1. Does Written Expression Affect Brand
Loyalty? Some Empirical Evidence
Gary So
BACKGROUND
• Many studies have explored the antecedents of
brand loyalty, but little study has been made
towards how to influence brand loyalty
• Krishnamurthi and Raj (1991) report positive
correlations between a brand’s reputation and the
price that consumers are willing to pay for that
brand
• Brucks et al. (2000) finds that brand name is used
as an indicator of product quality
• Friedrich (1990) postulates that writing can elicit
enduring attitude change about the written topic
• The Elaboration Likelihood Model developed by
Petty and Cacioppo (1986) suggests that contextual
cues or information can influence people’s attitudes
• Significant economic implications: increased
loyalty can lead to greater market share, reductions
in marketing cost, and greater trade leverage
OBJECTIVES
• Investigate whether writing about a brand can
affect one’s self-reported brand loyalty,
perceived quality rating, and price offers
• Examine whether there is a pronounced effect of
critique or praise when writing about a liked or
disliked brand
METHODS
• N = 74 Claremont College students
• 16 male, 54 female, 4 other
• Participants used 300 words to critique a brand,
praise a brand, or write a neutral piece, then
reported attitudes towards the brand
• Three dependent variables: brand loyalty, perceived
quality rating, and price offer
FIGURES
• Participants reported higher scores for brands they liked and
lower scores for brands they disliked across all conditions
• Contrary to expectations, writing a review had no effect on
participants’ brand attitudes
• Consistent with expectations, a three-way correlation was found
between brand loyalty, quality rating, and price offer
• Marketing implications: brands should focus on the emotional instead
of informational aspects of advertising
Limitations
• Lack of monitoring in an online survey means that participants may
have been distracted and thus disengaged in the study
• Most participants were Pitzer College students
Future Directions
• Examine a larger, more representative sample in terms of age, ethnic
and socioeconomic diversity, and/or geographic origin
• Provide the prompt in advance to let participants prepare a good
answer
• Investigate methods for brands to retain customers over the long run
DISCUSSION
REFERENCES
• Brucks, M., Zeithaml, V., & Naylor, G. (2000). Price and brand name as indicators of quality dimensions for consumer durables. Journal of the Academy of Marketing
Science, 28, 359-374. doi: 10.1177/0092070300283005
• Friedrich, J. (1990). Learning to view psychology as a science: Self-persuasion through writing. Teaching of Psychology, 17, 23-27. doi: 10.1207/s15328023top1701_5
• Krishnamurthi, L., & Raj, S. P. (1991). An empirical analysis of the relationship between brand loyalty and consumer price elasticity. Marketing Science, 10, 172-183.
doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/mksc.10.2.172
• Petty, R., & Cacioppo, J., (1986). The elaboration likelihood model of persuasion. Advances in Consumer Research, 19, 123-205.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
• I would like to thank my thesis advisors Linus Yamane, David Moore, and Alan Jones for bearing with and guiding me throughout the course of my senior thesis. I would
also like to offer special thanks to the Center of Neuroeconomic Studies at the Claremont Graduate University for gifting me with the idea to study brand loyalty. Lastly,
thank you to Pitzer College’s Research and Awards for providing the funding that made this project possible.
Written
review
Questionnaire Demographics
• SPSS was used to recode variables and compute composite (average)
scores for brand loyalty and quality rating for each participant
• Selection of a liked brand was associated with higher scores on brand
loyalty (p = .02), quality rating (p = .004), and price offer (p = .04)
compared to selection of a disliked brand
• Writing a critical or praising review did not significantly influence reported
levels of brand loyalty, quality rating, or price offer (p > .05 for each effect)
• Brand loyalty was positively correlated with each of quality rating (p < .001)
and price offer (p < .001), and quality rating was positively correlated with
price offer (p < .001)
RESULTS
Figures. Differences in estimated marginal means of
brand loyalty between review type and loyalty type.