This study employed the social comparison theory, brand signally theory and the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) to examine the extent to which attributes of a celebrity endorsing a brand and brand values impact on young adults’ cosmetics brand attitude and purchase intention. Data was collected from 301 young adult South Africans. Structural equation modelling results revealed that cosmetics brand attitude was influenced by celebrity attractiveness, credibility, celebrity product expertise and the symbolic brand value enjoyed from the brand. The brand attitude in turn predicted purchase intention.

With the tremendous development of social media in recent years, luxury brands have welcomed social media with open arms as a means to engage with their customers. How luxury brands can make good use of social media marketing strategy is a top priority for both academicians and partitions but has not been well investigated. Many significant research gaps are present in this area warranting further explorations. For example, there is little research on the effectiveness of celebrity endorsement on social media (except for Chung and Cho’ (2017) study), even less for luxury brands. In addition, previous research on social media marketing mainly focuses on western-based platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. Given the mentioned research gaps, this study builds on social media marketing and celebrity endorsement literature and aims to investigate the key factors influencing the effectiveness of celebrity-based social media marketing efforts for luxury brands. In particular, China market and Sina Weibo are selected as our research setting. We propose the message characteristics, celebrity characteristics, celebrity-brand relationship and brand characteristics have impact on customer engagement in celebrity-based social media marketing activities. We combined two data sources to generate the key variables. First, we derived posts on the brand pages of 12 luxury brands (e.g., Cartier, Tiffany, BVLGARI and PIAGET) that were published on Sina Weibo from September 2016 to March 2017 on the middle of December 2017. Then celebrity-related posts were all picked out. The final sample includes more than five hundred celebrity-related brand posts. For each post, it contains three kinds of engagement measures (i.e., the number of Likes, Retweets and Comments) observed on Sina Weibo. They are dependent variables in our model. We built up regression models to test the hypotheses. To generate those variables that cannot be derived directly from the posts, a set of independent coders was recruited to quantify those variables. The exploratory results show that posts related to celebrities (e.g., brand ambassador/spokesman) take a significant part of posts on Sina Weibo brand pages.

Introduction Celebrities are actively capitalizing on their fame and credibility by launching their own brand extensions which are heavily promoted on Instagram. This situation is especially prevalent in Malaysia among many local Malay ‘celepreneurs’. While consumers’ constant involvement with a celebrity on Instagram is believed to result in the purchase of celebrity branded products, the central question of how a causal variable such as Instagram involvement has an effect on the outcome of purchase has been less explored in contemporary studies. The role of celebrity adulation and style conformity in the context of celebrity branding-cum-entrepreneurship deserves much attention given the strong influence celebrities exert on young consumers in this digital era of accessible information. Research framework Given the admiration that young consumers have towards the celebrities they follow on Instagram, celebrity worship, in both pathological and non-pathological form, is believed to be a crucial link between their involvement with the social media and their desire to imitate their favourite celebrity’s style. Eventually this paves the way for the purchase of celebrity brand products given that getting the products is an avenue for the young consumers to attain their celebrities’ style. Therefore in this study, four variables that mediate the relationship between Instagram involvement and purchase of celebrity branded products are examined: celebrity worship as manifested across three varying levels particularly entertainment-social (lowest form of worship); intense-personal (mid-level); borderline pathological (highest level); and style conformity. Method Data was collected from 226 Malaysian women of Malay ethnicity who are active Instagram users and fall under the technology-savvy Millennial segment using a self-administered questionnaire. This segment of consumers is technology savvy and has personalities and lifestyles (Gurau, 2012). They also tend to imitate their favourite celebrity in contrast to their male counterparts (Djafarova & Rushworth, 2017). Measures for the mediating variables were derived from McCutcheon et al.’s (2002) Celebrity Worship Scale and Park and Yang’s (2010) items on celebrity style conformity. A five-point scale (1=strongly disagree to 5=strongly agree) was utilized to capture the responses to the variables measured. Analysis and results Serial multiple mediation testing was applied on the data using variance-based structural equation modelling. The multiple mediation analysis showed that of all the three levels of celebrity worship which mediate the link between Instagram involvement and style conformity, only celebrity worship (entertainment-social) was found to be a significant mediator between Instagram involvement and style conformity (Indirect effect=0.127; t-value= 3.285, 95% Boot CI: LL=0.059, UL=0.216). In addition, the presence of a serial mediation was detected for the link between Instagram involvement-celebrity worship (entertainment-social)-style conformity-purchase of celebrity brand products (Indirect effect=0.04; t-value=2.954, 95% Boot CI: LL=0.02, UL=0.08). Conclusion The serial mediation testing in this study has demonstrated that celebrity worship and style conformity serve as the missing link between the involvement-purchase relationship. Furthermore, the multiple mediation testing has shown that only celebrity worship at the basic level functions as a mediator. The findings of this study imply that the use of Instagram is indeed a compelling marketing communication tool that fosters the purchase of celebrity brand extensions. Constant involvement in Instagram by following the celebrity, liking, reposting, commenting or hashtagging on the celebrity’s account builds a keen sense of devotion for the celebrity whereby the individual will constantly watch, read and learn about the celebrity. This then heightens the user’s desire to emulate the style of the celebrity which may well lead them to purchase the celebrity’s products in an effort to imitate the celebrity’s look and demeanour. strong desire for and high willingness to spend on branded products that match their

Not all celebrity endorsements have been successful on social media. However, our understanding of the effectiveness of luxury brand celebrity endorsement advertising are limited. On the basis of Self-Congruity Theory (Sirgy, 1985), Meaning-Transfer Model (McCracken, 1989), and Match-Up Hypothesis (Kamins, 1990; Kamins & Cupta, 1994), this study investigates whether three components of image congruity (i.e., brand-celebrity, brand-self, celebrity-self) would influence brand attitudes, ad attitudes, and self-brand connection, and subsequently, influence consumer engagement and purchase intentions. This study also tests the moderating role of consumer type (followers vs. unfollowers of the social media brand page) in these relationships. After conducting a series of pretests to select a focal brand and celebrities, responses from 219 US female adults were used to data analysis. The results of structural equation modeling showed that brand-celebrity congruity was positively related to ad attitudes and brand attitudes. Brand-self congruity was positively related to ad attitudes, brand attitudes, and self-brand connection. Self-celebrity congruity was positively related to ad attitudes and self-brand connection but was negatively related to brand attitudes. Ad attitudes were positively related to brand attitudes and engagement intentions but were not related to purchase intentions. Brand attitudes were positively related to engagement intentions and purchase intentions. Self-brand connection was positively related to engagement intentions, and engagement intentions were positively related to purchase intentions. Finally, the results of a multi-group analysis showed that for unfollowers (n=125), ad attitudes were positively related to engagement intentions but brand attitudes were not. On the contrary, for followers (n=94), brand attitudes were positively related to engagement intentions but ad attitudes were not. This study highlights that self-brand connection is the key to cultivating consumer engagement on social media, along with the consumer’s positive attitudes toward the celebrity endorsement ad and the brand per se. If luxury brands wish to interact with their followers and increase their engagement, they need to focus their efforts on improving brand attitudes and self-brand connection through their brand pages. Our findings suggest that celebrity endorsed advertising contributes to creating self-brand relationships (Dwivedi et al., 2016) but it should be considered as a long-term investment.

Many information sources have reported that celebrity endorsements of luxury fashion brands are considered one of the success factors that enhance the growth of luxury markets. Yet two contrasting views are held as to whether or not celebrity endorsements are necessary for luxury brands. One view in support of celebrity endorsements for luxury brands insists that the use of celebrities generally provides many beneficial advantages, serving as a good communication tool. Specifically, the celebrity endorsements are effective in increasing ad viewers’ attention, polishing brand images, introducing new brands, and repositioning existing brands (Erdogan, 1999), enhancing message recall (Friedman & Friedman, 1979), and generating favorable attitudes toward ads and brands (Atkin & Block, 1983). Above all, brands endorsed by celebrities often obtain high brand awareness, resulting in a rapid sales increase (Ruiz, 2008). In contrast, the other view is more concerned with the diminished luxuriousness that is overshadowed by celebrities, rather than realizing an immediate increase in sales (Dubois, Laurent, & Czellar, 2001). Celebrity endorsements in ads are expected to increase brand awareness and simultaneously reduce the brand rarity impacting a qualification for status, which is central to brand luxuriousness in particular (Berry, 1994). The publicly recognized brand names would draw more attention from average consumers than from rich consumers, as the wealthier are the less influenced by celebrity endorsements (Gaudoin, 2013). In addition, considering that luxury brands are already constructed with well-defined brand meaning and personalities, using non-celebrity endorsers with luxurious images would be as effective as using celebrity endorsers in terms of improving brand luxuriousness (Okonkwo, 2007). As such, celebrity-endorsed luxury branding strategies seem to be questionable, though they are popularly being adopted. The current study aims to reveal the overall effectiveness of the use of celebrity versus non-celebrity endorsers on consequential consumer evaluations and highlight the importance of congruence between the brand and the endorser (match-up).