Turning buzz into behavior: Shopping companions as buffers against ambivalence in novelty marketing

Promoting consumer adoption of novelty products requires attention to both firms' marketing strategies and the psychological processes underlying consumer decision-making. Although novelty products often spark curiosity due to their uniqueness, they also elicit uncertainty and perceived risk, generating emotional ambivalence that inhibits consumers from acting on their initial interest. This research proposes that leveraging shopping companions can serve as an effective marketing strategy to reduce such ambivalence and, in turn, increase consumers’ acceptance of novelty products. Across seven studies—including laboratory experiments and large language model (LLM)-based text analysis—we demonstrate that shopping companions, particularly close friends, systematically reduce emotional ambivalence and lead to more favorable evaluations of novelty products. This companion effect holds for both low-priced and high-priced products. We also identify key boundary conditions: the effect is stronger for hedonic than utilitarian products, and it is moderated by price impact. When the novelty option carries a price premium over a regular alternative, the companion effect diminishes. Furthermore, the benefit does not extend to consumers high in fear of negative evaluation (FNE), for whom companion presence fails to reduce ambivalence. Together, these findings highlight the strategic value of integrating companion-based marketing with novelty-driven product design and communication, offering firms a powerful pathway to enhance consumer adoption in competitive marketplaces.