The rapid growth in the popularity of social media sites has meant that social media has become an important communication channel for brands. Brands create brand pages on social media to cultivate positive and strong relationships with consumers. This study seeks to enhance our understanding of how fashion brand pages in social media foster consumer-brand relationships by exploring the factors that affect the development of consumer-brand relationships. Drawing on the parasocial interaction theory, this study proposes parasocial interaction as a key factor of this process. Specifically, this study proposes four antecedents (vividness, interactivity, social presence, and focused attention) of consumers’ parasocial interaction with brand pages, which further affects consumer responses in terms of affective engagement and brand loyalty. An online survey was administered with consumers who have followed and visited at least one fashion brand page via a social networking site (SNS). Structural equation modeling revealed that consumers’ perceptions of vividness, interactivity, social presence, and focused attention on a fashion brand page positively affected their feelings towards parasocial interaction with the brand page, which in turn led to their affective engagement with the brand page and consequent brand loyalty. These findings suggest that consumers build relationships of varying degrees with brand pages in a similar manner to that with people, which leads to their development of a positive relationship with the brand. This study concludes with discussions and practical implications.

Existing literature on the CRM [Customer Relationship Management] has emphasized the marketing strategies between the franchisor and franchisee. In this study, we focused instead on factors involved in forging relationships based on marketing strategies between franchisee and the customers. A survey questionnaire was completed by 250 customers of Korean-style food franchises located in Seoul and Inchon. Each questions is based on a 5-point likert-type scale. After initial data recording, 41 questionnaires were deleted from the data set because of missing or insincerely answer. Finally, the sample data of 209 questionnaires were used for the statistical analysis. The data were analyzed with SPSS version 13.0 software to assess consumer satisfaction, trust, and support/reputation on flexibility and commitment. Regression analysis was performed to analyze the relationship between flexibility and commitment. Satisfaction and support/reputation significantly influenced flexibility, both satisfaction and trust significantly influenced commitment, and both flexibility and commitment significantly influenced the restaurant-consumer relationship.

본 연구에서는 SNS 사용자들이 온라인을 기반으로 생성하는 대인관계에 미치는 영향 요인을 규명하고자 하였다. 이를 위해 우선 온라인 대인관계 영향 요인들을 문헌적 조사와 실증적 조사를 거쳐 수집한 후, 설문 조사를 실시하였고, PLS와 구조방정식을 이용하여 분석을 하였다. 그 결과 인과적 분류에 따른 개인적, 관계적, 환경적 요인과 사회적매력, 육체적매력, 정보게시성, 호혜성, 유사성, 컨텐츠퀄리티, 웹외양, 공동공간감 등 8가지 세부 요인들은 대인관계 차원에 영향을 미치는 요인으로 검증되었다. 최종적으로 이 요인들을 SNS 사용자들의 온라인 기반 대인관계에 영향을 미치는 요인으로 제안하였다.

The purpose of this research is to introduce the concept of "relationship formation factors" in inter-firm relations and to empirically demonstrate that they are effective in improving the relationship results by means of an mediating variable. Therefore, the basic model of this study consists of the independent, mediating, and dependent variables. First, the independent variables, that is, the relationship formation factors, are further classified into three components. transactional, relational, and environmental characteristics. Then, the study empirically examines how each of the three components influences the dependent variable. that is, the business performance(Load Factor), by way of the mediating variables, that is, trust and relationship commitment.