Isabelle Dabler, Senior, Sam Walton Honors College of Business

Author: Isabelle Dabler | Major: International Business

My name is Isabelle Dabler, and I am completing my honors thesis under the mentorship of Professor Sarah Jensen of the Sam Walton College of Business Marketing Department. I am in the Honors Sam Walton College of Business at the University of Arkansas with a major in International Business with a concentration in Marketing and a minor in French. Over the course of my senior year, I am researching young consumers in the United States and how their perceptions of foreign luxury brands are formed as well as influenced by certain mediums such as social media, music, television, movies, etc. In the future, I will be moving back to my hometown of St. Louis, Missouri and perusing a career in Marketing.

For my honors thesis, the research I conducted was primarily primary research through surveys of students at the University of Arkansas. I asked a series of questions starting off easy asking things such as ‘Which foreign luxury brands are you familiar with,’ ‘Do you own any products from foreign luxury brands’ and so on. My survey then dove a little deeper asking participants about whether their perceptions of foreign luxury brands and products are influenced by things they see on social media platforms, on TV, in movies, or in music. I also asked participants if they believe that other people’s perceptions can be influenced by such mediums and to explain their reasoning. Overall, I found that survey participants not only felt influenced themselves, but also felt that other people could be influenced as well with social media playing the biggest role in exposing participants to the products as well as influencing their perceptions.

As an international business major studying marketing, I believe this research is important because with a more exhaustive understanding of how foreign luxury goods are viewed by young people, marketers in foreign countries can develop new strategies to advertise and sell said products. A lack of a vast understanding of how your products are perceived can lead to money being wasted on ineffective marketing strategies or cause companies to miss out on an entire market of potential customers. It is critical that foreign luxury brands understand that there has been a generational shift in consumers purchasing these products meaning the brands need to cater to their new market. In addition, with the knowledge of how consumers are being exposed to the products and how their being influenced, brands can use that information to tap into new marketing tactics and leverage the power of working with popular influencers to advertise their products, placing more sponsored advertisements on social media platforms, or even working with popular artists to incorporate product placements in their lyrics or music videos.

I chose my topic while finishing up my Spring semester of my junior year. I was enrolled in my mentor; Professor Sarah Jensen’s global marketing course and I was always interested to learn about the marketing processes and tactics used in other countries. I had also been seeing a lot of luxury products on my social media accounts, YouTube, hearing about them in music, etc., and thought it would be an interesting topic to research for my thesis. Since I was so interested in Professor Jensen’s course, I asked her to be my mentor for my thesis. Professor Jensen has played a crucial role in helping me stay on track with my thesis as well as providing tips on how to find more useful research, how my paper should be formatted, editing suggestions, and so much more. She has been a great mentor so far in this process and I am happy that we are able to collaborate on this research topic together.

Although I have not finished my thesis in its entirety yet, I have already learned so much about the topic from my research for my literature review. As I was researching information for my literature review, I had been sending out my survey to collect responses and it was fascinating how the previous research I had been analyzing was being proven once again by the data I was collecting from my survey. For example, through research I learned about the powerful abilities social media has on influencing young people and after closing my survey and looking over all the responses, 80.5% of participants stated they believe that social media has the biggest influence on their perceptions. Though, the research did come with challenges. At first my searches to find information were entirely too broad and unfocused. This caused me to narrow my thinking and ask myself what information am I truly looking for in order to answer my research questions? I also found that when searing for research on the topic of young consumers in the united states and their perceptions of foreign luxury brands was turning up information about young consumers, but not domestically based. I overcame such challenges by again, narrowing my focus, as well as scouring several different types of research data bases and using advanced search tools to find my needed research. I also still read the studies on young consumers in other countries to pull out information from the literature reviews that focused on broader, and general perceptions of all young consumers everywhere.

As for what’s next for me, I will soon be entering my final semester of college and will be finishing up my honors degree in international business and marketing. After college, I hope to be able to use the knowledge I acquired through my research and marketing classes such as that of Professor Jensen’s to use in my career in marketing.