DUBAI, JUNE 21, 2017 – An Assistant Professor with Canadian University Dubai’s School of Business Administration, Dr. Julia Finnegan, recently presented her paper on Luxury Marketing, titled “For the Love of Luxuries” at the 39th Annual ISMS (INFORMS Society for Marketing Science) Marketing Science Conference held at the University of Southern California’s Marshall School of Business in Los Angeles.
Dr. Finnegan, who earned her PhD in Marketing from Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Germany, discussed her research into the formation of “brand love” and its impact on a consumer’s willingness-to-pay in the German luxury market. Luxury brands include fashion labels like Louis Vuitton, Versace and Channel, as well as cars, watches, jewelry and even hotels and airlines.
“An emotional consumer-brand relationship, or brand love, has attracted a lot of attention in marketing research. However, brand love in the context of the luxury market has been left largely unexplored,” explains Dr. Finnegan. “During the course of my research I’ve found that luxury consumers show stronger brand love tendencies than other mass-market consumers, and that if luxury brands focus on long-lasting emotional consumer-brand relations they may increase their revenues and profits, not just through quantity of items sold, but also due to the higher price these consumers are willing to pay. This leads us to new implications for establishing emotional relationships with different consumer groups.”
The annual conference attracts an array of marketing academics, firms and consumers, as well as students, managers, and public officials. Dr. Finnegan presented her paper as part of a forum on Consumer Behavior, Brands and Luxuries, which also explored the use of celebrities and social media in marketing.