Social media and luxury brand: what luxury watch brands need to know when on Instagram

Abstract

The relationship between social media and luxury brands was started with hesitations due to different characteristics. Nevertheless, the huge opportunities brought by social media are something to be considered. It enables luxury brands to interact wider without time and distance barrier while the best platform for engagement is Instagram. Consequently, many luxury brands are trying to have their own Instagram accounts. However, there are no sufficient literatures that have discussed how things work specifically among the luxury watch brands. This research intends to find out how luxury watch brands should use Instagram and its effect on customer relationship and purchase intention. Researcher explores luxury watch brands' social media attributes (entertainment, customisation, interaction, word-of-mouth, and trend) and values (functional, hedonic, symbolic, financial, and relational) adopted from related journals. Then, this research will use PLS-SEM analysis to evaluate the relationship. Content analysis towards Instagram's practice of five luxury watch brands will also be conducted to gain insights for suggesting recommendation. Result indicates that there is a positive relationship between social media marketing, customer relationship, and purchase intention. Also, symbolic and hedonic value appears as the most engaging contents while relational shows potential though it has not been implemented frequently.