M31 - MarketingReturn

This study examines the links between conspicuous consumption and user activity on social media platforms, focusing on Generations Z, Y, and X. A set of statements focusing on conspicuous consumption, consumer behaviour on social media, and their food consumption habits was developed and tested on a sample of 679 respondents from the Czech Republic comprising these generations. Factor analysis was used to group tested statements into factors, and regression analysis was used to examine their association with salient consumption patterns. While the link between social media activity and conspicuous consumption was only confirmed for Generation X, the online behaviour of Generation Z, the confirmed influence of influencers on the purchasing behaviour of this generation, suggests a potential link that requires further  investigation.

In the German-speaking food market, a significant gap exists between consumer preference for sustainable options and purchasing behavior, primarily due to skepticism about the authenticity of sustainability claims. In a study involving 368 participants from Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, the influence of price on the perceived authenticity of sustainability labels was examined. Participants were surveyed on their explicit attitudes, while their implicit attitudes were assessed using the implicit association test (IAT). Results show that a higher price significantly improves the perception of a product's authenticity. Socioeconomic factors, such as nationality and gender, are significant, with Swiss nationality and female gender showing strong correlations with higher perceived authenticity. This study uniquely examines initial attitudes and reactions to reflect heuristic consumption decisions. Insights can be used to develop pricing and marketing strategies tailored to different markets and target groups, effectively addressing consumer skepticism through targeted communication and pricing.

This research delves into effective messaging strategies employed by companies to shape their reputation in anticipation of an initial public offering (IPO). Drawing insights from the analysis of 1162 media headlines encompassing 30 brands during their IPOs on NASDAQ or NYSE, the study offers valuable recommendations for entrepreneurs and startups engaging in rhetorical preparations for an IPO. By synthesizing the examination of successful companies' media framing with pertinent well-known communication frameworks (strategic communication and the PESO model), the article introduces the new 6I's model. This model serves as a comprehensive marketing guide, empowering entrepreneurs, and businesses to adeptly manage their company's reputation and highlight diverse accomplishments for the cultivation of a positive media image towards the IPO. The 6I's model encompasses messages centered on Increasing and rapid growth, Innovative technology, Immediate relevance, Individuals and personnel, In-charge management, and In-chronicle history and company tradition. Based on the suggested model, this study further develops the theoretical understanding of corporate narrative and strategic communication to mold the reputations of organizations.

This study aims to understand the factors influencing consumers' intention to adopt the metaverse as a marketplace for physical products and the role of trust specifically focusing on the generation aged 18–28. It also explores the moderating role of trust towards the company Meta in these relationships. An exploratory sequential mixed-method research design was employed to develop an encompassing conceptual model, enhance hypothesis formulation, and validate findings through triangulation. In the first phase of the study, in-depth interviews were conducted with professionals and students (n=11), and in the second phase, Likert-type questionnaire was administered (n=386) to university students. The data collected in the second phase was analyzed using Covariance-Based Structural Equation Modeling (CB-SEM) to validate the conceptual model. This included Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) for reliability and validity, followed by the assessment of path coefficients. Double-mean centering was applied to test moderating effects, with all analyses conducted using the R software's lavaan package. The results confirmed the positive effects of novelty, relative advantage, realism, and compatibility on consumers' intention to adopt the metaverse as a marketplace for physical products, while complexity and financial costs were identified as barriers. Trust towards Meta did not have a moderating effect. The findings provide insights for managers to develop the metaverse in a customer-centric manner and promote its unique features while addressing complexity and financial concerns. The study extends the literature on the metaverse in the consumer goods sector and contributes to Innovation Adoption Theory.

According to the service-dominant logic, the customer always contributes their resources to service delivery. This study adopts the service-dominant logic approach to social marketing in the context of preventative healthcare services for children immunization and investigates the influence of organizational (administrative quality, technical quality, and interpersonal quality) and customer operant resources (cultural resources, physical resources, and social resources) on word-of-mouth. Hierarchical multiple regression was used to test our hypotheses and the evidence indicated that all three quality dimensions of organizational operant resources significantly predict word-of-mouth behavior. Conversely, among three types of customer operant resources, social resources significantly predict word-of-mouth. The study contributes empirical insights to services marketing theory, social marketing theory, and practice.

As society becomes more and more socially conscious, corporate social responsibility may be one of the factors influencing the decision to buy. In the 21st century, cause-related marketing as one of the possible initiatives of a socially responsible approach became a common part of building a relationship with customers. But what are the differences in the perception of a cause-related marketing campaign among consumers with different levels of donation size with regard to gender distribution? Using existing studies, the responses concerning the perception of the campaign supporting a collection for the Zoo in the Czech capital were evaluated through a questionnaire survey. The data were factor-analyzed to determine the dimensions of the perception of the cause-related marketing campaign. The results show a two-factor solution: consumer attitudes towards the product and the company involved in the cause-related marketing campaign and consumer attitudes towards cause-related marketing in relation to a non-profit organization. The impact of donation size and gender on the resulting factors is assessed after.

This study aims to understand the mechanisms of consumers’ online grocery shopping (OGS) acceptance in the current COVID-19 pandemic. Through this perspective, an extended technology acceptance model is employed by including the fear of COVID-19 factor to reveal the extent of the Turkish consumers’ acceptance of OGS. We have tested the proposed research model on 455 survey participants living in various cities of Turkey. Structural equation modeling is employed to test the eleven research hypotheses. The results indicate that perceived ease of use, perceived usefulness, and attitude are valid predictors of OGS acceptance. Besides, the fear of COVID-19 negatively moderates these relationships. By revealing these empirical results, this study provides some useful insights into our understanding of the acceptance mechanisms of OGS processes in a pandemic situation. We hope to pinpoint the underlying reasons for the vast expansion of OGS among Turkish customers in pandemic times.

The aim of the paper is to determine the preferred forms of online shopping and preferred device for online shopping for different product categories by the youth consumers. The research showed that the smartphone plays not only an important role in the consumer behaviour of youth consumers, but they also frequently shop using this device. The paper also identifies the situational and demographic factors affecting online shopping based on which consumer segments were created. Cluster analysis using the K-means algorithm formed consumer segments in the online market in the Czech Republic. Four segments were defined – economically decisive from a city, emotively decisive, rationally thinking from a town, economically active. The results can be purposefully used in creating recommendations for e-shops and for their marketing management.

This article is focused on the differences in the brand equity of the streaming service Netflix before and during the COVID-19 pandemic in the Czech Republic. Brand equity is measured by a specially modified conceptual model. Based on a two-wave questionnaire survey, the possible impact of the pandemic on the dimension of the conceptual model was examined. The results showed that there was no statistically significant change in the level of brand equity but there was a change in its structure. It was also found that although the number of people who tried Netflix’s services increased during the COVID-19 pandemic, they did not become long-term users.

This study evaluates the impact of influencer marketing on consumers. Although online influencers are long established in German B2C markets, research in the field is scarce. Marketing managers are unsure how influencer marketing strategies should be drafted and which influencers should be recruited in order to maximize their marketing efforts at the consumer level. Based on a review of previous theoretical and empirical literature, a mixed method empirical study comprising semistructured interviews with three German fashion influencers and a consumer survey (N = 385) among the followers of these influencers are conducted to evaluate the impact of influencer activity on consumer followership, brand awareness and purchase intention. Results indicate that the intensity of influencer network involvement, intrinsic influencer motivation, authenticity of communication style and the real-life character of influencer posts increase the dependent variables. Hence, the empirical study has contributed to identify the most important determiners for the German B2C fashion influencer segment. Marketing managers are strongly advised to select influencers adequately and organize their marketing strategy in correspondence with their company and products.

This study was focused on application of perceptual carrying capacity concept in the environment of trade fairs. The main contribution of this study is exploration of customers' attitude towards overcrowding at trade fairs as there is not known any study with focus on these events. For this purpose, the eye tracking experiment was conducted, where different images depicting different level of visitors were used. In addition, the aim of the study was to identify what is at the centre of people's attention when looking at photographs taken at trade fairs. The study was conducted with 30 respondents from generation Y. The results imply that the number of people is a very important factor in deciding whether to attend these events (in this case trade fairs) or not at all. Simultaneously the in-depth interviews showed that people tend to have more of a negative attitude towards both overcrowding and a low number of people perceived at an event. This study also suggests that the optimal number of people at trade fairs is not extreme, not too low or not too high.

The purpose of this empirical research is to determine the relative impact of food safety concern, ethical concern and health consciousness on the theory of planned behavior dimensions. Moreover, this study also ascertains the impact of the theory of planned behavior dimensions (attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control on repurchase intentions of organic food among Pakistan and Italian consumers. A highly structured questionnaire is used to collect the data from 337 consumers from Italy and 314 consumers living in Pakistan. As proposed by the researchers, measurements invariance tests are used to analyze the cultural differences (if any) and subsequently structural equation modeling is used to determine the study hypotheses. The study results revealed mix findings and demonstrated significant differences between Pakistani and Italian consumers.

The subject of this research is to reveal the customer's approach towards local food in general and to explore the impact of its labelling on consumer perceptions. The main objective is to find out if an eco-label, a local-label or a bio-label has an impact on consumer behaviour. The following methods were used during the research: eye-tracking technology, in-depth interviews, the A/B testing method, the non-parametric Mann-Whitney test and the non-parametric Kruskal-Wallis test for testing hypotheses. Data were collected from the eye-tracking device in December 2015 and additionally revised for higher validation. In total, the observation contains 121 respondents (63 participants in the reference group - A, and 58 participants in the control group - B). Participants are defined as being from generation Z. It is assumed that the presence of the label on a product has an effect on consumer behaviour. The experiment itself took place at the eyetracking laboratory of the Faculty of Business and Economics at Mendel University in Brno.

In our study we have examined the awareness and attitudes of young people (18-24 years) in Hungary toward a special selection of items: as several countries in the world, Hungary also has its own list of domestic products, places and historical heritages, which are called 'hungaricums'. These items could be defined as the core elements of patriotism, thus they are able to induce strong ethnocentric behavior. Our aim was to differentiate the emotional attitudes by gender. To achieve that, we have designed an online survey in order to get a basic understanding about the young people's attitude toward the hungaricums and the gender differences in this age group. We have found that the hungaricums are known in this age group, but most of them has a really small spontaneous awareness. Based on the opinion of the respondents the most typical hungaricum is the schnapps ('pálinka'), and the Ilcsi natural cosmetics are the less typical to our country. By analyzing the gender differences with using ANOVA method we could conclude that the evaluation of the females is significantly higher in eight cases. Based on this evaluation we grouped the hungaricums with using the MDS method, and our results show that there are also some differences between the males and females. This study is the first step of a complex neuromarketing study, where we examined the visual representation of the hungaricums in an fMRI machine. Further extension of the research project is to check the attention and interest with the usage of an eye tracking device.

Many consumers believe that choices they make result from rational analysis of available alternatives. In reality, however, emotions greatly influence and determine our behaviour and decisionmaking also on the market of products and services. The main aim of this paper is to show the relationship between selected personality traits and emotional consumer behaviour. We used two psychological tests (Eysenck personality questionnaire and author's scale of emotionality) and tested several factors that might have influenced emotional consumer reactions. We found out that two of three tested personality predictors are significant - extroversion and neuroticism. The higher the score that respondents reach in the scales of extroversion and neuroticism was, the more emotional was their behaviour and decision making. In that connection, there are also differences between individual temperaments. Cholerics and melancholics react more emotionally than other two temperaments.

In this article we evaluate three chosen restaurants in Nitra city from the perspective of visual proposal of chosen communication tool, which can be effective for influencing of restaurant's guests to visit each restaurant. It might be done through techniques and methods used in neuroscience. The consumer neuroscience is the area of marketing that studies the sensomotoric, cognitive and affective consumer's reactions on different marketing stimulus. In this article, we use Eye Tracker as one of biometric methods and we research, how restaurant's leaflets can be attractive for guests and in the conclusion we suggest some tips for marketing communication doing for three restaurants in practice. Means of biometric and neuroimaging technologies it's found out, how the consumers do the unconscious purchasing decisions and what's part of brain is responsible for these processes that 95% of human thinking and activities become just real in subconscious. This paper is a part of Scientifics project VEGA 1/0874/14 (2014-2016): "Using of neuromarketing in the food visual merchandising", solved at the Department of Marketing and Trade, FEM-SUA.

The article focuses on how milk packaging is perceived by generation Y. The required data were obtained through eye-tracking using the SMI RED 250 device. Additionally an in-depth interview and a short questionnaire were included in the experiment to obtain complementary qualitative data. The research took place during November 2014 in the Eye Tracking Laboratory at Mendel University. In total 110 respondents representing generation Y participated in the experiment. The research analyzed the front of 12 types of milk packaging. The main objective was to determine which package attributes attract the most attention among consumers. The research shows that the most attention is given to the milk brand as well as claims with additional information, such as fat content and quantity. Additionally, the respondents were asked to rank the packaging samples from the best to the worst. Finally the respondents had to decide which of the products they would buy. The results provide valuable insights to create customized, eye-catching packaging for consumers.

Music is an inherent element of visual merchandising tools. It can affect not only the amount of time spent on shopping, but also the overall satisfaction of customers at the point of sale. Nevertheless, it is essential to find the right compromise between the combination of music genres and basic factors of store sound systems, because everyone perceives music and sound with varying sensitivity. Properly chosen music and sound system factors provide numerous advantages to retail stores, including the more relaxed and friendly-behaving staff as well as the encouraged customers spending more time inside the store. From the customer perspective, the music influences him when determining which store to choose. Last but not least, music can help the customer to overcome stressful situations such as waiting at the cash registers. We assessed the sound system and noise levels in retail stores operating in the Slovak food market through a questionnaire survey with the managers of these stores as well as by measuring the noise intensity in the particular sales departments. The survey sample included 182 store managers. The research was carried out in stores located mainly in western Slovakia and included Slovak retail chains but also companies with transnational capital ties. The questionnaire survey results showed that the store sound distribution depends on the size of the sales format and not on the ownership of particular retail chains operating in the Slovak Republic. Through measuring the level of noise a different approach of these companies can be assumed when creating cultural and pleasant shopping environment.