Friday Research: East or West - Consumer's Distinct Quest!

When Will You Use This?  

Planning and developing your branding and advertising strategy.

What’s The Red-Letter Bite Today? 

Spending huge amount of time in UK and Europe (West) and India (East), I couldn’t help but notice the difference between consumers preferences, consumption expectations and brand experiences. Time ago it has been observed that how consumers feel about an unhappy consumption experience depends on who makes the choice and, more significantly, in which cultural context the choice occurs. Actually there are important differences in how Easterners and Westerners view themselves.

Previous studies shown that Westerners tend to expect individuals to act to promote their own interest (coming from beliefs that individuals are self-reliant, self-centered people with autonomy over their own behaviour). On the other hand, in Eastern cultures, people expect groups to act to promtoe the interest of the group (coming from beliefs and values that places greater expectations on working towards the well-being of a group).

Current research* found that Westerners are more likely to switch brands when the unsatisfactory consumption experience is a consequence of their inaction relative to the inaction of a group to which they belong. In contrast, Easterners are more likely to switch brands when the unsatisfactory consumption experience is a consequence of inaction on the part of the group to which they belong relative to their own inaction.

Unhappy Eating Experience: Who will actually change the restaurant?

Addition To Your Bag of Tricks    

This study suggests a few ways how a company might benefit from this study in the areas of brand management and advertising. As authors say, “in bicultural settings (such as Singapore and India), firms would do well to consider the possibility that subtle message frames might yield brand loyalty or switching. Given the behavioral consequences of felt regret, an induction of regret can activate a change in the mode of behavior, such as brand-switching. For instance, a firm might be able to limit consumer switching following an unhappy experience, by emphasizing individual action or group inaction (in a Western setting) or by emphasizing individual inaction or group action (in an Eastern setting) in their persuasive communications, since such an emphasis is likely to elicit relatively less regret. By the same token, when consumers have an unhappy experience with a competing brand, a firm may be able to induce consumer switching by emphasizing individual inaction or group action (in a Western setting) or by emphasizing individual action or group inaction (in an Eastern setting) in their persuasive communications, since such an emphasis is likely to elicit relatively greater regret. Therefore, by appropriately accounting for elements that likely affect consumer regret and brand-switching, firms might enhance or limit brand-switching following an unsatisfactory consumption experience, an issue of considerable interest to firms addressing culturally diverse markets, both domestically and internationally..”.

  

*Sharon Ng, a, Hakkyun Kim, b, Akshay R. Rao,c,"Sins of Omission versus Commission: Cross-Cultural Differences in Brand-Switching Due to Dissatisfaction Induced by Individual versus Group Action and Inaction" Journal of Consumer Research, Upcoming 2014 {Thanks for the material}

P.S. When you’re done reading, I’d love for you to share your experience with cross-cultural marketing? Leave a comment or Tweet me, let's chat!

P.P.S. Need some help on crafting your marketing message? Let's do this together.