Setting up the stage.
The live stage needs WebGL. The scope would show a clean wave below unity and a clipped one past it.
Posting about it can kill the sale.
Five experiments on why sharing a product you love can make you less likely to buy it.
More posts, more sales. Right?
Brands read buzz as buying intent. Louder looks like better. For a product that says something about who you are, the research found the opposite.
Here is the paper.
Grewal, Stephen and Coleman, Journal of Marketing Research, 2019, volume 56, issue 2, pages 197 to 210. Five experiments on identity signaling, and what a post does to the urge to buy.
A post can stand in for the purchase.
You feel the urge to say who you are. Buying would say it. A post says it too, to an audience, for free. The echo comes back: need met, sale gone.
Some products speak for you.
A backpack that says you are green is a statement. A USB cable is a tool. A post can only answer the urge to buy when the product is a statement.
It was the posting, not the searching.
An eco-friendly backpack. Posting it in public made people less willing to buy it. Controls ruled out plain exposure. The post did it.
Two switches. Both on.
The product must say something about you, and the audience must see the post. Private posts and plain products left purchase intent alone. The loop needs a witness.
A big identity needs a bigger signal.
For a casual identity, one post feels like enough. For a central one it feels too light, so the urge to buy survives. The backfire weakens.
It only hits the same identity.
After posting eco products, the urge to buy eco products dropped. A plain bag was untouched. Undergraduates who imagined posting identity products were willing to pay $0.86 for a tote, against $1.28 for those who imagined posting functional ones.
The echo fades.
A post only counts while it is still on your mind. In the last study the effect diminished once the researchers waited a week. The signal had gone stale.
Five conditions. All must hold.
The product says who you are. The post is public. It comes before the purchase. It is still on your mind. The identity is moderate. Drop any one and the loop stays quiet.
Buzz is not demand.
A post can be the whole purchase. Four moves quiet the loop. Try each one.
Posting is not just promotion. It can be symbolic consumption.
When people post an identity product in public, the post can satisfy the need that would have driven the purchase.