GENDER-SPECIFIC ADVERTISING IN THE AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY: CAN IT MAKE A DIFFERENCE?

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GENDER-SPECIFIC ADVERTISING IN THE

AUTOMOTIVE INDUSTRY:

CAN IT MAKE A DIFFERENCE?

Natalie Kroezen S2587009

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Topics to be discussed

•  Introduction •  Findings in literature •  Methodology •  Results •  Discussion •  Managerial implications

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Introduction

•  Marketing effectiveness in durable goods.

•  Effectively advertising cars to potential customers, i.e. gender differences.

•  Ads make customers ‘like’ and prefer a car brand over another -> brand liking score.

•  Car characteristics influence the liking score.

•  Hedonic, utilitarian and ecological motives for preferring brand.

•  Influence of the economic situation, in the form of consumer confidence.

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•  Hedonic motives in car preferences Utilitarian motives in car preferences Ecological motives in car preferences

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Findings in literature

•  Brand liking score is explained as in what way consumers

prefer a brand to another when they hypothetically had to make a purchase of that product.

•  Brand characteristics play an important role in the liking score. Visible for potential consumer.

•  Liking scores are heterogeneous, lies in consumer’s and brand’s characteristics.

•  Consumer preferences for car types vary greatly from time to time (Baltas & Saridakis, 2013) -> economic situation.

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Findings in literature

•  Brand characteristics are used to attract and target potential customers.

•  A customer’s motivation for preferring a car brand is built on characteristics of the car -> motivations to buy.

•  Hedonic motives: enjoyment with product (design, look, style).

•  Utilitarian motives: ease and functionality (trade options, low costs).

•  Ecological motives: concerns for the environment (low CO2 emissions)

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Findings in literature

•  Consumers are heterogeneous, hence different reactions to advertisements between females and males.

•  Men are more involved in car brand choices than females.

•  Males do not look at the price as much as females do.

•  Females take more important decisions regarding money spending.

•  Overall, females tend to focus more on the look of a car and health factors in purchase decisions (hedonic & ecological). Males tend to focus more on the usability of a product

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Findings in literature

•  Consumer confidence is mostly used to forecast consumer spending's.

•  Consumer are willing to spend more when confidence is high, hence willing to buy a f.e. more expensive, green car.

•  Consumer durables are more sensitive during economic contractions and sales fall much quicker than they recover

during economic expansions (Deleersnyder, Dekimpe, Sarvary & Parker, 2004). Essential to target them the right way!

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Methodology

•  Multiple moderated time series regression models.

•  What factors (3 IV’s) influence the brand liking score of a car brand?

•  Data set had 23 characteristics for preference: three characteristics per factor were used.

•  Data set split on gender to account for moderating effect.

•  18 car brands were used.

•  Weekly data.

•  Consumer confidence levels added based on first-difference.

•  DV is the first preference of car brand, converted into the

brand liking score ranging from 0-1. Indicating that a score of . 13 means that 13% of the respondents had a preference for that car in that week.

•  Interactions between IV’s and moderator CC.

•  Multicollinearity and autocorrelation issues.

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Results

•  Samples signiﬁcantly diﬀerent -‐> T-‐test p < .05.

•  Females have 12 car brands that signiﬁcantly inﬂuence their brand liking score based on hedonic moDves vs 6 for males.

•  Females have 10 car brands that signiﬁcantly inﬂuence their brand liking score based on uDlitarian moDves vs 8 for males.

•  Females have 4 car brands that signiﬁcantly inﬂuence their brand liking score based on ecological moDves vs 8 for males.

•  Consumer confidence has a negaDve effect on 3 brands for females, vs 1 for males. Only Volvo has a posiDve effect for males during an economic expansions.

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Results: Added Z

•  Females largest effect for hedonic motives (.01), followed by utilitarian motives (.009) and ecological motives (.006).

•  Males largest effect ecological motives (.008), followed by utilitarian motives (.005) and hedonic motives (.004). Also interaction effect between ecological motives and consumer confidence significant effect (.05).

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Green classification

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•  Females have 2 of their top brands represented in the list. Also, 3 brands that had significant effect regarding ecological

motives are in the list.

•  Males also have 2 of their top brands represented in the list. Also, 2 brands that had significant effect regarding ecological motives are in the list.

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Added Z: Green vs brown brands

•  Compare green brands to brown brands for importance of advertising characteristics in the market.

•  For females, the largest effect was found for utilitarian motives for green cars and hedonic motives in the brown segment.

•  For males, the largest effect was found for ecological motives in the green segment and also in the brown segment.

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Discussion

•  The importance in adverDsing characterisDcs used in the three factors signiﬁcantly diﬀer according to gender.

•  Not only at brand-‐individual level, also generalized.

•  The consumer conﬁdence level does not give posiDve results, especially for males it can be said that economic posiDve

condiDons posiDvely inﬂuence the brand liking of green cars. Care less about the price. In line with literature since women tend to take more important decision regarding money

spending (Sandberg, 2014).

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Managerial implications

•  The findings in this research can give guidance to managers in how to properly attract potential buyers by providing insights in what matters most in an advertisement of a car.

•  Females need highlighting on hedonic characteristics, the look and style of a car are very important. This is the case for 12 brands, however also generalizable for the industry. Females do not favor cars for their green efforts. Companies that are in the ranking list and are green should focus on utilitarian

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•  The most important factor for males are ecological

characteristics, whilst utilitarian was expected. This is also the case for car brands that are in the top 50 of the ranking list.

•  The economic situation plays a role for males and their brand liking scores. During expansions the focus on the green aspect should be even higher. Males favor cars that are in the ranking list based on ecological motives, adding this element in an

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Limitations and future research directions

•  The model is never complete, hence adding's such as

advertising expenses could give more valuable insights. Also the specific marketing channels that are used can give more specific insights.

•  Research with specific cars of a brand instead of the brand as a whole.

•  Lack of data for several brands.

•  Factors are not based on hard evidence they are reliable to use.

•  Instead of the liking score, use the actual sales of a car.

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