Types of WOM Messages

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Journal of Promotion Management , 15:357381, 2009Copyright Taylor & Francis Group, LLCISSN: 1049-6491 print / 1540-7594 onlineDOI: 10.1080/10496490903185760

Types of Word-of-Mouth Messages:Information Search and Credence-Based Services

CHARLES H. PATTIUniversity of Denver, Denver, Colorado, USA

CHIA H. CHENQueensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

Word-of-mouth communication (WOMC) has been recognized as a powerful marketing communication medium and a credible information-gathering tool. To date, the various types of WOM messages have not been adequately studied, especially in credence-based services (CBS). Using the individual interview technique, this study lls this gap by describing the three types of WOMC messages in CBS information-gathering. The results contribute to the ongoing development of WOMC theory and also advance manage-

ments understandings of the types of WOMC messages in the CBS information-gathering process.

KEYWORDS advertising, Australia, credence-based services (CBS), higher education service (HES), information search, inter-national students (foreign students), marketing communication, promotion management, prospective overseas higher education stu-dents (POHES), theory, word-of-mouth communication (WOMC)

INTRODUCTION

The service industry has become a strong, driving force in worldwide eco-nomic growth and occupies a key portion of the national economy of post-industrial countries. In all post-industrial countries, for example, the highereducation sector (focus of this study) is one of the key economic contributors.The natural characteristics of a service versus tangible products lead prospec-tive consumers into risky situations and require more complex information

Address correspondence to Charles Patti, PhD, Daniels College of Business, University

of Denver, 2101 South University Boulevard, Denver, CO 80208. E-mail: [email protected]

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358 C. H. Patti and C. H. Chen

gathering and evaluation. These characteristics include heterogeneity, insep-arability, intangibility, and perishability (Zeithaml, Parasuraman, & Berry,1985; Murray & Schlacter, 1990; Murray, 1991; Hartman & Lindgren,1993; Mitchell & Greatorex, 1993; Lovelock, Patterson, & Walker, 2001,

p. 63; Sneath, Kennett, & Megehee, 2002).Prospective higher education students commonly have limited knowl-edge and experience in choosing universities and in evaluating key aspectsof the service attributes, including future possible career prospects, effectiveteaching and learning approaches, and the overall quality of the institutions(Richard, Gabrielle, & Craig, 1999). This limited knowledge base is especially true for prospective overseas higher education students (POHES) who expe-rience a high level of various types of perceived risks (Richard et al., 1999). When consumers cannot evaluate the service quality, value, or capability of service providers, word-of-mouth communication (WOMC) becomes a cred-ible, reliable, and cost-effective alternative medium to acquire subjective service evaluation and insightful information from other experienced customers within a short period of time (Murray, 1991; Beltramini & Sirsi, 1992; Bloom& Pailin, 1995; Mitra, Reiss, & Capella, 1999; Ennew, Banerjee, & Li, 2000;Thakor & Kumar, 2000; Berry & Bendapudi, 2003; Paswan & Ganesh, 2003).

From a marketing professionals perspective, WOMC is recognized asan effective and powerful marketing medium for consumers from the initialstage of information generating, to the selection of service providers, to thepost-consumption stage (Murray, 1991; Gilly, Graham, Wolnbarger, & Yale,1998). WOMC is also a strong inuencing tool for marketing practitioners, asit accelerates the consumer adoption cycle, increases acceptance or the speedof rejection, and indicates purchase intentions (Lampert & Rosenberg, 1975;Martinez & Polo, 1996). Furthermore, WOMC has strong inuential power inleading and guiding messages received when consumers are searching for in-formation, allocating searching efforts, and undertaking the decision process.

However, previous studies of WOMC in the information gathering pro-cess for a consumer purchase mainly focus on the types of WOMC messagesin purchasing tangible goods (Lampert & Rosenberg, 1975; Richins & Root-Shaffer, 1988; Assael, 1998). Very few studies have explored the types of

WOMC messages in services. This study addresses this gap in the literatureand has two objectives: (1) to understand the types of WOMC messages inconsumers information gathering, and (2) to identify the characteristics of each type of WOMC message.

LITERATURE REVIEW

Consumers Problems in CBS Information GatheringCredence-based services (CBS) are services, such as legal services, medical

services, and education services, that consumers feel are hard to evaluateeven after purchase (Freiden & Goldsmith, 1989; Hartman & Lindgren, 1993,


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Word-of-Mouth Messages 359

p. 9; Kotler & Keller, 2009). CBS not only have traditional services character-istics (heterogeneity, inseparability, intangibility, and perishability), but alsohave their unique characteristics (high market entry barrier environment,information asymmetry between customers and providers, service quality

evaluation difculty, higher perceived risk, and perceived price insensitivity)(Darby & Karni, 1973; Nayyar, 1990; Maute & Forrester, 1991; Powpakam,1996; Gallouj, 1997; Ha, 1998; Emons, 2001).

Higher education service (HES) can be regarded as one type of CBSin that it involves high personal involvement, complexity, high intangibility,and a professional and people orientation (Patton, 2000; Veloutsou, Lewis,& Paton, 2004). HES requires qualied professional academic staff to deliverthe service at a high level. For prospective students, gathering informationabout HES providers is an enormous challenge and affects overall studentsprofessional knowledge and transferable skills in future careers. In addition,the outcome of service content (lecturing and tutoring) is difcult forprospective students to evaluate (Hartman & Lindgren, 1993; Richard et al.,1999). Before service consumption, prospective students also have limitedknowledge and experience in choosing universities and in determining whatto study, what the future possible career prospects are, what the suitableteaching and learning approaches are for them, and what comprises quality teaching (Richard et al., 1999).

These concerns are especially relevant for POHES because of lack of fa-miliarity with the environment of the service providers (universities) and thegeographic distance between the POHES and the study destination. POHESare facing a higher level of various types of perceived risks than domesticstudents, namely: nancial risk (paying for tuition and fees, the educationalinvestment return, unknown future job attainment, job market demand intheir homeland); psychological and social risk (personal fear towards thenew environment, the need to build new or rebuild existing social net- works, social isolation, cultural adjustment); and functional risk (academicservice quality and career development impact) (Richard et al., 1999).

Information Gathering and WOMC When consumers initiate information gathering, they immediately face threeinformation source concerns: (1) different types of information sources; (2)effort of information gathering; and (3) search strategy (Meera & Dholakia,1997; McColl & Fetter, 1999). Consumers sequentially utilize two types of information sources: internal and external sources. Consumers immediately scan internal information sources such as the stored long-term memory,past personal experience, and knowledge (Harrison, 2002). If consumersinternally gathered information is not sufcient to eliminate their purchaseconcerns, they will initiate external information gathering from all possible

information sources. However, the content of consumers internal sourcesis individual and limited toward services. External information source (e.g.,


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WOMC) becomes compulsory or supplemental to consumers in informationgathering.

External information gathering includes two types of sources: imper-sonal sources and personal sources.

1. Impersonal sources: marketers generated and controlled advertising andmessages, and non-marketer generated publicity (Harrison, 2002) (e.g.,personal selling, advertising, goods information on package, brochures,catalogues, independent third-party information) (Schmidt & Spreng, 1996,p. 247; McColl & Fetter, 1999; Kotler & Keller, 2009).

2. Personal sources: positive or negative information or recommendationsfrom surrounding people, such as WOMC from friends, family, peer, andneighbors (Schmidt & Spreng, 1996, p. 247; Harrison, 2002).

WOMC is a signicant source of interpersonal information, experiencesource for consumers, a cost-effective marketing tool to service providers,and one of the inuential personal information sources shaping consumersattitudes after the early stage of the consumer purchase cycle (Goldenberg,Libai & Muller, 2001). WOMC provides solutions to consumers informationgathering problems in service attributes selection and inuences consumersservice expectations (Bansal & Voyer, 2000). WOMC has been adopted by consumers as an information-seeking communication to solve problems, toallow risk reduction, and to provide an evaluation function without commer-cial interest (Lampert & Rosenberg, 1975; Kotler & Keller, 2009). Both per-sonal information and independent sources are more effective and preferredsources by service consumers than tangible goods consumers, particularly when they are adopted together. One of the reasons is that WOMC tends togive consumers a high level of condence in service information gathering(Murray, 1991).

WOMC is effective in retaining and recruiting new consumers throughsatised consumers (Haywood, 1989). These early adopters provide usefulmessages including personal testimonies and recommendations to other con-

sumers. Later adopters rely on WOMC to construct their purchase decisions.Through the spread of WOMC messages, WOMC extends and acceleratesthe adoption cycle (Martinez & Polo, 1996).

This study draws on a number of denitions of WOMC (Arndt, 1967;Lampert & Rosenberg, 1975; File, Judd, Prince, & Russ, 1992; Wee, Lim, &Lwin, 1995; Walker, 2001; Stokes & Lomax, 2002) and adopts the followingdenition: An informal, person-to-person communication process of infor-mation searching between a perceived non-commercial communicator and third parties about consumers feelings after services post-consumption. Thisdenition mainly focuses on the WOMC information-gathering process of

potential consumers.


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Customer SatisfactionService satisfaction is one of the main determining factors for consumersand service providers to generate positive WOMC in the post-consumptionphase. If consumers believe dissatisfaction is not worth complaining about,service providers may not receive any negative WOMC feedback, and thusservice shortcomings may not be addressed. This may cause accumulativeand lasting damage to service providers (Lau & Ng, 2001). Scholars indi-cate that a higher level of customer satisfaction leads to higher purchaseintentions and positive WOMC (File, Cermak, & Prince, 1994; Wirtz & Chew,2002). When service quality does not meet the perceived standard, con-sumers are likely to initiate negative WOMC such as direct contact withprospective customers, especially with the strong social-tie customers, inorder to prevent uncomfortable consumption experiences from occurring

again (Walker, 2001; Wirtz & Chew, 2002). Furthermore, WOMC senders, who are frequently close to consumers, are key inuential parties to be in-cluded as a part of the marketing target audience in WOMC promotion (Lau& Ng). Prior buying experience and expectation also inuence the levelsof service satisfaction. Burton, Sheather, and Roberts (1995) conclude thatexperienced customers tend to have higher satisfaction standards to measureservice providers performance. Experienced customers tend to be more sat-ised than novice customers, particularly if their expectations of high overallservice quality are met. By contrast, for novice customers, it is easier to satisfy their standards with a small amount of service quality improvement beyond

their expectations. WOMC is the accumulative feedback activities of the entire consumerservice purchase cycle, not a simple one-shot effort. Furthermore, perfor-mance improvement can be made in a single area. Service satisfaction alonecannot be sufcient to trigger positive WOMC (Wirtz & Chew, 2002). WOMCactivities and processes involve several challenging soft tasks such as com-munication skills, communication efciency, customer orientation, promisedservice delivery and satisfaction of key service attributes, and developingpotential and maintaining existing opinion leaders (Haywood, 1989). Oneaspect of Walkers (2001) study suggested that using process and outcomemeasures of service quality together has better predictability than process oroutcome quality alone. Furthermore, Wirtz and Chew (2002) indicated thatsatisfying customers in service outcomes should be regarded as the necessary effort to meet basic expectations before the consumers purchase intentionis formed.

Australian Higher Education Service and InformationSearching and WOMC Australian higher education attracts a signicant number of overseas stu-

dents to Australia. These students, mainly from Asia Pacic countries


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(Australian Department of Education Science and Training [Australian Depart-ment], 2004), contribute and stimulate the Australian economy and society.In the short-term, they assist domestic economic development (e.g., contri-bution to the Australian GDP, additional job creation, attractive incomes

for universities) (Marginson, 2002; Australian Department, 2004). In thelong-term, the signicant, accumulative number of graduated overseas stu-dents has created cultural impacts and exchange opportunities (Marginson),personal interactions, built-up personal cross-country connections and al-liances, and established and provided cultural, business, and political op-portunities and alliances (Patton, 2000; Michael, Armstrong, & King, 2003).Graduated students who are satised with their life experiences in Australiabecome inuential opinion leaders who testify in their countries to prospec-tive overseas students through their entire life (Mazzarol & Hosie, 1996).

As consumers, POHES conduct information gathering in several phases(problem recognition, information search, evaluation of alternatives, pur-chase decision, post-purchase behavior) in order to choose education service (partners) institutions (Richard et al., 1999; Adams, Banks, & Olsen,2002; Kotler, Hayes, & Bloom, 2002; Gomes & Murphy, 2003; Pimpa, 2003).Moogan, Baron, and Bainbridge (2001) suggested three stages in studentsinformation gathering process:

STAGE 1: ENTRY LEVELINFORMATION R EQUIREMENT

Students are mainly concerned about tangible requirements, such as coursecontent, tuitions, entry requirement (GPA) and qualication, teaching andlearning methods, and assessments (Moogan et al., 2001). POHES may alsobe concerned with additional factors such as the study destination and theEnglish prociency test.

STAGE 2: DEEPER INFORMATION SEARCHING

At this stage, students include some soft factors such as their condence inthe institutions, the lifestyle (Moogan et al., 2001), the institutions reputation,

and learning assessment. POHES may be more concerned about culturalshock and adjustments.

STAGE 3: BEFORE M AKING FINAL DECISION

When students narrow the options down to a few candidate universities, they enter this stage. The life utility functions and environment factors becomesignicant concerns. These factors are invisible, not obvious, and requiretangible or comprehensive examples to understand. POHES, however, arefacing more obstacles in terms of geographic distance, time, and nancial

constraints.


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WOMC practice, such as the efforts concerning the potential use of satisedstudents or university graduates (Mazzarol & Hosie; Harris).

METHODOLOGY The purpose of this research is to explore the types of WOMC messagesin CBS information gathering. This study adopts exploratory research tocollect preliminary CBS searching information and obtain preliminary infor-mation and new insights, and behavior patterns from consumer informationneed aspects (Hair, Bush, & Ortinau, 2003, pp. 214250; Berg, 2009). Thequalitative approach used here is highly suitable for collecting and under-standing individual experience and attitudes to WOMC (Powpakam, 1996).Further, it enhances the understanding of intangible human factors, whichare strongly correlated with satised overseas higher education students at-titudes and their intentions to initiate positive recommendations to potentialoverseas higher education students (Carr et al., 1999). Therefore, adoptingthe qualitative research approach enables the researcher to generate mean-ingful WOMC phenomena on the basis of respondents research answersthan a quantitative research approach.

Data Collection

Convergence interviewing (CI) was used to collect the data. CI is dened asan in-depth interviewing technique for collecting, analysing and interpret-ing qualitative information about peoples experiences, knowledge, opinion,and beliefs that converge on important research issues through the use of anumber of interviews (Riege & Nair, 2004). CI has been adopted as a datacollecting method in business and other disciplines for emerging businessand marketing phenomena in areas such as business ethics (Kavali, Tzokas, &Saren, 2001), organizational learning (Yeo, 2002), offshore education partner-ships (Poole, 2001), university advertising measurement (Gateld, Barker, &Graham, 1999), overseas higher education partnerships (Heffernan & Poole,2004), managerial decision making (Gateld et al., 1999), strategic man-agement (Carr & Harris, 2004), and inuencing risk attitude in managerialdecision-making processes (Pennings & Smidts, 2000).

RESEARCH DESIGN

PopulationFull-time Asian overseas students constitute a signicant proportion of the

international student population in Australia. In addition, studies indicated


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TABLE 1 Summary of Common Characteristics of Types of WOMC Messages

Types of WOMC Characteristics

Common characteristics of Communication Approach types of WOMC messages 1. Participants followed the top-down approach,

general-to-specic approach in information gathering.2. Participants may experience each type of WOMC

messages sequentially or simultaneously.Information Conguration 1. The depth of information content extended with the

level of involvement in information gathering andnumber of types of WOMC messages.

2. Participants preferred to receive all types of messagesin their native language through an interactiveapproach.

a result, researchers are able to pay extra attention in interviewing sessionsto ensuring the validity, and reliability of study ndings (Gibbs, 2002).

FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

Three types of WOMC messages were found in this study: Type 1-serviceinformation gathering trigger and guidance; Type 2-subjective personal ex-perience; and Type 3-personal advice. Although these types of WOMC mes-sages had different attributes, the common characteristics of the three typesof WOMC messages co-existed and are summarized in the following section.

The Common Characteristics of the Types of WOMC Messages As shown in Table 1, the common characteristics consisted of two aspects:communication approach and information conguration.

WOMC receivers intended to develop a long-term relationship with WOMC senders in order to continually make inquiries and receive infor-mation. Therefore, the gradually established longterm relationship and par-ticipants information gathering development progress were two main fac-tors linking these types of WOMC messages between WOMC senders andreceivers.

T YPE 1-SERVICE INFORMATION G ATHERING TRIGGER ANDGUIDANCE

The results showed WOMC receivers tended to treat WOMC messages asthe initiation of their shopping journey, the gathering of shopping instruc-tions, and information and opinions about possible suitable universities. The

summary of Type 1 WOMC messages is displayed in the Table 2.


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TABLE 2 Summary of Type 1-Service Information Gathering Triggers and Guidance


Type 1Service Functions and Benetsinformation gathering 1. To briey introduce, arouse interests towardtriggers and guidance the topics.

2. To have information gathering directions to focuson particular information sources.

3. To allocate and devote their information searchingefforts to understand CBS.

4. To have an opportunity to establish WOMCsenders willingness and the information contactsfor further information inquiring.

5. To provide summarized general positive ornegative comments of service consumptionexperience to eliminate the psychologicalconcerns/risks.

The Information Content 1. Introducing related academic topics and

macro-environmental factors.2. Arousing WOMC receivers internal and external

motives.3. Providing general subjective comments and

recognized key information cues on Australianuniversities and Australia.

4. Forwarding participants the key sources for furthersearching.

5. Participants search for the most crucial cue(s),recognition and reputation, and always balancedtheir capability and desire to attend ideal

universities. WOMC Initiators (in Homeland and Australia)1. WOMC sources include friends, peers, family

members, education staff and agents, study companions in Australia (preferred) and homeland.

2. Friends and education agents were the mostinuential WOMC senders in the long-term.

3. Education staff and tutors were more credible inthe initial stage than friends and education agents.

Information content. The information content at this stage was morelikely to be focused on four aspects. First, through an introduction to themacro-environment of study destination background, participants were ableto understand the general Australian education structure and system, generalgeographic information such as climates and temperature, and the mainmilestones in the application procedure.

Second, internal and external key inuential motives were mentionedamong participants. Internal motives included strong personal inuence,enhanced job competitiveness, higher education quality, social consensusinuence, personal growth and life experience enhancement, and over-

all cost. External motives consisted of life pace and quality, geographic


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location, weather and temperature, and immigration possibility. Internal mo-tives seemed to be more inuential and signicant than external motives.These motives, especially-internal motives, became the dominant drivingforce in the entire prospective student information gathering process.

Third, it was critical for the participants to receive the positive or neg-ative general comments on Australian education systems, general Australianeducation programs, and university learning quality before participants in-terests in studying in Australia were afrmed. For example, one typical cueamong all participants was the ofcial university ranking by third partiesas a general indicator of university strengths in terms of quality, value formoney, public recognition to homeland education ministry and future em-ployers, and the Australian community. It helped prospective students avoidchoosing unrecognized universities.

Ranking information provides some evidence about the universitysstrengths according to the third-partys neutral opinions. Ranking infor-mation only provided the service quality position relative to all programsin the university, not any specic program. Rankings helped me havea general indication of their service quality. Then I explored further tolearn their specic strengths in my eld to proceed to the rst step of narrowing the search task. (Document 11 Transcription U2)

The ranking is the main inuential power evidence I received from my friend. If I do not explore this target list of universities, I would feel I am

behind my friends. (Document 11 Transcription U2)

Participants and their peers consistently paid extra attention to univer-sity rankings and consistently ignored the potential compatibility betweenthemselves and the university, their personal learning style, and other tangi-ble factors such as classroom size, total nancial budget and cost, and therequired environmental adjustment.

Next, due to high exibility and accessibility of WOMC sources, par-ticipants adopted WOMC information from all possible personal sourcesnetworks or their surroundings, and commercial information sources in their

homeland or Australia. The coverage and depth of personal information de-pended on prospective students information accessibility and their searchefforts.

Information barriers. Prospective students faced several informationbarriers in their own microenvironment:

1. New environment, situational problems, and experiences that were neverfaced at school.

2. No or little access to WOMC to obtain subjective experience and

knowledge.


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3. Language barriers when inquiring or seeking to enhance or obtain accurateinformation in terms of content in depth and scale of questioning.

. . . after I have experienced ESL school and university. Now I have no

problems in nding the ESL schools and universities by myself. I am sureI do not need the agent to help me apply for ESL schools and universities.(Document 10 Transcription G5)

Limitations of type 1 WOMC messages. The main limitations of the Type1 WOMC messages were the subjective, preliminary information content andlimited information volume for participants. WOMC receivers were easily in-uenced by other interpersonal sources such as peer inuence. The inuence was especially signicant for prospective female students who were seekingstudy companions in order to overcome social risk and future uncertainty.

T YPE 2-SUBJECTIVEPERSONALE XPERIENCE

Type 2 WOMC messages extended the scope of previous content in termsof information amount and the level of details. Additionally, WOMC sendersprovide their subjective experience and knowledge to prospective students without inputting personal comments, judgement, and intentional inuence.Therefore, not only did credible information increase, but also the layer of information had extended from simple factual data gathering to psychologicaland emotional encouragement. The summary is set out in Table 3.

The time sequence difference appears because the personal basic needsare the rst condition to meet, then I can enter the second step andconsider studying. When I am in my country, I know my environment.Since I have arrived here, my daily survival becomes the rst task I haveto solve before I can take care of other issues. (Document 4 TranscriptionQ1)

Not to change the university, but I changed course selection when Istudied ESL school. The main reason is that I trust my friends opinion andhis view and depth of his opinion is much higher and wider. He bringsme ideas, important points to consider, and information that trigger meto reect on my thinking and help reach my new decision. It takes sometime to digest and reect the information. This crucial decision came outafter 34 months. I needed time to think. I truly believe the point iscritical to lead me to the next important point and open a door for me.(Document 4 Transcription Q1)

Situational timing for type 2 WOMAC messages. When prospective stu-dents faced the following two situational categories, they were likely to

conduct a search for Type 2 and further WOMC messages.


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TABLE 3 Summary of Type 2Subjective Personal Experience


Type 2Subjective Functions and Benetspersonal experience 1. Provide accumulated factual information, subjective

academic and life experience for participants to collect,clarify and conrm the gathered information.

2. The collected experience and information assistedparticipants to decide on target universities.

3. Saving time on trial-and-error process, allows immediatestart on the right track to gather information, enhancesthe level of understanding receivers concerns from theprovided information and valuable lessons through theinteractive approach in their native language.

4. To adopt a concise, direct, economical, and conclusiveapproach to focus on the central questions and avoidinformation overow from impersonal sources such asprinted materials and the Internet.

5. Personal experience becomes life experience lessonsand alternative wisdom kept for later needs.

6. Providing continuous psychological and emotionalsupport to overcome participants frustrations,psychological risks, self-condence loss, emotionalexhaustion, and uncertainties.

7. Established the trust connection to refer to other WOMCsenders to address unanswered questions.

Information Content 1. Received extensive, deeper, detailed, voluminous

information on previous and additional issues.2. Related to university/academic: the possible admission

feedback from universities, other alternative university entry programs, and a universitys specic strengths infaculty and teaching quality.

3. Related to improving their academic performanceinformation and study skills in individual subjects:lecturers teaching and evaluation patterns, particularevaluation activities and tips, and previous lecture notes.

4. Related to local living adjustment and local knowledgeinformation, particularly when participants rst arrivedin Australia: more accurate living cost information andkey expense items, accommodation searching andarrangements, shopping experience (saving tips),banking and nancial information (foreign currency trading activity), immigration regulation (workingpermits, visa extension procedure, permanentimmigration information).

WOMC Inuential Senders1. In homeland and Australia, friends (peer, school staff)

and private education agents were the most inuential WOMC senders.

Situational Timing1. Particular situational timing or environment factors

stimulated and encouraged participants to seek Type 2- WOMC messages.


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The rst category of situations directly related to prospective studentsown capability (e.g., the level of knowledge and experience):

1. Prospective students had little or no knowledge about the Australian ed-

ucation system and no ideas about how to start gathering information.2. Impersonal information was not efcient or transparent in their environ-ment.

3. Overseas experience knowledge was not accessible and available.4. Prospective students faced the barriers in language and information access.5. Prospective students had low psychological condence to make their own

decisions.6. Prospective students needed to clarify the key issues and resolve the

intangible questions (e.g., teaching quality and accommodation).7. Prospective students had short time duration for information gathering

and decision making.8. Prospective students were not comfortable with the result of their own

data collection regarding credibility, reliability, and the possible potentialissues.

All universities websites try to tell all students their universities are betterand they should come to study. I would like to have reliable informationto tell me the real situation from personal experience. In my case, I felt my alumnus was reliable to me and he was referred by my college principal. Also from this personal information source, it told me information that was not provided by the university. (Document 8 Transcription Q-3)

The second category of situations related to WOMC senders informationquality, and included:

1. Situations when WOMC message senders were not able to provide moreup-to-date information, accurate knowledge and experience, and

2. Situations when WOMC senders were not able to supply the additionalcredible answers or solutions and collective personal experience.

Type 2 WOMC messages provided conrmation and enhanced personalcondence on application and studying in university and enabled prospec-tive students to recover from the negative emotion and reduce the level of perceived risk. The result strengthened the social relationship between theparticipants and their friends or education agents. Participants also regardedType 2 subjective personal experience as the access to credible throughexperience sharing.

Whenever I feel anxious, I will catch any possible personal sources and

ask for questions. Whoever the person is! I did not make a lot of effort


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to search for particular personal source. However, if I knew someoneor someone gave me the contact information, then I contacted personalright away, such as my sisters friends who were studying in Australia. Theinformation searching process can help me reduce my level of anxiety.(Document 6 Transcription U1)

Whether positive or negative, personal experience enhanced partici-pants understanding on the key issues, built their capability for comparingthe facts, claried prospective students obscured situations, enhanced un-derstanding, and provided how-to solutions to negative university replies.The unknown answers or the further information requests also might bereferred to other alternative sources with their endorsement. In particular,personal experience sharing from trusted friends provided a foundation tostart conducting their own information gathering to nd solutions.

T YPE 3-PERSONALADVICEType 3-Personal Advice refers to WOMC messages based on senders profes-sional and personal judgement, knowledge and prior subjective experience.Effective Type 3 WOMC messages commonly appear after Type 2 WOMCmessages with the established ongoing social-tie relationship and involvehigh-level psychological involvement, emotional interactions, and consid-erations of prospective students problems. A summary of Type 3 WOMCmessages is presented in Table 4.

In total, three main information-processing tasks were found: compar-

ing, conrming, and advising. WOMC senders were requested to assist incomparing the difference between the stated facts in impersonal sources (fa-cility, course structure, and design) and their subjective experience (teach-ing quality and staff qualication), to conrm their subjective experience andopinions (overall service satisfaction), and to elicit prospective students owndecisions or judgements to boost the level of condence on decision mak-ing (nal selection of university for enrolment, suitable lecturers). WOMCsenders information gathering patterns and the feedback on particular lec-tures teaching quality were particularly meaningful for the participants whohad low teacher-to-student-ratio courses (e.g., music performance and re-

search supervision). The information content mainly related to academic advice (e.g., lecturing approaches). WOMC receivers preferred and commonly requested a guideline to enhancing overall academic performance.

My friends also help me to construct my course selection and structure.My friend told me which seminars or courses are important for me toenrol. It was based on her personal experience and judgement. It wasthe most useful and needed information from my friend. Also, she gaveme comments on the difculties of studying in university. It helped meto work hard without the possible disappointments. (Document 10 Tran-

scription G5)


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TABLE 4 Summary of Type 3Personal Advice

Types of WOMC Comments/Description

Type 3Personal advice Functions and Benets1. WOMC receivers were able to generate informative

comparisons, conrmations, and solutions focusedenquiries to receive personal comments, insightfulsuggestions, or judgement to solve particular issues.

2. Three information processing tasks were involved:comparing, conrming, and advising.

3. With increasing established strong social ties between WOMC receivers and senders from previous types of WOMC messages, Type 3 WOMC messages naturally appeared after Type 2 WOMC messages.

Information Content 1. WOMC senders provide professional, knowledgeable,

insightful suggestions or comments mainly related tocritical issues such as university and teaching quality,program structure, faculty operation, academicperformance, learning style, teaching approaches, andcareer planning.

2. The messages tend to be presented through warnings inlectures.

3. Preferable attributes: (1) the up-to-date information;(2) insightful, deep, projective suggestions according to WOMC receivers situations; (3) clarifying, conrming,solving the concerns and proposing a solution;(4) successful experience of personal testimonies/storiesrelated to receivers personal problems or possible futurechallenges and learning difculties (e.g., group meeting,

teamwork activities, and study skills); (5) written inprospective students languages (if it is applicable). WOMC Inuential Senders1. Experienced friends and private education agents in

homeland and Australia.

The selection of studying subjects, future careers, and the outlook forjobs. How is the status of degree recognition in my study, such as phar-macy practice in my country? Because I was not able to thoroughly

considering these thingsdue to the short duration between my grad-uation and university entry. Secondly, the outcome of graduation frommy study is not bright as here. In my country, the income of pharmacy in my country is low and the role is insignicant. By contrast, here itis emphasised and that lets me realize the importance of my degree. Ibelieve that the social, emotional, cultural adjustments are the challengesfor me after I graduate. (Document 6 Transcription U1)

When prospective students need feedback on the comparison analy-sis or to conrm the targeted university, participants expect to have frank,

insightful feedback on their questions.


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For example, when I was collecting college information, I read the adver-tising in a local Chinese newspaper about the college program and coursestructure. I knew that entering the college is a pathway or a solution forme to study in university. Later I talked with my friends about their university experiences with programs and course structures. (Document 7Transcription G4)

The best time for WOMC receivers to adopt Type 3-personal advice was when participants faced unsolvable situations. Since Type 3 involved a highlevel of subjective comments and judgment, WOMC senders tended to provide personal examples rather than direct advice. Therefore, to avoid possibleopinion disagreement and social relationship disharmony, WOMC senderstended to wait for information seekers inquiries.

The personal advice is most useful when I have difculty interpretingthe information. Then I need additional help to correct or inform my view about decisions. Such as when I arrive I might not even be awareof my learning difculty in interpreting assignment requirements andinstructors standards. My friends suggestions and interpretations helpedme identify, clarify, and explain the instructors points. The advice helpsme have the best performance. (Document 4 Transcription Q1)

You should go to Lab, and you go to see your lecturers or e-mail lecturersto ask questions. He told me that I could do this and this was somethingI did not know. He helps me understand the normal boundaries and howto get assistance from the lecturers . . . (Document 9 Transcription Q4)

Another ideal timing point for Type 3 WOMC messages was when par-ticipants were involved with legal regulations. The attitude of WOMC senderstended to include serious warning messages in their advising, such as Youshould study hard, Watch out for the absent rate, and You should pay attention to what you say.

When prospective students considered their course or subjects, WOMCsenders subjective experience helped to diagnose and solve prospective stu-

dents concerns. By contrast, impersonal university publications only explainprogram structure and are not able to provide assistance to help prospectivestudents make high involvement decisions.

Program and course descriptions do not thoroughly reect what to expectin the course. I can not understand the pre-requisites to the certain sub-jects, although the information indicates there is no pre-required subjectneeded. However, it is better to have certain subjects taken in advancein order to have better learning performance. This usually needs WOMCthat provide me with the experiences of other students and gives me

advice about pre-requisites. (Document 4 Transcription Q1)


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Limitations of type 3 WOMC messages. Considerable limitations of Type3 WOMC messages were discovered. They were: (1) the messages werebased on individual, subjective experience, and the senders situation mightbe unique; (2) WOMC senders showed the attitude they are not responsible

for participants decisions, academic results, and personal problems; (3) par-ticipants tended to mainly take WOMC senders advices as learning lessons,case examples, and possible solutions in their nal decision making

CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

Three types of WOMC messages were discovered in this study: Type 1-service information gathering trigger and guidance, Type 2-subjective per-sonal experience, and Type 3-personal advice. Prospective students com-monly adopted the top-down approach or the general-to-specic approachin the WOMC information gathering process. The diversity in the depth of information content also extended with the level of relationship involvementand information gathering duration.

Type 1 WOMC messages triggered and aroused participants internaland external motives to attract participants interests. Type 1 also introducedoverall features and benets of education service products without deepersubjective experience sharing or advising. Signicantly, WOMC senders provided information-gathering guidelines to initiate information gathering. In-formation sharing established the social connections for ongoing informationsharing development and provided experienced feedback, thus minimizingparticipants psychological concerns.

Type 2 WOMC messages supplied personal subjective experience andknowledge to prospective students without personal judgements or recom-mendations. The function of Type 2 WOMC message was to accumulatesubjective study and life experience from the two most inuential WOMCsourcesfriends and education agentsin order to clarify and conrm col-lected impersonal information.

Type 3 WOMC messages were based on senders professional and per-

sonal knowledge and experience to give the senders subjective commentson participants concerns about academic and life issues. The best timing forthe supply of Type 3 WOMC message was when participants were facingdifcult or unexpected events. Then, participants were able to appreciatedeep, insightful, projective suggestions or advice from WOMC senders.

Implications for ManagementThis study provides promotion management guidance, particularly for

Australian university administrators and their agents, in designing and


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implementing effective marketing messages. Specically, this study sug-gests the designing of WOMC messages according to the service providersown strength(s), especially in functional risk (e.g., innovative course design,unique course content, exibility in take-in sessions, heritage programs and

reputation) and perceived price risk (e.g., value for money, internationalprice comparison, perceived benets). It also leads practitioners to turn con-sumers motives and information needs into the design of the personalized,controlled interactive marketing communication packages (e.g., personal tes-timony, stories) through integrating other marketing communication media.Therefore, the managed WOMC messages can be presented in personalized,effective, concise, timely, and neutral content to attract prospective Asianstudents.

Limitations and Further Study This study involved full-time Asian international students from Pacic Rimcountries in Australian universities. However, the population of Australianuniversities is multicultural and may not be represented by a single popu-lation group. Future research can explore other regional overseas students with diversied cultural background, such as Western and Middle East coun-tries (Wee et al., 1995; Lau & Ng, 2001; Liu et al., 2001; Boulard, 2004; Money,2004), to show how the cultural differences impact on WOMC adoption andtypes of WOMC messages. Furthermore, the research sample collection does

not include other Australian higher education institutions such as polytechnicinstitutions, where a growing number of Asian overseas students are attend-ing for their personal development or immigration purposes. Including thisgroup of population may contribute additional ndings.

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Documents

Types of WOM Messages