Haslam College of Business - UT Haslam Research Connects Marketing Decisions to Real-World Outcomes

Marketing decisions fundamentally shape how consumers experience, engage with and develop trust in brands. Faculty in the Department of Marketing at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Haslam College Business study how these decisions — from pricing and digital communication to the use of AI — influence consumer and frontline employee attitudes and behaviors, organizational financial performance and broader stakeholder outcomes.

To better understand the relationships between marketing decisions and business results, Haslam’s marketing scholars conduct theory-driven research in both field and laboratory settings. Their work addresses a diverse set of of strategic and behavioral questions, from value creation and trust building to sensory marketing and adaptation in response to technological and market change.

Insights on Consumer Behavior in a Digital World

Haslam’s behavioral marketing faculty examine how consumers interact with products, information and digital environments, as well as how small design choices can meaningfully influence consumer behavior and decision-making.

Associate professor Mari Romero studies how visual information, such as product aesthetics, numerical representations and spatial arrangements, affect consumer preferences and spending. Her research demonstrates how the presentation of information can alter choice, offering insights into how firms can communicate more clearly and effectively. “I aim to uncover why consumers think, feel and act the way they do when interacting with products, brands or marketing messages,” Romero explains.

Fellow associate professor Annika Abell conducts influential research on how digital interfaces and features — including website design, app interfaces and rating visualizations — impact consumer behavior. Her work shows how digital design elements commonly used in practice influence consumer judgement and engagement, and highlights how firms’ interface decisions shape the consumer experience.

“Starting with real-world phenomena in the marketplace, like web platform design decisions, helps ensure practical relevance,” Abell says.

Together, research from Abell and Romero underscores how seemingly minor design decisions can have outsized effects on how consumers understand, evaluate and trust what they see. By examining marketing through the lens of real-world interfaces and information environments, their work offers practical guidance for firms navigating increasingly complex digital spaces where clarity, responsibility and consumer experience are not just design considerations, but strategic imperatives.

How Marketing Strategy Affects Trust, Loyalty and Performance

Hoorsana Damavandi, a Haslam marketing assistant professor, explores how firms’ strategic decisions create, communicate and deliver value through decisions that affect both consumer behavior and broader stakeholder perceptions. Her research examines pricing decisions, product quality and location-based strategies, seeking to understand how these choices influence customer trust, loyalty and firm performance.

Damavandi’s work highlights that strategic decisions often have consequences beyond their original goals and targets. “Firms operate within complex ecosystems where their strategic decisions may have spillover effects,” she explains.

By exploring how these effects unfold, including during times of external shocks like the COVID-19 pandemic, Damavandi’s scholarship helps clarify how firms can pursue growth while protecting trust and long-term performance.

Neeraj Bharadwaj, the Proffitt’s Professor in Marketing, examines how companies can turn societal impact into strategic advantage. His work examines how sustainability and other purpose-driven initiatives strengthen brand equity, drive long-term value and enhance competitive positioning, as well as when these elements risk undermining performance. He also explores how firms can succeed in the circular economy, offering insight into how shifting from linear “take-make-waste” models to regenerative systems can reshape operations, partnerships and value propositions. His work helps business leaders make smarter decisions about sustainability investments, brand strategy and growth in a rapidly evolving marketplace.

How Sales Strategy Shapes Frontline Performance and Well-Being

Faculty in the marketing department also conduct important research that seeks to bridge sales practice and academic theory by understanding the real-world challenges and experiences of sales teams professionals.

Associate professor Nawar Chaker studies how organizations can improve sales performance while supporting salesperson well-being and stronger customer outcomes. His research shows how digital technologies and AI are reshaping the sales function, clarifies how cross-functional dynamics influence results and identifies the traits, behaviors and organizational conditions managers can hire for and develop to boost productivity. Chaker’s findings help firms build more effective, resilient sales teams that drive revenue, customer value and market growth.

“For many companies, salespeople are the primary revenue generators and critical points of customer contact, so it is essential to understand what companies can do to better manage and promote the well-being of their salespeople while also creating exceptional customer value and grow market share,” he explains.

When Marketing Strategy and Consumer Behavior Intersect

Some of the department’s most impactful research sits at the intersection of firm strategy and consumer behavior, examining how marketing decisions and innovations affect both organizational outcomes and individual decision-making.

Stephanie Noble, the Nestle USA Professor in Business with Haslam’s marketing department, examines how firm-level innovations, such as mobile shopping technologies and service robots, change consumer behavior. One of her studies shows that grocery shoppers using mobile phones tend to move differently through retail stores, leading to increased spending. In another investigation she explores how people respond to advice from service robots and finds that consumers are more likely to follow a robot’s guidance when it is clear a human is involved.

Associate professor Aaron Garvey also focuses on how firms rely on behavioral insights when pursuing strategic initiatives, specifically in technology-driven contexts. “Strategy sets the course, but behavioral insights ensure the execution works for consumers,” Garvey explains.

Garvey’s research on AI-enabled communication shows that customers are more comfortable receiving bad news from AI but prefer good news from a human, a finding that can shape how companies design customer service systems. His work also examines how AI persuasion influences trust, offering insights relevant to both businesses and policymakers as AI-enabled tools become more prevalent.

Advancing Marketing Research and Serving Communities

By linking marketing decisions to consumer behavior, organizational outcomes and broader societal effects, Haslam’s marketing faculty demonstrate the strategic importance of rigorous marketing scholarship. Their work exemplifies how research-driven insight advances theory, informs practice and shapes markets in meaningful and lasting ways.

CONTACT:

Leah McAmis, senior editor, leah@utk.edu