Past Conferences
- Online Media and Online Marketing
- Visual Marketing: Theory and Action
- Restoring America's Image Abroad
- Marketing Meets Design
"Leveraging Consumer Psychology for Effective Health Communications"
While researchers in consumer psychology and public health communications both seek to learn more about how consumers make their health-relevant decisions, and how to craft more effective health-related interventions, they do not learn often enough from each other's work. In addition, much of the valuable work in both these research streams does not often actually get applied to many of the major health-care challenges facing citizens and policy-makers.
This conference brought together top research-scholars from the consumer psychology and public health communications communities, as well as policy makers who presented work on fighting the obesity epidemic.
"Online Media and Online Marketing"
Consumers are rapidly embracing online media, online communities and online retailing. Marketers today need to understand the opportunities and roles of these new tools. How significant are the trends? What drives them? How will they affect marketing practice and theory? How can we separate reality from hype – and what can be learned from early successes and failures? Leading speakers from industry and academia brought the latest news on these topics to the table.
The conference was organized by the Marketing Science Institute in Boston and the Sloan Center for Internet Retailing at Anderson Graduate School of Management, University of California, Riverside and co-sponsored by The Yaffe Center
"Visual Marketing: Theory and Action" Conference
Visual marketing – brands, logos, packaging, websites, television, and more – vie for consumers’ attention more strongly than ever. Despite vast sums spent on visual persuasion and its prominent position in marketing practice, we have no coherent body of knowledge available to improve its impact.
With support from the Yaffe Center and others, this 2005 conference explored new directions in this growing area of study.
Publication: Visual Marketing: From Attention to Action
Edited by Michel Wedel and Rik Peters
Published by Taylor and Francis (Psychology Press), this comprehensive book aims to further research and theory development in visual marketing. It brings together leading researchers in the field to help establish visual marketing as a coherent discipline. It addresses three areas in visual marketing theory: attention and perception; visual cognition; and action and choice. It goes beyond what is known, and offers a more visionary account of the directions that visual marketing research could and should take.
The new volume is not confined to advertising alone. It shows how visual marketing permeates almost all consumer and marketing activities. It will be of interest to undergraduate and graduate students in marketing, management, industrial design, and consumer and social psychology. Professional practitioners, especially those involved with marketing communications, retail, and in store marketing and market research, will also benefit from the empirically based and innovative ideas put forth in this book.
"Restoring America's Image Abroad”
Robin Wright (Washington Post Global Affairs Correspondent and Middle East expert) chaired a distinguished panel to discuss this vital topic. Our guests came from every sector: the State Department, media, industry (including Altria Group, Inc. and Hill and Knowlton) with academic experts from the University of Michigan and more.
Panelists discussed how the US communicates its policies overseas in these difficult times. They were also part of a larger, closed workshop on "Communicating with Skeptical Audiences-Challenges and Solutions."
The workshop and panel discussion were organized by the Yaffe Center, funded by Mr. William K. Fung and supported by the University of Michigan's International Institute and Davidson Institute.
> Restoring America's Image Abroad Workshop Notes
Marketing Meets Design
The Yaffe Center and the Marketing Science Institute held a very successful joint conference entitled, "Marketing Meets Design," in New Orleans in 2003. With design and marketing experts in the field from both business and academics, the conference considered case studies of the business value of design, strategic and organizational issues of integrating marketing and design, and followed up with a session on research issues and advice.
Experts included:
- Sam Farber, Founder, OXO International
- Philip Thompson, Brand Studio Manager, Whirlpool Corporation
- Jeff Smith, Chirman, Lunar Design, Inc.
- Lee Green, Director, Corporate Identity and Design, IBM Corporation
- Jeff Harley, Manager of Brand Character and Theme Research, Design Center, General Motors Corporation
> Full List of Marketing Meets Design Conference Speakers and Agenda