不同促销方式对产品购买决策的影响——基于解释水平理论视角的研究

The Effect of Promotion Types on Consumers' Purchase Decisions:From the Perspective of Construal Level Theory

赠品促销与价格促销对消费者购买决策的影响研究结果尚存在分歧。根据解释水平理论,通过三个实验探究了赠品促销产品组合与价格促销产品组合在不同任务类型、不同时间距离条件下的促销效果差异。结果表明:(1)不同时间距离下,消费者对促销产品决策存在差异。赠品促销方式在近期将来购物场景下的促销效果比在远期将来购物场景下的促销效果更好;价格促销方式在远期将来购物场景下的促销效果比在近期将来购物场景下的促销效果更好。价格支付意愿任务下,消费者对远期将来场景下促销产品的感知价值比近期将来购物场景下促销产品的感知价值高;购买可行性任务下,消费者对近期将来购物场景下促销产品的感知价值比远期将来购物场景下促销产品的感知价值高。(2)时间距离对促销方式与任务类型的表征水平匹配关系有增强、扩大作用。购买可行性任务下,与远期将来时间相比,消费者更倾向于在近期将来时间条件下选择赠品促销产品组合。价格支付意愿任务下,与近期将来时间相比,消费者更倾向于在远期将来时间条件下选择价格促销产品组合。

Premium promotion and price promotion are the most frequently used marketing tools. However, research on how the two types of promotions differently influence consumers＇ decision, s remains scarce. Construal level theory （CLT） provides a new perspective to investigate how consumers construe two types of promotions. CLT proposes that individuals use higher level of construal （abstract mindsets） to represent an object as the psychological distance increases. Construal levels influence consumers＇ decisions by a preference for information or events that match their abstract or concrete mindsets. As price promotions provide more utilitarian benefits and express core values, which are more likely to remain unchanged; premium promotions provide more hedonic benefits and express peripheral values, which are more likely to decrease with time. Guided by the CLT, we hypothesized that price promotions and premium promotions were represented at high and low construal level respectively. The role of promotion types in consumers＇ decision making was depended on whether consumers＇ goals and tasks match with the construal levels of promotion types. Three experiments were conducted to test the hypotheses. In experiment 1, 86 college students were engaged in a 2（promotion type： premium promotion vs. price promotion）×3 （temporal distance： near future vs. distant future） between-subjects design of experiment which was conducted to study the construal level of promotion types. In experiment 2, 136 college students participated in a 2 （task type： Willingness to Pay task vs. choice feasibility task） × 2 （temporal distance： near future vs. distant future） between-subjects design of experiment, which was conducted to study the construal level of decision tasks. 175 college students participated in the third experiment which used a 2 （promotion type） × 2 （task type） × 3 （temporal distance） between-subjects design to study the congruency effect between the construal level of promotions／the decision tasks and the temporal distance. The results indicated that premium promotion was more effective in the near future and price promotion was more effective in the distant future, which meant that price promotions and premium promotions were represented at high construal level and low construal level separately. Furthermore, when construal levels of promotion types matched with the goals and tasks, their positive effects could be amplified. The results have some important implications. Firstly, marketing personnel should select the appropriate promotion types according to the time period. Meanwhile, they should pay more attention to whether the decision context factors match with the construal levels of the promotion types.