Marketing Communications

LOW ELABORATION LIKELIHOOD, COGNITIVE ATTITUDE FORMATION 93

gather and process information to find the best choice. They are not looking for direct

evidence of performance superiority in this case, but settle for a satisfactory or acceptable

brand choice. Therefore, they seek for reassurance or credibility in heuristic cues such as

brand name reputation, experts endorsing the brand, price level, etc. Table 3.5 summarises a

few ad characteristics that can be used as a heuristic cue (Photo 3.2).

Another example is the use of celebrities. The heuristic in this case might be ‘if George

Clooney loves Nespresso, it has to be good’ or ‘if Anna Kournikova wears a Shock sportsbra

because “only the ball should bounce”, it has to be a comfortable and good bra’.

It is generally accepted that consumers think products are better when they are made in countries holding a positive

image. These effects have been found in a huge variety of countries. One explanation for these effects is that consumers

use country stereotypes as a heuristic to simplify the decision process. An additional and more recent explanation

is that a reference to the country in which the product is made spontaneously activates country stereotypes, and

that these stereotypes influence the evaluation of the product even when consumers do not intend to use this

information in their judgement. In a recent experimental study, consumers had to classify eight fictitious brands of

notebooks as either good or bad. In a first stage, consumers were exposed to brand characteristics (processor speed,

hard drive capacity and RAM size). On the basis of these characteristics they were taught how they could easily

make a distinction between a good and a bad brand. After an unrelated task, consumers were in a second stage

re-exposed to the eight brands, but now information was added concerning where the brand was manufactured

(either a positive- or a negative-image country). Next, consumers had to classify the brands again. Half of the

respondents were distracted during this task, while the other half could pay full attention to the classification task.

The results showed that the negative or positive effect associated with the country of origin involuntarily influenced

brand judgements. This effect was larger in the distracted group who could not pay full attention to the brand

categorisation. This suggests that in cases where respondents’ MAO factors are high (high motivation or involve-

ment, high ability and opportunity) and consumers follow central-route processing, automatically activated country

stereotypes are more likely to be inhibited, while their impact is largest when one of the MAO factors is low.^64

researCh insight

Automatic and unintentional country-of-origin effects

Table 3.5 Potential heuristic cues

Characteristics Peripheral cue Heuristic

Source Attractiveness The more attractive, the better

Expertise The more expertise, the better

Status The higher the status, the better

Number of sources The more, the better

Message Number of arguments The more, the better

Repetition The more, the better

Layout The more attractive, the better

Product Price The higher, the better

Design The more attractive, the better

Country of origin German is good (cars)

The Netherlands is good (cheese)

Italian is good (fashion, leather)

Source: Based on Pieters, R. and van Raaij, F. (1992), Reclamewerking (How Advertising Works). Leiden/Antwerp: StenfertKroeseUitgevers.

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