Syftet med denna kandidatuppsats har varit att, genom en studie av interaktionen mellan mäklare och dess kunder samt interaktionen mäklare emellan, försöka svara på hur fastighetsmäklaren agerar i sitt dagliga arbete. Metoden som använts har varit en kvalitativ studie vilken genomförts genom en deltagande observation. Mäklarna på en fastighetsbyrå har studerats utifrån ett dramaturgiskt och ett markandsföringsperspektiv. Mäklarens arbete med att skapa legitimitet för tjänsten och en god image illustreras i form av termerna roller, kundrelationer, kundnöjdhet och word-of-mouth. Uppsatsen utmynnar i en diskussion där mäklarens påstådda oumbärlighet som mellanhand vid fastighetsaffärer ifrågasätts..

The purpose of warning labels used by governments is to decrease consumption. In Sweden, the mandatory warning labels are designed according to statutory guidelines, and not according to research on attention-grabbing graphic elements. This results in a belief that the attention toward the warning labels is poor. An extensive experiment underlies this study, which has the purpose of providing insights to the effects that warnings, warning design, and warning content has on attention, attitudes and behavior in print ads. The study shows that, even though the standard design and content has lost much of its potential to communicate the warning, it gains more attention compared to a warning label with new design and content.

The aim of this Masters thesis is to examine the use of IT, that is the Internet and other applications of personal computers, among seniors 65+. It also deals with issues of access to IT for seniors in public libraries. The theoretical background of the study consists of Rogers "Diffusion of innovations", Hektors categories of information activities, and the Swedish IT-commissions categories of motives and prerequisites for the use of IT. The research questions focus on factors motivating the use of IT, the extent and the purposes of IT use, the consequences and the barriers that IT-users experience, and views on IT in public libraries and IT courses, respectively. Qualitative interviews were carried out with nine senior IT-users.

The Dark Side of the Word-of-Mouse Effect- An experimental study of how negative information in today?s social media can influence consumer perception As a result of the electronic revolution of information dissemination, social media as a phenomenon has come to play an important part, both in society at large but also when it comes to business and marketing. Nowadays, knowledge and opinions about brands and products are spread by reputation through a wide range of social media platforms, a phenomenon which in the literature is referred to as word-of-mouse or electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM).The purpose of this paper is to investigate how people?s opinions towards a company and its product are affected by negative information in terms of eWOM. Or more precisely, whether or not there is a difference in this effect depending on information content, concerning company values on the one hand and product attributes on the other.This was done in an experimental setting where two groups of respondents were subjected to fictitious information of different types using established social media platforms.

In information retrieval there is a problem with ambiguous words. To solve this problem word sense disambiguation WSD is used. Few studies combining information retrieval and word sense disambiguation have been conducted with Swedish words. The purpose of this thesis has been divided in two. The first purpose was to examine Swedish information retrieval and disambiguation in the query phase.

The purpose of this study is to highlight the opportunities of using social media as a communicative tool to attract and engage customers on different social media platforms. In recent years social media has become an important way for business to communicate with people both national and global. The idea behind this thesis was found when we saw different approaches of how companies used social media as a marketing tool. Through a qualitative approach we did eight interviews with six different companies and two social media consults which have given us a basis of what companies really want to achieve with social media. With these interviews we were able to analyze and discuss the abilities to interact with people and how companies distribute content that engage users and increase their credibility to the company..

Word-of-mouth marketing (WOM) has been considered as one of the most effective marketing tools, yet the least understood. While its lucrative effects have been well proven in academic studies worldwide, little is yet known of why consumers engage in WOM, and what factors actually drive this sought-after behavior, particularly in an online context. While today's research lacks holistic views on the simultaneous effects of multiple WOM-drivers, this paper takes on a meta-analytic approach by building on the pertinent literature to construct an aggregated model, including several previously acknowledged drivers divided into two categories: (1) Brand related drivers and (2) Personal and situational drivers. The authors then empirically examine what drivers are the most influential on WOM in an online social media context. By doing so, this thesis does not only contribute to marketing managers' better understanding of online communications management, it also sheds light on the theoretical knowledge of the behavioral drivers of WOM.

The thesis examines the nineteenth century German philosopher and philologist Friedrich Nietzsche?s early notion of how a word is generated in the process of perception. It does so by looking at the ?metaphorical transitions? Nietzsche talks about in the essay ?Über Wahrheit und Lu?ge im außermoralischen Sinne? (?On Truth and Lie in an Extra-MoralSense?). According to the relevant passage in ?On Truth and Lie?? an image is first created as a metaphor for a stimulus and a word is then created as a metaphor for the image.

This study aims to describe how a company behind a well-established brand in the fashion industry has strategically chosen to communicate with their target market. Interviews with four individuals in different positions within the company have generated qualitative data, which is presented and analyzed in relation to the theoretical frame of reference in this study. The results show that the company does not use conventional marketing, but relies rather on marketing based word-of-mouth generated by its customer base due to its unique store concepts. Previous research has shown that this type of marketing strategy is effective and beneficial to the brand equity, a conclusion that is demonstrated to also apply to the survey object of this study. Furthermore, it is also shown that this is largely due to the distinct and coordinated image that the company maintains through strict standardization..

The cocoa produced in Fiji is exported to industrialized countries for processing of the raw material. The Swedish organization Cocoa Bello is involved in a project to provide the Fijian cocoa farmers with knowledge as well as resources to enable local processing and to attain added value of the cocoa crop. The purpose of this study is to discover a field of application for the Fijian cocoa among the rural population, using an ethnographic design. We spent one week in Namau Settlement, Fiji, where we applied in-depth interviews and participant obser-vations in six families. We found a number of aspects affecting food choices, such as social, economical and cultural beliefs.

Abstrakt: Sedan en tid tillbaka pågår en intensiv debatt i Sverige kring könsneutrala ordet Hen och om man överhuvudtaget ska använda sig av ett könsneutralt ord och undvika att benämna kön i en del sammanhang. Syftet med denna undersökning var att undersöka hur könsneutrala pronomen ? Hen påverkar människors attityder. Det är en kvantitativ studie i experimentell design, utförd genom enkätundersökningar där frågor om känslor, beteende och uppfattningar om ordet Hen efterfrågas. Antas det generellt att en text handlar om män även om det inte är definierat? Blir samhället mer förutsättningslöst med användning av könsneutrala ordet hen? Attityder är inte lätta att förutspå, människor vet vad som är rätt och fel men agerar inte alltid utifrån sin vetskap, samt med tillräckligt stor påverkan kan en person ändra sin attityd.

Abstrakt: Sedan en tid tillbaka pågår en intensiv debatt i Sverige kring könsneutrala ordet Hen och om man överhuvudtaget ska använda sig av ett könsneutralt ord och undvika att benämna kön i en del sammanhang. Syftet med denna undersökning var att undersöka hur könsneutrala pronomen ? Hen påverkar människors attityder. Det är en kvantitativ studie i experimentell design, utförd genom enkätundersökningar där frågor om känslor, beteende och uppfattningar om ordet Hen efterfrågas. Antas det generellt att en text handlar om män även om det inte är definierat? Blir samhället mer förutsättningslöst med användning av könsneutrala ordet hen? Attityder är inte lätta att förutspå, människor vet vad som är rätt och fel men agerar inte alltid utifrån sin vetskap, samt med tillräckligt stor påverkan kan en person ändra sin attityd.

Due to a growing interest in communication in today?s society the demand for equipment that is used in communication networks increases while the competition between companies that produce this equipment grows. To meet the increasing demand and at the same time having a competitive product development many companies use some effective product design, such as the modular product design. When a modular product design is used it?s good to compare different module configurations for a certain product and to simplify these comparisons some tool can be used.

In this study we have examined how men and women are heard on Sveriges Televisions program Debatt. Debatt broadcast on Sveriges Televison which is a public service broadcaster. Through the use of a quantitative content analysis and a dialogical approach, we have documented how many men and women who speak, how they speak, how long they have the word and the subjects they will be heard in, in the program Debatt. We have investigated the ten last broadcast programs from the fallseason 2011. Every program is 45 minutes long and contains from two to three discussiontopics each time. By categorizing our survey and enter the result in four different tables, we found that the majority, 63%, of those that are heard are men.

This bachelor thesis in tourism studies focuses on people's use of social media related to travel. The paper aims to provide a wider knowledge of tourist?s propensity to display destinations through social media and how they perceive others that display travelling. This is put in relation to the term of social status in order to find out if there is a possible link. The intention was to provide an insight into the phenomenon to contribute new awareness that destinations can exploit in their marketing.