IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jbrese/v168y2023ics0148296323005283.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Influencing brand personality with sonic logos: The role of musical timbre

Author

Listed:
  • Techawachirakul, Monin
  • Pathak, Abhishek
  • Motoki, Kosuke
  • Calvert, Gemma Anne

Abstract

This study examines the relationship between instrumental timbre and brand personality and its underlying mechanisms. Our findings demonstrate that the connotative meanings of instrumental timbre act as a cognitive mechanism behind the timbre-brand association based on gender stereotypes. Specifically, sogos created using feminine instruments that connote positive valence are matched with sincerity dimension. Similarly, sogos created using masculine instruments that connote potency are matched with ruggedness, and this relationship is mediated by the perception of low pitch. Further, creating sogos with instruments that match a brand’s personality evokes congruence of brand attributes, which in turn positively impacts brand attitude and purchase intention. These findings contribute to the literature on branding and sensory marketing by linking instrumental timbre with the well-known brand personality scale and the EPA (Evaluation, Potency, and Activity) framework. Insights learnt can help brands create sogos that are congruent with their brand’s personality.

Suggested Citation

  • Techawachirakul, Monin & Pathak, Abhishek & Motoki, Kosuke & Calvert, Gemma Anne, 2023. "Influencing brand personality with sonic logos: The role of musical timbre," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 168(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:168:y:2023:i:c:s0148296323005283
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusres.2023.114169
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0148296323005283
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jbusres.2023.114169?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Wang, Jie & Zhang, Xiadan & Jiang, Jing, 2022. "Healthy-Angular, unhealthy-circular: Effects of the fit between shapes and healthiness on consumer food preferences," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 740-750.
    2. Motoki, Kosuke & Nakahara, Takanobu & Velasco, Carlos, 2023. "Tasting brands: Associations between brand personality and tastes," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 156(C).
    3. Richard Klink & Gerard Athaide, 2012. "Creating brand personality with brand names," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 23(1), pages 109-117, March.
    4. Aparna Sundar & Theodore J. Noseworthy, 2016. "Too Exciting to Fail, Too Sincere to Succeed: The Effects of Brand Personality on Sensory Disconfirmation," Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Consumer Research Inc., vol. 43(1), pages 44-67.
    5. Puligadda, Sanjay & VanBergen, Noah, 2023. "The influence of sound logo instruments on brand personality perceptions: An investigation of brand ruggedness and sophistication," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 156(C).
    6. Techawachirakul, Monin & Pathak, Abhishek & Motoki, Kosuke & Anne Calvert, Gemma, 2023. "Sonic branding of meat- and plant-based foods: The role of timbre," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 165(C).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Techawachirakul, Monin & Pathak, Abhishek & Motoki, Kosuke & Anne Calvert, Gemma, 2023. "Sonic branding of meat- and plant-based foods: The role of timbre," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 165(C).
    2. Stacey M. Baxter & Jasmina Ilicic & Alicia Kulczynski & Tina M. Lowrey, 2017. "Using sublexical priming to enhance brand name phonetic symbolism effects in young children," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 28(4), pages 565-577, December.
    3. Zhang, Yicong & Guo, Xiaoling, 2023. "“New and old†: Consumer evaluations of co-branding between new brands and Chinese time-honored brands," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 73(C).
    4. Hu, Miao & Chen, Jie & Chen, Qimei & He, Wei, 2020. "It pays off to be authentic: An examination of direct versus indirect brand mentions on social media," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 19-28.
    5. Seung-hye Jung & Joon-ho Kim & Ha-na Cho & Hae-won Lee & Hyun-ju Choi, 2021. "Brand Personality of Korean Dance and Sustainable Behavioral Intention of Global Consumers in Four Countries: Focusing on the Technological Acceptance Model," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(20), pages 1-19, October.
    6. Sungwoo Choi & Stella X Liu & Choongbeom Choi, 2022. "Robot–Brand Fit The Influence Of Brand Personality On Consumer Reactions To Service Robot Adoption," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 33(1), pages 129-142, March.
    7. Ekaterini Drosou, 2019. "Greek Womens’ Mentality towards Fashion Brands and the Influence of Print Images," Athens Journal of Business & Economics, Athens Institute for Education and Research (ATINER), vol. 5(4), pages 301-328, October.
    8. Richard R. Klink & Lan Wu, 2017. "Creating ethical brands: the role of brand name on consumer perceived ethicality," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 28(3), pages 411-422, September.
    9. Zheng, Chundong & Qian, Fangyuan & Song, Jiehang & Wang, Han, 2024. "Make the photo in good shape: The matching effect of photo shapes and donation appeals on donation intentions," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 77(C).
    10. Chen Yang & Jing Hu, 2022. "When do consumers prefer AI-enabled customer service? The interaction effect of brand personality and service provision type on brand attitudes and purchase intentions," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 29(2), pages 167-189, March.
    11. Liu, Stephanie Q. & Wu, Laurie Luorong & Yu, Xi & Huang, Huiling, 2022. "Marketing online food images via color saturation: A sensory imagery perspective," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 151(C), pages 366-378.
    12. Jihoon Cho & Swinder Janda, 2023. "Perception carryover in cross-buying: the role of interpurchase time and product locus," Journal of Marketing Analytics, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 11(4), pages 809-819, December.
    13. Sevgi Ay?e Öztürk & Fatma Zeynep Özata & Feyza A?largöz, 2015. "How Foreign Branding Affect Brand Personality And Purchase Intention?," Proceedings of Business and Management Conferences 2304200, International Institute of Social and Economic Sciences.
    14. Daniel Kaimann & Clarissa Laura Maria Spiess Bru, 2023. "Sounds too Feminine? Brand Gender and The Impact on Professional Critics," Working Papers Dissertations 107, Paderborn University, Faculty of Business Administration and Economics.
    15. Landgraf, Polina & Stamatogiannakis, Antonios & Yang, Haiyang, 2024. "How mortality salience hurts brands with different personalities," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 308-324.
    16. Alicia Kulczynski & Stacey Brennan & Jasmina Ilicic, 2021. "A spokesperson with any name won’t be as charming: the phonetic effect of spokesperson name and gender on personality evaluations," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 28(2), pages 221-239, March.
    17. Benedikt Schnurr, 2017. "The impact of atypical product design on consumer product and brand perception," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 24(6), pages 609-621, November.
    18. Abhishek Pathak & Carlos Velasco & Charles Spence, 2020. "The sound of branding: An analysis of the initial phonemes of popular brand names," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 27(3), pages 339-354, May.
    19. Rajesh Sharma, 2020. "Building Consumer-based Brand Equity for Fast Fashion Apparel Brands in the Indian Consumer Market," Management and Labour Studies, XLRI Jamshedpur, School of Business Management & Human Resources, vol. 45(3), pages 337-365, August.
    20. Wu, Yi & Cai, Yuanyuan & Zhou, Xiaohan & Huang, Xinyi, 2024. "Shaping extendibility: The influence of circular versus angular shapes on consumer brand extension evaluation," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 171(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:168:y:2023:i:c:s0148296323005283. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jbusres .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.