Australasian Marketing Journal

Success in social marketing is rarely clear cut and even more rarely believed to have been achieved. Social marketing practitioners are under increasing scrutiny to benchmark efficiencies of social change programs to achieve ‘success’ outcomes. Using road safety as a case study, this paper addresses the complex nature of success within a social marketing context. First, we discuss the conundrum facing road safety in articulating ‘success’ when at policy level success is quantified objectively, yet at a community level perceptions of system failure are equated with individual death. Methodologically we apply comparative empirical approaches to examine perceptual versus objective road safety outcomes. The paper concludes with a discussion and proposal of alternate strategies for measuring programmatic success, and raise issues concerning the longevity of developing competitive and sustainable benchmarks.

This paper examines consumer evaluations of cooperative branding alliances (co branding) in a consumer marketing context. These co branding alliances are described as the pairing of two or more brands to form a separate and unique product, with their success being reliant on producing positive consumer evaluations. Data was gathered from 194 respondents with qualitative and quantitative findings showing that in order to achieve positive consumer evaluations of co branded offerings, brand partners independently require positive parent brand attitudes as a precondition. Furthermore, high levels of perceived parent brand fit is also a requisite for creating favourable co brand evaluations, albeit the moderating influence of ‘parent brand fit’ on how consumers evaluate co brands received mixed results.

Using a survey of 349 respondents, we investigate the triggers of word of mouth (WOM) in four durable categories and compare this evidence with previous findings for services. For these durables, positive word of mouth (PWOM) is mostly triggered by advertising and customer satisfaction with the product, while negative word of mouth (NWOM) is rare and mostly triggered by the content of conversation and the perception that other persons need advice. This contrasts with previously established findings for services where advertising has little effect on PWOM and dissatisfaction has substantial effect on NWOM. These differences have important implications: they suggest that durable ads should be tested to check that they trigger PWOM and that service providers should pay more attention to the satisfaction derived from the service experience.

At the end of the last century, Sharp and Wright (1999) documented the emergence of a school of marketing enquiry labelled as the Empirical Generalisationists. With this special edition on Empirically-Based Marketing Knowledge, we take the opportunity to update that original article, giving an overview on the health of the Empirical Generalisations research tradition. We put forward a call to action for more researchers to take up the challenge to develop scientific laws in marketing, and promote a culture of evidence-based theory and managerial decision making.

This study aims to investigate the external input of influencers and the internal input of commitment in online relationships as antecedents for purchase intent with consideration of the mediating role of brand image. Data were gathered from a survey of 730 international online consumers, and results were analyzed using LISREL. The result shows the importance of the brand image for the purchase intent in online relationships, and also finds that the brand mediates an effect from influencers and commitment on purchase intent. Companies working to strengthen their relationships concerning their brand can learn that it is meaningful to also work with relationship commitment (to encourage customers to be part of a continuous relationship) and to find influencers appropriate to showcase the product. Also, even if strong relationships build brands, carefulness concerning the brands offered in the online store is strategically important. This study adds to the literature by extending research on brand importance in online relationships, specifically by adding the concepts of commitment and influencers’ influence into the model. The latter expands knowledge of how complex the online environment is in terms of factors to consider for online marketers.

Leading Edge Users have been attracting increasing attention in the study of innovation. Their effect is hypothesised to be threefold: in the development of new product concepts; their role in early adoption and thus cash flows for the firm; and acting as a catalyst for the diffusion process. Urban and von Hippel (1988) demonstrate the first, Morrison, Roberts and Midgley (1998) test the second. In this paper we examine the degree of opinion leadership that Leading Edge Users (LEUs) have so we can estimate their potential to do the third.

This paper shows that Leading Edge Status (LES) is related to opinion leadership as long as the organisation is well connected to the network. We found strong evidence that organisations with high LES were more likely to play a bridging role with organisations outside the industry than were Innovators (measured by Rogers’ time of adoption). This implies that LEUs are extremely useful in bringing information about technology into the industry from outside. When this is added to the Opinion Leadership role of LEUs, it is seen that they can play a positive role in speeding up the diffusion process.

Managers cannot afford to ignore social media and have stepped up their involvement in the belief that social media activities extend the brand's reach and engagement with consumers. Facebook is the preeminent social medium with an ever increasing branded content. One hundred brands selected from the Interbrand “Best Global Brand Report” form the basis of this study to test research propositions about the ability of branded Facebook pages to expand and engage users. Data captured from branded Facebook pages was supplemented with socialbaker's data. No correlation is found between the size of a brand and the number of Facebook fans, and there is no consistent relationship with user engagement and brand size.

The authors discuss broadening reach, improving engagement, interaction and activity and the implications for social media strategies and make recommendations for managing Facebook presence. Paid advertising is required to increase brand reach to all potential category users.