Psychology of performance and preference: Advantages, disadvantages, drivers and obstacles to the achievement of congrue
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GLORIA A. MOSS is a research fellow at Glamorgan University Business School and visiting professor at the Ecole Superieure de Gestion (ESG) in Paris. She combines an extended background in Human Resources, having held training manager positions with Eurotunnel and Courtaulds, with a fresh approach to segmentation marketing.
Keywords
Abstract
gender ; sex differences; personality; product; management; brand management; mirroring principle; design; leadership; congruence; mirroring principle
The marketing literature suggests that customers are satisfied when there is congruence between performances (products and management behaviours) on the one hand, and preferences (whether for management behaviours or products) on the other. There has been little systematic work into the extent to which performances and preferences (in the senses outlined above) are influenced by segmentation variables such as personality and gender, and the extent to which the successful interaction of segmentation variables, acting on performance and preferences, can bring about the congruence between performance and preference recommended in the marketing literature. This paper describes the way personality and gender can impact on performances and preferences and how an awareness of this can help an organisation ensure congruity between product offering and customer preference.
Journal of Brand Management (2007) 14, 343–358. doi:10.1057/palgrave.bm.2550075
THE PRINCIPLE OF CONGRUENCE
Gloria A. Moss Business School, Glamorgan University, Llantwit Road, Pontypridd, CF37 1DL Wales, UK. Ecole Superieure de Gestion (ESG), Paris Tel: +44 1443 483293 E-mail: [email protected]
According to Hammer, the author of the acclaimed ‘Reengineering the Corporation’,1 the seller no longer has the upper hand. Businesses that survive will be those that shape their products or services around the ‘unique and particular needs’ of their customer.The link that this implies between the product or service on the one hand, and the customer on the other, finds expression in the principle of congruence that associates successful marketing with a match between customer self-concept and product.2–5 Although the advantages of this principle are well established, the psychological mechanisms
involved in this process are less well established. The purpose of this paper is to examine in detail the processes involved in achieving congruence between a product and a customer’s self-concept. We will begin by examining elements that remain ‘behind the scene’, namely the links between the product and the person creating or managing it (a link referred to in this paper as the ‘performance’ element), and the links between a product and the consumer’s reaction to that product (referred to in this paper as the ‘preference’ element). The elements linking the product to the creator are ones implicitly recognised
© 2007 PALGRAVE MACMILLAN LTD 1350-23IX $30.00 BRAND MANAGEMENT VOL. 14, NO. 4, 343–358 APRIL 2007
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in popular culture. Well-know
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