The impact of placebo effect on purchase in promotion activities

Consumers' perceptions, attitudes, and even personalities are the factors that affect individuals' purchasing behaviors and their evaluations of goods and services. In this direction, the beliefs that consumers develop for brands, the experiences they have with the brand, and the attitudes they exhibit are affected by the psychological elements that consumers have. The placebo effect, which is used by businesses in marketing strategies to motivate consumers' purchasing behavior, is defined as the effect of consumers' beliefs and expectations shaped by their daily life experiences on product judgments and services. It can be said that the placebo effect has started to be included in the marketing mix elements and marketing strategies to motivate the purchasing behaviors of consumers by businesses and in promotion activities, which are the key points with the consumer in the target audience. In this context, promotion activities will be analyzed within the scope of this thesis to observe the effect of the placebo effect on the consumer's purchase intention. Within the scope of this study, country of origin effect, scarcity concept, sales promotion activities, product packaging, digital marketing and social media activities are considered as promotion activities. In the study using qualitative research methods, online survey method was used. Keywords: placebo, marketing, marketing mix, promotion activities