Consumers’ religio-spiritual insights in Ramadhan advertisements

Abstract

Consumers get irritated and distracted while watching the Ramadan TV commercials due to the non-availability of the consumers’ religio-spiritual insights and this irritation can sometimes create a negative brand image. Marketers have ‘christmasised’ this spiritual month of Ramadan as they are considering Ramadan a seasonal shopping festival like other western festivals. Marketers reserve almost half of their annual budget for advertising during Ramadan but they are not considering the spiritual aura during this spiritual month when the spiritual contemplations of Muslims are higher than any other Islamic month. This study provides a comprehensive framework that will help marketers to incorporate consumers’ religio-spiritual insights in Ramadan TV commercials so that consumers cannot be irritated and distracted. Some of the important constructs explored in this study include spirituality, religiosity, entertainment, information, and credibility of the source. This exploratory research is conducted by following the guidelines of grounded theory. 25 in-depth semi-structured interviews have been conducted from the consumers having religious, non-religious, and sports/yoga orientations to understand the consumers’ spiritual insights and propose a comprehensive framework.