Dr Maria van Dessel

Biography

Maria graduated with a Ph.D. at the School of Advertising, Marketing and Public Relations at the Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia in 2010. Her principal teaching and research cover the general area of marketing communications with a focus on advertising. Her teaching assignments have included undergraduate and postgraduate courses in marketing, market research, ethics in marketing communications, direct marketing, contemporary issues in advertising, advertising management and foundation advertising subjects. Her dissertation focused on an area largely overlooked by academic researchers: business-to-business (B2B) advertising. Maria’s research challenges long-standing assumptions within the “facts sell” approach for creating effective B2B marketing communications by investigating the effect of symbolic and literal messages on advertising performance. Early in her academic career, Maria has presented at three international conferences with journal and proceedings publications.
Research Focus and Impact
Maria’s research focus concerns the effect of literalism and symbolism in business-to-business (B2B) print advertising. In contrast to consumer markets—which demonstrate the benefit of cultivating deep emotional connections through symbolic advertising messages—most B2B ads are literal. Maria’s research (the effects of alternative advertising message strategies) contributes to mass communication theory, research methodology (specifically, the development of message measurement scales), and the practice of B2B marketing communication. The results of her first major study on the effects of message strategy have challenged the long-standing reliance on literal messages to contribute to profitability of B2B markets. Her work on scale development and large-scale content analysis have attracted the interest from other scholars and has lead to further studies and collaborations on an international level.
Research interests

• Advertising message strategy


• Literalism and symbolism in advertising messages


• Business-to-business advertising


• Advertising education and research

Awards

• Nominated QUT Outstanding Doctoral Thesis Award, 2010


• Ph.D. QUTPRA Scholarship, 2008


• Finalist: ISBM 2008 Doctoral Competition, Institute for the Study of Business Markets (ISBM), Pennsylvania State University, U.S.A. 2008


• QUT Outstanding Contribution Award: Highly Commended, 2006