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The purpose of this paper is to identify whether the Spanish stock market experiences a negativity effect on the announcement of Spanish consumer sentiment information and if firms that are signatory to the UN Global Compact on corporate social responsibility are relatively more salient in the minds of investors.

The authors use consumer sentiment announcements to show how the negativity effects on the Spanish stock market are significantly influenced by how salient the stock is in the minds of investors. If a firm’s stock exhibits negativity effects on the release of consumer sentiment information then this stock is salient to investors. If firms who are signatory to the UN Global Compact exhibit significant negativity effects, it could be concluded that these stocks are salient, particularly if firms that are not signatory to the Global Compact do not exhibit a similar negativity effect.

The IBEX35 index experiences significant negativity effects upon the release of Spanish consumer sentiment announcements. This is similar to that reported in other countries, notably Australia and the USA. Using the constituent firms in the IBEX35 index, the authors find that those firms that are signatory to the UN Global Compact are significantly more likely to experience negativity effects upon the release of Spanish consumer sentiment information than if they are not signatory to the Global Compact. This indicates that firms that are part of the UN Global Compact are more salient to investors.

Available published Spanish data on consumer sentiment.

Little is understood of the impact that consumer sentiment announcements have on stock prices. Studies in USA and Australia have identified significant negativity effects in stock markets when consumer sentiment information is released. This research has found that a psychological negativity bias occurs in firms that are salient to investors. Salience has been found to be important in asset pricing.

This paper tries to find out which companies are more likely to sign the UN Global Compact. These companies are more sensitive to consumer sentiment, because they depend on the everyday decisions of the consumers. The more the companies depend on consumers, the more they care about them. And, when the consumer sentiment goes down, they are more affected by this sentiment. These firms are also more worried about the long term. They are not only thinking about the profits in the short term but also about maintaining the generation of profits in the long term.

This paper aims to focus on the phenomena of negative brand relationships and emotions to evidence how such relationships transpose into the willingness to participate in collective actions in anti-brand communities.

An online survey was carried out, targeting Facebook anti-brand communities, dedicated to sharing negativity toward technology products. A total of 300 members of these communities participated in the study.

The study shows that the two dimensions of negative brand relationship (negative emotional connection and two-way communication) lead to community participation in anti-brand communities, through the mediating role of social approval and oppositional loyalty. Anti-brand community growth is supported by members’ intentions to recommend the group and is the result of their participation.

The study’s focus on technology brands calls for further research on other brand types and categories and the inclusion of other independent variables should be considered to extend understanding of collective negativity in anti-brand communities.

The paper provides insight to brand managers on the ways to manage negativity around their brand online and understand the role that brand communities play in this process.

The paper proposes the first integrative view of brand negativity, encompassing emotions and behaviors of consumers as individuals and as members of a collective, which allows the understanding of the dynamics of anti-branding and highlights the mechanisms that facilitate anti-brand community expansion.

Negativity towards a brand is typically conceived as a significant problem for brand managers. This paper aims to show that negativity towards a brand can represent an opportunity for companies when brand polarization occurs. To this end, the paper offers a new conception of the brand polarization phenomenon and reports exploratory findings on the benefits of consumers’ negativity towards brands in the context of brand polarization.

To develop a conception of brand polarization, the paper builds on research on polarizing brands and extends it by integrating insights from systematic literature reviews in three bodies of literature: scholarship on brand rivalry and, separately, polarization in political science and social psychology. Using qualitative data from 22 semi-structured interviews, the paper explores possible advantages of brand polarization.

This paper defines the brand polarization phenomenon and identifies multiple perspectives on brand polarization. Specifically, the findings highlight three distinct parties that can benefit from brand polarization: the polarizing brand as an independent entity; the brand team behind the polarizing brand; and the passionate consumers involved with the polarizing brand. The data reveal specific advantages of brand polarization associated with the three parties involved.

Managers of brands with a polarizing nature could benefit from having identified a group of lovers and a group of haters, as this could allow them to improve their focus when developing and implementing the brands’ strategies.

This exploratory study is the first explicitly focusing on the brand polarization phenomenon and approaches negativity towards brands as a potential opportunity.

This study aims to investigate if different types of negative electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) have various negative effects on the attitude of the consumer toward a product (Laptop) and whether this newfound attitude remains unaffected by the subsequent influence of positive eWOM.

A quantitative study in Germany was conducted. In the two-part experimental setting, first, a factorial repeated-measures between-subjects design was used in which the types of negative eWOM have been manipulated. The second part is characterized by a mixed between–within subjects design to test the durability of attitudinal changes.

The results demonstrate that destructive and ethical eWOM only provoke a small decline in consumer attitude compared to functional product criticism. Furthermore, the examination shows that renewed positive eWOM can improve the attitude, whereas ethical criticism is the most difficult to correct.

The study views negative eWOM differentiated. Researchers could adopt this approach by analyzing online communication more precisely. Ambivalent relationships between negative eWOM and their outcomes can be explained.

The findings lessen the fear of permanent loss of brand reputation caused by negative reviews. The harmful effects on the attitude can be compensated through targeted marketing management actions. The study shows which content companies need to focus on.

Previous literature has predominantly overlooked the complex nature of negative eWOM. Therefore, the study provides first empirical results about the divergent effect of different content types of negative eWOM on consumer attitude toward a product. Additionally, the durability of consumer negativity could be measured over time.

This paper aims to provide a better understanding of negative consumer–brand relationships in social-media-based anti-brand communities from a consumer culture theory (CCT) perspective. In particular, it investigates the purpose and the meaning of the consumer participation in online anti-brand communities, also through the analysis of the ways in which they express negative feelings toward the hated brands.

This study applies a “symbolic netnographic” method to six anti-brand communities related to four global brands, namely, Apple, Nestlé, Uber and McDonald’s. Moreover, several interviews were conducted with anti-brand community administrators.

The findings show that the main reason for consumers to join anti-brand communities is a desire to participate in the construction of new meanings and values of modern consumption, translating their ideological incompatibility with certain brands into negative engagement and activism aimed at destroying the hated brand’s image and reputation. Furthermore, the findings reveal that brand anthropomorphism is a frequent means of communication also used in the context of negative consumer–brand relationships, to strengthen the battle against the hated brand in a more frontal and direct manner.

Although this research provides some initial insights into negative consumer–brand relationships in the social media anti brand communities, the paper also has some limitations. The netnographic approach should be analyzed within more and different anti-brand communities. In this investigation, the authors perceived how difficult it is to obtain feedback from communities and to secure the collaboration of their administrators. There is also a need for research on other potential factors that can play a key role in negative consumer–brand relationships in social-media anti-brand communities, such as cultural capital or the impact of cultural perceptions. Moreover, future research should focus on different types of products and brand services, such as hedonic vs. utilitarian brands, as these might generate different types of consumer behavioral responses. Finally, a further direction for future research would be to consider the set of “brand recovery strategies” that can be implemented by companies to deal with negative consumer–brand relationships, including the identification of situations in which “not acting” could be preferable.

Understanding the antecedents and types of negative consumer–brand relationships enables companies to identify “brand recovery strategies” for managing negativity in the appropriate manner. Moreover, negative feelings toward brand could even be an opportunity for improving branding management.

This research improves on previous few studies dealing with online anti-brand communities from a CCT perspective. Firstly, it provides a holistic perspective of negative consumer–brand relationships in general and specifically of brand hate, thus advancing our understanding of the sociocultural dynamics of negative consumer–brand relationships; secondly, it provides new insights into the brand anthropomorphism phenomenon emerging in the negative feelings context. Overall, this research contributes to knowledge for both academics and managers as to why, how and for what purpose consumers experience negative engagement toward certain brands in the specific context of social-media-based anti-brand communities.

This study aims to explore consumers' perceptions of stealing thunder and to investigate significant factors for maximizing its effect.

This study used a mixed-methods approach. First, qualitative responses from 286 Korean participants were collected and analyzed (Study 1). Second, the experiment employed a randomized 2 (crisis communication timing: stealing thunder vs thunder) × 2 (transparent vs nontransparent communication) × 2 (follow-up actions: good vs poor) between-subjects experimental design with 426 Korean participants to investigate and confirm the results of Study 1.

Qualitative data showed that the participants' evaluation of corporations' stealing thunder strategy is complicated. Some do not perceive corporate use of stealing thunder at face value, but rather view it as yet another hopeless, selfish and irresponsible crisis communication strategy, distrusting it based on strong cynicism toward all corporations. An experiment confirmed that stealing thunder was significantly more effective in eliciting consumers' ethical judgment (EJ) and word-of-mouth (WOM) on corporations than the thunder strategy. Significant two-way interaction effects between crisis timing and follow-up actions showed that the stealing thunder strategy should be accompanied by follow-up actions to increase consumers' credibility and WOM intentions.

This study investigated how consumers evaluate stealing thunder by adopting both a qualitative and quantitative approach to explore how they make meaning out of this phenomenon.

The purpose of this paper is to provide insights into personalisation from a practitioner’s perspective to bridge the practitioner-academia gap and steer the research agenda. A wide scope of research has investigated personalisation from a consumer perspective. The current study aims at bridging the consumer and practitioner perspective by entering into a dialogue about the practical application of personalisation. It takes the personalisation process model by Vesanen and Raulas (2006) as the starting point.

Lead by the exploratory character of the study, semi-structured expert interviews were conducted with marketers, market researchers and online privacy specialists.

The results showcase how practitioners view the issues present in consumer research. First, they are overly positive about personalisation. Second, they are aware of constraining factors; findings showcase best practices to mitigate them. Finally, practitioners are aware of controversies surrounding personalisation and thus engage in ethical discussions on personalisation.

This study shows that practitioners have somewhat different believes about the utility and appreciation of personalised marketing practices than consumers. It also shows awareness of some of the key concerns of consumers, and that such awareness translates into organisational and technological solutions that can even go beyond what is currently mandated by law. Six insights into personalised marketing as well as expectations for the future of the phenomenon are discussed to steer the research agenda.

Insights into the practice of personalisation contribute to a shared understanding of this phenomenon between involved actors, such as marketers, advertisers, and consumer representatives. In addition, implications for lawmakers are discussed, suggesting that the implementation of privacy laws needs more clarity and that actions aiming at improving consumer knowledge are needed.

The paper contributes to the literature first, by drafting a descriptive map of personalisation from a practitioners’ perspective and contrasting it with the perspective stemming from consumer research and, second, by offering insights into the current developments and direct implications for practice and future research.

Negativity in marketing communication is a dangerous phenomenon that is the antithesis of the goal of public relations and advertising. Despite its increased prominence in the marketplace, the literature has barely given notice to negative communications. This article presents a series of four experimental studies designed to make a start towards filling the void in our understanding of negativity.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate four possible asymmetries in US aggregate consumption and its major components (durables, non-durables, and services) for the period 1990-2013. Understanding the asymmetric behavior of the components is important since the impact of monetary policy on separate consumer spending categories may differ substantially.

The authors first employ stationarity and cointegration tests to specify and estimate the long-run equilibrium relationship between consumer spending and such variables as disposable income, consumer sentiment, and the expected real interest rate. The authors then specify a structural error-correction model for each spending category to simultaneously investigate such possible asymmetries due to the ratchet effect, psychological negativity bias, interest rate effect, and varying degree of adjustment in eliminating disequilibrium defined as the gap between actual and desired spending.

First, consumption and its major components all display asymmetric behavior consistent with psychological negativity bias. Second, consumer spending on durable goods also displays asymmetries consistent with both the ratchet effect and the interest rate effect. Third, non-durables respond asymmetrically to disequilibrium; consumers adjust (increase) spending on non-durables only when actual spending is below desired spending on non-durable goods. Fourth, services also respond asymmetrically to disequilibrium; consumers adjust (reduce) spending on services only when actual spending is above desired spending on services.

This study provides new insight on the asymmetric behavior of consumer spending. The authors believe that the findings should help with macroeconomic policymaking when such indicators as income, consumer sentiment, and expected real interest rates display significant variations.

This research investigates when and how brands influence attribute importance weights. Most past studies modelling consumer decision processes treated the brand of a product as an attribute parallel to the price, color or size of a product, and as a result, those studies assigned an equal (i.e. non-contingent) importance weight across brands for each attribute. In contrast, this study introduces a brand-contingent attribute-weighting process, in which brand is a higher-order construct that influences attribute importance.

This study presents a multi-level choice model in which the importance weight of an attribute can vary across brands. This study then estimates the model using real purchase data and survey data from an airline industry.

This study finds that attribute importance weights are contingent upon two aspects of a brand – the perceived relative position of the brand and consumers’ brand usage experiences. Specifically, when consumers perceive a brand to be inferior to its competitors in a given attribute, they generally place greater weight on that attribute for that brand. In contrast, when consumers perceive a brand to be superior to its competitors in a given attribute, only consumers with extensive brand usage experiences place greater weight on that attribute for that brand.

The findings provide managerial insights on brand positioning and segmentation strategies using consumers’ brand usage experiences.

This study advances the literature on consumer decision processes by modeling an attribute-weighting process that is contingent upon brands. The present study models this process based on consumer behavior theories and estimates the model using real market data.