Nail it! - The impact of creative product variant names on purchase intention for cosmetics

Abstract

In this study we examine if creative product names impact consumers’ purchase intention for cosmetics. By combining previous literature about creativity, branding, self-congruity and hedonic consumption we hypothesised that hedonic products, exemplified by cosmetics, should benefit from creative names. An experiment including nearly 700 respondents tested creative product names within three selected categories against alpha-numeric names. The results of the experiment revealed that two out of three categories, Geography and Animals & Nature, increased purchase intention among consumers on a statistically significant level. For the third category, Sex & Romance, the results were not significant. Altogether, we conclude that creative product names, particularly those with strong symbolic meanings, positively affect purchase intention for cosmetics.