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This study aims at examining the role of the e-store brand personality congruence/incongruence of a multichannel apparel retailer in the formation of consumers' perceived e-store brand fit and e-store patronage intention, based on the concept of image congruence.

An online survey was conducted with a US national sample of 458 female consumers (20–50 years old) who had shopped for clothing online.

Results revealed that e-store brand personality incongruence in three personality dimensions had a negative impact on consumers' e-store patronage intention directly as well as indirectly by reducing the consumers' global perception of the e-store brand fit. Further, the retailer's relevance to the consumer moderated the relationship between the perceived e-store brand fit and e-store patronage intention in that this relationship was significantly greater among consumers with a high (vs low) perceived self-relevance of the retail brand.

The findings highlight the importance of symbolically integrated cross-channel brand management for multichannel apparel retailers by clearly identifying their brand personality and carefully crafting it into their e-store interface design and e-store visual merchandising to convey the brand personality.

This study expands the application of image congruence to the cross-channel image congruence phenomenon in multichannel retailing environments by examining the e-store brand image congruence employing both direct and indirect approaches.

When retail businesses, especially small businesses with greater vulnerability, could not meet consumers in person during the recent pandemic crisis, how did they adapt to the situation? This study examined how small business practitioners (SBPs’) perceptions, trust and adoption intention levels for social media, as well as the relationships among these variables, changed before and during the crisis based on the integration of the contingency theory and the diffusion of innovation theory (DIT).

Online surveys were conducted with USA SBPs before (n = 175) and during (n = 225) the recent pandemic. The hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling (SEM), multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) and multiple-group SEM analysis.

The results confirmed significant sequential positive relationships between SBPs’ perceived external pressure and perceived benefits of adopting social media, which in turn led to their trust in and then adoption intentions for social media. Further, the comparisons between the pre- and in-pandemic samples revealed that SBPs’ perceptions and adoption intentions all became significantly higher during (vs before) the pandemic, but the structural relationships among these variables weakened during the pandemic.

This study uses a novel approach to integrate the contingency theory with the DIT to propose small businesses' perceptions, trust and adoption intentions for social media during the innovation decision process under rapid contingency changes. Our findings also offer practical implications including recommendations for small businesses’ innovation management as well as training programs.

This study aims to explore how brands use brand personification techniques in real-time marketing on social media, particularly Twitter, and examine how these techniques impact consumer engagement, moderated by brand-event congruence levels.

Data included 464 tweets posted by 95 brands around three large events in 2019. The types of brand personification techniques and the level of brand-event congruence applied by the tweets were content-analyzed, and regression analyses were conducted to examine their linkages to consumer engagement metrics.

Results confirmed the use of diverse personification techniques in brands’ real-time marketing tweets as in the previous literature. The study also revealed a new personification technique, tacit expression, not reported in previous literature. The study also showed that the overall effectiveness of multimedia-based (vs caption-based) personification techniques in increasing consumer engagement on social media was greater, but their relative effectiveness varied depending on whether or not the event was functionally congruent with the brand.

The findings offer valuable suggestions to brand managers regarding prioritizing brand personification techniques and aligning brands’ social media marketing with real-time events to maximize the effectiveness of real-time marketing in boosting consumer engagement.

This research offers insights into the dynamic effects of different brand personification techniques in the new context of real-time marketing, extending the scope of literature on brand personification and anthropomorphism. The revelation of a new type of brand personification not captured in the extant literature is also a significant contribution.

Based on cue utilization theory, this study aims to examine effects of the style (fashion vs basic) and licensing status (licensed vs nonlicensed) of university-related apparel products (URAPs) as intrinsic and extrinsic cues, respectively, impacting university fans’ responses (i.e. attitudes, purchase intentions and purchase behaviors) and the moderating roles of personal factors (i.e. perceived university prestige, quality consciousness and uniqueness seeking).

Data were collected via an online quasi-experiment employing a 2 (licensing status: licensed vs nonlicensed) × 2 (style: basic vs fashion) within-subjects design with a purposeful sample of 1,126 students and alumni of a Southeastern American university.

Results show that consumers generally responded more favorably to licensed (vs nonlicensed) URAPs, especially for basic styles, whereas their responses to fashionable URAPs were more favorable for nonlicensed (vs licensed) URAPs. Furthermore, the positive effects of licensing status were stronger for consumers with high (vs low) perceived university prestige or quality consciousness. Consumers generally more favorably responded to basic (vs fashion) URAPs, but this style effect was weaker among those with a high (vs low) uniqueness seeking tendency.

Theoretical explanations on URAP consumption have been scant in the product and brand management literature. This study fills this literature gap by conceptualizing extrinsic (i.e. licensing status) and intrinsic (i.e. style) cues crucial in URAP consumption from a cue utilization theory lens and demonstrating empirical evidence for the intricate interplays among the two cues and diverse personal characteristics.

The purpose of this paper is to examine how the sentiment of social networking site (SNS)-based brand-related electronic word-of-mouths (eWOMs) influences consumers’ engagement in brand value co-creation and brand trust change, thereby influencing their purchase intention for the brand; and explores a potential moderating effect of mavenism.

A sample of 237 college students participated in an online survey to report brand-related eWOM stories to which they were exposed and the brand trust change, brand value co-creation behavior and attitude and purchase intention in response to this exposure. The eWOM stories were content analyzed into positive vs negative eWOM. Structural equation modeling was used to test all hypotheses.

Participants reported a significantly higher level of brand value co-creation engagement behavior and more positive brand value co-creation engagement attitude and brand trust change after seeing a positive (vs negative) brand-related eWOM on SNSs. Brand trust change and value co-creation engagement attitude positively influenced purchase intention. The moderating effect of mavenism was not significant.

Findings suggest that brand marketers should actively monitor and respond to the sentiment of SNS-based eWOMs and establish strategies to encourage consumers to create and share positive eWOMs on SNSs.

This study contributes to closing the empirical gap in SNS-based eWOM research by providing support for brand-related eWOM sentiment as a significant motivational factor triggering consumers’ engagement in brand value co-creation and brand trust change on SNSs as well as purchase intention.

The purpose of this study is to investigate mature consumers' perceived risks and benefits and purchase intentions in the context of online apparel shopping and the role of age and past experience in their perceptions and intentions.

A national sample of 293 US male and female mature consumers (born in or before 1964) participated in a mail survey. Structural equation modeling was used to test the hypotheses regarding relationships among mature consumers' age, prior experiences, perceived risks and benefits, and purchase intentions.

The study revealed that perceived benefits regarding product and price offerings and perceived financial risk were significant predictors of mature consumers' online apparel purchase intention. In addition, the level of past online shopping experience was a strong antecedent of the mature consumer's perceived risks and benefits of online shopping. Age and general internet experience showed limited influences on mature consumers' perceptions and purchase intentions.

The study provides numerous implications for future research with regard to the challenges mature consumers may experience in adopting the internet as a shopping medium.

Findings from the study suggest that online retailers targeting mature consumers need to be aware of limitations and difficulties that mature consumers may face and to develop their web sites and communication messages to meet the specific needs of these consumers.

The study provides valuable insight into the mature consumers' internet shopping phenomenon, addressing a gap in the literature. The use of a national sample allows for generalization of the findings.

The purpose of this paper is to explore brand association dimensions important to consumers of US specialty apparel brands targeting young women and develop a valid and reliable brand association scale for assessing and monitoring consumers' associations about brands in this market.

This study uses mixed methods combining qualitative and quantitative approaches through surveys to explore and validate brand association dimensions and develop a quantitative brand association measurement.

In total, seven brand association themes were identified in the qualitative stage. Through a scale development and validation process, these themes were narrowed down to four brand association dimensions – self‐relevance, service, merchandise, and store environment – represented in a brand association scale consisting of 14 items.

The scale developed in this study is germane to a specific market. However, the scale development procedure proposed in this study can be easily replicated to create brand association measurements for other apparel categories. Future research adopting the suggested scale development procedure may produce findings that allow for comparisons between brand association dimensions that are important in different markets.

This study identifies four brand association dimensions important to US specialty apparel brands and proposes a reliable and valid procedure to develop a measurement that can be used for apparel companies to track their brand associations.

Brand association measures developed in general marketing contexts may not be transferrable to apparel brands. This study addresses the need for developing a brand tracking measure specifically designed for the apparel industry.

The purpose of this study was to examine visual merchandising (VMD) elements of apparel retail web sites, to describe the state of apparel online VMD and to develop a taxonomy of online VMD cues whose effects can be studied empirically.

A total of 50 US and 50 Korean web sites were content analyzed in terms of environment, manner of presentation, and path finding.

Results of the study revealed that many VMD features of offline stores have been implemented online. In addition, some VMD features of online apparel stores do not have a direct offline parallel. The taxonomy of VMD cues can be used by researchers to systematically study the effects of the cues following the SOR Model.

Because of the descriptive nature of the study important discussions about possible effects of various VMD elements on consumer behaviors cannot be addressed. Future research needs to investigate the effects of different VMD features introduced in the study on diverse consumer behaviors.

Using the VMD categories developed and coded in the study, online apparel retailers may be able to gain knowledge about online VMD features they can use to create desirable effects simulating those of in‐store VMD.

In spite of the strategic importance of VMD in online apparel stores, specific online VMD features that may influence consumer attitudes and behaviors have not been identified. Findings provide a comprehensive list of online VMD elements available from apparel web sites that are comparable to traditional offline VMD.

The purpose of this paper is two‐fold: to investigate virtual agent representational characteristics (modality, interaction style, animation, realism, embodiment, and gender) employed by agent software providers in developing commercial and non‐commercial web sites; and to examine older consumers' preferences in these agent characteristics.

Study 1 involves a content analysis of 64 sample web sites of agent providers, and study 2 consists of four focus group interviews conducted with 25 older consumers in the age group of 65‐82 years.

Findings from both studies reveal some important disconnects between agent characteristics (modality, realism, animation, and gender) offered by virtual agent software providers and those preferred by older consumers. As a result, important recommendations are provided for the development of virtual agents for e‐commerce applications to enhance accessibility for older users.

No previous studies have investigated which agent characteristics enhance web accessibility and are most preferred by older users in the context of e‐commerce applications.

The purpose of this study is to investigate whether the visual presence of a virtual agent on a retail Web site reveals positive outcomes for older users with respect to enhancing perceived interactivity, social support, trust and patronage intentions and alleviating user anxiety.

A between-subjects laboratory experiment was conducted with 50 older users, which included an interaction experience of 30 minutes followed by a paper-based questionnaire. The visual presence of the agent was manipulated in a mock retail Web site through the presence or absence of a virtual agent image, while maintaining the same agent functionality.

The contrasts of senior users’ shopping experiences between two agent-mediated Web sites (with or without agent image) support the direct “persona” effects of a virtual agent’s visual presence on enhancing perceived interactivity, social support, trust and patronage intentions in the retail Web site, while alleviating user anxiety. Further, anxiety alleviation is fully explained by increased perceptions of interactivity. Perceived social support fully mediates trust in the benevolence of the online retailer. Trust ability emerges as a salient factor mediating the relationship between agent persona and patronage intentions.

This work is the first to identify the value of human visual embodiment for older users’ online shopping experiences, which has implications for other low-experience/expertise users of a medium.