臺大管理論叢 NTU Management Review VOL.30 NO.1

Is a Bigger Picture Better? The Impact of Product-Model Ratio and Brand-Consumer Relationship on Advertising Effectiveness 154 Is a Bigger Picture Better? The Impact of Product-Model Ratio and Brand-Consumer Relationship on Advertising Effectiveness English Summary Researchers in the field of advertising elaborate on the conceptual metaphor theory (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980) to show how marketers use conceptual metaphors to attract consumers to make product purchases. People learn concrete physical concepts first, and abstract concepts are easier to comprehend when metaphorically mapped onto concrete concepts which people are already familiar with (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980; Landau, Meier, and Keefer, 2010). Metaphorical associations can then influence the psychological judgments of people. Since consumers rely on size as an important visual cue, this study examines how visuals (e.g., images of the products and models) influence ad effectiveness. More specifically, this study examines how advertisers can use size contrast between model and product images (SCMP) to maximize ad effectiveness. Size (big or small) can be an important metaphor, as it shapes the perceptions of significant social stimuli (Landau et al., 2010). Early studies show that both children (Bruner and Goodman, 1947) and adults (Postman and Bruner, 1948) perceive socially significant symbols as physically larger than neutral symbols. People commonly talk about an increase in significance as physical largeness or expansion (“This is a big problem, and it is only going to grow ;” Lakoff and Johnson, 1999). Despite its prevalence in our daily life, this metaphor remains unexplored in an advertising context. Furthermore, this study is interested in the boundary conditions of using SCMP. The brand’s social role (BSR) is proposed as a moderator. Consumers tend to treat a brand as a human being (Aaker, 1997; Aggarwal and McGill, 2012), and interact with the brand in ways similar to interpersonal relationship partners (Aggarwal, 2004; Fournier, 1998; Swaminathan, Page, and Gürhan-Canli, 2007). This study distinguishes two types of brand social roles: leader-like vs. friend-like. When a brand positions itself as a leader, consumers consider it superior to other brands in the same product category. Slogans such as “There is no substitute” (Porsche) and “The king of beers” (Budweiser) are two examples from brand leaders. On the other hand, when consumers perceive the brand as a friend, they feel that the brand is sincere and trustworthy (Aaker, Fournier, and Brasel, 2004). A friend-like brand and their customers Chun-Tuan Chang , Department of Business Management, National Sun Yat-sen University Hsin-Yi Wang , Department of Business Management, National Sun Yat-sen University