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This study investigates the role of source familiarity in moderating the effect of service adaptive behavior (SAB) on customer satisfaction. Applying the accessibility–diagnosticity framework and situated cognition theory as the theoretical basis, this research hypothesizes that when customers are familiar with the source that provides the service (i.e. brand familiarity for Study 1 and personal familiarity for Study 2), customer satisfaction responses to SAB would be more moderate than when customers are not familiar with the source. Two studies were conducted to test the hypotheses.

Two experiments manipulating SAB and the brand name familiarity (Study 1) and personal familiarity with the service staff (Study 2) as the source familiarity were conducted. Customer satisfaction as a function of source familiarity was measured to test the hypothesis that source familiarity moderates the relationship between SAB and customer satisfaction.

Compared to unfamiliar sources, familiar sources generated a more moderate response in customer satisfaction as a function of SAB. High familiarity with the brand and service staff induced top-down, memory-based processing that overrides external stimuli as the basis of satisfaction judgment; bottom-up, stimulus-based processing relying on SAB for judgment kicked in only when the source familiarity is low.

From a practical point of view, this study indicates the importance of SAB, especially for brands with low awareness, and alludes to the comparative importance of relationship building in service delivery processes.

This study contributes to the literature by validating the role of contextual factors in influencing the impact of SAB on customer satisfaction.

This research aims to compare consumer responses to pro-environmental communication and appeals to recycle packaging when these messages come from a high-familiarity versus a low-familiarity brand.

Two online between-subjects experimental studies evaluate consumer perceptions and the willingness to comply with recycling appeals in response to pro-environmental communications from a high-familiarity versus a low-familiarity brand. To test the hypotheses, the studies examine the moderating role of sustainability habits and the mediating role of shared environmental responsibility.

Findings show that communicating a brand’s adoption of sustainable packaging is more salient to consumers when the appeal comes from a low-familiarity rather than a high-familiarity brand, especially when sustainability habits are weaker. The mediating role of shared environmental responsibility partly explains consumers’ commitment to act pro-environmentally.

Sustainability officials and policymakers should consider the impact of pro-environmental interventions that encourage collective recycling between brands and consumers. Practitioners are encouraged to examine revised waste management schemes such as extended producer responsibility programs to elicit the collaboration of consumers in initiatives that boost recycling and stimulate pro-environmental behaviors.

Using the diagnosticity–accessibility framework and habit theory, to the best of the author’s knowledge, this research is among the first to empirically examine the role of sustainability habits in consumer responses to pro-environmental brand communications. It also highlights consumers’ willingness to comply with brands’ take-back programs in a shared effort to reduce plastic waste and encourage a circular economy.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of brand familiarity, the number of pieces of product information presented on a web site, and previous online apparel shopping experience on perceived risk and purchase intention.

The experiment was 2 (brand familiarity)×2 (information availability) factorial design and 166 students participated in this study.

Multivariate and univariate analyses found a significant effect of brand familiarity and previous experience on perceived risk and purchase intention, and no effect of amount of information on perceived risk and purchase intention.

Participants may not have carefully considered the product information because the experiment was not an actual purchase situation, although a scenario was given. In future studies, creating an actual purchase situation may be necessary to investigate the effect of the amount of information available on the web sites on perceived risk and decision making.

The present study suggests that internet retailers should capitalize on the power of their brand names. Multi‐channel retailers may be able to derive significant advantages from brand familiarity among their customers.

This study has added to the in‐home shopping literature by extending findings of previous research to internet shopping. Findings suggest that internal information, specifically familiarity with brands offered online and previous experience of shopping online, influence perceptions of risk associated with shopping online, as well as intentions to purchase online.

Most marketing practices assume that consumers will buy when prices are low. This assumption, however, may not always hold true. Employing equity theory and Veblen’s theory of the leisure class, this study tested two moderating effects to ascertain the relationship between perceived price and purchase intention. The purpose of this paper is threefold: first, to examine the relationship between perceived price and willingness to purchase; second, to discover the effects of two moderators (perceived price fairness and vanity) on this relationship; and third, to compare how these moderating effects differ by consumers’ brand familiarity.

A total of 287 usable data sets were collected from college students in the southeastern region of the USA.

The findings showed no negative relationship between perceived price and willingness to purchase. Only perceived price fairness was found to moderate the perceived price–purchase intention relationship. Furthermore, the moderating effect of price fairness was only confirmed in the high brand familiarity group, while the moderating effect of vanity was only confirmed in the low brand familiarity group.

Generalization of the findings is cautioned because findings may vary by demographic backgrounds.

Since purchase intention increases when price is fair even though price is high, marketers should put efforts into promoting and creating the perception of fair price of their products and brands.

This study extends price perception research by incorporating two theories (equity theory and Veblen’s theory of the leisure class) that help further elaborate the relationship between perceived price and willingness to purchase.

This paper investigates the effects of advising strength of a recommendation agent on users' trust and distrust beliefs and how the effects are moderated by perceived brand familiarity.

A research model is evaluated using a laboratory experiment with 149 participants.

Results reveal that a strong advising tone leads to higher trust in terms of users' credibility and benevolence beliefs and lower distrust in terms of their discredibility beliefs (the trustor's concerns regarding the trustee's dishonesty and competence in engaging in harmful behavior) when perceived brand familiarity is high. By contrast, when brand familiarity is low, strong advising tone results in low trust in terms of users' credibility belief and high distrust in terms of their beliefs in discredibility and malevolence (concerns regarding the trustee's conduct in terms of a malicious intention that can hurt the trustor's welfare).

This paper contributes to the trust and distrust literature by studying how each of the dimensions of trust and distrust can be affected by an RA's design feature. It extends the attribution theory to the RA context by studying the moderating role of brand familiarity in determining the effects of the advising strength of an RA. It provides actionable guidelines for practitioners regarding the adoption of an RA's appropriate advising strength to promote different types of products.

The purpose of this paper is to study the interaction of timing cues (active deals vs upcoming deals) and brand familiarity on consumers’ purchase intention.

The research design of this paper is based on one experiment conducted in a behavioural experimental laboratory and two experiments in Mechanical Turk. The data received from these experiments were analysed using one-way ANOVA technique and PROCESS models.

Results across three experiments show that consumers prefer upcoming deals over active deals when brands are of low familiarity. However, the effect is attenuated for brands with high familiarity. Further, the paper proposes and shows that the effects of timing cues and brand familiarity interactions on purchase intention are explained by temporal distance. Finally, results show that need for cognition moderates the effects.

The research results may vary when size of discounts is mentioned. There is a need to study various other moderators such as product type, self-other overlap and regulatory focus.

The paper offers managerial strategies and insights that can be adopted by the online retailing industry. Paper offers practical implications for brands, especially for ones with low familiarity.

This paper adds to the literature by studying new timing cues to understand the behaviour of consumers in retailing industries.

The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of brand familiarity and profit-sharing rate on Muslim customers’ brand trust, perceived financial risk, perceived value and intention to invest in an Islamic bank.

A between-subjects experimental design was applied in the study. Six experiments involving two brand familiarity levels and three profit-sharing rates were conducted using a total of 217 samples. Randomization was applied in the study, which generated unequal sample sizes for each group of experiments.

The findings of this experimental study demonstrated that Muslim customers’ familiarity with the bank’s brand has a significant impact on their brand trust and intention to invest in an Islamic bank. The study also found that the profit-sharing rate has a significant impact on the perceived value both with and without interaction with brand familiarity.

The current study applies an independent measured design or a between-subjects experimental design, that resulted in unequal sample sizes. In addition, the study also does not control for the types of bank accounts owned by respondents. The design may invite the presence of confounding variables that exist due to individual differences and environmental variables.

The results show that Islamic bank managers should care about the brand familiarity issue, which strongly influences customers’ brand trust and customer intention to invest in an Islamic bank. In addition, Islamic bank managers should pay attention to the profit-sharing rate given to customers, as it interacts with brand familiarity in influencing customers’ perceived value.

This study examined the impact of brand familiarity and profit-sharing rate on Muslim consumers’ brand trust, perceived risk, perceived value and intention to save in an Islamic bank. The paper provides a shred of empirical evidence to the theoretical relationship between the subjective and objective cues that influence the formation of customers’ trust, perceived financial risk, perceived value and intention in the Islamic bank context.

Adopting the theory of parasocial interaction (PSI) and schema theory, this study proposes that a brand’s personalized response and brand familiarity on a corporate blog will lead to higher perceived brand similarity, credibility and blog recommendation intention.

A 2 (brand familiarity: high, low) × 3 (brand responses: none, automated and personal) experimental design was developed to test the hypothesized relationships. A total of 474 qualified data were collected using an online survey. ANOVA was utilized to test the research hypotheses.

Study results revealed that personalized messages lead to stronger perceived brand similarity, credibility and blog recommendation intention than those exposed to automated and no response. Brand familiarity also significantly influenced perceived brand similarity, brand credibility and blog recommendation intention. Further, the study analysis revealed an interesting interaction effect between brand awareness and brand response on recommendation intention.

The study provides meaningful implications and suggestions for the effective corporate blogging strategy to influence consumers’ attitudes and image toward brands and establish strong brand equity and relationships with customers.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the impact of brand familiarity on the various dimensions of brand experience, and to identify the factor structure of brand familiarity for financial services brands.

This study used a convenience sampling technique by contacting 216 respondents, and examined the relationship between brand experience dimensions and brand familiarity. An independent sample t-test was performed to assess the differences for brand experience dimensions. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were performed for both low familiarity and high familiarity service brands to highlight the differences.

The improvement in brand familiarity is positive for sensory, emotional, behavioral and relational brand experiences for high familiarity service brands. Exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis found a four-factor brand experience model for low brand familiarity and a five-factor brand experience structure for high familiarity financial services brands. The study of financial services brands validates the service brand experience framework of Nysveen et al. (2013) for high familiarity brands, but not for low familiarity financial services brand.

There is a need for marketers to comprehend various dimensions of brand experience in the context of financial services brands which are experiencing increased competition with non-banks.

The study makes a contribution to the existing literature as the concept of brand familiarity and its relationship with brand experience have received scant attention in the past.

This study aims to investigate the effects of brand familiarity on attitude formation across different advertising channels, product types and brand settings.

A meta-analysis containing 107 empirical studies with 183 effects sizes tests a theoretical model according to situational moderators and methodological factors of brand familiarity.

Brand familiarity has stronger positive impacts on attitude formation under particular advertising tools (online and real advertising), product types (hedonic and mature products) and brand characteristics (memory-based recall). The findings also depend on methodological factors such as student samples, laboratory settings and non-estimated effect sizes.

This meta-analytic study reconciles prior inconsistencies and advances the understanding of brand familiarity across key advertising, product and brand moderators.