The effects of brand hearsay on brand trust and brand attitudes

ABSTRACT

Utilizing Grace and O’Cass’s Service Brand Verdict (SBV) framework, this research suggests that brand hearsay (i.e., advertising/promotion, word-of-mouth, and non-paid publicity) affects brand trust (i.e., affective and cognitive trust), which then leads to forming brand attitudes. This study tests the model and hypotheses based on responses from a sample of 346 respondents recruited by online sampling. A two-stage procedure is conducted to assess the measurement model and structural model using a bootstrapping technique with SmartPLS 3. The findings demonstrate that advertising/promotion and WOM (eWOM) had effects on affective trust while publicity did not have effect on affective trust. Also, advertising/promotion had a direct positive effect on cognitive trust, whereas neither WOM (eWOM) nor publicity did. In the brand trust-attitude link, affective trust not only fosters cognitive trust to brands, but also affects brand attitude positively.

摘要

利用Grace和O’Cass（2005）的服务品牌评价（SBV）框架，研究表明品牌传闻（即广告/促销、口碑和非付费宣传）影响品牌信任（即情感和认知信任），进而形成品牌态度.本研究基于346名在线抽样调查对象的回答，测试了模型和假设.采用智能PLS3自举技术对测量模型和结构模型进行了两阶段评估.研究结果表明，广告/促销和WOM（eWOM）对情感信任有影响，而宣传对情感信任无影响.广告/促销对认知信任也有直接的积极影响，而WOM（eWOM）和公共宣传都没有.在品牌信任态度环节中，情感信任不仅对品牌产生认知信任，而且对品牌态度产生积极影响.

KEYWORDS:

• Brand hearsay
• brand trust
• brand attitudes
• smartPLS 3

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Korea and the National Research Foundation of Korea [NRF-2016S1A5A2A01025198]