Ripple Effect / Forschungsgruppe Konsum und Verhalten (PDF)

– voting about ads – already leads to the hypothesised word of mouth effects.

On the following pages, we will describe the experiment design, the sample selection, and the results. Once the appropriateness of our direction was confirmed, we moved on to the second stage, based on a more complex conceptualisation, including a measurement of EmI, its antecedents and consequences. This more elaborate test was organised in co-operation with a German word-of-mouth marketing panel, and conducted within a campaign that introduced a new corporate blog.

The second part of this chapter is dedicated to detailing all aspects of this test. It describes the considerations that led to the experiment design, explains the steps taken for the measurement of the different constructs (with a particular focus on the differentiation between formative and reflective specifications), and, finally, presents and discusses the results obtained. 6.2 First Preliminary Research 6.2.1 Introduction In 2006, we conducted an early quasi-experiment with chewing gum maker Wrigley.

The primary objective was to assess whether or not an approach designed to stimulate the four factors thought to contribute to an experience of empowerment, would indeed stimulate word of mouth activity. Chewing gum was found to be suitable for a number of reasons. We follow Zaichkowsky (1985, p. 346), who, based on a literature review, suggested that low-involvement products are characterised by a lack of information-seeking about brands, little comparison between product attributes, perception of similarity among different brands, and no special preference for a particular brand.

In light of this definition, we consider chewing gum to be a low-involvement product category. (Also, in one of Zaichkowsky’s empirical analyses, instant coffee was shown to be a low-involvement product category, as was yoghurt, in Laurent & Kapferer [1985]. We assume that chewing gum, in terms of the level of involvement that consumers experience with it as a product category, can be considered to be similar to these two product categories.)