Consumer Semiotics

Although structural semiotics has origins in the dual disciplines of communication science and anthropology, many commercial semioticians limit their practice to the analysis of texts such as advertising, popular media, and cultural phenomena, to the exclusion of consumer research. Some practicing semioticians even advertise that semiotics does not apply to consumer behavior. However, a cursory look at the academic literature makes it clear that the object of semiotics is not limited to textual analysis, but applies to a wide range of human experiences, including social organization (Hodge and Kress 1988), cinema spectating (Metz [1976] 1981), the flow of traffic in a mall (Oswald 2015), and even animal behavior (Sebeok 1972). Furthermore, in the course of twenty years of consulting to blue chip companies, it is clear that the object of semiotics is not limited to textual analysis, but also applies to a wide range of marketing factors including consumer-centered design strategy, cultural branding, and media planning. This chapter illustrates how semiotics can be applied to standard qualitative research methods to gain deeper insights, encourage respondent creativity, and improve the consistency and validity of findings for the client. Christian Pinson contributes an early essay on marketing semiotics research.