Reference:Australian and New Zealand Marketing Academy Conference, Perth, Australia, 28 Nov 2011 - 30 Nov 2011. Editors: MacCarthy M. Proceedings of the Australia New Zealand Marketing Academy Conference 2011. School of Marketing, Faculty of Business & Law, Tourism and Leisure, Edith Cowan University, Melbourne, Australia. 2011
Rights:Copyright: School of Marketing, Faculty of Business & Law, Tourism and Leisure, Edith Cowan University
Word of mouth communication (WOM) is becoming increasingly important for marketing practitioners and academics. Practitioners are interested in WOM because it is the medium for something that advertising interrupts: consumers’ desire to be entertained. Although many studies have investigated why consumers participate in WOM, no research has explicitly investigated entertainment as a WOM motivator. This exploratory study fills this gap by asking consumers to describe past WOM episodes they have shared with others. Results show that wanting to entertain others is a WOM motivator, and that WOM’s entertainment value can be magnified through purposeful exaggeration. Entertainment value was highest for extremely dis/satisfying consumption experiences and those with high levels of affect and involvement.