The aesthetic effect of products on purchase intention and purchase commitment at the point of sale with the mediating role of emotional attachment and the moderating role of consumer goals

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Professor, Faculty of Management and Economics, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran

2 Graduate student in Business Management, Department of Business Management, Persian Gulf University, Bushehr, Iran

3 Graduate student in Business Management, Department of Business Management, Faculty of Farabi, Tehran University, Qom, Iran

Abstract

Introduction: Nowadays, the manufacturing and supply of beautiful products is an important factor which can attract customers and motivate their purchase intention through point of sale (POS) marketing. Thus, there is a challenge for manufacturers and stores to attract customers. According to research in this field, the level of customers' trust and the perceived risk that they have when buying from manufacturers and stores has a significant impact on the relationship between their mental image and their purchase intention. Consumers have the ability to develop strong emotional attachments as well as deep relationships with brands to meet their functional, materialistic and emotional needs, which occurs through features such as designing a beautiful product. Great coordination between beautifully designed products and consumer tastes increases the ability of products to convey this special value to brands. Products with a high aesthetic value create a sense of emotional belonging among customers and consumers. In other words, there is a close relationship between the aesthetic features of a product and the emotional responses of consumers. In general, choosing a product with a high aesthetic value, a suitable design and a nice color as well as good performance lead to a sense of excitement and satisfaction among customers. The present study was carried out with the aim of increasing knowledge in the field of consumer behavior, especially to stimulate and induce responses in buyers with beautiful products at the point of sale. The study also seeks to investigate the aesthetic effect of products on purchase intention at the point of sale with the mediating role of emotional attachment and the moderating role of consumer goals. 
Methodology: This is a cross-sectional descriptive-survey study. The statistical population of the research included the customers of Iranian and foreign home appliances in Tehran. In total, 400 customers were selected by a random sampling method. The data collection tool was a standard questionnaire and the Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) technique. The Partial Least Squares approach (Smart PLS) was employed to test the hypotheses and the conceptual model.
Results and Discussion: The research findings reveal that aesthetic products have significant effects on purchase intention as well as purchase commitment. The indirect effect of these products is through the mediating variable of emotional attachment is significant. Purchase commitment has a significant effect on purchase intention. Functional goals positively and significantly affect the relationship between emotional attachment and purchase intention; however, the relationship between emotional attachment and purchase commitment is not significant. Moreover, materialistic goals positively and significantly affect the relationship between emotional attachment and purchase commitment, but they are not significant in the relationship between emotional attachment and purchase intention. The results of the Mann-Whitney U test suggest that the mean ratings of foreign products are higher than those of domestic products and that foreign brands are in a better position than the Iranian brands.
Conclusion: According to the results of this study, people who experience higher emotional responses with beautiful products tend to maintain a relationship with those brands and return to buy them again. It can be concluded that the attention of household appliance manufacturers to the beauty of products has a significant effect on the sensory evaluation of customers and encourages them to buy those brands. Also, satisfaction with the purchased product can lead to repurchase or purchase commitment. According to the findings of this study, consumers who purchase foreign brands have more emotional attachment than those who buy domestic brands. The purchase commitment and purchase intention among the consumers of foreign household appliance brands are higher than in those who buy domestic appliance brands. Therefore, household appliance manufacturers and sellers should consider sensory evaluation in product design and color selection, persuade customers to buy using point-of-sale marketing and make them experience an exciting purchase that satisfies them. The products designed based on aesthetic principles are able to create positive feelings or instinctive reactions that motivate consumers to buy, so appliance manufacturers should consider aesthetics for their products. There is a close relationship between the aesthetic characteristics of a product and the emotional responses of consumers, and scientific evidence shows how the aesthetic characteristics of a product stimulate and create an emotional response. According to the results of this study, aesthetic products stimulate the emotions of consumers; a product with higher aesthetics is more likely to have a significant impact on consumers' positive emotions. Aesthetic values, as a mediator, play an important role to stimulate emotions. Furthermore, the results suggest that designing a product with high aesthetics stimulates consumers' emotions, which can lead to consumer purchase intention (CPI). Also, consumers believe that the purpose of their purchase is their favorite quality and features. They believe that beautiful and efficient products have a significant impact on achieving their purposes. They stated that they purchase household appliances to meet their functional and materialistic needs. Given that those products are classified as durable ones, most consumers believe that their purpose is to have good function of the products. Manufacturing companies can pay more attention to this issue.

Keywords


Allen, M. W., & Ng, S. H. (1999). The direct and indirect influences of human values on product ownership. Journal of Economic Psychology, 20(1), 5-39.
Anastasiadou, E., Lindh, C., & Vasse, T. (2019). Are consumers international? A study of CSR, cross-border shopping, commitment and purchase intent among online consumers. Journal of Global Marketing, 32(4), 239-254.
Arian, M., Mansoori Moayed, F., & Kord naeej, A. (2018). Brand Satisfaction and Repurchase Intention: Explaining the role of lifestyle and hedonic values. Organizational Resource Management Research, 8 (1), 1-21. [In Persian].
Bachleda, C., Fakhar, A., & Hlimi, L. (2012). Sunscreen purchase intention amongst young Moroccan adults. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 2(5), 132.
Berry, L. L. (1995). Relationship marketing of services-growing interest, emerging perspectives. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 23(4), 236-245.
Bhattacharya, C. B., & Sen, S. (2003). Consumer-company identification: A framework for understanding consumers’ relationships with companies. Journal of Marketing, 67(2), 76-88.
Bigoin-Gagnan, A., & Lacoste-Badie, S. (2018). Symmetry influences packaging aesthetic evaluation and purchase intention. International Journal of Retail & Distribution Management. Vol. 46 No. 11/12, pp. 1026-1040.
Biswas, D., Labrecque, L. I., Lehmann, D. R., & Markos, E. (2014). Making choices while smelling, tasting, and listening: the role of sensory (Dis) similarity when sequentially sampling products. Journal of Marketing, 78(1), 112-126.
Bloch, P. H., Brunel, F. F., & Arnold, T. J. (2003). Individual differences in the centrality of visual product aesthetics: Concept and measurement. Journal of Consumer Research, 29(4), 551-565.
Boztepe, S. (2007). Toward a framework of product development for global markets: A user-value-based approach. Design Studies 28 (5): 513–33.
Boztepe, S. (2007). User value: Competing theories and models. International Journal of Design, 1(2): 55–63.
Brakus, J. J., Schmitt, B. H., & Zarantonello, L. (2009). Brand experience: What is it? How is it measured? Does it affect loyalty? Journal of Marketing, 73(3), 52–68.
Cakici, A. C., & Tekeli, S. (2020). Consumers’ perceptions of visual product aesthetics based on fashion innovativeness and fashion leadership levels: A research study in Mersin. Journal of Global Business Insights, 5(1), 73-86.
Candi, M., Jae, H., Makarem, S., & Mohan, M. (2017). Consumer responses to functional, aesthetic and symbolic product design in online reviews. Journal of Business Research, 81, 31-39.
Chen, Y., Lu, Y., Wang, B., & Pan, Z. (2019). How do product recommendations affect impulse buying? An empirical study on WeChat social commerce. Information & Management, 56(2), 236-248.
Chitturi, R., Raghunathan, R., & Mahajan, V. (2007). Form versus function: How the intensities of specific emotions evoked in functional versus hedonic trade-offs mediate product preferences. Journal of marketing research, 44(4), 702-714.
Crolic, C., Zheng, Y., Hoegg, J., & Alba, J. W. (2019). The influence of product aesthetics on consumer inference making. Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, 4(4), 398-408.
Enrique Bigné, J., Mattila, A. S., & Andreu, L. (2008). The impact of experiential consumption cognitions and emotions on behavioral intentions. Journal of Services Marketing, 22, 303–315.
Hashemzadeh, G., & Bahrami, M. R. (2015). The effect of customer feeling on product features with Kansei engineering approach. Journal of Tomorrow Management, 15 (47), 51-64. [In Persian].
Hoegg, J., & Alba, J. W. (2011). Seeing is believing (too much): The influence of product form on perceptions of functional performance. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 28(3), 346-359.
Horstmann, F. (2017). Measuring the shopper's attitude toward the point-of-sale display: Scale development and validation. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 36, 112-123.
Hosseini, S. F., Khalili, F., & Lotfi, R. (2018). The effect of electronic word-of-mouth communication (eWOM) on repurchase intention with the mediating role of electronic commitment and trust (Case study of Samsung mobile phone in Tehran). Journal of Management and Accounting Studies, 4 (1), 136-250. [In Persian].
Huang, J., Sun, Y., & Wan, X. (2020). Gender Differences in the Associations Between Gray Matter Volume and the Centrality of Visual Product Aesthetics. Neuroscience, 431, 64-72.
Karkoodi, M., Poormusa, S., & Taj Dini, A. (2016). Investigating the factors affecting the commitment and behavior of buyers in the Cardboard Box and Container Manufacturing industry. Journal of Wood and Forest Science and Technology Research, 23 (4), 233-254. [In Persian].
Keeney, R.L., Raiffa, H., (1993). Decisions with Multiple Objectives: Preferences and Value Trade-offs. Cambridge University Press.
Klini Mamqani, N., & Morshedzadeh, E. (2010). User evaluation and product performance with interaction design approach, Journal of Fine Arts - Visual Arts, (41), 95-104. [In Persian].
Kotler, P., & Keller, K. L. (2017). Marketing Management, translated by Mehdi Amir Jafari, Tehran, NAS Publications, third edition, fourteenth edition. [In Persian].
Kumar, M., Townsend, J. D., & Vorhies, D. W. (2015). Enhancing consumers' affection for a brand using product design. Journal of Product Innovation Management, 32(5), 716-730.
Laran, J., Janiszewski, C., & Salerno, A. (2016). Exploring the differences between conscious and unconscious goal pursuit. Journal of Marketing Research, 53(3), 442-458.
Lewicka, M. (2011). Place attachment: How far have we come in the last 40 years? Journal of Environmental Psychology, 31(3), 207-230.
Liberman, A., & Chaiken, S. (1991). Value conflict and thought-induced attitude change. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 27(3), 203-216.
Lin, G. T., & Sun, C. C. (2009). Factors influencing satisfaction and loyalty in online shopping: an integrated model. Online Information Review, 33(3), 458–475.
Mahmoudi, M. (2012). Social-psychological effects and product characteristics on the consumer shopping behavior during leisure. Business Management Perspective, (10), 117-136. [In Persian].
Marzocchi, G., Morandin, G., & Bergami, M. (2013). Marzocchi, G., Morandin, G., & Bergami, M. (2013). Brand communities: loyal to the community or the brand? European Journal of Marketing., 47, 93–114.
Mousavi, S. N. (2016). Explaining the mediating role of product performance in the impact of brand vision and positioning on brand equity. Journal of Business Management, 8 (1), 229-243. [In Persian].
Nagel, C., & Schumann, J. H. (2020). Post adoption buffering effects of innovative product aesthetics. Creativity and Innovation Management, 29, 128-139
Noble, C. H., & Kumar, M. (2008). Using product design strategically to create deeper consumer connections. Business Horizons, 51(5), 441-450.
Osuna Ramírez, S. A., Veloutsou, C., & Morgan-Thomas, A. (2017). A systematic literature review of brand commitment: Definitions, perspectives and dimensions. Athens journal of business and economics, 3(3), 305-332.
Pandit, A., & Vilches-Montero, S. (2016). Are reward cards just a business deal? The role of calculative versus emotional card commitment in driving store loyalty. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 31, 355-360.
Raab, G., Goddard, G.J., Ajami, A.A., Unger, A. (2017). The psychology of marketing: cross-cultural perspectives. Gower Publishing, New York.
Reimann, M., Zaichkowsky, J., Neuhaus, C., Bender, T., & Weber, B. (2010). Aesthetic package design: A behavioral, neural, and psychological investigation. Journal of Consumer Psychology, 20(4), 431-441.
Richins, M. L. (2013). When wanting is better than having: Materialism, transformation expectations, and product-evoked emotions in the purchase process. Journal of Consumer Research, 40(1), 1-18.
Roberts, K., Varki, S., & Brodie, R. (2003). Measuring the quality of relationships in consumer services: an empirical study. European Journal of marketing.
Shrum, L. J., Wong, N., Arif, F., Chugani, S. K., Gunz, A., Lowrey, T. M., & Sundie, J. (2013). Reconceptualizing materialism as identity goal pursuits: Functions, processes, and consequences. Journal of Business Research, 66(8), 1179-1185
Soleimani, B., & Halimi, M. H. (2011). Aesthetic approaches as product design and development. Monthly Scientific Journal of Bagh- E. Nazar, 8 (16), 79-92. [In Persian].
Stilley, K. M., Inman, J. J., & Wakefield, K. L. (2010). Spending on the fly: mental budgets, promotions, and spending behavior. Journal of Marketing, 74(3), 34-47
Strack, F., & Deutsch, R. (2004). Reflective and impulsive determinants of social behavior. Personality and social psychology review, 8(3), 220-247
Thomson, M., MacInnis, D. J., & Park, C. W. (2005). The ties that bind: Measuring the strength of consumers’ emotional attachments to brands. Journal of consumer psychology, 15(1), 77-91.
Tyan-Yu, W., Chueh-Yung, T., & Cian-Yu, S. (2017). Unity enhances product aesthetics and emotion. International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 59, 92-99.
Vilches-Montero, S., Hashim, N. M. H. N., Pandit, A., & Bravo-Olavarria, R. (2018). Using the senses to evaluate aesthetic products at the point of sale: The moderating role of consumers’ goals. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 40, 82-90.
Watson, J. J. (2003). The relationship of materialism to spending tendencies, saving, and debt. Journal of Economic Psychology, 24(6), 723-739.
Zeithaml, V. A. (1988). Consumer perceptions of price, quality, and value: A means-end model and synthesis of evidence. Journal of Marketing 52 (July): 2–22.