Authors: Adrian Dilaver and Mario Oreski Tutor: Urban Ljungquist Examiner: Anders Pehrsson Purpose: The purpose of this study the relationship between brand experience, brand trust  and brand loyalty. Research questions: What type of relationship does brand experience have with brand loyalty? How does brand trust affect the relationship between brand experience and brand loyalty? Methodology: A descriptive research design with a quantitative approach was conducted, utilizing an online questionnaire with a total of 113 respondents. Conclusion: The findings of this research partially supports that sensory-, intellectual- and behavioral experience have a positive- and direct relationship with brand loyalty. Affective experience did not have a positive relationship with brand loyalty, not even when tested separately. The mediating variable in this study (brand trust), also partially mediated the relationship between sensory-, intellectual- and behavioral experience and brand loyalty. However, brand trust did not mediate the relationship between affective experience and brand loyalty. / <p>Acnkowledgments</p><p>This study could not have been conducted without the help of several people. Firstly, we would like to thank Urban Ljungquist for his guidance and assistance throughout this process. We would also like to thank Anders Pehrsson for giving us valuable feedback and input during the seminars. Further, we want to thank all of the respondents who participated in our survey and made it possible for us to conduct our research. Lastly, the researchers would like to thank each other for supporting and encouraging one another during this process.</p><p>Linnaeus University  </p><p>Växjö 26th of May 2017</p>

Social networking sites are a major networking tool for consumer interactions as they provide a platform for communication, socialization, and learning activity. Subsequently, social media has become an important marketing tool for advertising companies’ messages. As a result, fashion brands such as H&M and Victoria’s Secret started to show more brand ads on Facebook. Facebook is one of the most powerful social networking sties due to its ability to reach to broad consumer groups through a brand page. However, research regarding this topic is limited as the social networking sites is relatively a new phenomenon. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to examine the effect of the brand’s comments in attenuating (enhancing) negative (positive) influence of other consumer’s postings on brand trust and purchase intention of other consumer’s postings on social media. Findings from this study revealed that there is no moderating effect of brand comments of the relationship between other consumer’s postings and brand trust, while positive other consumer’s postings has a significant effect on consumers’ brand trust. Also, there were no significant differences among other consumer’s postings, brand comments and purchase intention relationships. These findings add to the previous literature explains that brand should interact with consumers frequently in order to induce positive other consumer’s postings to develop brand trust. By using the consumer socialization theory to investigate Facebook marketing, this study provides insights and information on consumer attitudes and behaviors related to Facebook brand page.

Building on the stimulus-organism-response model, this paper aims to fill the considerable research gap by developing a deeper understanding of social commerce as a global emerging phenomenon and investigating the effectiveness of social commerce marketing stimuli and its consequences on consumer behavior on Instagram. The study adopts a mixed-methodology approach, including a web-based survey and a focus group interview, to build a deeper understanding of the phenomenon and account for the social aspects of social commerce. Based on a sample of 317 international consumers, the analysis demonstrates that all dimensions of social commerce marketing stimuli have significant effects on online brand engagement on Instagram; which consequently positively influences brand trust and online purchase intention. Moreover, the focus group interview complements the findings and provides potential explanations for the discovered relationships.

Framväxten av flertalet detaljhandelsalternativ har resulterat i att modemarknaden blivit allt mer konkurrensutsatt vilket lämnar konsumenten till oändligt många valmöjligheter. Den föränderliga lojaliteten gentemot varumärken innebär flertalet utmaningar för företag att särskilja sig från mängden och erbjuda konsumenten värde för att därmed ha möjlighet till att upprätthålla en långvarig relation med konsumenten. Under senare tid har det blivit allt mer intressant att undersöka konsumenters ”kärlek” till varumärken och med tiden har begreppet varumärkeskärlek uppstått i forskningssammanhang. Varumärkeskärlek innefattar den grad av passionerad, känslomässig anknytning som en nöjd konsument har för ett visst varumärke. I studien presenteras teorierna Customer-Based Brand Equity (CBBE), 11 Dimensions of Love Toward a Brand och The Brand Love prototype som behandlar varumärkeslojalitet och varumärkeskärlek. Utefter förutnämnda teorier har författarna sedan utformat ett nytt teoretisk ramverk med sex stycken faktorer som förutsätts för att uppnå varumärkeskärlek. Studiens syfte är att ur ett konsumentperspektiv utforska vilka faktorer som skapar varumärkeskärlek samt hur varumärkesägande företag utefter detta skapar varumärkeslojala konsumenter. Resultatet från de kvalitativa, semistrukturerade intervjuerna och enkätundersökningen visar på att fyra faktorer var starkt kopplade till varumärkeskärlek: Förtroende, Identitetsskapande, Kärleksrelationer samt Upplevd och förväntad kvalité. / The fast evolvement of retail alternatives has resulted in an increasing competition in the fashion market which leaves the customer with a number of options to choose from. The change in loyalty toward brands means that companies have to face many challenges which involves distinguishing themselves from other companies. They have to offer the consumer value and thereby create an opportunity to maintain a long-term relationship with the consumer. In recent times it has become interesting to study consumers “love” towards brands and over time the concepts of brand love has emerged in research contexts. Brand love includes the level of passionate, emotional attachment that a satisfied consumer has for a particular brand. The study presents following theories: Customer-Based Brand Equity (CBBE), 11 Dimensions of Love Toward a Brand and The Brand Love prototype which manage brand loyalty and brand love. The authors has then used the earlier mentioned theories to create a new theoretical framework with six factors predicted for achieving brand love. The aim of the study is to examine in a consumer perspective which factors that create brand love and how brand-owned companies can create loyal consumers. Through qualitative, semi structured interviews and surveys the results indicates that four factors had a strong connection to brand love: Brand trust, Brand identification, Love relationship and Perceived and expected quality.

A brand could be considered to be the face of a company. The most visible aspect of a brand is the logo, but there is another perspective widely known, namely brand personality. Previous studies have acknowledged that brands, in the eyes of consumers, can be seen as having personality traits. With this knowledge, it becomes important for managers to understand what type of personality their brands possess and how therelationship between brand personality and consumers, especially their behavior, works. The purpose of this study was to explore whether brand personality has an effect on consumers‟ preference and trust towards a brand, and furthermore, whether brand personality is first influencing brand identification, as an indirect link, on its way towards preference and trust. Another aspect of this study was to make a cultural comparison between Germany and Sweden in order to find out if there are any differences in how consumers from different cultures view brand personality, and if that affects the results for brand identification, preference and trust. The findings will help marketing managers to understand the effects of brand personality, its relationship with the consumer, and moreover if the concept of brand identification is an important aspect in order to increase consumers‟ preference and trust towards a specific brand. A quantitative method was used for this study, since a large sample was thought to be needed. A total of 317 respondents provided answers for this research, out of those 190 were gathered from an online survey, while the remaining 127 answered a standard paper-based questionnaire. 181 of the respondents were German and 136 were Swedish.Two non-probability sampling techniques, snowball and convenience, were used. The questionnaires consisted of 26 questions, 13 for each brand, measuring brand personality, brand identification, preference and trust, using Likert-scales from 1 to 5. Four brands, Apple, Nike, Ikea and Mercedes Benz, were used, each restricted to one page. In order to not provide the respondents with an overwhelmingly number of questions to answer, a split of the questionnaire was made. Two questionnaires, the first with the brands Apple and Nike, and the second with Ikea and Mercedes Benz were conducted. The splitting procedure was also used to provide answers concerning cultural differences. One questionnaire was culturally neutral, while the other was culturally biased, allowing for the exploration of the effects of country of origin and consumer ethnocentric tendencies. The results of this study showed that there were indications of brand personality affecting the level of trust towards a brand among consumers. Especially, correlations were found between the brand personality dimensions of Competence and Sincerity with brand trust and between Excitement and preference. However, the concept of brand identification, as a connecting link, is found to have very weak effects on consumers‟preference and trust. Nevertheless, the findings indicate that brand personality effects consumers‟ preference and trust directly. Regarding the cultural comparison with Germany and Sweden, the responses provided an inconclusive result. In questionnaire one, the answers were fairly similar. The same could be said about questionnaire two, even though German respondents tended to produce higher scores for the brand personalities than Swedish respondents. Overall, by illustrating the results in a graph, it can be determined that the answers from both groups exhibit the same pattern. Furthermore, it was concluded that there were no clear indications of country of origin or consumer ethnocentrism effects.

Background: During the last decade, retail businesses have realized the importance of creatinga strong brand to be able to differentiate in a fierce market. However, having a strong brand isno longer enough to survive in the long run and gain a large customers base. Especially in theretail and fashion industry where many products fulfill the same need for the customer, making it important to adapt to changes on the market and stand out in the crowd. This has lead to the wide variety of brands that can be found and an intensified competition. Therefore, the key factor for building a long-term relationship is through customer brand relationship. A literature review showed that the most important variables needed to build this relationship are brandexperience, brand satisfaction and brand trust. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate how brand experience, brand satisfaction and brand trust effect brand loyalty in Växjö, Sweden. Hypotheses:H1: Brand experience has a positive effect on brand loyalty.H2: Brand satisfaction has a positive effect on brand loyalty.H3: Brand trust has a positive effect on brand loyalty. Method: This study was based on a deductive and quantitative research approach withempirical data conducted from 239 respondents to either accept or reject the stated hypotheses. Result and conclusion: According to the empirical data, the stated hypotheses were acceptedand imply that 41.2 percent of brand loyalty can be explained by brand satisfaction, brand trustand brand experience. However, for retail businesses within the fashion industry to ensurebrand loyalty from the customers, brand satisfaction is the main focus.

Given the credence nature of food quality and food safety attributes, consumers cannot easily verify whether food is high quality or is safe to eat, thus they rely on abstract systems of regulation and quality signals such as brands to make informed consumption choices. In fact, trust is recognized as a rational strategy that reduces consumers’ uncertainty when purchasing goods with credence attributes. While trust in food is a topical issue in an era of increasingly complex food systems, how trust and more precisely brand trust affects consumers’ perceptions of food is a relatively new research area in food economics. This thesis aims to answer questions such as what drives trust in the actors within the Canadian food system (i.e. government, farmers, food manufacturers, and food retailers) and in food brands, and the relationship between that trust and consumer confidence in food quality and food safety. Previous studies on institutional and system trust have been carried out primarily in the sociology, marketing and political sciences disciplines, while a few studies in food economics have investigated the influence of institutional trust and reported the degree of public trust in market actors. This study extends previous research on consumer trust in the context of food by developing a conceptual model in which trust in the food system and brand trust are expected to evolve to public confidence in credence attributes and lead to consumer commitment to food brands. Inspired from a comprehensive synthesis of the literature on consumer trust, the theoretical background suggests that consumer confidence in food attributes is jointly determined by trust in the food system (system-based trust) and brand trust (product-based trust), and it is moderated by consumer characteristics (personal-based trust) – namely: risk, past consumption experience and ethically-motivated behaviour. As well, consumers are assumed to perceive an actor or a brand as trustworthy through the influence of four postulated dimensions of trust: perceived competence, credibility, benevolence and reputation. A Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) approach is used for the empirical analysis. Data were gathered through an online survey of consumers conducted across Canada in July 2012 focusing on fresh chicken and packaged green salad products. The results show that individually none of the postulated antecedents of trust (i.e. competence, credibility, benevolence and reputation) was a significant driver for trust, especially for packaged salad. Unlike previous research on institutional trust and brand trust that uses a number of separate dimensions to measure trust predominantly in non-food contexts, this thesis finds that trust in the food system and food products could be measured differently by taking into account the interactive effects of perceived competence, credibility, reputation and benevolence on public trust. As such, the findings suggest that Canadian consumers tend to trust brands of chicken and packaged salad when these products are perceived as high quality, are backed by credible information, have a good reputation and, at the same time, enhance consumers’ welfare. In fact, a brand cannot be perceived as high quality and safe to eat (brand competence) without containing transparent information signalling its quality and safety (brand credibility). Additionally, results reveal some apparent product-specific effects: brand trust matters in fostering consumer confidence in chicken but not for salad. Furthermore, trust in the food system as a whole appears to be more influential in leading to public confidence in credence attributes than trust in food brands in the case of chicken. As such, it appears that trust in actors within the food supply chain is more important than relying on individual products. As well, the analysis shows that while psychographic variables (risk aversion, past consumption experience) and some demographics (e.g. gender, education) moderate the relationship between trust in the food system and brands for chicken, this is not the case for salad. In terms of marketing implications, the results suggest that while brands are useful signalling mechanisms, trust in these brands is not the main driver for consumer confidence in credence attributes. Furthermore, the much stronger effect of system trust implies that decision-makers would benefit by investing in building trust relationships with the public. Transparent communication and credible assurances about the practices and the intentions within the food system could be a way to gain and maintain public trust and, ultimately, consumer confidence in food quality and food safety.

Välgörenhet är något som har ökat de senaste 30 åren och 2008 slogs det ett världs rekord i insamling till välgörenhetsändamål. Med flera organisationer som ägnar sig åt välgörenhet kan det bidra till att konkurrensen hårdnar i mellan dem. Med ökad konkurrens i en marknad växer behovet av att ha en strategisk marknadsföringsplan som bidrar till konkurrenskraft. I denna uppsats undersöks hur välgörenhetsorganisationer kan stärka sitt varumärke och utveckla förtroendet hos sina bidragsgivare via sociala medier. Varumärke är något som är under ständig påbyggnad. Det går att jämföra med ett pussel, där alla bitar skall tillsammans bilda en helhet. För att en organisation ska kunna skapa ett starkt varumärke är de i behov av att få en enhetlig kommunikation som sprider sig utöver hela organisationen. Förtroende skapas då en bidragsgivare har möjligheten att lära känna en organisation, via upplevelser, aktiviteter och engagemang skapas en relation som i sin tur gynnar både organisationen och bidragsgivaren. De teoretiska utgångspunkterna i uppsatsen behandlar hur konkurrenskraftiga strategier skapar fördelar för organisationer på marknaden. Därefter framförs hur marknadsföring i sociala medier kan se ut och vilka effekter det kan bidra till. Varumärke, förtroende och dialoger tas även upp för att få en förståelse för hur de hänger ihop. Uppsatsens tillvägagångssätt består av observationer och intervjuer med tre organisationer som är aktiva inom välgörenhet. De organisationer som berörts är Rädda barnen, Hjärt- och lungfonden samt Barncancerfonden. Observationer och intervjuer som genomförts har därefter ställts mot den analysmodell som togs fram utifrån de teoretiska utgångspunkterna. De slutsatser som uppsatsen kommer fram till är att välgörenhetsorganisationer idag använder sig av strategiska marknadsföringsplaner för att stärka sitt varumärke. De ser på sociala medier som en kommunikationskanal som bidrar till att skapa förtroende för befintliga och potentiella bidragsgivare. Genom att skapa aktiviteter och dialoger via sociala medier medför det att bidragsgivare kan skapa en relation till välgörenhetsorganisationen. En relation som skapar förtroende och en starkare tillit till organisationen och varumärket. / Charity has grown tremendously the last 30 years. In 2008 there was a new world record revolving the most donated amount combine towards charitable causes. With an increasing of charity organizations around the world, the competition around these organizations has also increased. And with the increased competition between the charity organizations, the need for competitive strategies has become more important.  This thesis examines how charity organizations use social media to strengthen their brand and create trust towards donors. Through a study involving observations and interviews of three chosen charity organizations, a conclusion has been determined. The chosen organisations in this thesis are: Rädda barnen, Hjärt- och lungfonden and Barncancerfonden. A brand is something that is under constant development, it is almost refered to as a puzzle. All the bits and pieces have to be there to see the big picture. The same thing applies to the brand. A brand that is transparent and can be seen throughout the whole organization can result in a stronger brand. The conclusion of this thesis is that trust can be achieved by creating and maintaining activities and participation that involves donors. By making the donors feel more connected to the organization and by encourage dialogues, a relationship is created. The relationship can lead to a long commitment from the donor that will benefit both parties. It can also lead to a word of mouth-effect, also known as buzz-marketing. The WOM-effect involves the donor and his or hers ability to spread the organizations brand and knowledge to other donors, thus increasing trust for the organizations cause and brand.

Diss. Stockholm : Stockholms universitet, 2008.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Hotel, Restaurant, Institution Management and Dietetics / Ki-Joon Back / This study, based on customer-based brand equity (Keller, 1993), sought to identify key brand associations in brand knowledge and investigated attendees’ behaviors as evidenced in a comparison of a professional association’s major and regional conferences. The points of comparison were brand satisfaction, updated expectation of brand value (UEBV), brand trust, and attitudinal brand loyalty (ABL), especially the mediating effect of UEBV on brand trust-ABL link and the moderating effect of behavioral brand loyalty (BBL) within the brand trust-(UEBV)-brand loyalty link. To identify the proposed paths and differential effect of brand knowledge across I-CHRIE annual conference (IC) and regional CHRIE conferences (RC), this study sampled I-CHRIE members attending IC and/ or RC, using an online survey system. The response rate was 20.1% (213 out of 1,036) for IC and 19.4% (201 out of 1,036) for RC. Confirmatory factor analysis and/or structural equation modeling were used to test construct validity and hypotheses. Findings showed that professional education, staff service, site selection, and social networking are positively related to brand satisfaction, whereas brand awareness is negatively associated with it. Because brand satisfaction is a starting point in affecting UEBV, brand trust, and ABL, these four brand associations are presumed to be major sources of the differential effect of brand knowledge between IC and RC. Also, positive relationships existed on each path for brand satisfaction-UEBV, UEBV-brand trust, brand satisfaction-brand trust, and brand trust-ABL. It is especially important to look at the mediating effect of UEBV on brand satisfaction-brand trust path. UEBV was found to serve as a partial mediator on the brand satisfaction-brand trust path across the two groups. This result suggests that brand trust, the firm expectation that the brand will perform according to its promise, builds up through UEBV as well as through brand satisfaction. This study further extended the proposed theoretical model by dividing it into high and low BBL groups designed to unveil the differential characteristics or mechanisms between two groups. Except for the brand trust-ABL path, BBL was found to moderate the direct path (brand satisfaction to brand trust) and the indirect path (brand satisfaction to brand trust via UEBV). These findings support the notion that since high BBL attendees sustain longer relationships with a particular conference than low BBL attendees, high BBL attendees experience more cumulative satisfaction and update favorable expectations of brand value (through the perception of more [relational] benefits), thereby solidifying expectations about confidence in a brand (brand trust). Brand loyalty holds invaluable benefits for associations when associations in similar disciplines compete for potential attendees. Benefits from brand loyal customers lower marketing costs and increase market share and profitability. Thus, associations should build their conference marketing and management on brand loyalty by carefully designing brand associations attendees consider important. Persistent delivery of high-quality education programs, venue selection, and social networking enables associations to obtain cumulative satisfaction, UEBV, brand trust, and consequently brand loyalty. Retention of brand loyal attendees induces deep commitment to the conferences and great resistance to other conferences’ marketing strategies, thereby contributing to high revenue and market share.