week 6 - social influence + persuasion

Question 1

define a group

Answer 1

two or more people who interact to accomplish indivdual or mutural goals

Question 2

define reference groups

Answer 2

any person or group that serves as a point of comparision for indivdual in forming values, attitudes or behaviours

Question 3

marketing created reference groups may include (think assignment 2)

Answer 3

Experts
‒ Celebrity endorsers
‒ Trade characters
‒ Common person appeals
‒ Third‐party accreditation

Question 4

explain mrg’s tarade characters

Answer 4

Trade characters are quasi‐celebrity endorsers
• Present an idealised and exclusive image that is under the complete control
of the company
• Provide product‐related information and, in some instances (example:
Ronald McDonald), a personality for the product

Question 5

explain mrg’s common person appeals

Answer 5

Focus on ordinary people in everyday situations who are using or endorsing
a particular product
‒ Perceived by consumers as being similar (i.e., non‐aspirational)
‒ Can ‘model’ desired patterns of behaviour

e.g. washing ads

Question 6

explain thrid party accreditation

Answer 6

Third parties (example: National Heart Foundation) can, for a fee, accredit
that a product/service meets certain minimum standards
• Provides consumers with some assurance that a claim being made by a
brand has been externally verified

Question 7

explain message framing

Answer 7

How you frame messages (focusing on losses vs. gains) can influence how
consumers respond to those messages

• Consumer responses to message framing will depend on whether the
behavioural outcomes being communicated are desirable (example: healthy

heart) or undesirable (example: heart disease)

Option 1: If you don’t eat 2 serves of fruit and 5 serves of vegetables each day,
your risk of getting colon cancer will increase

Option 2: If you eat 2 serves of fruit and 5 serves of vegetables each day, your
risk of getting colon cancer will decrease

Question 8

explain two sided messaging

Answer 8

Message sidedness relates to the types of arguments featured in a message
‒ One‐sided messages highlight arguments ‘for’ the brand
‒ Two‐sided messages highlight arguments both ‘for’ and ‘against’ the
brand
• Like a vaccination, two‐sided messages inoculate consumers against future
persuasion attempts by competing brands; they provide consumers with
counter‐arguments against potential arguments made by competitors

Question 9

explain types of emotional appeals that can be used in messaging

Answer 9

Marketers can develop communications that appeal to a wide range of
emotions, including love, ambition, nostalgia, respect, status…
• We will look at three of the more common emotional appeals used by
marketers:
‒ Humour
‒ Fear
‒ Sex

Question 10

explain the emotional appeal of - fear

threat component

response component

Answer 10

Fear (emotion) arises from perceptions of threat (cognition)
• Fear appeals should include a threat component (to elicit fear) and a response component (to demonstrate how to reduce the threat)

‒ Threat component
o Severity: is the threat serious?
o Susceptibility: could the threat happen to me?

‒ Response component
o Response efficacy: does the suggested response work?
o Self‐efficacy: can I perform the suggested response?
o Barriers to self‐efficacy: what stops me doing the response?

Question 11

explain order effects

Answer 11

e.g. which ad was first, which was last

Placement within a commercial break matters:

‒ Ads placed first in a commercial break are recalled best

‒ Ads placed in the middle of a commercial break are recalled least

‒ Ads placed last in a commercial break are recalled slightly better than
those in the middle

• Note: recall can be improved by showing a second, shorter version of the ad
at the end of a commercial break