This research introduces the concept of “brand addiction” as a new marketing construct. Employing conceptual development, the concept of brand addiction is defined as a psychological state that entails an obsessive relationship between the consumer and a specific brand. To examine the phenomenon of brand addiction, the present research was designed based on a partial sequential mixed methods research in which a qualitative study was followed by a quantitative study. Arguing that research on brand addiction should be built based on an understanding of how consumers experience this phenomenon in reality, the research incorporated a series of four qualitative focus group studies to uncover the possible core features, motives, and consequences of the brand addiction prototype using discursive psychological perspective. Survey data were subsequently used to generate the brand addiction measurement scale and to test the brand addiction theoretical model. Using exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses, the brand addiction measurement scale employed 14 core elements. In addition to the brand addiction core features, the brand addiction prototype comprises brand trust, ideal, and actual self-image congruence and fashion interest as its antecedents. Furthermore, the brand addiction prototype includes the feeling of guilt, appearance esteem, debt attitude, and life happiness as its consequences. This research concludes with a presentation and discussion of the theoretical and managerial implications. The research findings provide an understanding of and deep insights into the brand addiction phenomenon, thereby adding to the existing body of literature.

Consumers watch what a brand does, listen to what a brand says, and expect to make a meaningful connection with a brand via social media. Thus, creating effective and persuasive content on behalf of a brand to attract consumers becomes an important task for today’s marketers in social media. In this dissertation, brand information disclosure is defined as any communication of a brand’s relevant information, thoughts, and feelings, which are generated and deliberately disclosed by marketers. Further, disclosing perceived backstage of a brand by showing various behind-the-scenes information is proposed as a unique type of brand information disclosure, which is interpreted as a higher degree of brand information disclosure. Motivated by the integral role of self-disclosure in interpersonal relationships, the purpose of this dissertation study is to investigate the influence of a brand’s disclosure of perceived backstage information through social media. Specifically, this study explored how the degree and the scarcity of information disclosure would influence on consumer’s intimacy, liking, and trust toward a brand as well as consumer-brand relationship quality. Further, the study attempts to investigate the moderating role of consumer’s advertising skepticism on consumer responses. The findings from this dissertation study illustrate that degree of brand information disclosure is a significant influence on consumers’ brand evaluations and consumer-brand relationship quality in a social media environment. In addition, findings highlighted the influential role of the scarcity of information disclosure, depending upon the degree of information disclosure. Moreover, the findings evidenced how the consumer’s general advertising skepticism can play a significant role when consumers are exposed to information from the brand via social media. / text

Brand relationship literature assumes that consumers draw little distinction between the relationships consumers have with brands and those they have with people. However, are brand relationships and human relationships really so similar? This research builds on the application of the Self Expansion Model (Aron & Aron, 1986) to brand relationship theory by revealing an indirect effect and a boundary condition to explain how and when brand relationships influence the pattern of resource allocation strategies that reflect a cognitive merging of “self” and “brand” thereby demonstrating a departure from the resource allocation strategies of interpersonal relationships (Aron et al., 1991).

While existing literature describes strong brand relationships along several dimensions, this research sheds light on the identity perspective of brand relationships through the lens of consumer identity fusion, aiming to understand the extent to which consumers incorporate brands into their self-perceptions. Specifically, this research investigates the nature and effects of consumer identity fusion and its motivational consequences following brand transgressions. Study One examines whether consumer identity fusion out-predicts brand identification in estimating the tendency for consumers to endorse pro-relationship behavior with regard to minor or severe transgressions. The results show that highly fused consumers are more likely to undertake constructive coping strategies and are less likely to engage in destructive coping strategies than are weakly fused consumers. The fusion × perceived severity interaction effect is found only for the exit coping strategy. Study Two assesses how consumer identity fusion influences consumers’ responses to personal-related versus societal-related brand transgressions. The findings demonstrate that the effect of consumer identity fusion is stronger than that of brand identification across different behavioral outcomes; it has a greater effect on participants’ relationship-serving responses to personal-related transgressions than to societal-related brand transgressions. However, the fusion × brand transgression types interaction effect is found only for exit responses. Finally, Study Three incorporates an additional self-affirmation manipulation to determine the interplay of consumers’ personal and social identities, aiming to disentangle the source of the motivational machinery needed for consumers’ pro-relationship behaviors. The findings underscore that highly fused consumers in the affirmation condition are less likely to exit the brand relationship than those in the no affirmation condition when facing personal-related brand transgressions, even though self-affirmation should reduce the negative effect of brand transgressions. Nevertheless, the expected relationships are not found for consumers’ change in brand evaluation and other behavioral measures. The findings of this research together suggest that consumer identity fusion is applicable for understanding connections between consumers and the brand relationship partner in consumer-brand relationships. Implications of these findings and directions for refinement and future research are discussed. / text

Relationship marketing is an important part of the development of brands. The following report conceives the role of relationship marketing and how brands can use social networks as a key for unlocking a relationship with their consumer. This report presents the managerial implications on relationship marketing, the importance of dialogue, and social media. This report is for marketers to understand the importance of initiating, developing and maintaining a relationship with consumers and translate the concepts so that brands can successfully apply them into social networks. / text

This research investigates how communal and exchange brand relationship norms determine consumers’ tendencies in processing brand information in morality or competence terms, respectively. Study 1 tests the hypothesized relationships between relationship norms and morality/competence social cognition. The results show that exchange norm-oriented consumers evaluate a brand mainly based on its competence attributes, whereas communal norm-oriented individuals place additional focus on the brand’s moral conduct. As an extension of Study 1, Study 2 examines the effectiveness of morality-framed and competence-framed advertising messages in relation to the relationship norms salient at brand exposure. The findings reveal that exchange norm-oriented individuals demonstrate more favorable attitudes towards the competence-framed message, whereas communal norm-oriented individuals show more positive attitudes towards the morality-framed message. Finally, Study 3 investigates how the norms dominant in the relationships with a brand influence consumers’ attitude change in response to morality- and competence-based negative information on the brand. The results show that exchange norm-oriented individuals are more susceptible to immoral brand information, and communal norm-oriented individuals are equally affected by both types of negative brand information. This research suggests that the different emphasis on morality and competence information in communal and exchange brand relationships not only influences how consumers form their initial impressions of a brand and evaluations of advertisements but also how they interpret negative brand information as brand relationships unfold. / text

The current research argues that brand commitment, a multidimensional construct consisting of brand attachment, long-term orientation, and intent to persist, is a better indicator of brand relationship strength than brand attachment alone. Brand commitment is a better indicator of brand relationship strength because it is able to predict brand relationship persistence, is influenced by important antecedents of brand relationship strength, and can explain the relationship between the antecedents of brand relationship strength and relationship persistence while brand attachment cannot. The current research employs survey methodology, SEM, and a between-subjects experimental design to test this argument. The results indicate that brand commitment predicts relationship persistence and reveal that long-term orientation and intent to persist are important predictors of relationship persistence. These findings contribute to the consumer-brand relationship literature by illustrating the importance of understanding all three of components of brand commitment.

Within the marketing management sphere, consumer-brand relationship theory has attracted interest and academic research since its inception. One area that has been relatively unexplored, however, is the interplay between vernacular languages and consumer-brand relationships in a multilingual South Africa. Celebrated for its multicultural and multilingual identity, South Africa recognises eleven official languages with English predominantly used across marketing activities. Despite a variety of research projects aimed at exploring consumer-brand relationship theory, there remains a gap in the knowledge regarding how languages impact the relationships that consumers form with brands. Previous research has been centred on the Western and Asian markets and has failed to address the challenges of the diverse South African market. Consumers experience an emotional link and a sense of attachment to their home language. This paper postulates that this connection extends to consumer-brand relationships and that language choice can, therefore, impact the formation and development of brand relationships. This paper sought to explore this theory, using qualitative research methods. In-depth interviews were conducted in order to collect information about consumers' experiences and feelings regarding this topic. Fourteen participants from various language groups were asked a series of open-ended questions and their responses recorded. Results demonstrated that the use of first languages can influence how consumers respond to brands and can affect a number of elements identified in the brand-relationship quality model. The analysis found a link between language use and brand relationship theory, finding that the use of consumers' mother tongues can lead to consumers developing relationship qualities including love and passion, self-connection and commitment. This demonstrates that language can play a significant role in impacting consumer-brand relationships. We, therefore, infer that language can potentially impact consumer-brand relationships, and that language choice has the power to impact how consumers build relationships with brands.

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Yes / Although there are several marketing implications that have been considered in the context of social media marketing, less attention has been paid to the influence of antecedents of consumer brand engagement (telepresence, social presence and involvement) and their consequences for non-profit organizations. Thus, the main purpose of current research is to examine the influence of telepresence, social presence and involvement on consumer brand engagement (CBE) (second-order), which in turn affects electronic word of mouth and willingness to donate. To test the proposed model, this paper used social media platforms. We employed a Facebook page that presents non-profit organizations (brands) using a sample of non-students. We found that telepresence, social presence and involvement positively impact CBE, which in turn impacts electronic word of mouth and willingness to donate. The findings of our research demonstrate how CBE is formed in this particular context and what outcomes are to be expected, with important implications for both marketing theory and practice.