Angella J. Kim

Impacts of Luxury Fashion Brand’s Social Media Marketing on Customer Relationship and Purchase Intention

Abstract Luxury brands have always been fashion industry leaders, with admirable aesthetic value and innovative yet traditional business management. The brands constantly struggle to secure profits by providing novel value to customers through quality products and services, customer management, retail strategies, and innovative marketing mixes. However, the recent entry of numerous fashion brands in the luxury market coupled with decreased sales related to economic downturns have led to new challenges for luxury firms. Because the luxury fashion business is considered high value-added with guaranteed high profit margins and secure regular customers, the lower sectors have begun to heat up the competition. To survive the recent unforeseen challenges of heated competition, they have turned toward marketing communication using social media. Social media are the two-way communication platforms that allow users to interact with each other online to share information and opinions. Use of social media sites such as Twitter and Facebook has already expanded to almost every luxury fashion brand and been evaluated as business take-off tools. With the increased use of social media as a means of marketing communication for luxury brands, it has become necessary to empirically analyze the effect of social media marketing (SMM). Thus, the study presented here investigated the effects of this SMM on customer relationships (involving intimacy and trust) and purchase intention. A preliminary test was conducted in order to draw a sample of a luxury fashion brand for this study. Self-administrated questionnaires with visual stimuli were used to collect data from luxury consumers in the Seoul area. Respondents were restricted to consumers who had purchased any luxury fashion brand item within the previous two years. Among 150 questionnaires distributed, 133 questionnaires were finally employed for statistical analysis. Principal component analysis using varimax rotation was conducted to figure out the properties of luxury fashion brands’ SMM. The social media contained five properties: entertainment, customization, interaction, word of mouth, and trend. Factor loadings ranged from .84 to .52. Cronbach’s α lay between .80 and .88, demonstrating adequate construct reliability. Multiple regression analysis was conducted to test the effects of SMM on customer relationship (i.e., intimacy and trust) and purchase intention, as well as relationship between customer relationship (i.e., intimacy and trust) and purchase intention. Results show that entertainment has a significant positive effect on intimacy (β=.25, t=3.48, p<.01), trust (β=.34, t=5.75, p<.001), and purchase intention (β=.31, t=4.32, p<.001). Other positive effects are customization on trust (β=.13, t=2.28, p<.05), interaction on purchase intention (β=.25, t=3,54, p<.01), word of mouth on intimacy (β=.14, t=1.92, p<.05) and purchase intention (β=.19, t=2.65, p<.01), and trend only on trust (β=.32, t=5.30, p<.001). It seems that entertainment, customization, and trend were satisfying what customers expected from a luxury fashion brand. Because the luxury industry aims to provide value to customers in every way possible, the brands should focus on providing free entertainment content, customized services, and trend forward social media site which all act positively toward enhancing customer relationship. Trust has a significant relationship with purchase intention (β=.34, t=4.85, p<.001). Since the trust variable within a customer relationship was only significantly associated with purchase intention, the mediating effects of customization and trend were found. The study proves the effectiveness of luxury brands’ SMM on both customer relationships and purchase intention, and proposes a strategy to enhance the brands’ performance by defining specific factors influencing both. The result show that the chosen brand’s SMM includes distinctive elements in comparison to old-fashioned marketing performances. Every property found in luxury brands’ SMM positively influenced customer relationships and purchase intention, with entertainment affecting more variables than any other properties. Luxury brands should heavily supply an entertainment aspect of social media contents and activities. Every activity enabled by use of the media, such as creating relationships with other users, providing customized service and free entertainment contents, and obtaining genuine information on personal interest should all be entertaining. By focusing on providing such features, customer relationships and purchase intention will be enhanced. Concerning the association between customer relationship and purchase intention, trust and purchase intention were highly related. Customers’ trust was strengthened via interaction with other users as well as brand on social media sites. Trust gained while enjoying entertainment and communication provided on the sites seems to contribute greatly toward a luxury brand’s profit. With the growing interest of luxury fashion brands in providing luxurious value to customers in every way possible, using social media appears to be appropriate for retaining old customers and attracting cross-shoppers. As competition among luxury fashion brands becomes more intense by providing plenty of alternatives to customers, the brands’ prosperity seems no longer quite so promising. The importance of managing customers as valuable assets cannot be emphasized more. As such, more luxury brands should engage in social media marketing activities to anticipate a positive contribution to the brands by providing new luxury value to customers.

The Impact of Design Characteristics on Brand Attitude and Purchase Intention - Focus on Luxury Fashion Brands -

Most luxury fashion brands have a strong brand identity and the product design characteristics of a brand are critical factors that influence brand identity. The design of products influence brand identity and play an important role in the choice by consumers in which brand to purchase. This study investigates the impact design characteristics of luxury brands on brand attitudes as well as purchase intentions in the examination of the differences in the impact influence by product category and consumer characteristics. The product design of brands was evaluated and measured by innovative and traditional characteristics. The product categories were divided into apparel, bags, shoes, and accessories. The consumer characteristics used in this study are fashion involvement, age, income, and the amount of money used for purchasing fashion products. Sample brands, Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Hermes, Burberry, and Gucci, were extracted from the Intel-brand`s Luxury Brand Ranking 2008 and pilot tested for appropriateness. The data collected from 120 luxury consumers and 92 samples were statistically analyzed with SPSS 15.0, reliability test, factor analysis, ANOVA, frequency test, regression, and t-test. The findings are as follow. First, luxury brands were divided into two groups by innovative design characteristics and traditional design characteristics; innovative design characteristics show a significant influence on brand attitude and purchase intention. Second, only fashion related behavior factors among consumer characteristics became moderators when design characteristics influenced brand attitude and purchase intention. Third, the differences in purchase intention affected by design characteristics were found in bags, shoes, and accessories category. It is necessary for luxury brands to focus on innovative design characteristics and to specify the different needs of consumers through fashion related behavioral factors. This research will be useful to luxury brands in designing products and planning marketing strategies by offering specific information for luxury brand consumers.

Relationship between Personal Protective Equipment, Self-Efficacy, and Job Satisfaction of Women in the Building Trades

AbstractWithin construction trades, there is a lack of personal protective equipment (PPE) and work clothing specifically designed and manufactured for women. This was a mixed methods study designed to investigate the use of PPE and work clothing among tradeswomen and to examine attributes significantly related to PPE/work clothing satisfaction using the Functional-Expressive-Aesthetic (FEA) consumer needs model. In addition, the relationship between PPE/work clothing, self-efficacy, and job satisfaction were quantitatively analyzed. The findings of this study suggest the common phrase “dress for success” applies beyond white-collar workers. The data showed clear connections between satisfaction of PPE and work clothing, self-efficacy, and overall satisfaction of trades work. Although it is a leap to imply properly fitting PPE can improve the statistics of job retention for tradeswomen, this research indicates it is logical to suggest wearing proper PPE and work clothing creates a more positive work exper...

Identifying Antecedents of Risky Appearance Management Behaviors: The United States and South Korea

Acts of appearance management include a range of activities to control the presentation of the body that one makes to self and to others. Appearance management behaviors (AMBs) can be divided into two categories: risky and non-risky. Risky AMBs can all be linked to some threat to health if engaged in for extended periods of time. We investigated body-related variables predicting engagement in three specific categories (i.e., cosmetic procedures, extreme dieting, use of diet aids) of risky AMBs with female undergraduates from the U.S. (n = 349) and from South Korea (n = 338). The predictor variables were objectified body consciousness (OBC) and body image investment (BII). Mediating variables investigated were body comparison (BC) and body satisfaction (BS). Across all risky AMBs investigated and with participants from both countries, as BC increased, BS decreased. Similarly, OBC and BII significantly predicted BC for both groups of women. For Korean women, OBC predicted engagement in cosmetic procedure and extreme dieting through BC. For U.S. women, OBC and BII predicted extreme dieting and use of diet pills through BS. Further, there was a difference between the two countries in terms of the specific risky AMBs engaged in. Korean participants engaged in cosmetic procedures followed by extreme dieting. U.S. participants engaged in the use of diet aids followed by extreme dieting.

The Preference and Purchasing Intention of Traditional Design by Characteristics of Traditional Culture Values and Preferred Style Image of Traditional Design

This study investigates the Korean loungewear market and the traditional culture values of consumers related to loungewear to examine the preference of Korean traditional details, sewing techniques in loungewear design, and purchasing intentions. A survey method was used in this study. A total of 230 self-administered questionnaires were obtained from female consumers and 214 data sets were used for analysis. For the analysis, factor analysis, cluster analysis, and ANOVA were executed with PASW Statistics 18.0 and a structural equation model was estimated by Amos 18.0. The results are as follows. Traditional culture values were classified into two dimensions, traditional succession value and traditional design preference value. In the structure equation model, the traditional design preference value had a significant effect on the preference and the traditional culture succession value had significant effect on purchase intention. The results proved that the preference on loungewear with Korean traditional elements is closely related to purchase intention. Consumer groups were divided into three groups by traditional culture values factor; traditional culture succession group, traditional design preference group, and traditional culture indifference group. Style preference images showed significant differences in relation to traditional culture groups. This study is for use as fundamental knowledge on traditional loungewear brand development and strategy planning by offering specific traditional culture aspects associated with preference and purchase intentions.

Attitudes toward crowdsourced, community-involved new product development

Purpose In the context of crowdsourced new product development (NPD), the purpose of this paper is to investigate the optimal level of community involvement (CI) (e.g. zero, limited, and high) when creating products from the perspectives of both ordinary and advanced users. The authors also investigate the influence of design interest and need for social affiliation on users’ attitudes toward and willingness to use community co-design. Design/methodology/approach The authors conducted two survey studies using ordinary (Study 1, n=199) and advanced users (Study 2, n=131) to evaluate the co-designed T-shirts reflecting varying levels of CI (i.e. zero, limited, and high). The stimuli for both studies were the same and included ten sets of T-shirt co-designs generated from a CI crowdsourced website, Threadless. Fishbein’s (1963) multi-attribute attitude model was used to compute subjects’ overall attitude score toward the T-shirt co-designs. Findings Results showed both ordinary and advanced user groups rated the design quality of products reflecting limited CI lower than those of zero CI. Advanced users also rated the design quality and sales potential of products from limited CI lower than those of high CI. Further, advanced users indicated that products resulting from high CI reflected significantly better designs with regard to color, shape/line, size, general theme, and overall design as compared to products from limited CI. Design interest as well as need for social affiliation influenced users’ willingness to use community co-design and their attitudes toward a community co-design experience. Originality/value The research made an important differentiation between zero, limited, and high CI during the co-design process as well as between ordinary users and advanced users contributed to the extant literature addressing crowdsourcing in NPD.