Situation Variation in Consumers’ Media Channel Consideration

In this article, the authors investigate consumers’ consideration of media channels during different usage situations. They develop a model that explains consumers’ media channel consideration as a function of the media channel’s perceived benefits. In addition, they hypothesize that the usage situation affects consumers’ media channel consideration and that situation-based benefit requirements moderate the effect of the benefits on their channel consideration. The authors test the hypothesized relationships using survey data from 341 consumers regarding their consideration of 12 different media channels used by manufacturers to communicate product information across three product-related usage situations. The results of the analyses support the proposed model structure and confirm the expected relationships among perceived media channel benefits, usage situations, media channel requirements, and consumers’ media channel consideration.