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Brand management has traditionally enlisted visual branding elements, including the brand’s graphic logo, to distinguish and communicate the personality of the brand. However, as healthcare organizations work to shape how consumers perceive their brand, organizations are also enhancing their brand identity with sound and music by creating a sonic brand. This research paper aims to examine how sonic brands influence consumer emotional reactions and trust in a healthcare provider. It also explores how sonic brands can differentially affect consumers, depending on their level of engagement in their physical and mental health.

Two experimental studies were conducted that tested the use of a sonic logo for healthcare providers in consumption contexts that might elicit negative emotions, cancer care and mental health care.

The results suggest that the presence of a sonic logo helped to alleviate negative emotions as well as engender trust in the provider. Findings also revealed that for consumers who are less engaged in their health, a sonic logo served as a peripheral cue by enhancing perceptions of competence and empathy for the healthcare provider.

Findings from this research provide insight into how sonic brands can increase the effectiveness of branded healthcare communications.

This study aims to examine the relationship between marginalization, Web presence and firm performance for small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

This study relies upon interviews and surveys of managers and/or owners of SMEs. Using confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling, the authors tested an integrated model of the relationship between marginalization, Web presence and firm performance.

Findings indicate that marginalization enhances the risk perceptions entrepreneurs assign to internet use. This enhanced risk perception then limits the extent to which an entrepreneur responds to online customer feedback, which has implications for the SME’s relationship and reputation management efforts with buyers, ultimately impacting the enterprise’s performance.

This study sheds light on the overlooked phenomena of marginalization and internet avoidance among entrepreneurs. The findings provide insight for entrepreneurs on the deleterious consequences associated with lacking an online presence.

The purpose of this paper is to build upon reward-learning theory and examine the role of indulgent food consumption and habitual eating behaviors as a means of emotional coping.

Both qualitative and quantitative methods were enlisted to explore emotional eating and indulgent tendencies. In Phase 1 of this research, participants responded to open-ended questions regarding the drivers of emotional eating. In Phase 2, a theoretically driven model was developed from Phase 1 findings and quantitative data was collected to test it.

Phase 1 findings indicate that negative terms such as “stressed” and “distract” were more prevalent in the high emotional coping group as opposed to the low emotional coping group. Building from Phase 1, findings from Phase 2 demonstrate a link between emotional eating and indulgent food consumption, underscoring the impact of habitual behaviors. Specifically, emotional coping frequency fully explains the relationship between emotional eating habits and indulgent eating frequency, while intentions to eat indulgent foods partially mediates the relationship between attitude toward indulgent foods and indulgent food consumption frequency. In addition, intentions to eat indulgent foods partially mediates the relationship between emotional coping frequency and indulgent food consumption frequency.

Social marketing efforts can be enlisted to de-market fatty foods to individuals prone to engaging in emotional eating. Individuals might also be encouraged to use emotion regulation techniques to help manage negative emotions.

This research contributes to the existing marketing and consumer well-being literature by exploring the role of habit formation in the development of emotional eating and indulgent food consumption.

This research aims to examine the unique emotional distress experienced during the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. It explores the role of fear and anxiety, what fueled it and how fear and anxiety impacted consumption and behaviors of conformity and compliance.

An exploratory assessment of the emotions and behaviors of individuals during the early part of the coronavirus outbreak (early March 2020) was conducted by sending a questionnaire to a national panel (n = 42). The insight offered from these individuals, in conjunction with prior literature, provided the basis for the development of a conceptual model that was tested using survey methodology (n = 691).

Both exploratory and empirical research indicate that ruminative thoughts were positively related to feelings of fear and anxiety, whereas trust in leadership was negatively related to fear and anxiety. Feelings of fear and anxiety were also associated with purchasing in large quantities, in compliance with guidelines to slow the spread of the virus and the management of negative feelings through consumption.

Important insight for marketers and public policymakers in how fear and anxiety might be both tempered and mitigated during emergencies is offered.

This research provides new insight into what fuels fear and anxiety during a pandemic and investigates how fear and anxiety impacts consumption and behaviors of conformity and compliance.

Researchers and practitioners have traditionally maintained that organizational buying requires rational decision-making. However, individuals at organizations make decisions daily applying a confluence of rationalizations and emotions. This study aims to address the roles of personal feelings, facts and emotional advertising content in the organizational decision-making process.

In two studies, the authors apply both qualitative and quantitative methods to explore emotional and cognitive reactions to advertising. In Study 1, depth interviews were conducted with marketing and advertising content developers from a Fortune 100 technology company. In Study 2, a web-based survey was sent out to a Fortune 100 company’s buyer panel.

Results suggest that advertising using emotion-based themes helps to foster brand engagement tendencies and advocacy for a brand. Findings also demonstrate that organizational status (C-level executive’s vs non-C-level employees) moderates the relationship between buyers’ reliance on facts and their receptivity to advertising using emotion-based themes, such that reliance on facts increases the appeal of emotional advertising.

This research contributes to the organizational buying literature by addressing the dearth of research on the role of emotions in organizational decision-making and providing insight into the role of advertising in business-to-business (B2B) decision-making.

These results imply that advertising incorporating emotion-based themes provide meaningful information to B2B buyers and is especially effective when targeted at buyers at higher levels in an organization.

B2B buying behavior has traditionally been considered a rational undertaking. This research explores how decision-making orientation and the presence of advertising using emotion-based themes help to foster engagement and advocacy for the brand.

Organizations can benefit significantly from the growing capabilities of the internet. As the Web facilitates purchasing and reduces the costs of marketing, companies can connect with customers through the use of storytelling. This study aims to examine how small businesses leverage the use of storytelling to engage with customers and drive revenue and online reputation management.

Both qualitative and quantitative insights are offered in two studies. In Study 1, interviews were conducted with business owners to explore the efforts made by their companies to connect and engage with consumers online. Study 2 builds on the findings from Study 1 and uses survey methodology to test a model which outlines how storytelling can foster engagement with customers.

Results indicate that story content is positively related to emotional content and the personal connection an individual feels toward a firm’s products. Furthermore, user-generated content moderates the relationship between story content creation and personal connections. Findings also demonstrate that personal connection is essential to customer engagement. Ultimately, engagement can lead to revenue generation from social commerce as well as increased reputation management activity.

This research demonstrates how small businesses can use the power of storytelling to immerse and transport audiences in such a way that customer beliefs and attitudes toward the firm are impacted in a favorable way. By telling its brand story well, firms have the power to increase the value of their products.

The dynamic landscape of healthcare has seen significant changes in marketing by the various types of healthcare providers. This research aims to explore the impact of emotions in healthcare advertising.

Two consumer panel experiments investigate the role of hope and empathy appeals in fostering positive evaluations toward healthcare providers (medical centers for serious illnesses).

Study 1 shows that two types of emotion-based healthcare appeals are more effective than non-emotional appeals. Study 2 compares the relative effectiveness of hope versus empathy appeals with medical expert or typical person (patient) testimonials.

Findings demonstrate that in a healthcare context, an expert testimonial enhanced the persuasiveness of a hope-based appeal, whereas testimonials from unknown patients were not effective.

Understanding the role of emotions in healthcare advertising is increasingly important as healthcare providers compete on care and quality outcomes and advertising agencies vie for the attention of consumers.

The purpose of this study is to examine the stages involved in occupational dream pursuit (ODP). In this study, dreams are studied in the context of life-changing, occupational endeavors. The judgment and decision-making that fuels the process and the consumption motives that appear throughout the various stages of the journey are examined through the narratives of individuals living out their career-related dreams.

Open-ended interviews were conducted with individuals who were embarking on a life-changing career attainment experience. The narratives of these informants uncovered psychological, social and behavioral aspects of the dream pursuit process.

Through the informants’ narratives, common themes emerged with respect to the ODP journey, and these themes offered a fluid interpretation of the stages involved in the dream pursuit process: revelation, inciting action, development, maintenance and evolution. At each stage, specific consumption motives and behaviors predominate. These themes, including the consumption, psychological and developmental processes that take place at each stage, are discussed through the narratives of the informants.

This study highlights the role of positive emotions, personal growth, consumption motives and behaviors in ODP.

Dreams give individuals a sense of purpose and being. Although conventional wisdom acknowledges the importance of dream actualization, limited behavioral research has explored the nuances of ODP with regard to decision-making and consumption.

Organizational buying behavior has often been treated as a rational activity, even though humans are involved in the decision-making. Human decision-making often includes a complex cadre of emotions and rationalizations. Subsequently, organizational buyers may not only be driven by logic, testing and facts, but also by emotions. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role that emotions play in organizational buying behavior.

In-depth interviews were conducted with marketing decision-makers for one of the most valuable brands in the world. The role that emotions play in the behavior of organizational buyers is elucidated from the perspective of these marketing professionals.

Emotions are prevalent at all stages in the organizational decision-making process and various discrete emotions fuel action tendencies among buyers. Efforts are made by marketers to strategically manage the emotions buyers experience.

Although organizational buyers must see the functional value of a product or brand, companies need to consider ways in which brands can connect with buyers on an emotional and personal level.

This paper contributes to the literature by offering insights into which discrete or specific emotions are most prominent in organizational buying behavior and how the manifestation of these emotions impact decision-making at each stage in the buying cycle.