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The purpose of this paper is to advance the understanding of sound branding by developing a new conceptual framework and providing an overview of the research literature on non-musical sound.

Using four mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive types of non-musical sound, the paper assesses and synthesizes 99 significant studies across various scholarly fields.

The overview reveals two areas in which more research may be warranted, that is, non-musical atmospherics and non-musical sonic logos. Moreover, future sound-branding research should examine in further detail the potentials of developed versus annexed object sounds, and mediated versus unmediated brand sounds.

The paper provides important insights into critical issues that suggest directions for further research on non-musical sound branding.

The paper identifies an unexploited terrain of possibilities for the use of sound in marketing and branding.

The paper identifies a subfield within sound-branding research that has received little attention despite its inevitability and potential significance.

The purpose of this study is to determine how sonic logo’s acoustic features (intensity, pitch and pace) based on melodic tunes with no voice orient the response of consumers, attract attention, elicit levels of pleasantness and calmness and transmit brand personality traits.

A within-subject experimental factorial design is applied to measure emotional arousal (indexed as electrodermal activity) and enhancement on perceptual processing (indexed as heart rate), as well as self-reported factors, namely, calmness/excitement, pleasantness and brand personality scales.

Results show a significant increase on electrodermal activity associated with fast-paced sonic logos and a decrease in heart rate in slow-paced long sonic logos. Also, fade-up, pitch-ascending fast sonic logos are defined as more exciting and descending-pitch sonic logos as more pleasant.

The use of sonic logos with no voice does limit its implications. Besides, the use of three variables simultaneously with 18 versions of sonic logos in a laboratory setting may have driven participants to fatigue; hence, findings should be cautiously applied.

First, sonic logos are best processed in a fade-up form. Second, fast pace is recommended to orient response, whereas slow pace is recommended to transmit calmness. Practitioners may opt for fast-paced sonic logos if the design is new or played in a noisy environment and opt for slow-paced sonic logos in already highly recognized sound designs.

To the best of authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to combine psychophysiological measures and self-reported scales in a laboratory experiment on how sonic logo’s acoustic features orient response, transmit emotions and personality traits.

Product trials are an effective way to influence consumer attitudes. While research has established several factors that influence whether consumers will try a product or not, it is less understood how marketers can optimize the trial experience itself. The purpose of this paper is to explore flow as an optimal state and the factors that give rise to it during a product trail.

This research consists of three experimental studies in which people trial new music. This paper explores the ability of curiosity to optimize consumers’ flow experience during the trial and their attitudes toward the trialed product. This paper manipulates curiosity before the trial using information about the music (Study 1) and music previews (Study 3) and also demonstrates that curiosity is naturally elevated among those high in openness to experience (Study 2).

The results demonstrate that curiosity before a product trial fosters an optimal experience during the trial in the form of flow states, defined as an enjoyable state of full engagement, which in turn mediates more positive attitudes toward the trialed product. This paper demonstrates that curiosity can be evoked using product information or a preview of the content and can vary based on individual differences in openness to experience. The relationship between curiosity and flow is moderated by the valence of the information that is used to elicit curiosity, such that negative-valence information thwarts the relationship.

While the studies conducted by the authors focus on the positive influence of curiosity in the trial of music, the effects may be different for other products. These studies are also limited to two different manipulations of curiosity.

This research has implications for marketers, as it demonstrates the relevance of flow and how to enable it in product trials to optimize effectiveness. The manipulations also demonstrate how to manage the amount of information that is given to consumers before they trial a product.

This research reveals that flow states optimize the product trial experience. This research also advances the understanding of the relationship between curiosity and flow by moderating their relationship with the valence of information that elicits curiosity. The findings also broaden the relevance of curiosity and flow in marketing by demonstrating their benefits within product trials.

The aim of this study is to determine which of previously used survey measures can be considered the most appropriate to assess children’s advertising exposure. First, three levels of content specificity for assessing children’s exposure to advertising were distinguished as follows: exposure to the medium, exposure to broad content and exposure to specific (i.e. commercial) content. Second, using longitudinal data from 165 children between 8 and 11 years old, the test-retest reliability and content validity of survey measures from all three levels were examined.

Due to societal concerns about the effects of advertising on children’s well-being, research into this topic is expanding. To enhance knowledge accumulation and bring uniformity to the field, a validated standard survey measure of advertising exposure is needed. The aim of this study is to provide such measures for television and internet advertising.

The findings suggest that all measures provided solid estimates for children’s television and internet advertising exposure. Yet, due to minor differences in reliability and validity, it may be concluded that television advertising exposure can best be measured by asking children how often they watch certain popular (commercial) television networks, either weighting or not weighting for advertising density. Internet advertising exposure can best be measured by asking children how often they use the internet or how often they visit certain popular websites, weighting for advertising density.

The current measures for children’s advertising exposure through traditional media can easily be adapted to fit new media.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of behavioural attitudes towards the most popular social medium in the world, Facebook, amongst Millennials in South Africa (SA), and to determine whether various usage and demographic variables have an impact on intention-to-purchase and purchase perceptions.

Quantitative research was conducted by means of a survey among a sample of over 3,500 respondents via self-administered structured questionnaires in SA. A generalised linear model was used to analyse the data.

The results confirm that advertising on Facebook has a positive influence on the behavioural attitudes (intention-to-purchase and purchase) of Millennials who reside in SA. The usage characteristics, log on duration and profile update incidence, as well as the demographic influence of ethnic orientation also resulted in more favourable perceptions of Facebook advertising.

Research on Facebook advertising was only conducted in SA, whereas other emerging countries warrant further investigation to establish if they share the slight positive sentiment towards intention-to-purchase and purchase. This inquiry only provides a “snap shot” of behavioural attitudes, usage and demographic factors towards social media advertising, whereas future research could consider the development of cognitive, affective and behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising by employing longitudinal and qualitative research designs.

Organisations and managers should consider that their existing Facebook advertising strategies may only have a limited effect on intention-to-purchase and purchase in SA. However, certain usage characteristics, namely the more time spent logged on to Facebook and the greater frequency of profile update incidence, as well as the demographic variable, namely black and coloured Millennials, resulted in more favourable behavioural attitudes towards Facebook advertising. Hence, organisations and managers should be prepared to alter or adapt their Facebook advertising tactics accordingly when targeting the notoriously fickle Millennials.

This investigation found that Facebook advertising has a nominal positive influence on behavioural attitudes among Millennials, which is in congruence with the communications of the effect pyramid model that was established through traditional advertising research. This paper also makes a noteworthy contribution to attitudinal research in emerging countries where there is a dearth of research in social media advertising.

This paper aims to analyse the prevalence of emotional and rational appeals in social advertising campaigns. There are studies about the effectiveness of these tones of appeals in social marketing, but there is no evidence about their prevalent use in social advertisements.

The authors conducted a content analysis of forty social advertisements promoting attitudes and behaviours regarding social causes. The selected ads were in video format and were extracted from the YouTube channels of Portuguese governmental and non-governmental organisations. The ads were coded according to the characteristics of each tone of appeals and classified as emotional, rational or a mix of both.

The authors classified 25 social ads as rational appeals, 8 as emotional and 7 as a mix of both appeals. The results of the research show that social marketers have preference for the use of rational tone in social advertising campaigns.

This study shows that there is a disruption between theory and practice in social marketing, considering the higher prevalence of rational appeals in contexts where theory recommends emotional appeals for higher effectiveness. This evidence is surprising, considering a previous study that evidenced a higher use of emotional appeals in advertising connected to social causes than in commercial advertisements. This paper focus on how practice may disrupt theory and explores possible reasons for the phenomenon.

The outbreak of Covid-19 increased the average time spent on social media (SM). This led to a transformation in how companies manage their digital marketing channels and created additional pressure for business-to-business (B2B) and family businesses, which tend to focus more on personal relationships with customers and stakeholders than on the implementation of digital marketing strategies on SM. The present research examines the case study of a Facebook advertising campaign created to promote the products and business values of an Italian family firm specialising in the production and commercialisation of biostimulants for agriculture.

The research aims to combine digital marketing avenues (i.e. a Facebook advertising campaign) with established psychological and behavioural theories, such as the dual process theories, by comparing the effects of two promotional videos (emotional vs functional).

The results suggest that emotional videos generate more passive behaviours, such as views, as well as active behaviours in the form of likes, comments and shares, while functional videos induce people to search for more information about the advertised products.

This is the first study to validate the role of Facebook advertising campaigns in developing an information-based approach to B2B family firms by testing the effectiveness of a targeted campaign comparing the impact of emotional and functional cues on increasing users' engagement while optimising the circulation of video content. The study helps to reduce the academic–practice gap by investigating the example of a fruitful integration between academic research and management practice.

This paper aims to explore how music festival organisers negotiate diversity and inclusion in marketing and promotion practices through symbolic and social boundaries.

Based on semi-structured interviews with 18 festival organisers in Rotterdam and participant observation with six festival photographers I show that symbolic and social boundaries are employed in three areas: (1) boundaries in festival format (i.e. [partially] free or ticketed), (2) boundaries in distribution partners and technologies and (3) boundaries in promotional content.

Symbolic and social boundaries are intentionally used by festival organisers to build and delineate festival audiences. Implications are drawn on current understandings of the accessibility of music festival spaces, arguing that festival research should move beyond within-space dynamics to grasp the negotiation of diversity and inclusion at festivals more fully.

While music festivals are often marketed as celebratory spaces that are “welcoming to everyone”, few studies have investigated diversity and inclusion nor marketing and promotion practices at music festivals. This study shows how festival audiences are shaped through marketing and promotion practices.

The influence of technology on marketing communications is rising in both applications and value created. Artificial intelligence (AI) and, as a result, smart speakers are benefiting both brands and customers at many levels. In particular, AI opens up the possibility to establish human-like dialogs with customers and to advertise brands in a new and engaging way. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to understand why and how consumers would accept receiving advertising (ad) via AI-enabled devices such as smart speakers.

A total of 326 individuals participated in a study that explored the factors influencing ad acceptance in smart devices. A partial least squares-structural equation model technique was used to validate the results.

The findings show that customer acceptance of ads via smart assistants is influenced by smart assistant usefulness and hedonic motivations. However, privacy risk moderates the relationship between smart speaker ease of use and smart speaker usefulness.

This paper explores the main drivers of ad acceptance via smart speakers and goes beyond the existing knowledge of smart speaker acceptance to further explore how this can become an important channel for brands to communicate.

La influencia de la tecnología en las comunicaciones de marketing está aumentando tanto en las aplicaciones desarrolladas como en el valor creado. La inteligencia artificial (IA) y, en consecuencia, los altavoces inteligentes están beneficiando tanto a las marcas como a los clientes a muchos niveles. En particular, la IA abre la posibilidad de establecer diálogos similares a los humanos con los clientes y de publicitar las marcas de una manera nueva y atractiva. Por lo tanto, es necesario entender por qué y cómo los consumidores aceptarían recibir publicidad (anuncios) a través de dispositivos con IA, como los altavoces inteligentes.

Un total de 326 personas participaron en un estudio que exploró los factores que influyen en la aceptación de la publicidad en los dispositivos inteligentes. Se utilizó una técnica PLS-SEM para validar los resultados.

Los resultados muestran que la aceptación de los anuncios a través de los asistentes inteligentes por parte de los clientes está influenciada por la utilidad del asistente inteligente y las motivaciones hedónicas. Sin embargo, el riesgo para la privacidad modera la relación entre la facilidad de uso del altavoz inteligente y su utilidad.

El artículo explora los principales impulsores de la aceptación de la publicidad a través de los altavoces inteligentes y va más allá del conocimiento existente sobre la aceptación de los altavoces inteligentes para explorar más a fondo cómo esto puede convertirse en un canal importante para que las marcas se comuniquen.

科技对营销传播的影响在应用和价值创造方面都在上升。人工智能（AI）以及智能音箱在很多层面都对品牌和客户有益。尤其是, 人工智能开辟了与客户建立类似人类对话的可能性, 并以一种新颖的、有吸引力的方式宣传品牌。因此, 了解消费者为什么以及如何接受通过人工智能设备（如智能音箱）接收广告（广告）是有必要的。

本研究的326名参与者探讨了影响智能设备中广告接受度的因素。PLS-SEM技术被采用以对结果进行验证。

研究结果显示, 客户通过智能助手接受广告会受智能助手有用性和享乐动机的影响。然而, 隐私风险调节了智能音箱的易用性和智能音箱的有用性之间的关系。

本文探讨了通过智能音箱接受广告的主要驱动因素, 并超越了现有的关于智能音箱接受度的知识, 进一步探讨了这如何能成为品牌沟通的重要渠道。

This article examines the ways in which the popular music industry markets artists through integrated transmedia marketing campaigns. These campaigns unfold across multiple media and create multiple pathways for audience engagement, particularly fan engagement, across social media platforms. The purpose is to further theorise the relationship between artists, the music industry and audiences.

The study used digital ethnography to scrutinise the activities within a contemporary music transmedia marketing campaign, focusing on the release of Taylor Swift's album Reputation as an illustrative case.

The study demonstrates how strategically curated activities encompass platforms' affordances and industry events by making use of fan engagement across social media platforms and streaming services. Fans shift through platforms, as well as across digital and physical spaces, through defined marketing activities at specific times. This article proposes the concept of choreographed engagement to specifically address the ways in which the temporal and spatial aspects of social media marketing are used at the intersection of platform logic, algorithm economy and fan engagement to reach wider audiences.

By proposing the concept of choreographed engagement, the authors bridge the gap between fan practices and marketing practices, providing insight into how commodification of fan engagement is utilised spatially and temporally within the contemporary platform economy. Choreographed engagement constitutes a significant aspect of strategic communication and marketing. The term expands the vocabulary used in the debate on the commodification of artistic work, and audience engagement in the platform era.