Browsing by Author "Vanhuele, M."

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Open Access
Consumer attitude metrics for guiding marketing mix decisions
(Informs, 2014-08) Hanssens, D. M.; Pauwels, Koen Hendrik; Srinivasan, S.; Vanhuele, M.; Yildirim, G.; Business Administration; PAUWELS, Koen Hendrik
Marketing managers often use consumer attitude metrics such as awareness, consideration, and preference as performance indicators because they represent their brand's health and are readily connected to marketing activity. However, this does not mean that financially focused executives know how such metrics translate into sales performance, which would allow them to make beneficial marketing mix decisions. We propose four criteria-potential, responsiveness, stickiness, and sales conversion-that determine the connection between marketing actions, attitudinal metrics, and sales outcomes. We test our approach with a rich data set of four-weekly marketing actions, attitude metrics, and sales for several consumer brands in four categories over a seven-year period. The results quantify how marketing actions affect sales performance through their differential impact on attitudinal metrics, as captured by our proposed criteria. We find that marketing-attitude and attitude-sales relationships are predominantly stable over time but differ substantially across brands and product categories. We also establish that combining marketing and attitudinal metrics criteria improves the prediction of brand sales performance, often substantially so. Based on these insights, we provide specific recommendations on improving the marketing mix for different brands, and we validate them in a holdout sample. For managers and researchers alike, our criteria offer a verifiable explanation for differences in marketing elasticities and an actionable connection between marketing and financial performance metrics.
Open Access
Mind-set metrics in market response models: an integrative approach
(American Marketing Association, 2010-08) Srinivasan, S.; Vanhuele, M.; Pauwels, Koen Hendrik; Business Administration; PAUWELS, Koen Hendrik
Demonstrations of marketing effectiveness currently proceed along two parallel tracks: Quantitative researchers model the direct sales effects of the marketing mix, and advertising and branding experts trace customer mind-set metrics (e.g., awareness, affect). The authors merge the two tracks and analyze the added explanatory value of including customer mind-set metrics in a sales response model that already accounts for short- and long-term effects of advertising, price, distribution, and promotion. Vector autoregressive modeling of the metrics for more than 60 brands of four consumer goods shows that advertising awareness, brand consideration, and brand liking account for almost one-third of explained sales variance. Competitive and own mind-set metrics make a similar contribution. Wear-in times reveal that mind-set metrics can be used as advance warning signals that allow enough time for managerial action before market performance itself is affected. Specific marketing actions affect specific mind-set metrics, with the strongest overall impact for distribution. The findings suggest that modelers should include mind-set metrics in sales response models and branding experts should include competition in their tracking research.