Being True to Oneself: Investigating Celebrity Brand Authenticity

Celebrity brand authenticity is introduced as a construct that represents consumer perceptions of celebrities being “true to oneself” in their behaviors and interactions with consumers. A scale is developed through two purification stages and the scale's predictive validity is assessed. First, the meaning of celebrity brand authenticity to consumers is explored. Second, the Authenticity Inventory from the psychology literature is adapted to develop a scale for consumer perceptions of celebrity brand authenticity. Celebrity brands are perceived as true to self when they appear genuine in their relationships with consumers and behave in accordance with their perceived held values. Evidence of the convergent and discriminant validity of the celebrity brand authenticity scale is provided, which confirms celebrity brand authenticity as distinct from celebrity attachment, despite containing relational items. Finally, the predictive power of celebrity brand authenticity is confirmed through positively influencing consumer intentions to purchase an endorsed brand. Brand managers can use celebrity brand authenticity to position or develop celebrity brands, as well as in the selection of celebrity endorsers.     

The moderating impact of perceived globalness on consumers’ purchase intentions for copycats: The pleasure of hurting global brands

Copycats or “me‐too” brands imitate prominent features of market leaders with the intention to benefit from consumers’ positive associations of the imitated brand. However, the imitated market leader can be perceived as being local (=in‐group) or global (=out‐group). Employing social identity theory, Study 1 examined the interaction between copycat strategy and perceived globalness of the brand, showing that consumers have higher purchase intentions for global copycats versus a local counterpart. Study 2 shows that the interacting effect of copycat strategy and perceived globalness is moderated by consumer ethnocentrism. Further, authors demonstrate that a global copycat elicit greater schadenfreude (vs. local brand), which in turn increases consumers’ purchase intentions. Subsequent mediation analysis shows that ethnocentric consumers experience schadenfreude upon encountering copycats of global brands, which in turn increases purchase intention, whereas low ethnocentric consumers show higher purchase intentions for local differentiated brands because they deem a copycat strategy as unacceptable. Finally, Study 3 examines whether the results from Studies 1 and 2 continue to hold for theme copycats.     

An Extended Search for Generic Consumer–Brand Relationships

Relatively few empirical studies address the question of generic relationships between consumers and brands. But a relationship‐oriented brand communication seems to have become increasingly important to companies. In this article, the authors present details of a study on generic consumer–brand relationships conducted in Germany. Based on the data of more than 900 consumers, four different types of consumer–brand relationships emerge, characterized as “best friendship,” “unemotional purpose‐based relationship,” “loose contact,” and “happy partnership.” An extended analysis of the data using advanced statistical methods supports these findings to a high degree. Furthermore, as the results of the extended analysis also suggest, numerous well‐known brands often appear within less favorable relationships like “unemotional purpose‐based relationship” and “loose contact.” These findings indicate important shortcomings of relationship‐oriented brand management in many companies and suggest the need for further work in this area.     

The neurophysiological mechanisms underlying brand personality consumer attraction: EEG and GSR evidence

The “similarity-attraction” mechanism of brand personality exists in a state of controversy because many studies have found that the brand personality favored by consumers is inconsistent with their personality. The psychological reasons underlying this paradoxical situation remain unknown. Therefore, based on the circumplex model of emotion theory in neuroscience, this study uses EEG and GSR to measure physiological responses and self-assessment questionnaires to the display of 5 brand personality images to subjects with different Big Five personality traits. 36 undergraduate students participated in the experiment. The results show that: 1) if the questionnaire survey method is used, the results are approximately consistent with previous studies, which is consistent with the theory of ‘similar personality leads to attraction’. 2) The subjects' physiological indicators were not concordant with the self-report scores. Based on EEG and GSR results, brands with the “competence” personality strongly attracted consumers with strong ‘openness’. Subjects with strong “conscientiousness” avoided the ‘sincerity’ and ‘ruggedness’ brand personality; Based on the “emotion/feeling” theory of neuroscience, this study explains the non-concordant results of physiological indicators and self-assessment questionnaires, and proposes a new solution to the controversial issue of brand personality theory. Our findings have significant practical value for guiding brand personality design and the identification of target consumer groups.     

A path to altruism: Investigating the effects of brand origin and message explicitness in CR‐M campaigns

An increasing number of fashion brands are employing cause‐related marketing (CR‐M) campaigns to promote their social responsibility. However, with growing consumer skepticism about CR‐M, it is becoming more difficult than before to encourage consumers' positive responses to these campaigns. Based on construal level theory and rhetorical theory, this study examined the way brand origin (local vs. global), and its interaction with message type (explicit vs. implicit), influence consumers' perceived brand altruism and brand favorability. Two experimental studies were conducted with a total of 574 U.S. consumers. The results of Study 1 indicated that consumers exhibited higher perceived brand altruism and brand favorability toward a local brand's CR‐M campaign than a global brand's, showing that psychological distance can influence a CR‐M campaign's effectiveness. In addition, the results of Study 2 revealed that an explicit CR‐M message was more effective for global brands, while an implicit message was more effective for local brands, and perceived brand altruism mediated both effects. This suggests the importance of framing messages according to brand origin to maximize CR‐M campaigns' ability to achieve their goals effectively, in which perceived brand altruism plays a key role. The study's implications and limitations are discussed.     

The Eyes Have It: How a Car's Face Influences Consumer Categorization and Evaluation of Product Line Extensions

This research focuses on a previously unexamined risk associated with the widely used new product development strategy of line extensions. Specifically, it explores consumer reactions when line extensions become too visually similar and examines both short‐term and longer term strategies for solving the problem. Examined in the context of consumer durables, specifically, automobiles, the results show that consumers who make categorization mistakes when trying to distinguish between two visually similar product lines have more negative attitudes not only toward the product but also toward the parent brand. The results of Study 1 confirm that providing a design vocabulary that articulates the car's design features is effective in reducing consumer's categorization mistakes. In addition, results of Study 2 indicate that changes to the car's “eyes” (headlights) are more effective than changes to the car's “mouth” (grille) in helping consumers to differentiate among cars in the line.     

The Effect of Brand Gender on Brand Equity

Brand personality has been suggested as an important source of consumer‐based brand equity, yet empirical research on the relation between brand personality perceptions and brand equity is scarce. This article examines the link between masculine and feminine brand personality and brand equity as well as the underlying process of this relationship. Study 1 reported herein involves 140 existing brands and demonstrates that high levels of brand masculinity and femininity relate positively to brand equity, and that this relation is not moderated by participants’ sex. Study 2 demonstrates that brand gender accounts for brand equity ratings above and beyond other brand personality dimensions. Study 3 identifies ease of categorization as the underlying mechanism for the relationship between brand gender and brand equity.     

Brand and consumer engagement behaviors on Facebook brand pages: Let's have a (positive) conversation

This paper examines consumer-brand engagement on social media, focusing on the dynamic interplay between brands and consumers as well as among consumers themselves. In addition to liking and sharing behaviors, we look at what influences consumers to provide feedback to brands by commenting on brand posts, connect with other consumers by replying to their comments and agree with other consumers by liking their comments and replies. Drawing on a large longitudinal dataset from 2740 Facebook brand pages across 25 industries, a multilevel multivariate autoregressive zero-inflated negative binomial model is used to examine how brand post and response behaviors are related to specific consumer engagement behaviors. Results show that the amount of brand posts indirectly affects consumer comments through increased liking and sharing, but with diminishing returns. Liking is key as it increases positive and attenuates negative feedback, whereas sharing is associated with both positive and negative consumer-brand comments. Posting photos and videos encourages liking, with photos having increasing returns. Videos are the only format with a direct positive influence on consumer-brand comments, though with decreasing effect. Brand replies to consumer comments, even delayed ones, have little effect on negative conversations but prompt replies would be more beneficial as they bolster positive consumer comments. Moreover, our findings provide evidence for both a “positivity spiral” and “negativity spiral”, with the negativity spiral stronger than the positivity one. Taken together, these findings shed light on how marketers can stimulate positive conversations between brands and consumers on social media.     

The Role of Brand Detachment on the Dissolution of the Relationship Between the Consumer and the Brand

Given the growing role of affective factors in consumer behaviour and particularly on brand loyalty, the deterioration of these factors can provide an additional explanation of the dissolution of the relationship between the brand and the consumer. A new concept, brand detachment, was developed in marketing research to enhance understanding of the dissolution process of the relationship between brands and consumers. Brand detachment results from the dissolution of the affective bond existing between a brand and a consumer and can be seen as an attitudinal aspect of the dissolution process of certain relationships. After conceptualizing brand detachment, the results of a quantitative study (N=434, use of regression analysis) allow this concept to be used as an indicator of the consumer's propensity to end the relationship with the brand. Thus brand detachment has a negative influence on the consideration of the brand and the consumer's subsequent buying behaviour in relation to it.     

Do brands benefit consumers?

Advertising exists to communicate information about, and promote, brands—using ‘brands’ in the broadest sense. Brand owners, it might be believed, are thereby promoting their own interests. This paper explores the extent to which consumers benefit. Brands provide economic value for money, functionality in developing the requisite quality of products to solve consumer problems and psychological satisfaction. Thus functional benefits are intrinsic to the brand and its component products, psychological benefits are in the mind of the consumer and economic benefits relate to the exchange transaction. Brands are diverse, offering different benefits in different ways to different consumers at different times. Any aggregation of brand (dis)benefits therefore needs to be treated with caution. The picture is not wholly positive and consumer concerns with branding need to be factored in. The defence is the marketplace itself: consumers are free to choose. Retailer brands meet the demand, where it exists, for alternatives to manufacturer brands. Some consumers are undoubtedly confused for part of the time but branding is a long-term investment. Manufacturer brand leaders fifty years ago are brand leaders today. They would not exist at all if enough consumers did not continue to buy them.

This article considers these consumer concerns alongside the arguments for brands, except for the last (values) which is outside its scope. In general, the economic case today is secure even though earlier economists considered brands restricted competition. The bottom line of any remaining concern is whether consumers are satisfied that brands provide value for money. If consumers feel satisfied, then they are satisfied whether or not others think they should be. General consumer satisfaction with brands' value for money is none the less an inference drawn from the literature and analysis. Similarly, functional and psychological benefits appear to outweigh disadvantages but empirical research is needed to establish the extent of consumer (dis)satisfactions.     

Consumer‐Generated Representations: Muslim Women Recreating Western Luxury Fashion Brand Meaning through Consumption

The aim of this paper is to explore the influence of consumer‐generated representations on symbolic brand meaning. The term consumer‐generated representation is used in this research to refer to the image created for a brand based on the defining characteristics of a consumer or group of consumers. A preliminary qualitative study consisting of 12 in‐depth interviews was conducted in Kuwait, specifically exploring Muslim female consumers as consumers of western luxury fashion brands. The findings show that Muslim female consumers generate “Modestly Sexy” representations that recreate meaning for western luxury fashion brands in Kuwait. Thus, marketers need to recognize the importance of managing consumer‐generated representations on a global scale.     

Leveraging consumer personality and social media marketing to improve a brand's social media equity

Consumer personality traits impact consumer actions, preferences, online behaviour and shopping motives. This study examines personality traits as drivers of social media equity by addressing the mechanisms under which consumer personality traits influence social media equity. We aim to combine consumer-level information with brand-level metrics to advance our understanding of consumers' associations with brands on social media and how specific consumer personality traits can be leveraged to improve a brand's social media equity. Using a self-administered survey, a total of 418 respondents from an online consumer panel participated in this study. The results from structural equation modelling revealed that while extraversion, openness to experience and neuroticism personality traits are positively associated with brand engagement and brand advocacy, agreeableness and conscientiousness are significantly associated with brand advocacy and not with brand engagement. This study advances theory by examining how consumer personality traits influence social media equity via brand engagement and brand advocacy as mediators. The findings provide rich practical insights into underlying mechanisms through which marketers can increase social media equity using consumer personality traits.     

A Prototype of Multicomponent Brand Personality Structure: A Consumption Synmbolism Approach

Brand personality (BP) in the postmodern marketplace encompasses a variety of anthropomorphized attributes associated with a brand, reflecting on a wide spectrum of social, cultural, and psychological associations capturing various aspects in everyday life stories of consumers. Most prior research onBP, however, has employed a psychology‐based approach, and has not yet fully demonstrated the concept's market‐driven scope in the contemporary brand schema. To bridge the gap between the practitioner and scholar, this study employed a consumption symbolism approach to develop a multicomponent structure ofBP. A qualitative study was conducted with 36 brands of six product/service categories (fashion/luxury, beverage, automotive, personal computer, cosmetics, and retailer) within a specific context (South Korea). The results yielded a prototype of multicomponent BP structure consisting of one psychological component (traits) and three sociocultural components (narratives of socioeconomic/life scene/physical variability). The findings of the study broaden the current understanding of BP by suggesting a multidisciplinary perspective embracing its sociocultural aspects, and by empirically demonstrating the prototype reflecting on a wide spectrum of consumer narratives.     

The effect of activity identity fusion on negative consumer behavior

Negative consumer behavior is an important research topic as it explores consumer behaviors that threaten a brand's image and financial stability. However, prior research offers conflicting findings on whether a strong consumer‐brand relationship hurts or protects a brand after a market disruption or a brand transgression. To provide clarity on this issue, this work argues that disrupting the consumer‐activity relationship motivates consumers to reaffirm and protect their identity, thereby leading to negative consumer behavior. The data reveal that, after a brand‐initiated market disruption, consumers with high activity identity fusion are more likely to spread negative word‐of‐mouth, boycott the brand, and avoid repurchasing the brand in the future. Moreover, the data suggest that high brand identity fusion protects the brand during market disruptions; therefore, prior conflicting results may be due to the fact that the consumer‐activity relationship was not accounted for. Theoretically, this work establishes that consumers' relationship with their consumption activities has significant impacts on consumer behavior. Brand managers and marketers are urged to develop strategies that focus on strengthening the consumer‐brand relationship and not the consumer‐activity relationship.     

Trust,Commitment, and Older Women: Exploring Brand Attachment Differences in the Elderly Segment

Understanding older adults’ product consumption behavior is of high importance to consumer and marketing research. Prior studies have mainly focused on older adults’ cognitive decline and compared their behavior to that of younger consumers. A neglected area of research has been older consumers’ brand attachment that is associated with potential differences between consumers in their fifties and in their seventies. In this article, the authors provide insights into the under‐researched field of elderly women's brand attachment. Drawing on socioemotional selectivity theory, a shift toward emotional aspects in brand relationships is proposed. A model involving trust and commitment processes is developed and empirically tested in a survey among 341 older women. Moderator analyses reveal significant differences between the “younger elderly” and the “older elderly” in relationships among self‐concept connection, partner quality, trust, and commitment. For the younger elderly, how a brand is (based on trust judgments) seems to be more important. For the older elderly, what a brand does in its role as relationship partner becomes more relevant.     

A new C-OAR-SE-based content-valid and predictively valid measure that distinguishes brand love from brand liking

This article provides a new, C-OAR-SE-based, contrastive measure that distinguishes “brand love” from “brand liking.” The new measure is tested in an empirical study conducted among German university students about brands of products that they buy in four diverse product categories. From a consumer perspective, the incidence of consumers who have a loved brand in the category was found to be only 17 % for laundry detergent, 18 % for coffee, and 26 % for computers, peaking at 45 % in the fashion clothing category — findings that suggest that over half of young consumers do not acquire the state of brand love. Turning alternatively to a brand perspective, the findings indicate that, in general, about one in four of the brand’s customers will come to love the brand. Loving the brand, versus merely liking it, clearly pays off behaviorally — thereby demonstrating very good predictive validity for the new contrastive measure. Brand purchase or usage rate and brand recommendations were found to be approximately doubled for those who love the brand in comparison with those who merely like it.     

Brothers in blood,yet strangers to global brand purchase: A four-country study of the role of consumer personality

Although personality traits have repeatedly been shown to influence consumer behavior, their impact on willingness to buy global brands has yet to be empirically investigated. Based on a four-country sample (N = 4539) of South East European consumers, we test alternative pathways linking consumer personality traits to global brand purchase intentions. Our findings show that extraversion, neuroticism, conscientiousness and openness to experience impact purchase intentions mediated through consumers' global brand associations, domestic country bias and price sensitivity. Implications of the findings for theory and practice are considered and future research directions identified.     

Uppercase Premium Effect: The Role of Brand Letter Case in Brand Premiumness

Researchers have recently begun investigating how visual elements affect brand positioning. However, little is known about the effect of brand typeface features on brand premiumness. This paper proposes and verifies that letter case affects consumers’ perceived brand premiumness. Eight experiments, including one eye-tracking experiment, reveal that consumers perceive brands that use all uppercase letters (“uppercase brands”) as more premium than those that use all lowercase letters (“lowercase brands”). We refer to this effect as the “uppercase premium effect.” This effect is induced by the perceived conspicuousness of uppercase brands, a process which in turn is moderated by the product's social visibility. The effect is reversed for consumers who prefer subtle signals (“inconspicuous consumers”) because these consumers are likely to perceive a conspicuous uppercase brand as gaudy. Whereas status-motivated consumers are more likely to choose uppercase brands due to the increased premiumness perceptions, the increment in such perceptions does not further influence the purchase decisions of consumers indifferent to expressing status. We conclude with a discussion of theoretical and practical implications and offer suggestions for further research.     

THE IMPACT OF ORDER FULFILLMENT SERVICE ON RETAILER MERCHANDISING DECISIONS IN THE CONSUMER DURABLES INDUSTRY

Historically, manufacturers held the upper hand in consumer goods supply chain relationships. There has been a pervasive shift of power to retailers over the past 20 years, however, ushering in an era of waning consumer loyalty to manufacturers' brands and increasing loyalty to retailers. While there is extensive research focusing on the manufacturer‐consumer relationship, retailers' increased ability to influence consumer purchases suggests that manufacturers should understand not only consumer perceptions of delivery service, but also retailer perceptions. We incorporate social network theory to examine the manufacturer‐retailer‐consumer linkages in the consumer durables industry, with the emphasis on the retailer in the role of the “broker” (Burt 1992). Specifically, we examine whether retailer perceptions of a manufacturer's order fulfillment service (OFS) positively impacts retailer perceptions of the manufacturer's brand, the importance of the product, and the likelihood of the retailers' salespeople to recommend the product to consumers. The research bridges OFS and retailer purchase behavior in a consumer durables industry characterized by high levels of consumer involvement, brand presence, and personal selling.     

Exploring the Importance of Gay‐friendliness and its Socialization Influences

Gay men and lesbian consumers are increasingly representing a desired target audience for brands seeking to build brand loyalty in an under‐tapped market. The existing literature on marketing to gay men and lesbians suggests that brands targeting this market should position themselves as gay‐friendly. Nevertheless, little is known about consumer perceptions of gay‐friendliness, its antecedents or the socialization processes relevant to establishing a brand's gay‐friendly claim. This paper attempts to fill this void by reporting the results of a survey of gay men and lesbian consumers. The survey assessed the factors involved in perceptions of gay‐friendliness, socialization sources and the relationship between gay‐friendly brand claims and attitudes towards the brand.