Social media is a newer emerging media outlet that could serve as a good communication tool for companies, marketers, and advertisers alike; yet, studies into the effects that social media may have on people’s perceptions is more limited. The goal of this research study is to investigate whether or not social media has the ability to influence people’s perceptions of brands. It applies cultivation theory to social media and specifically looks at whether or not social media can cultivate brand affect, trust, and loyalty. As a result, this study will allow for potential understanding of how to use social media effectively to communicate messages and where additional research can be done to better understand this newer media outlet. / text

Current marketing research suggests that two separate cognitive functions, rational "brand trust" and emotional "brand affect", work independently to influence brand loyalty and in turn, consumer purchasing. Yet, this idea is at off with a growing body of neuroeconomic research, which demonstrates the role of emotion in seemingly rational decisions.Here, we examine psychological, economic, and neuroscientrific research on how, along with the stand-alone effects of brand affect, emotion may influence brand trust, illustrating how these two seemingly separate functions may work in conjunction. First, we use psychological and economic theories such as the Somatic Marker Hypothesis, Affect-as-Information Theory, and Appraisal Tendency Theory to demonstrate that emotions have a large role in decision-making. Next we describe views from behavioral economics on how human decision-makers respond to uncertainty, drawing on frameworks, such as Prospect Theory and experimental findings like the Ellsberg paradox. Experimental findings suggest that people find the unknown emotionally aversive, both for uncertainty in outcomes (risk) and the range of possible outcomes (ambiguity). Risk- and ambiguity-aversion appear to arise from separate neural systems, suggesting that brand trust can increase affect by decreasing both perceived ambiguity and risk. Finally, we examine the marketing implications of the conclusion that affect and trust are interconnected. With the new perspective gained, marketers can better understand the mutually dependent relationship of brand affect and brand trust and begin to examine ways to capitalize on the clarification.

Magister Commercii - MCom / The concept of brand loyalty highlights the importance of brands in marketing strategy development because it leads to a stream of benefits for the company (lower marketing costs, less price sensitivity, greater market share and greater profits). Questions thus arise about how brand loyalty is achieved, especially for low involvement product categories classified as fast moving consumer goods (FMCGs). Models of how brand loyalty is built have been tested and most agree that brand loyalty is linked to satisfying customer needs. Knowledge about the type of needs (utilitarian and hedonic) is however, not usually determined. How the different types of needs first influence brand trust and brand affect, before affecting consumer satisfaction, also requires investigation. This study therefore tested how brand building efforts for some selected FMCG brands in South Africa impact on brand loyalty, as well as the extent to which utilitarian and hedonic need satisfaction leads to brand trust and brand affect for these low involvement products. The study also examined the extent to which brand trust and affect influence consumer satisfaction, examined as drivers of attitudinal and behavioural brand loyalty. Quantitative research methods were used to collect and analyse the data, appropriate because of the nature of the research (testing relationships between multi-variables), and the fact that standardised instruments were available to test the proven and valid variables. Data was collected from 272 White, Indian, Coloured and Black South Africans living in Cape Town. The respondents were sampled from malls in Nyanga (targeting Black consumers, most of whom represent lower income consumers), Mitchell's Plain (targeting middle income Coloured and Black consumers), and Canal Walk (targeting high income White, Coloured, Indian and Black consumers), all of which either have SPAR, Pick n Pay or Shoprite/Checkers retailers that sell FMCGs. Structural equation modelling was the main data analysis method for this multivariate investigation.