Linking social media marketing activities with brand love: The mediating role of self-expressive brands
ISSN: 0368-492X
Article publication date: 27 November 2017
Issue publication date: 29 November 2017
Abstract
Purpose
This research aims to investigate the link between social media marketing (SMM) activities and brand love. It further investigates the mediating impact of self-expressive brands (inner and social) between the relationships of SMM activities and brand love, which in turn impact brand loyalty. Using the context provided by Facebook, the author contributes in three ways to the nascent marketing literature: by linking SMM activates with brand love, by investigating the mediating impact of self-expressive brands between SMM activities and brand love and by investigating the impact of brand love on brand loyalty.
Design/methodology/approach
Using a sample of 400 followers of Facebook pages, data were collected and analyzed using structural equation modeling.
Findings
The findings reveal that SMM activities positively affect self-expressive brands (inner and social), which in turn impact brand love. The author also finds that brand love positively affects brand loyalty. The author further finds that self-expressive brand (inner) fully mediates the relationship between SMM activities and brand love, whereas self-expressive brand (social) partially mediates this relationship.
Originality/value
Previous researchers neither have the chance to link SMM activities with brand love nor to explain its role as an antecedent to self-expressive brand. Therefore, the author contributes to nascent literature by linking and investigating the mediating impact of self-expressive brands between the relationships of SMM activities and brand love which in turn impact brand loyalty.
Keywords
Citation
Algharabat, R.S. (2017), "Linking social media marketing activities with brand love: The mediating role of self-expressive brands", Kybernetes, Vol. 46 No. 10, pp. 1801-1819. https://doi.org/10.1108/K-04-2017-0130
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2017, Emerald Publishing Limited