Talking with You—Not at You: How Brand Ambassadors Can Spark Consumer Brand Attachment?

Abstract

Strongly supported forms of online and offline consumer networking strategies have the potential to reach consumers adverse to traditional forms of mass media advertising (Trusov, Bucklin and Pauwels 2009). Whilst such channels may offer important opportunities for marketers, brand managers must fully understand how to exploit them for maximum benefit (Kucuk 2010). Consumers engage in online interactions to satisfy their cognitive, social and emotional needs in a way that emulates traditional face-to-face contexts (Jae Wook et al. 2008). The impact of such consumer-to-consumer interactions and, information exchange on brand attachment and subsequent buying behavior is well documented in the literature with reported flow-on benefits such as enhanced attitudinal and behavioral loyalty, positive word of mouth (WOM), willingness to pay a premium price (WPPP) and brand defense (Jae Wook et al. 2008). However, the ability to stimulate and build brand attachment via the satisfaction of consumer needs in the context of brand-initiated, as opposed to consumer initiated, interactions is unknown. This is because such contexts have typically excluded marketers’ direct brand involvement. Usually, where brands have been involved, contact has been through forms of sponsorship or via a paid endorser, where direct interaction between consumers and brand representatives is extremely limited, scripted or non-existent. This is due to consumer skepticism stemming from their fear that brand participation in their conversations is motivated by the opportunity to ‘sell’. Consumers also often wish to keep their conversations ‘private’ in order to speak freely or even, sometimes, criticize products as well as praise them. Consequently, direct interactions between brands and consumers, both on and offline, are not truly co-created experiences where value is given and derived by both parties.