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Text analysis is increasingly used for consumer and marketing insight. But while work has shed light on what firms should say to customers, when to say those things (e.g. within an advertisement or sales interaction) is less clear. Service employees, for example, could adopt a certain speaking style at a conversation's start, end, or throughout. When might specific language features be beneficial? This article introduces a novel approach to address this question. To demonstrate its potential, we apply it to warm and competent language. Prior research suggests that an affective (i.e. warm) speaking approach leads customers to think employees are less competent, so a cognitive (competent) style should be prioritized. In contrast, our theorizing, analysis of hundreds of real service conversations from two firms across thousands of conversational moments (N  = 23,958), and four experiments (total N  = 1,589) offer a more nuanced perspective. Customers are more satisfied when employees use both cognitive and affective language but at separate, specific times. Ancillary analyses show how this method can be applied to other language features. Taken together, this work offers a method to explore when language matters, sheds new light on the warmth/competence trade-off, and highlights ways to improve the customer experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last 50+ years, there has been a huge rise in interest in consumer language research. This article spotlights the emergence and evolution of this area, identifying key themes and trends and highlighting topics for future research. Work has evolved from exploration of broad language concepts (e.g. rhetorics) to specific linguistic features (e.g. phonemes) and from monologues (e.g. advertiser to consumer) to two-way dialogues (e.g. consumer to service representative and back). We discuss future opportunities that arise from past trends and suggest two important shifts that prompt questions for future research: the new shift toward using voice (vs. hands) when interacting with objects and the ongoing shift toward using hands (vs. voices) to communicate with people. By synthesizing the past, and delineating a research agenda for the future, we hope to encourage more researchers to begin to explore this burgeoning area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Influencer marketing has become big business. But while influencers have the potential to spread marketing messages and drive purchase, some posts get lots of engagement and boost sales, while others do not. What makes some posts more impactful? This work examines how sensory language (e.g. words like "crumble" and "juicy" that engage the senses) shapes consumer responses to influencer-sponsored content. A multimethod investigation, combining controlled experiments with automated text, image, and video analysis of thousands of sponsored social media posts, demonstrates that sensory language increases engagement and willingness to buy the sponsored product. Furthermore, the studies illustrate that these effects are driven by perceived authenticity. Sensory language leads consumers to infer that influencers actually use the product they are endorsing, which increases perceived authenticity, and thus engagement and purchase. These findings shed light on how language shapes responses to influencer-sponsored content, deepen understanding of the drivers of authenticity, and suggest how to develop more impactful social media campaigns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When sharing information and opinions about products, services, and experiences, communicators often use either past or present tense (e.g. "That restaurant was great" or "That restaurant is great"). Might such differences in verb tense shape communication's impact, and if so, how? A multimethod investigation, including eight studies conducted in the field and lab, demonstrates that using present (vs. past) tense can increase persuasion. Natural language processing of over 500,000 online reviews in multiple product and service domains, for example, illustrates that reviews that use more present tense are seen as more helpful and useful. Follow-up experiments demonstrate that shifting from past to present tense increases persuasion and illustrate the underlying process through both mediation and moderation. When communicators use present (rather than past) tense to express their opinions and experiences, it suggests that they are more certain about what they are saying, which increases persuasion. These findings shed light on how language impacts consumer behavior, highlight how a subtle, yet central linguistic feature shapes communication, and have clear implications for persuasion across a range of situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From advertisers and marketers to salespeople and leaders, everyone wants to hold attention. They want to make ads, pitches, presentations, and content that captivates audiences and keeps them engaged. But not all content has that effect. What makes some content more engaging? A multimethod investigation combines controlled experiments with natural language processing of 600,000 reading sessions from over 35,000 pieces of content to examine what types of language hold attention and why. Results demonstrate that linguistic features associated with processing ease (e.g., concrete or familiar words) and emotion both play an important role. Rather than simply being driven by valence, though, the effects of emotional language are driven by the degree to which different discrete emotions evoke arousal and uncertainty. Consistent with this idea, anxious, exciting, and hopeful language holds attention while sad language discourages it. Experimental evidence underscores emotional language's causal impact and demonstrates the mediating role of uncertainty and arousal. The findings shed light on what holds attention; illustrate how content creators can generate more impactful content; and, as shown in a stylized simulation, have important societal implications for content recommendation algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Communication is an integral part of everyday life. Consumers chat with friends, search for information, and complain to customer service. Salespeople pitch products, employees answer questions, and market researchers ask them. But communication does not occur in a vacuum. Modalities (e.g., speaking or writing), channels (e.g., text, phone call, or email), and devices (e.g., smartphone or computer) are the mediums through which communicators communicate. While these mediums often seem incidental, might they impact what gets communicated? And if so, how? This paper offers a comprehensive framework for understanding how mediums shape the message. Specifically, we argue that modality, devices, and channels all shape communication through the same two key drivers: deliberation and audience salience. As a result, the mediums communicators use to communicate impact everything from the thoughtfulness and concreteness of communicated content to the degree to which it is self‐enhancing or honest. This work sheds light on the psychology of content production, provides insight into the drivers and consequences of communication, and highlights how emerging technologies may shape communication in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Consumers often communicate their attitudes and opinions with others, and such word of mouth has an important impact on what others think, buy, and do. But might the way consumers communicate their attitudes (i.e. through speaking or writing) shape the attitudes they express? And, as a result, the impact of what they share? While a great deal of research has begun to examine drivers of word of mouth, there has been less attention to how communication modality might shape sharing. Six studies, conducted in the laboratory and field, demonstrate that compared to speaking, writing leads consumers to express less emotional attitudes. The effect is driven by deliberation. Writing offers more time to deliberate about what to say, which reduces emotionality. The studies also demonstrate a downstream consequence of this effect: by shaping the attitudes expressed, the modality consumers communicate through can influence the impact of their communication. This work sheds light on word of mouth, effects of communication modality, and the role of language in communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Consumers often share word of mouth, and such interpersonal communication shapes attitudes and purchases. But while some research has examined what consumers talk about, there has been less attention to when consumers discuss. How does the distance from now (i.e., whether something is temporally near or far away) shape the likelihood of discussion? And might the effect of temporal distance on word of mouth vary based on whether those things happened in the past or will happen in the future? Five studies, including analyses of thousands of social media posts, address these questions. They suggest that consumers tend to talk about temporally near things, but that this is moderated by whether they are talking about the past or future (i.e., consumers talk about more temporally distant things when talking about the future). Accessibility seems to play an important role in these effects. While temporally near things tend to be more accessible, on average, goals and plans are more likely to remain active in the future, which shapes what gets discussed. These findings have implications for understanding drivers of word of mouth, how time shapes consumer behavior, and how companies can more effectively manage interpersonal communication. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some cultural products (e.g. books and movies) catch on and become popular, while others fail. Why? While some have argued that success is unpredictable, we suggest that period-to-period shifts in sentiment—what we term sentiment volatility—enhance engagement. Automated sentiment analysis of over 4,000 movies demonstrates that more volatile movies are evaluated more positively. Consistent with the notion that sentiment volatility makes experiences more stimulating, the effect is stronger in genres where evaluations are more likely to be driven stimulation (i.e. thrillers rather than romance). Further, analysis of over 30,000 online articles demonstrate that people are more likely to continue reading more volatile articles. By manipulating sentiment volatility in follow-up experiments, we underscore its causal impact on evaluations, and provide evidence for the role of stimulation in these effects. Taken together, the results shed light on what drives engagement, the time dynamics of sentiment, and cultural analytics or why some cultural items are more successful. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prior approaches that leverage identity to motivate prosocial behavior are often limited to the set of people who already strongly identify with an organization (e.g., prior donors) or by the costs and challenges associated with developing stronger organization-linked identities among a broader audience (e.g., encouraging more people to care). In contrast, this research demonstrates that small prosocial gifts, such as tips or small donations, can be encouraged by framing the act of giving as an opportunity to express identity-relevant preferences—even if such preferences are not explicitly related to prosociality or the organization in need. Rather than simply asking people to give, the "dueling preferences" approach investigated in this research frames the act of giving as a choice between two options (e.g., cats vs. dogs, chocolate vs. vanilla ice cream). Dueling preferences increases prosocial giving by providing potential givers with a greater opportunity for self-expression—an intrinsically desirable opportunity. Seven experiments conducted in the laboratory, online, and in the field support this theorized process while casting doubt on relevant alternatives. This research contributes to work on self-expression and identity and sheds light on how organizations can encourage prosocial behavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Consumers are often frustrated by customer service. But could a simple shift in language help improve customer satisfaction? We suggest that linguistic concreteness—the tangibility, specificity, or imaginability of words employees use when speaking to customers—can shape consumer attitudes and behaviors. Five studies, including text analysis of over 1,000 real consumer–employee interactions in two different field contexts, demonstrate that customers are more satisfied, willing to purchase, and purchase more when employees speak to them concretely. This occurs because customers infer that employees who use more concrete language are listening (i.e. attending to and understanding their needs). These findings deepen understanding of how language shapes consumer behavior, reveal a psychological mechanism by which concreteness impacts person perception, and provide a straightforward way that managers could help enhance customer satisfaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Advances in machine learning and artificial intelligence are revolutionizing many aspects of human life, and as Banker et al. (2024) illustrate, generative artificial intelligence may also facilitate hypothesis generation in academic research. But while it is easy to imagine this idea generating some alarm (i.e., hypothesis generation may seem like the most creative, human part of research), their work actually raises an even more important question: Why should we believe that the current (human) method of hypothesis generation is somehow ideal in the first place? This article discusses the implications of their work and outlines how automated content analysis and machine learning can also help researchers determine what hypotheses deserve attention in the first place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]