ABSTRACT Distinctive product design is a cornerstone of sustainable branding. Ideally, consumers ... more ABSTRACT Distinctive product design is a cornerstone of sustainable branding. Ideally, consumers will be able to identify brands by product design without seeing any logos. Once companies have established strong associations between product designs and brands in consumers’ minds, they seek protection against imitation as well as consistency in product lines. This research discusses methods for measuring consumers’ abilities to identify brands by product design. Study 1 shows that brand identification depends on the evaluation mode that the identification task evokes. Compared to a task that presents products side-by-side (comparative mode), participants are more likely to confuse copycats with an original design when they see only one product (non- comparative mode). Study 2 replicates findings of Study 1, demonstrating some robustness of effects across three countries (United States, Spain, Germany) and across three different product categories (beer, smartphones, cars). Study 2 further investigates how familiarity with the product influences brand identification. Although consumers with high (compared to low) familiarity are more likely to accurately identify an original product in a non-comparative evaluation mode, they are also more likely to confuse a copycat with the original product in this mode. Overall, this research extends knowledge about brand identification by product design and provides information brand managers may need for legal decisions in trademark or design patent cases. This research also provides information for brand managers making decisions regarding new product development, e.g., product line extensions.
ABSTRACT Customer experiences play an important role in retail brand management. This research in... more ABSTRACT Customer experiences play an important role in retail brand management. This research investigates how bodily experiences in retail environments influence customers’ perceptions of retail brand personalities. Based on research on human personality perception, we propose that bodily experiences transfer metaphoric meaning to customers’ brand perceptions. In a field experiment and a lab experiment we manipulated participants’ bodily experiences (feeling of hardness and temperature) and consistently found a metaphor-specific transfer of experiences to retail brand personality perceptions (on the dimensions “ruggedness” and “warmth”). A third study reveals the mechanism behind the effect and demonstrates concept activation elicited by bodily experiences in customers’ minds.
... through standardization strategies and the opportunity for competitive advan-tage that can re... more ... through standardization strategies and the opportunity for competitive advan-tage that can result from local variations of marketing instruments is a major challenge for multinational com-panies (Douglas and Wind 1987; Jain 1989; Szymanski, Bharadwaj, and Varadarajan ...
ABSTRACT Distinctive product design is a cornerstone of sustainable branding. Ideally, consumers ... more ABSTRACT Distinctive product design is a cornerstone of sustainable branding. Ideally, consumers will be able to identify brands by product design without seeing any logos. Once companies have established strong associations between product designs and brands in consumers’ minds, they seek protection against imitation as well as consistency in product lines. This research discusses methods for measuring consumers’ abilities to identify brands by product design. Study 1 shows that brand identification depends on the evaluation mode that the identification task evokes. Compared to a task that presents products side-by-side (comparative mode), participants are more likely to confuse copycats with an original design when they see only one product (non- comparative mode). Study 2 replicates findings of Study 1, demonstrating some robustness of effects across three countries (United States, Spain, Germany) and across three different product categories (beer, smartphones, cars). Study 2 further investigates how familiarity with the product influences brand identification. Although consumers with high (compared to low) familiarity are more likely to accurately identify an original product in a non-comparative evaluation mode, they are also more likely to confuse a copycat with the original product in this mode. Overall, this research extends knowledge about brand identification by product design and provides information brand managers may need for legal decisions in trademark or design patent cases. This research also provides information for brand managers making decisions regarding new product development, e.g., product line extensions.
ABSTRACT Customer experiences play an important role in retail brand management. This research in... more ABSTRACT Customer experiences play an important role in retail brand management. This research investigates how bodily experiences in retail environments influence customers’ perceptions of retail brand personalities. Based on research on human personality perception, we propose that bodily experiences transfer metaphoric meaning to customers’ brand perceptions. In a field experiment and a lab experiment we manipulated participants’ bodily experiences (feeling of hardness and temperature) and consistently found a metaphor-specific transfer of experiences to retail brand personality perceptions (on the dimensions “ruggedness” and “warmth”). A third study reveals the mechanism behind the effect and demonstrates concept activation elicited by bodily experiences in customers’ minds.
... through standardization strategies and the opportunity for competitive advan-tage that can re... more ... through standardization strategies and the opportunity for competitive advan-tage that can result from local variations of marketing instruments is a major challenge for multinational com-panies (Douglas and Wind 1987; Jain 1989; Szymanski, Bharadwaj, and Varadarajan ...
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