Kwon, Eun Sook (Grady PhD alum) and Jooyoung Kim, “Exploring Brand Humanization on SNSs: Brand personality and its influence on brand partner quality, brand attitude and consumer behavioral engagement,” International Journal of Internet Marketing and Advertising, 16(3), 2022.
Abstract: This study explored whether consumers interacting with brands on SNSs attribute human-like personalities to brands and further examined the relationships between personality dimensions and brand performance measures. Responses from 922 research participants (530 brand followers and 392 brand non-followers on SNSs) were analyzed. Brand followers and brand non-followers attributed some of the same personality dimensions (Sophistication, Sincerity, and Competence) while there were differences between the two groups: Excitement only among brand non-followers; Agreeableness and Unpleasantness only among brand followers. The personality dimension Sincerity had a strong, positive influence on brand performance measures. Implications are discussed.
Abstract: Sports sponsorship has been considered a key branding strategy for various marketing objectives, but little research investigated how consumers perceived sponsor brands through sports competitions. This study aimed to examine whether team performance and gender difference jointly impacted consumers’ perceived brand personality and how team identification and self-brand connection moderated such impacts on perceived brand personality in the context of sports sponsorship. A two (Team performance: win/loss) by two (Gender: male/female) between-subjects experiment was designed with team identification and self-brand connection as two moderators. Results indicated that team performance, team identification, and self-brand connection yielded individual and joint influences on perceived brand personality. Specifically, team performance exerted significant effects on five dimensions of brand personality, while team identification yielded significant effects on brand responsibility, aggressiveness, and simplicity. Self-brand connection moderated the effect of team performance on brand responsibility and activity. The empirical evidence further illustrated that consumer-level factors came into play to influence perceived brand personality. In support of the affect-transfer hypothesis, team performance that evoked emotions greatly impacted consumers’ perceived brand personality, as they rated a sponsor brand as more positive in terms of brand responsibility, activity, aggressiveness, simplicity, and emotionality.
Abstract: Through two studies, this research examined consumer responses to empowerment hashtags in social media–based fashion advertising. The findings of Study 1 indicated that consumers showed more favorable attitudes toward empowerment-campaign hashtags than brand-name hashtags, and that the perceived information value of hashtags meditated the relationship between hashtag type and attitudes toward the hashtags. Furthermore, consumer responses to the two hashtag types varied depending on the sophistication dimension of brand personality. Study 2 extended Study 1 by further examining the effects of empowerment hashtags on consumers’ attitudes toward ads and consumer–brand identification. Participants perceived greater information value from empowerment hashtags, showed more favorable attitudes toward the ads with empowerment hashtags, and identified more strongly with advertised brands. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
