example, given the choice between many different brands, the emotions elicited by the environment, the package branding, past experiences with a given brand and prior exposure to marketing communications will cause the consumer to place greater weight on one product over another.

Advertising

that stimulates a general positive feeling

( ' I like doughnuts ' ) may not translate

into purchase of the advertised brand of

doughnut, such as Krispy Kreme Donuts,

in particular, but any doughnut.

Advertising needs to generate a specifi c

feeling, an ' I like to eat Krispy Kreme

Donuts ' feeling.

Recent investigations into the impact

of affect on reactions to advertising confi rm

that emotion does play an important role

in consumer reactions to marketing

messages. Affect generated by an ad is a

strong predictor of purchase intent,

stronger than either cognition or brand

interest. 31

In fact, merely liking an

ad is enough to stimulate purchase. 32

Feelings about an ad contribute signifi -

MORRISON AND CRANE

414 © 2007 PALGRAVE MACMILLAN LTD 1350-23IX $30.00 BRAND MANAGEMENT VOL. 14, NO. 5, 410-421 MAY 2007

cantly to attitudes toward an ad and beliefs

about the brand being advertised, independent

of semantic judgments about the

ad. This effect is greatest when the ad, or

message, is transformational (evokes the

experience of brand consumption) rather

than informational. 33 This lends some

support to the idea that marketing

messages need to be tailored to fi t the

specifi c emotional state that will result in

product purchase. For example,

many services are intangible. Consumers

cannot pick up a service, kick its tires or

otherwise evaluate it before consumption.

Services consumption also relies on the

performance of another human being.

The ability of that person to perform the

service as expected can only be estimated

by the prospective consumer. Finally, services

inherently involve the customer in

the creation of the fi nal product. Because

the consumer is actively engaged in the

service experience, and has more investment

in the interaction, emotions are

likely to be more signifi cantly engaged by

many service encounters than by advertisements

or product purchases. 36

Based on the model presented

Because

the consumer is actively engaged in the

service experience, and has more investment

in the interaction, emotions are

likely to be more signifi cantly engaged by

many service encounters than by advertisements

or product purchases. 36

Emotion will play a role

in the purchase decision when there is not

enough information to discern between

alternative products. Given the nature of

services, it is likely that emotion may play

a strong role in evaluating three of the

aforementioned criteria.

For example, the

technical capabilities of a service provider

may not be known, or may not be knowable

in the case of high credence services.

Because people are generally

motivated