Professor Rebekah Russell-Bennett

  • Professor Rebekah Russell-Bennett

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Program Lead - People, practices, policies to lead the economy

Doctor of Philosophy, Management (University of Queensland)

Background Rebekah is a professor in marketing and co-director of the Centre for Behavioural Economics, Society and Technology (BEST). She has an international reputation for research and industry relevance in the field of Social Marketing (using commercial marketing to address social problems such as alcohol consumption,  chronic disease, water usage, electricity use, public transport and diet).  Rebekah uses theories and frameworks from services marketing and social marketing to co-create innovative services and products that support people in their life, protect the planet and enable organisational success. Rebekah has attracted more than $20m in funding from the ARC, industry and government organisations which is evidence of the high impact of her research. She has supervised 43 research students to completion and is known internationally for her active mentorship of students through the creation of opportunities. Rebekah is a sought after keynote speaker due to her humour and ability to communicate scholarly evidence in a plain-English practical manner. For an example presentation see Rebekah present a project on empowering mature women to secure housing. Rebekah's recent successes are receiving the 2021 Robert Johnston award for the best paper in the Journal of Service Management (the number 1 service journal) and co-leading the successful bid for a $6.5m ARC Industrial Transformation Training Centre on Behavioural Insights for Technology Adoption (BITA) - the first ARC ITTC in Australia from the social sciences/business fields. Rebekah is immediate past National President of the Australian Association of Social Marketing (the peak industry body for social marketing in Australia). For details of Rebekah's Real World Projects in Social Marketing visit her Linked In Profile https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebekahrussellbennett Rebekah is also a leading educator in the field of marketing and is responsible for the development of the award-winning QUTopia role-play simulation at QUT. Rebekah holds a PhD in brand loyalty for the services sector,  is the co-editor for the Journal of Services Marketing (A ranked Q1 journal) and has published over 300 peer-reviewed articles with more than 90 journal articles:

  • Journal of Business Research
  • Psychology and Marketing
  • Journal of Service Management
  • Journal of Service Theory and Practice
  • European Journal of Marketing
  • Journal of Marketing Management
  • Industrial Marketing Management
  • Journal of Brand Management
  • Journal of Product and Brand Management
  • Journal of Services Marketing
  • Health Marketing Quarterly

Rebekah has worked with organisations across a variety of service industries in Australia including

  • Australian Red Cross Blood Donation Service
  • Australian Breastfeeding Association
  • Brisbane Lions
  • Citysmart (Brisbane City Council)
  • Department of Agriculture, Water and Environment (Commonwealth)
  • Department of Education (Commonwealth)
  • Department of Energy and the Environment (Commonwealth)
  • Department of Housing and Communities (QLD)
  • Department of Natural Resource, Minerals and Energy (QLD)
  • Department of Transport and Main Roads (QLD)
  • Energex
  • Energy Consumers Australia
  • Essential Energy (NSW)
  • Lions International
  • Queensland Catholic Education Commission
  • IP Australia
  • Mission Australia
  • Sensis
  • Queensland Health
  • Queensland Rail
  • Telstra
  • Westpac
  • WorkCover
  • Yellow Pages Australia

Research interests

  • Behaviour change
  • Innovation
  • Health Services
  • Energy efficiency
  • Service Technology
  • Service design
  • Customers experiencing vulnerability

Rebekah has led over 45 social impact projects drawing on services thinking and social marketing. To view these project pages go to Service Thinking for Social Problems or the Behavioural Change and Social Marketing Program in the BEST Centre. Awards

  • 2021: Robert Johnston award for best paper (Journal of Service Management)
  • 2019: Top Australian researcher in the field of marketing (The Australian September 2019)
  • 2019: Highly commended award - Journal of Service Theory and Practice
  • 2019: Best research paper award - World Social Marketing Conference, Edinburgh
  • 2018: QUT Vice Chancellors Excellence Awards - Teaching (QUTopia)
  • 2018: Highly commended best paper - American Marketing Association Services Special Interest Group Conference
  • 2016 Best academic paper, best student paper, International Social Marketing Conference
  • 2016 Winner - National Australian Institute of Marketing Awards - Best mobile.
  • 2015 QUT Business school teaching and learning Innovation Challenge - Winner
  • 2015: QUT Vice Chancellor's Performance Fund Award (Research)
  • 2014: Office of Teaching and Learning (OLT) Citation (national) for outstanding contribution to student learning
  • 2010: QUT Vice Chancellor's Performance Fund Award (Teaching)
  • 2010: Best Paper Award, Social, Nonprofit and Political Marketing Track, Australian and New Zealand Marketing Academy Conference (ANZMAC)
  • 2008: Highly Commended Award, Emotions Network Conference, Fontaineblau, France
  • 2008: Vice-Chancellors Award for Performance (Research)
  • 2008: Vice-Chancellors Award for Performance (Teaching)
  • 2006: Best Paper Award, Emotions Network Conference, Atlanta, USA
  • 2006: Best Paper Award, e-marketing Track, Australian and New Zealand Marketing Academy Conference (ANZMAC)
  • 2001: Best Paper Award, Market Research Society of Australia National Conference
  • 2000: Best Lecturer Award, Master of Technology Management Degree, Griffith University
  • 1998: Lifetime membership conferred, Golden Key Honours Society for outstanding academic achievement.

Additional information

Experience

Professor Russell-Bennett’s work is situated within the social marketing domain and in particular social services provided by government and non-profit organisations where she facilitates the design of innovative services to improve wellbeing, the environment and society. Her contribution to the field of social marketing has been recognised by being the inaugural elected National President of the Australian Association of Social Marketing (2009-2014) and service on editorial boards of key journals.  Rebekah is a leader in shaping the debate and impact of social marketing in this country and extending innovating examples for other countries. She was recognised in 2019 by The Australian as the top Australian researcher in the field of marketing (most citations in the top 20 journals in the field). She is the coeditor of the Journal of Service Marketing where she has quadrupled the impact factor of the journal since 2014 when she took over. Translational impact Prof Russell-Bennett has made substantial research and translational impact in the field of social marketing (behaviour change). She improved electricity consumption in low-income households by 12.3% through a field experiment using gamification as part of a large-scale commonwealth government project (e.g., Journal of Business Research 106:377-387, Journal of Social Marketing 8:2-23, Psychology and Marketing, Vol 34: 394-409).  She was an expert witness in two parliamentary enquiries on the use of technology in health programs and the development of a state health promotion agency in 2015 and 2016 where many of her recommendations were adopted (Qld parliamentary inquiry into the Health Promotion Interventions Using Telephone and Web-based Technologies, Qld parliamentary inquiry into the establishment of a Queensland Health Promotion Commission). She trialled a world-first two-way automated text service to support new mothers in breastfeeding with the Australian Breastfeeding Association resulting in an 8% improvement in exclusive breastfeeding compared to women in the control group. (BMC Pregnancy & Childbirth 14:374-385).  She worked with Breastscreen Queensland (Queensland Health) to increase the level of market (customer) orientation amongst radiographers to improve the screening rates of eligible women (ch. in Social Marketing: Why Should the Devil have all the Tunes? A few more tunes 2nd ed).  She conducted multiple studies on blood donor/non-donor behaviour over several years and provided recommendations for improving marketing communication and service delivery to increase repeat donations (Service Industries Journal 37:657-660, Journal of Business Research 99: 157-166). She designed a gamified education program on moderate drinking for teenagers and in a randomised control trial funded by the ARC which improved alcohol knowledge and attitudes towards reduced drinking (Journal of Nonprofit and Public Sector Marketing, Vol 27; 105-128  Journal of Business research 68: 2155-2163). She has also contributed internationally to the development of the social marketing field in her role as immediate past president of the Australian Association of Social Marketing Russell-Bennett is a thought leader by being amongst the first to apply services thinking  in the domain of social marketing and to introduce social marketing frameworks to the services marketing literature. Example projects Rebekah co-led a project to empower mature women in maintaining secure housing after experiencing a change of circumstance (job, relationship or income). The prototype of the Women's Butterfly Project was funded by the Department of Housing and Communities in 2020/21 and is in field as a pilot-test. As one of two QUT researchers involved in a ground-breaking initiative led by CitySmart and funded by the Federal Government for $6.5 million Rebekah was successful in changing energy habits of 1000 energy usage behaviour of low-income earners through the use of technology.  The project, Reduce Your Juice had outstanding success with a reduction in electricity use and bill size as well as receiving 11 industry and academic awards. The Australian Red Cross Blood Service has funded multiple projects on donor research to identify barriers for blood donation, service perceptions amongst donors and to test the use of technology for improving blood donation rates. See project page Queensland Health funded multiple projects to identify barriers for women and men's participation in cancer screening programs. Visit our project page and select Health Screening to filter the projects. The Commonwealth Department of Education funded a project to use social marketing to widen participation in the tertiary education sector by disadvantaged groups. In this project, persona sets were developed for learners, teachers and parents with corresponding prototype designs for a digital portal that reflected the needs of each persona. LINKED IN For details of Professor Russell-Bennett's activities, visit her linked in profile https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebekahrussellbennett

Awards

Type
Academic Honours, Prestigious Awards or Prizes
Reference year
2021
Details
Best Paper Award - Social Marketing Track for "Re-imagining issue framing: The Women¿s Butterfly Project"
Type
Academic Honours, Prestigious Awards or Prizes
Reference year
2021
Details
Robert Johnson Best Paper Award for "The transformative service paradox: The dilemma of wellbeing trade-offs"
Type
Academic Honours, Prestigious Awards or Prizes
Reference year
2019
Details
2019 Top Researcher in Field of Marketing (most citations in top 20 discipline journals)
Type
Academic Honours, Prestigious Awards or Prizes
Reference year
2019
Details
Best Research Paper Award for "Hug, Nudge, Smack or Shove: How do consumers react to a social dilemma?"
Type
Academic Honours, Prestigious Awards or Prizes
Reference year
2018
Details
QUT Vice-Chancellors Excellence Award for Teaching
Type
Academic Honours, Prestigious Awards or Prizes
Reference year
2016
Details
Winner Best Academic Paper Award for "Can a digital approach change low-income energy saving behaviours?"
Type
Academic Honours, Prestigious Awards or Prizes
Reference year
2016
Details
National award winner - mobile category for Reduce Your Juice
Type
Academic Honours, Prestigious Awards or Prizes
Reference year
2015
Details
Winner - QUT Business School Teaching and Learning Innovation Challenge
Type
Academic Honours, Prestigious Awards or Prizes
Reference year
2015
Details
QUT Vice-Chancellor Performance Award - Research
Type
Academic Honours, Prestigious Awards or Prizes
Reference year
2014
Details
2014 National Citation Award for Innovation in Teaching

Publications

Research Projects

Title
ARC ITTC (CTET) for Cell and Tissue Engineering Technologies
Primary fund type
CAT 1 - Australian Competitive Grant
Project ID
IC190100026
Start year
2019
Keywords
Title
Advancing Prevention Science: Application of Social Marketing to Change the Drinking Culture of Young Australians
Primary fund type
CAT 1 - Australian Competitive Grant
Project ID
LP130100345
Start year
2013
Keywords
Social Marketing; Alcohol; Adolescents

Current Supervisions

  • Brainwaves and Behaviour: Understanding Digital Social Support Tools and Customer Engagement Behaviour
    PhD, Associate Supervisor
    Other supervisors: Dr Kate Letheren
  • The effectiveness of marketing communication for minimising resistance to cosmetic biomedical innovation: the imagined customer experience
    PhD, Associate Supervisor
    Other supervisors: Associate Professor Laura Bray
  • Behavioural insights of 'The Sandwich Generation': coping and cracking
    PhD, Associate Supervisor
    Other supervisors: Professor Uwe Dulleck
  • The Engaged Parent: The role of marketing communication and impact of rhetoric in improving low SES parental engagement in public education services
    PhD, Associate Supervisor
    Other supervisors: Associate Professor Anne Lane
  • The Robotic Service Trilemma: Understanding human wellbeing within the service triad
    PhD, Associate Supervisor
    Other supervisors: Professor Marek Kowalkiewicz
  • Copresent Service Robots in High Contact Services |
    PhD, Associate Supervisor
    Other supervisors: Associate Professor Frank Mathmann
  • Deepfakes: A state of play and interactions with behavioural biases and value
    PhD, Associate Supervisor
    Other supervisors: Dr Kate Letheren
  • Designing for Self-Discovery: Responding to dissatisfaction and disengagement in higher education by facilitating transformative experiences.
    MPhil, Associate Supervisor
    Other supervisors: Professor Larry Neale

Completed Supervisions (Doctorate)

Completed Supervisions (Masters by Research)