Making the Difference: Consumer-oriented marketing strategy of a new attribute expansion through a spillover phenomenon lens

Summary

New attribute expansion strategies, such as introducing a new sustainability attribute to a product category where such attribute was previously unavailable, typically aim to enhance consumer evaluations of and choices for the product they were designed for; the target product. By applying the theoretical lens of the spillover phenomenon, the present thesis deepens the understanding of how new attribute expansion strategies create a competitive advantage. The results show that new (sustainable) attribute expansion strategies disrupts consumers’ expectations about the product category and negatively affect attitudes towards and choices for competing products. These negative spillovers of a new attribute expansion strategy to competing products originate from the attention and comparison processes and are likely to occur as long as a new attribute expansion strategy involves design changes that are within reasonable boundaries of a product category.