The development of artificial intelligence technology has led to the creation of virtual influencers that have been embraced by marketing professionals. Starting with advertising recognition, a ...variable that directly affects marketing effectiveness, this study investigates whether virtual influencers lead to different levels of ad recognition among consumers from human influencers. The present study's three experiments demonstrate that (1) compared to human influencers, virtual influencers have a significantly greater impact on consumers' identification of advertisements; (2) the impact of influencer type on consumers' brand attitudes is mediated by the their advertising recognition; (3) the level of consumers' perceived sensory capacity of virtual influencers negatively moderates the effect of virtual influencer's post on consumers' advertising recognition. These research findings have significance for developing virtual influencer marketing in practice.
This paper investigates the influence of Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response (ASMR) elements in advertising on consumer attitudes. Through three experimental studies, we assess the impact of ASMR on ...attitudes toward ads and brands across hedonic and utilitarian product categories, and for known and unknown brands. Our findings reveal a generally negative effect of ASMR on ad attitudes among the wider population but identify a positive impact among those who experience ASMR's physiological sensations, as serially mediated through physiological and emotional responses. Notably, negative brand attitudes were observed only with unknown brands. This research underscores the nuanced role of ASMR in advertising, highlighting the potential for positive effects within a specific consumer segment, while cautioning against its broader application.
The development of multiple applications with features of games has brought about a new trend – gamification. Gamification has become a fast-emerging practice in the business world, with a growing ...number of organizations adopting gaming techniques and game-style rewards in order to increase customer engagement. Despite this growing trend and the potential role played by gamification, the marketing literature lacks models that explain the use of gamification in the marketing context, customers' perceptions of gamification and its effects on their attitudes towards the brand. This study addresses this omission by adopting the TAM framework in a gamification context. Similar to TAM, gamification finds its roots in the technology and information systems literature. Drawing on TAM, this study presents a model that examines the effects of gamification on customers' intention to engage in the gamification process and their attitudes toward the brand. Using a quantitative methodology, the results provide empirical support for perceived usefulness and perceived enjoyment as predictors to intention of engagement and brand attitude. However, perceived ease of use was surprisingly found not to be significantly related to people's intention of engagement with the gamification process and their brand attitude. In addition, perceived social influence was found not to be related to people's intention of engagement, but was related to their brand attitude. The findings of this research have theory and practical implications.
•Perceived usefulness positively influences intention to engage with the game.•Perceived usefulness positively influences attitude towards the gamified brand.•Perceived enjoyment is the strongest predictor to intention of engagement.•Perceived enjoyment is a strong predictor to brand attitude.•Perceived social influence positively influences consumers' brand attitude.
It is important to understand the relative importance of business ethics and social responsibility in determining brand attitudes. However, there has been a failure in prior research to differentiate ...between attitudes toward business ethics and CSR. This research reviews customer-brand research related to business ethics and social responsibility and conducts a study to evaluate customer attitudes. Four scenarios offer variations in company behaviors related to positive and negative conduct of customer social responsibility and business ethics. Study findings from a panel of 351 respondents provide new insights related to a customer's expectations and perceptions of company CSR and business ethics behavior. We conclude that although CSR attitudes remain important, customers value business ethics as a critical behavior in their perceptions of brand attitudes.
Display omitted
Brand attitude has been the primary concern for corporation sustainability for a long. Studies have focused on various attributes concerning brand attitude comprising of many research articles. This ...study focuses on bibliometric analysis of brand attitude examining 1497 documents published for the years 1944–2021. The purpose of this study is to examine historic research trends, developments, and future conduits based on co-authorship and co-occurrence analysis using VOSviewer. The study highlights the most prolific articles containing the most productive authors and their affiliations, keywords, and influential journals, along with future research trends. The result shows that the number of publications follows a very slow trail until 2008, mildly until 2012, following which the cumulative growth in publication increased manifold. Further, results show that researchers from the United States, South Korea, and Taiwan extended many efforts to the global knowledge of literature leading other countries. The emerging hotspot keywords analysis suggests that brand avoidance, subtle, brand betrayal, consumer ethnocentrism, environmental sustainability and policy, brand activism, brand authenticity, consumer brand engagement, and brand competence are the key areas that attract researchers' attention policymakers as future research boulevards. In the case of consumers' brand attitudes, there is a scarcity of studies that investigated the consumers' implicit and explicit brand attitudes.
This study examines the effects of consumer-based brand equity (CBBE) components (i.e., brand loyalty, brand awareness, perceived quality, and brand image) of luxury hotel brands on consumer brand ...attitude and purchase intention with brand performance as a contextual factor. Through a survey involving 327 tourists conducted in luxury hotels in Macau, results reveal that all four CBBE elements positively relate to brand attitude, and three directly influence purchase intention. Brand attitude mediates the relationship between four CBBE elements and purchase intention, and brand performance moderates the relationship between brand attitude and purchase intention. This study expands CBBE theory to include luxury hotel brands and contributes to the literature by clarifying the direct, indirect, and total effects of each CBBE element on brand attitude and purchase intention. In addition, the study identifies brand performance as a contextual factor rather than a consequence of brand equity and brand attitude.
The presence of fake news via Internet media compels researchers and practitioners to understand the consequences of this phenomenon on marketing activities. Surprisingly, no marketing study to date ...has analyzed the effect of fake news on consumers' evaluations of a brand advertised on the same webpage. To fill this gap, this study empirically investigated whether individuals' perceptions of fake news transfer to an adjacent brand advertisement. Specifically, we manipulated news truthfulness and source credibility, observing the change in individuals' responses while distinguishing between objective truthfulness and the perceived credibility of the news.
The results confirmed that the news' objective truthfulness exerts no direct effect on behavioral intentions toward the brand (i.e., intention to purchase, spread word-of-mouth, or visit the brand's store). However, we did uncover a chain of effects whereby the impact of fake news on behavioral intentions was fully mediated by people's perceptions of the news' credibility, which affected the perceived credibility of the sources, which then influenced brand trust, which finally translated into brand attitudes. From a managerial perspective, this study's results can partially reassure brand managers that their brand advertisements will not suffer from appearing next to fake news when the source itself is credible.
•The presence of fake news indirectly affects behavioral intentions toward a brand advertised on the same webpage.•This mechanism holds when the source is not reliable per se (intrinsic source credibility is low).•However, the results no longer hold when the source is reliable a priori (intrinsic source credibility is high).•The causal path is not affected by individuals' perceived ability to discern real from fake news.
•Develops a multi-disciplinary measure of the brand signature construct.•Results indicate that brand signature includes dissemination of its dimensions (brand name and brand logo).•Recognised brand ...attitude with two components (i) brand association and (ii) brand belief.•Identifies brand awareness components (i) brand familiarity, and (ii) brand recognisability.•Understanding the determinants that affect brand signature to manage global hotel brand reputation and performance.
This paper develops a multi-disciplinary measure of the brand signature construct by means of literature review and primary data analysis. This study explains that brand signature involves (i) endorsement of consistent consumer attitude toward diffusion of a brand name and brand logo (consists of typeface, design, and color); (ii) the expression and pursuit of a distinct message and the quality of the organization to consumers as well as consistency in communication; and (iii) the implementation, support, and maintenance of hotel brand signature systems based on the use of online/offline media. SEM is employed in order to test the proposed model. The results indicate that brand signature includes dissemination of its dimensions; brand attitude with two components (brand association and brand belief); brand awareness consists of brand familiarity, and brand recognisability; and consistency in brand reputation and prefaced by hotel brand performance implementation. Brand signature is recommended as a tool useful for the service industry to manage their global hotel brand reputation and performance.
The purpose of this study is to investigate how self‐brand connection in an interactive multi‐actor single‐brand retail context can lead to consumers' willingness to pay premium through the ...sequential mediation of brand attitudes (intransigent and flexible) and brand love. Study 1 shows that self‐brand connection strengthens (weakens) consumers' intransigent (flexible) brand attitude, thereby increasing their brand love and willingness to pay price premium. Furthermore, consumers' high level of cynicism attenuates brand love and willingness to pay premium for consumers' displaying flexible brand attitudes. Study 2 shows that favorable other customer perceptions can mitigate the detrimental impact of high consumer cynicism on consumers' brand responses. In Study 3, we found that other customers' favorable behaviors (over similarity and/or appearance) can best mitigate the negative effects of consumer cynicism on brand love and willingness to pay premium. The research contributes by showing how varying degrees of consumers' self‐brand connection can develop willingness to pay premium through developing either intransigent (constructive route) or flexible (mitigating route) brand attitudes and brand love. For consumers harboring flexible brand attitudes accompanied with high cynicism, other customer perception serves as a conditioning tool, that alleviates their cynicism, and garners higher brand love as well as willingness to pay premium, and behavior dimension of other customer perception dominates in this quest.
PDF
