About AMA

Executive Summary
Brand extensions represent a strategic tool for marketing managers to capitalize on a brand’s equity. Some extensions are inexplicably more successful than others, and not surprisingly, the extent to which a given brand transfers successfully into various other categories has generated high levels of managerial and academic interest. Although much is known about how brand, product, category, and firm differences affect brand extensions, considerably less is known about the effect of consumer-level differences on brand extension success. In this research, the authors examine the impact of a significant consumer-based difference—“implicit theory” of the self—on perceptions of a brand extension’s fit. Research in psychology supports the notion that people possess implicit theories about the malleability of their own personality traits and that these implicit theories affect inferences made when judging the traits of others. As such, people are presumed to adopt one of two theories: Either traits are dispositional, fixed entities that cannot change (entity theory), or traits are situational, dynamic, and able to change with time and effort (incremental theory). If implicit theories determine whether people’s personality traits are considered fixed or malleable, it is expected that they do the same with regard to the personality traits of a brand. The authors hypothesize that entity theorists, who view personality as fixed, will be less accepting of a brand’s attempts to extend into a new, dissimilar category than incremental theorists, who view traits as more flexible. The results from three experiments offer validation for this central assertion and offer valuable insights into how managers can better understand consumers’ evaluation of brand extensions and the role brand personality and implicit theories play in that process.

The authors demonstrate that consumers’ implicit theory orientation affects the evaluation of brand extensions in many ways. It affects brand extension acceptability (Study 1), personality trait congruence (Studies 2 and 3), and judgments of fit (Studies 2 and 3). Furthermore, implicit theory orientation may be dispositional, but it can be situationally primed (Studies 1 and 3) and thus used by marketers in persuasive communication to influence consumers’ perceptions and increase brand extension success (Study 3).

For practitioners, this research provides a new approach to the problem of perceived fit for brand extensions. Rather than view fit as a constant, the expanded conceptualization offered in this research aids managers in changing the mind-set of the consumer to make the same brand extension message more effective. When managers cannot modify an extension’s positioning, product characteristics, or brand personality, they can still increase acceptance of a brand extension by influencing or activating different implicit theory orientations. In addition, the firm does not need to focus consumers specifically on the brand traits they want accepted; communicating the malleability of the parent brand as a whole or even priming consumers’ implicit theories regarding their individual traits will suffice. To this end, the power and flexibility associated with priming implicit theories has important real-world implications for brand managers in affecting brand extension success.

Biography
Eric A. Yorkston is Associate Professor of Marketing in the Neeley School of Business at Texas Christian University. He has published in Journal of Consumer Research and Journal of Retailing, among other journals, and has served on the editorial review boards of Journal of Consumer Research and Journal of Consumer Psychology. He received his PhD in Marketing from New York University’s Stern School of Business and his MBA from Rutgers University. He has consulted for and worked with numerous companies, including Rahr Brewing Company, bioTRAiTS, the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial, and DDB Chicago. His current research interests include the psycholinguistics of branding, sequential product evaluations, consumer recommendation systems, and intentional priming.

Joseph C. Nunes is Associate Professor of Marketing at the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business. He has published in Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, Marketing Science, and Harvard Business Review. He is currently a member of the editorial review boards of Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research Marketing, Science, and Journal of Consumer Psychology. Professor Nunes was selected as one of the future leaders of the next generation of marketing academics by the Marketing Science Institute Young Scholars Program and is a recipient of the Dean’s Award for Excellence in Research from the Marshall School of Business. He has served as an independent consultant to numerous companies, including Southwest Airlines, Nestlè, BBDO Advertising, and Peapod. His current research interests include loyalty programs, luxury goods, pricing, product assortment, and other areas of consumer decision making.

Shashi Matta is Assistant Professor of Marketing in the Fisher College of Business at Ohio State University, where he has taught in the undergraduate, MBA, executive MBA, and executive education programs. He received his PhD in Business Administration with a concentration in Marketing from the University of Southern California, an MBA from XLRI Jamshedpur (India), and a bachelor’s degree in Engineering from Osmania University (India). His industry experience includes senior positions in marketing management, brand and product management, and advertising. His research has been published in Journal of Consumer Research and Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, among other outlets. His research interests include consumers’ expectations and judgments of service firms, stereotyping, and branding strategies.

Member Comments (0):

To rate or comment on articles, you must be a logged in AMA member. Click here to join