The Good and Bad of Negative Word of Mouth

1. Introduction
Organizations are continually seeking new ways to achieve competitive advantage and wordof-mouth (WOM) represents such an opportunity. With the advancement of Internet
technologies, customers can share their opinions in ways that were not possible just a few
years ago. Consumers now have the ability to express their thoughts and feelings openly after
they consume a product or service. While WOM can be positive, neutral or negative, research
comparing positive and negative WOM is almost non-existent. Consequently, the present
study focuses on the differences in positive and negative WOM in terms of content, emotion,
strength and influence on opinion.
WOM communication has a significant effect on consumer behavior and was described by
Bass (1969) and Moore (1995) as the most important factor influencing sales growth through
the diffusion process. In particular, when customers experience dissatisfaction with a brand,
they can post their negative reactions on an online public forum such as a companys website,
social networking sites, or third-party complaint websites. This negative word-of-mouth
(NWOM) is observable not only by other customers, but also by the firm itself. Thus, these
social media technologies motivate a firm to understand the sentiments and the consequences
of these negative messages posted by its customers (Chevalier & Mayzlin, 2006; Fournier &
Avery, 2011). This engagement also changes the power dynamics between a firm and a
consumer in the sense that customers NWOM potentially influences other customers who
read these expressions as well as the posters themselves (Pitt, Berthon, Watson, & Zinkhan,
2002). The phenomenon of electronic word-of-mouth (e-WOM) has spurred streams of recent
research in consumer complaining behaviour (CCB) and sentiment analysis. In the CCB
literature, complaints are thought to be triggered by negative feelings or emotions from
perceived dissatisfaction (Day, 1984; Landon, 1980), and such emotions are believed to
affect attitudes toward brands, purchase intentions, and purchase decisions (Maute & Dubs,
1999; Riegner, 2007). However, previous studies examined NWOM in a less accurate
manner by conducting a survey asking participants to rate negative emotions (e.g., anger,
contempt, disgust, shame, sadness) that are typically associated with dissatisfying
consumption experiences, or other psychological and behavioural measures that could reflect
customers post-consumption experience. Moreover, prior studies were not able to estimate
the impact of negative emotions on purchase behaviours. We consider customers' complaints
posted on an online public forum as NWOM and investigate the effects of posting and
viewing NWOM, and expressing different negative emotions. We address the aforementioned
shortcomings of previous studies by analyzing a unique dataset that comprises customers
NWOM activities on a firms community website and their purchase and redemption
behaviours.
Consumer Buying Decision
The decision process and psychosocial activity involve while evaluating, acquiring,
consuming or ordering of goods and services. The increasing numbers of consumers facing
the issue of confusion by overchoice and disbelieving the claims of the product, cutting

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The Good and Bad of Negative Word of Mouth

through advertising clutter with the message has never been more important.(Loudon &
Della Bitta, 1994)
Word of Mouth
Word of mouth is not Shill marketing, where actors are hired in companies for creating a
conversation process with consumers, without informing them that theyre staged (recognized
as reaching marketing). Word of mouth could not considered as forged online marketing,
where individuals forward e-mails to persons who dont want them, or where any companies
post fake ideas on social media, or review sites like Amazon. Word of mouth has strong
perception in human mind, which is done by all every time By which a powerful
communication can be done. It is also a part of social communication. Word of mouth is the
way of sharing ideas, believes and experiences among each other. Always share truthful idea,
and also create word of mouth (Balter, 2004).
Word-of-mouth recommendations are among the top influencers of purchase behavior.
Thanks to social media networks like Facebook and Twitter, online product reviews on
shopping websites and services like Angies List, Yelp and TripAdvisor, word of mouth
about companies and their products and services can spread quickly. While this acceleration
can help companies with positive online word-of-mouth marketing, negative online word-ofmouth can pose a serious problem for brands. Think of the time in 2009 when two Dominos
pizza employees posted a vulgar video on YouTube showing employees preparing
sandwiches in an unsanitary way. The video spread quickly boosted by Twitter and other
social media and was viewed more than a million times. The company responded quickly by
firing the employees, tweeting an apology and posting an apology video on YouTube.

2. Research Objectives

To study the impact of negative word of mouth on future purchase behavior in food
industry.
To check whether consumers are supposed to give more importance to negative word
of mouth rather than positive word of mouth

3. Variables of Study
RESEARCH OBJECTIVES

HYPOTHESIS

VARIABLES

H1: Negative word of mouth DV : Consumer Buying

will decrease future purchase Behaviour
behavior
IDV : Review Content

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The Good and Bad of Negative Word of Mouth

H2: Consumers give more DV : Consumer Buying

importance to negative word Behaviour
of mouth than positive word
IDV : Review Content
of mouth.

4. Conceptual Model

Consumer
Buying
Behaviour

Review Content

Demographic Factors

5. Research Methodology
5.1 Research design
A Descriptive Research design will be used for the research to investigate the effect of
Negative Word of Mouth.
Experimental design
A controlled group study is proposed to satisfy the objectives. The data for the controlled
group study will first be collected from Foodpanda.com and Zomato.com, one of the leading
online platforms for listing food outlets and restaurants respectively. Sentiment Analysis will
be done by listing negative keywords from the review given by customers and rating them
according to their negativity. It is proposed to sample 100 reviews. Based on the Sentiment
Analysis the reviews will be categorized into 4 themes, one neutral, one positive and two
negativity themes.

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The Good and Bad of Negative Word of Mouth

On the Basis of the themes formed after Sentiment Analysis, the 4 control groups of 25
responds each will be subjected to each theme and then their responses will be recorded
through a structured undisguised questionnaire.
The data recorded will be compiled, and variance across different groups will be measured
through ANNOVA and Regression Analysis.
5.2 Sampling
Sampling Unit:

Students

Sampling Frame: Customers using online food ordering Platforms

Sampling Size:

25 Samples for Each Control Group

Total 100 Questionnaire Responses
100 Reviews Sentiment Analysis

Sampling Design: Stratified Random sampling.

Data Analysis Tool: Sentiment Analysis, ANNOVA & Regression

5.3 Data Collection

Variabl
e

Review
Content

Author

Kaiser (1974)

I
t
e
m
s
1
4

Dimensions

1.
2.
3.
4.
5.

6.

7.

Product review websites influence online

purchase decisions.
Online product reviews for consumers
affect my purchase decision.
Reading online consumer reviews before
purchase affect my purchase decision.
The price of product before purchase
affects my purchase decision.
If I have little experience with a product, I
often search information on the web about
the product
Simple-recommendation
reviews
are
subjective, emotional and have no support
for arguments.
Attribute-value recommendations are
specific, clear and having reasons for
arguments.

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The Good and Bad of Negative Word of Mouth

8.
9.
10.
11.
12.

13.
14.

Consu
mer
Buying
Behavi
or

Kaiser(1974)

1
2

Recency of product reviews posted on the

website affect my purchase decision
Consistency of other reviews posted on the
website affect my purchase decision.
The number of product reviews affects my
purchase decision.
Reliability of the site that present the
reviews affect my purchase decision.
If Web site that present the reviews
concern to company that I want to buy
product, affect my purchase decision
Internationality of the web site that present
the reviews affect my purchase decision.
Spelling or grammar mistakes in product
review affect my purchase decision.

1.

I often use internet for Information prior to

purchase.
2. I think shopping on internet saves time.
3. It is more difficult to shop on the internet.
4. I often use internet for shopping.
5. I believe online shopping will eventually
supersede traditional shopping.
6. I will prefer online shopping only if online
prices are lower than actual price.
7. A long time is required for the delivery of
products and services on the internet.
8. Selection of goods available on the
internet is very broad.
9. The description of products shown on the
websites is very accurate.
10. The information given about the products
and services on the internet is sufficient.
11. Online shopping is as secure as traditional
shopping.
12. I would be frustrated about what to do if I
am dissatisfied with a purchase made from
the internet.

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The Good and Bad of Negative Word of Mouth

6.0 References
[1] Gregg, D. G. and J. E. Scott (2008), "A Typology of Complaints about eBay Sellers." in:
Communications of the ACM,Vol. 51, No. 4, 69-74.
[2] Grgoire, Y.; Tripp, T. M., and R. Legoux (2009), "When Customer Love Turns into Lasting
Hate:The Effects of Relationship Strength and Time on Customer Revenge and Avoidance."
in: Journal of Marketing,Vol. 73, No. 6, 18-32.
[3] Harrison-Walker, L. J. (2001) "E-complaining: A Content Analysis of an Internet Complaint
Forum." in: Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 15, No. 4/5, 397-412.
[4] Hennig-Thurau, T.; Gwinner, K. P.; Walsh, G. and D.D. Gremler (2004), "Electronic Wordof-Mouth via Consumer-Opinion Platforms: What Motivates Consumers to Articulate
Themselves on the Internet?" in: Journal of Interactive Marketing,Vol. 18, No. 1, 38-52.
[5] Hirschman, A. O. (1970), "Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms,
Organizations, and States," Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts.
[6] Huang, J.-H. and Y.-F. Chen (2006), "Herding in Online Product Choice." in: Psychology
and Marketing, Vol. 23, No. 5, 413-428.
[7] Richins ML (1983). Negative word-of-mouth by dissatisfied consumers: A pilot study.
Journal of Marketing, 47, 68-78.
[8] Prendergast, G., Ko, D. and Yeun, S.Y.V. (2010) Online word of mouth and consumer purchase
intentions, International Journal of Advertising, 29(5), pp. 687-708. ECONIS, EBSCOhost,
[9] Sweeney, Jillian C, Geoffrey N Soutar, and Tim Mazzarol (2012), Word of mouth: measuring the
power of individual messages, European Journal of Marketing, 46(1/2), 23757.
[10] Newman, Peter (2003), An Investigation of Consumer Reactions to Negative WordofMouth On the Internet, doctoral dissertation, Institute of Communications Research, University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

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