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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the interaction effect of placement characteristics and emotional experiences on consumers’ recognition of placed brands. Brand recognition is a fundamental step in the consumer’s decision-making journey.

The authors developed a research model based on emotional process theory and cognitive capacity theory incorporating placement characteristics, emotional experiences and brand recognition. An experimental study of 110 young Chinese consumers was conducted to test the research model.

The findings indicated that all three placement characteristics (prominence, serial positions and plot connection) had significant effects on brand recognition, as suggested in previous research. The effect of emotional experiences on brand recognition was comparatively less prominent. Placement characteristics and emotional experiences also interacted to influence the recognition of placed brands.

This study shows the role of emotional experiences and their interaction with placement characteristics on brand recognition, which has yet to be examined. The conceptual model contributes to the product placement literature by suggesting that both cognitive and emotional processing are important for brand recognition. The findings provide useful insights for marketers in designing effective product placement strategies.

Based on both quantitative and qualitative analyses, this study revisits public relations (PR) and marketing practitioners' perceptions of PR function and its relationship with marketing function in the digital context.

An online survey targeting 234 PR and marketing practitioners was first conducted, followed by a total of 27 in-depth interviews with PR and marketing practitioners.

Results from the two phases of analysis show that both PR and marketing practitioners perceive market functions as sales-oriented, whereas media relations is interpreted as more of a PR function. Content marketing and influencer marketing via digital communication channels help to enhance the convergence of PR and marketing functions. PR and marketing practitioners believe that PR and marketing functions are integrative, and they are willing to work flexibly for both functions within workplaces.

This study presents a continuum of PR and marketing functions in the digital era that illustrates the role of digital communication in the convergence of PR and marketing functions. The results help to advance the theoretical discussion on both the functional (excellent PR practices and relationship management) and critical (the social role of PR in the participatory culture) approaches of PR in the digital context. Managerial implications are also discussed in addition to the theoretical contributions.

With the growing popularity of digital engagement, this study explores the interrelationships among digital engagement, interactivity and engagement strategies from the perspective of practitioners.

Individual in-depth interviews were conducted with 27 practitioners who have been involved in marketing communication activities in Hong Kong.

It was found that practitioners interpreted digital engagement mainly from the cognitive and behavioral dimensions and organizations engaged with their target audiences with either transactional or transitional communications. Functional interactivity and medium interactivity were perceived as the basis of digital engagement.

This qualitative analysis enriches the extant literature in marketing and public relations by delineating the relationships between interactivity and the use of different levels of digital engagement strategies, as well as guiding practitioners in setting effective digital engagement strategies.

Placement prominence is a multidimensional concept. Previous studies have defined and operationalized prominence in different ways, and no studies have tried to systematically examine what should and should not be counted as prominence. This study aims to fill this gap.

Using a content analysis of six short films and a survey study on 129 Chinese young adults, this study systematically examined 13 dimensions of placement prominence on the memory of placed brands.

Factor analysis has reduced the 13 dimensions into five factors: contextual, narrative, sensory, exposure and spatial prominence. Fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) software was used to conduct a contrarian case analysis and test for predictive validity. This was followed by a QCA to identify the optimal configurations of the five factors that may lead to a high recognition of the placed brands. The optimal configurations were also contrasted across two gender and brand familiarity groups. While the optimal configurations of prominence on brand memory for male and female participants were largely the same, the combinations differed between participants with low and high brand familiarity.

Previous studies in product placement usually operationalize prominence with a few dominant dimensions intuitively though several other dimensions, and their interactions could also affect the prominence level. To the best of authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that used multiple dimensions of prominence configurations to identify paths that may lead to low and high brand memory. The empirical results contribute to the theory and understanding of the effect of prominence on brand memory and provide guidance to brand managers in determining which prominence configuration is the most suitable for achieving their promotional objective.

This study aims to extend the literature on marketing communications by exploring the effect of placing products in humorous scenes. It aims to ascertain the prevalence of placement scenes associated with humor in television programs and the effect of humor on brand persuasiveness.

The study used a two-phase research process. A content analysis of prime-time television programing was conducted to map the relative prevalence of brands placed in humorous contexts and for the selection of research stimuli. This was followed by a large-scale experimental study of 1,100 television viewers in Hong Kong with real stimuli that had been digitally manipulated.

The study found that a humorous context did enhance recall of placed brands but its effect on brand attitudes was mediated by audience involvement in the viewing and moderated by psychological trait reactance. Interestingly, and in contrast to conventional advertising, placing brands in a humorous context led to lower involvement in the viewing, which, in turn, resulted in lower brand attitudes. Individuals with low trait reactance were more positive toward brands placed in a non-humorous context than individuals with high trait reactance while individuals with high trait reactance were more positive toward brands placed in a humorous context, though the difference was less prominent.

The findings help to illustrate when and how a humorous context contributes to the recall of and attitudes toward placed brands.

The results also facilitate marketers and program producers to choose the best placement context and design more effective placement strategies.

This research is the first to empirically examine the effect of a humorous context on the unaided recall of and attitudes toward brands placed in television programs.

The purpose of this study contributes to literature on marketing communications by empirically contrasting the effectiveness of a new form of covert promotions (product placement in recipes) and an overt promotion (traditional advertisement). The mediating role of perceived believability of promotional materials and the moderating roles of advertising skepticism and brand awareness were examined based on a conceptual model.

A Web-based experiment with 2 (form of promotion: overt versus covert) × 2 (brand awareness: low versus high) between-subjects full factorial design was used. A public sample of 537 participants had participated in the study. The conceptual model was further tested on 106 participants using stimuli of a fictitious brand.

A two-stage moderated mediation analysis shows that the perceived believability of promotional materials was a significant mediator of the form of promotion and brand evaluations. Consumers showed a higher level of believability toward covert promotion, which, in turn, led to more positive evaluations of the promoted brand. Advertising skepticism and brand awareness were found to significantly moderate the relationship between form of promotion and attitudes toward the promoted brands. A similar pattern of results was obtained when stimuli of a fictitious brand were used.

This research addresses an important issue in marketing communication and extends the understanding of the perception of overt and covert promotions by examining the underlying mediating and moderating variables, which have rarely been explored before. The results guide marketers in developing effective marketing communication strategies for well-known, less well-known and even new brands. It also directs policymakers to consider whether integrated branded content in recipes should be disclosed to protect consumers from surreptitious promotions, which may help to lower consumers’ skepticism toward advertising in the long run.

Expenditures on beauty, fitness and body shaping by females have increased significantly in recent years. Most previous studies examined this from the psychological perspective of self-acceptance and self-liking. However, this phenomenon may also have social implications. This study aims to provide a profound understanding of the social environment for female professionals as well as actionable insights for the government and social institutions.

A research model was developed based on impression management and social identity theories incorporating impression management motives, impression construction consumption and social identity. A survey study of 419 Chinese female professionals was conducted to test the research model.

This study surveyed 419 Chinese female professionals and found that impression management motives significantly drove female professionals to spend on their faces and bodies for impression construction, which in turn contributed to the enhancement of their social identities in three dimensions: relational identity, public identity and collective identity.

In a male-dominated society, it has become a norm that females should be cautious about their facial appearance and body shape. Females are often forced to consume to attain physical attractiveness and to construct a favorable social image. This study shows that consumption for impression construction has become a frequently used strategy for impression management and identifies key areas of societal concern.

Market-oriented relations has been regarded as a kind of public relations practices widely performed by the practitioners of public relations and marketing. This study attempts to discuss market-oriented relations in the digital era in which public relations and marketing practitioners' involvement in managing market-oriented relations was simultaneously related to their perceptions of interactivity effects, value of public relations and benefits of digital media usage in public relations practices.

A self-administrated online survey targeting 241 practitioners engaged in coordinating public relations activities in Hong Kong was conducted in 2017.

Structural equation modeling (SEM) analysis showed that practitioners' involvement in market-oriented relations practices had significant positive effects on their perceptions of interactivity effects, value of public relations and benefits of digital media usage. Practitioners' perceptions of interactivity effects and benefits of digital media usage were positively affected by their perceptions of public relations value, particularly public relations effectiveness. Clients' profitability and business intelligence, as well as interactivity effects in terms of involvement and perceived customization were practitioners' key concerns in managing market-oriented relations.

This study explores how practitioners of public relations and marketing perceived and practiced public relations in the digital era. Specifically, the conception of market-oriented relations in regard to the use of digital media was discussed in the proposed structural model.

With the prevailing use of online communication platforms, this study revisits the definitions of trust in an online context. By exploring organizational online communications from a practitioners' perspective, a conceptual framework that illustrates the nature of trust and its relationship with dialogic communication between organizations and organizations' stakeholders in the digital era is proposed.

A total of 27 in-depth interviews were conducted with public relations and marketing practitioners involved in coordinating organizational online communications in Hong Kong.

From the practitioners' perspective, stakeholders' online trust toward an organization, which is a hybridity of initial and rapidly evolving trust, begins with stakeholders swift and initial judgment of the organization according to category-based cues (including knowledge-based attributes of the organization, institutional cues, and particular attributes of online dialogic communication) available on online platforms and further develops over time. Practitioners regard the integration of online and offline communication platforms to be the most effective way to build trust in organization–stakeholder relationships in the digital era, while dialectical tensions can hinder trust formed in online communication.

Along with the proposed conceptual framework, this study advances the discussion of online trust in public relations practices from the practitioners' perspective. A qualitative approach provides rich descriptions that may help to enrich theories in public relations and communication management regarding the interplay of trust and dialogic communication in organizational practices in the digital era.

This research contributes to literature on marketing communication by exploring the roles of depth of processing and the dispositional factor, need for cognition (NFC), on consumer perceptions of product placement.

A web-based experiment with a 2 (low versus high prominence) x2 (low versus high brand awareness) x2 (with versus without prior disclosure) between-subjects full factorial design was conducted.

The results indicate that prominent placements were found to elicit more extensive processing, which was negatively correlated with brand attitudes. A significant negative relationship between NFC and purchase intention towards a placed brand was also revealed.

The study offers managerial and policy implications for practitioners and educators. It is suggested that brand practitioners should avoid placing brands too prominently or in film genres which are cognitively demanding. The low NFC group appears to be more vulnerable to covert marketing. Therefore it is suggested that media educators target this group and plan effective media literacy programs to guard youngsters from surreptitious selling.

This is the first study to empirically examine the role of prominence, brand awareness and prior disclosure in the processing of product placement information and their influence on product placement effectiveness.