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This research aims to investigate the moderating impact of product shadows in gestalt versus component product frames on ad effectiveness perceptions. It offers insights on shadow-compatible and incompatible modes of product presentation color as well as consumer visual processing modes that offer optimal advertising effectiveness.

This research begins with a content analysis of some popular print magazines and builds on qualitative findings from interviews conducted with two industry executives. It then undertakes four experiments to test the proposed hypotheses following a more deductive approach.

Results reveal that incorporating product shadows increase ad effectiveness for gestalt products presented in black-and-white, but lower ad effectiveness for component products presented in color. Additionally, ad effectiveness for a gestalt (component) product presented in black-and-white (color) increases (decreases) in the presence of product shadow when consumers are currently processing in a compatible, gestalt (component) visual mode.

In addition to extending the limited marketing research on product shadows, this research contributes to the literature studying information communication theory (ICT) and advertising effectiveness, Construal-Level Theory (CLT), Heuristic–Systematic Model (HSM) of information processing and stylistic visual cues used in advertising.

This research is focused on advertising effectiveness, providing a tangible outcome of interest to practitioners. An optimal use of this simple, inexpensive and stylistic ad element can help managers design effective communications without forgoing established brand equity.

Limited marketing research on product shadows has only looked at their impact on product luxury implications (Sharma, 2016), experiential versus functional brand evaluations (Sharma, 2018) and product heaviness perceptions (Sharma and Romero, 2020). To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this work is the first to investigate specific gestalt versus component product contexts and the role of black-and-white and colored product presentations, along with specific consumer visual processing modes where shadows either increase or decrease the overall ad effectiveness.

With the rapid development of technology, 360° panorama on mobile as a very convenient way to present virtual reality has brought a new shopping experience to consumers. Usually, consumers get product information through virtual annotations in 360° panorama and then make a series of shopping behaviors. The visual design of virtual annotation significantly influences users' online visual search for product information. This study aims to investigate the influence of the visual design of virtual annotation on consumers' shopping experience in the online shopping interface of 360° panorama.

A 2 × 3 between-subject design was planned to help explore whether different display model of annotation (i.e. negative polarity and positive polarity) and different background transparency of annotation (i.e. 0% transparency, 25% transparency and 50% transparency) may affect users' task performance and their subjective evaluations.

(1) Virtual annotations with different background transparency affect user performance, and transparency has better visual search performance. (2) Virtual annotation background display mode may affect the user operation performance; the positive polarity of the virtual annotation is more convenient for the users' visual searching for product information. (3) When the annotation background transparency is opaque or semi-transparent, the negative polarity display is more favorable to the users' visual search. However, this situation is reversed when the annotation background transparency is 25%. (4) Participants preferred the presentation of positive polarity virtual annotations. (5) Regarding the degree of willingness to use and ease of understanding, participants preferred the negative polarity display for 0% background transparency or 50% background transparency. However, the opposite result was obtained for 25% background transparency.

The findings generated from the research can be a good reference for the development of virtual annotation visual design for mobile shopping applications.

1. Virtual annotation background transparency and background display mode are two essential attributes of 360° panoramas.

2. This study examined how virtual annotation background transparency and background display mode influence user performance and experience.

3. It is recommended to use a translucent or opaque annotation background with a negative polarity display.

4. Virtual annotation presentation with 25% background transparency facilitates consumer searching and comparison of product information.

5. Users prefer a positive polarity annotation display.

Virtual annotation background transparency and background display mode are two essential attributes of 360° panoramas.

This study examined how virtual annotation background transparency and background display mode influence user performance and experience.

It is recommended to use a translucent or opaque annotation background with a negative polarity display.

Virtual annotation presentation with 25% background transparency facilitates consumer searching and comparison of product information.

Users prefer a positive polarity annotation display.

Chapter 4 shows and tells how to create visual art to achieve deep understanding about stories that individuals tell. Creating visual narrative art (VNA) of stories achieves several objectives. First, creating VNA revises and deepens sense-making of the meaning of events in the story and what the complete story implies about oneself and others. Second, creating VNA surfaces unconscious thinking of the protagonist and other actors in the story as well as the storyteller (recognizing that in many presentations of stories an actor in the story is also the storyteller); unconscious thinking in stories relating to consumer and brand experiences reflect one or more archetype (Jung 1916/1959) fulfillments by the protagonist and the storyteller; given that almost all authors agree on a distinction between processes that are unconscious, rapid, automatic, and high capacity, (System 1 processing) and those that are conscious, slow, and deliberative (System 2 processing, see Evans, 2008), VNA enables and enriches processing particularly relating to system 1 processing–enabling more emotional versus rational processing. Third, creating VNA of stories is inherently and uniquely fulfilling/ pleasurable/healing for the artist; using visual media allows artists to express emotions of the protagonist and/or audience member, to vent anger, or report bliss about events and outcomes that words alone cannot communicate; VNA provides a tangible, emotional, and holistic (gestalt) experience that is uniquely satisfying and does so in a form that many audience members enjoy over and over again. Chapter 4 elaborates on the rationales for its central proposition, briefly reviews relevant literature on VNA, and illustrates one mode of VNA for the complementary stories told by a consumer and brand.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the interaction effect of innovative product category and presentation order on consumer consumer’s purchasing intention and the mediating role of perceived novelty and risk perception.

The authors examined the hypotheses in three experiment studies. In Study 1, the authors primed innovative product category and presentation order on consumer consumer’s purchasing intention. In Study 2, the authors measured the mediating role of perceived novelty and risk perception. In Study 3, they validated the moderating effect of picture and text consistency on the improvement of purchase preference.

The results reveal that RNP/INP and presentation order (from whole to part/from part to whole) could enhance consumers’ purchase intention and verify the mediating role of perceived novelty and risk perception, based on which a complete internal mechanism model is constructed. The third experiment shows the moderating effect of picture and text consistency on the improvement of purchase preference by matching the category and presentation order of innovative products.

Prior literature on the thinking mode of holistic and partial processing has been mostly applied to the cognitive field of reading and text labeling. In this study, using the holistic (local) processing thinking model and anchoring theory, eye movement experiments and situational experiments, the audience’s analysis framework of information processing mechanism is constructed. The unique phenomenon of product category and overall (local) presentation order coexisting in innovative product advertisement is considered comprehensively.

This paper aims to examine how visual and haptic package design characteristics singularly and jointly affect consumers' brand impressions.

Integrating and extending design perception with congruence and fluency theories, the paper presents three research propositions that are tested in three studies. Bottled water serves as an example category with data provided by professionals and consumers.

Study 1 identifies key types of holistic bimodal designs (Modern, Big Grip, Prototypical‐Small, Boxy Billboards, and Prototypical‐Large) based on brand visual and haptic factors. Study 2 relates these types to unique single‐modal brand impressions. Study 3 determines how consumers evaluate brands depending on the semantic congruence between haptics and visuals. Except for the excitement dimension, brand evaluations are more positive under conditions of high rather than low congruence.

The findings are obtained for a single category (bottled water) using experiments designed to highlight and focus consumer attention on the formation of impressions. The findings may thus not fully reflect consumer responses in actual retail purchase situations.

The paper provides preliminary guidelines on how to utilize visual and haptic cues in the design of brand packages for stimulating desired consumer responses.

The work presented in this paper contributes to the literature on design‐based brand inferences and semantic congruence by integrating the visual with the haptic perspectives.

The paper aims to clarify the influence of different picture contents on consumer's willingness to click pictures when shopping for agricultural products online and examine the intermediary mechanism and boundary conditions of the impact.

The paper opted for an empirical study based on the cue utilization theory and information processing theory, including three experiments to test the existence, intermediary mechanism and boundary conditions of the impact of online picture contents of agricultural products on consumers' clicking intention.

The paper provides empirical insights about the influence of picture contents on consumer's willingness to click when shopping for agricultural products online. The picture of product's production environment or grower on the search result page can effectively improve consumer's willingness to click the product under dual systemic information processing modes. Compared with product pictures, pictures displaying products and production environment can stimulate more cognitive system processing, and pictures displaying products and its growers can stimulate more emotional system processing, both resulting in higher click intention. However, the above effects only exist in the context of non-branded agricultural products.

The research results not only provide practical guidance for merchants, but also fill the gap in the research on the impact of picture contents on consumers in the field of agricultural products in online marketing.

The paper aims to clarify the influence of different picture contents on consumer's willingness to click pictures when shopping for agricultural products online and examine the intermediary mechanism and boundary conditions of the impact.

The paper opted for an empirical study based on the cue utilization theory and information processing theory, including 3 experiments to test the existence, intermediary mechanism and boundary conditions of the impact of online picture contents of agricultural products on consumers' clicking intention.

The paper provides empirical insights about the influence of picture contents on consumer's willingness to click when shopping for agricultural products online. The picture of product's production environment or grower on the search result page can effectively improve consumer's willingness to click the product under dual-systemic information processing modes. Compared with product pictures, pictures displaying products and production environment can stimulate more cognitive system processing, and pictures displaying products and its growers can stimulate more emotional system processing, both resulting in higher click intention. However, the above effects only exist in the context of non-branded agricultural products.

The research results can not only provide practical guidance for merchants, but also fill the gap in the research on the impact of picture contents on consumers in the field of agricultural products in online marketing.

The purpose of this paper is to control the size of online advertising by the use of the single factor experiment design using the eight matching methods of logo and commodity picture elements as independent variables, under the premise of background color and content complexity and to investigate the best visual search law of logo elements in online advertising format. The result shows that when the picture element is fixed in the center of the advertisement, it is suggested that the logo element should be placed in the middle position parallel to the picture element (left middle and upper left), placing the logo element at the bottom of the picture element, especially at the bottom left should be avoided. The designer can determine the best online advertising format based on the visual search effect of the logo element and the actual marketing purpose.

In this experiment, the repeated measurement experiment design was used in a single factor test. According to the criteria of different types of commodities and eight matching methods, 20 advertisements were randomly selected from 50 original advertisements as experimental stimulation materials, as shown in Section 2.3. The eight matching methods were processed to obtain a total of 20×8=160 experimental stimuli. At the same time, in order to minimize the memory effect of the repeated appearance of the same product, all pictures, etc., the probability was randomly presented. In addition, in order to avoid the pre-judgment of the test for the purpose of the experiment, 80 additional filler online advertisements were added. Therefore, each testee was required to watch 160+80=240 pieces of stimulation materials.

On one hand, when the image elements are fixed for an advertisement, the advertiser should first try to place the logo element in the right middle position parallel to the picture element, because the commodity logo in this matching mode can get the longest average time of consumers’ attention, and the duration of attention is the most. Danaher and Mullarkey (2003) clearly pointed out that as consumers look at online advertising, the length of fixation time increases, the degree of memory of online advertisement is also improved accordingly. Second, you can consider placing the logo element in the left or upper left of the picture element. In contrast, advertisers should try to avoid placing the logo element at the bottom of the picture element (lower left and lower right), especially at the lower left, because, at this area, the logo attracts less attention, resulting in shortest duration of consumer attention, less than a quarter of consumers’ total attention. This conclusion is consistent with the related research results.

Advertising owners in the logo and picture elements for typesetting, if advertisers want to highlight the elements of the commodity logo, the logo should be arranged in the first point of view more locations, which cause consumers more unconscious processing, to achieve good memory and communication effects. Therefore, based on the above conclusions, it is also recommended that the logo elements should be placed on the right side of the picture elements in the advertising layout, and the sixth form of matching should be avoided as much as possible.

Drawn from the concepts of processing fluency and mental imagery, the present study aims to fill the void by developing the mechanism underlying consumers' cognitive processing of visually appealing digital content in social media (i.e. Instagram) of retail brands.

Data were gathered using a web-based survey method with consumers residing in the USA (N = 328). Structural equation modelling (SEM) was employed to investigate the proposed hypotheses. In addition, measurement invariance and multigroup analyses were conducted to test the moderation effect of need for cognition (NFC).

The results supported the pivotal role of mental imagery when consumers process visual messages in the context of a retail brand's Instagram. Both comprehension fluency and imagery fluency positively influence mental imagery, which in turn cultivates positive attitude towards the brand. The mediating role of mental imagery is confirmed. Furthermore, individuals' NFC interacts with imagery fluency but not with comprehension fluency such that high NFC strengthens the effect of imagery fluency on mental imagery. That is, when high-NFC consumers process information on Instagram, their perceptions of ease of generating imagery likely evoke visual representation of the brand's messages on Instagram in their minds.

This research provides feasible ways for brands to increase the effectiveness of digital marketing communications in social media (e.g. optimising of the contextual features of visual information and employing interactive features such as filters of social media to enhance processing fluency).

Within the context of digital retailing, this study provides a new perspective of consumers' imagery processing to investigate the effectiveness of visual-focussed messages.