Abstract Brand Flagship Platforms (BFPs) serve as a strategic tool for manufacturer brands to strengthen customer relationships by offering digital benefits beyond product purchases. This research advances the emerging literature on BFPs by examining how five consumer goals (commercial exchange, social exchange, self-improvement, epistemic empowerment, and creative empowerment) affect brand attachment and purchase intention in the sports context. The results show that commercial exchange and epistemic empowerment exert significant positive effects on purchase intention. Social exchange, as a higher-order goal, is the only consumer goal that exhibits a substantial mediation effect on purchase intention via brand attachment. Furthermore, the analyses of four leading sports-related BFPs reveal that the consumer goals most effective in fostering brand attachment and purchase intention (epistemic empowerment and social exchange) are also prominently reflected in the platforms’ feature sets. By contrast, features supporting self-improvement are widely implemented, despite this goal showing no meaningful impact on brand attachment or purchase intention. These findings provide actionable insights for designing user-oriented BFPs and underscore the importance of aligning platform features with consumer goals. Overall, this research enriches both the theoretical and managerial understanding of BFPs as a marketing instrument.

Abstract Storytelling presents a promising approach to building a strong brand. While the impact of storytelling on brand perception has been well researched from a consumer perspective, few studies have examined how SME entrepreneurs apply this concept. This study contributes to closing this research gap by exploring the role that brand storytelling plays in small businesses and how it mediates the relationship between brand identity and brand performance. A unique dataset of 217 German SMEs, including 107 effective responses from German start-ups, provided the basis for this study. For data analysis, this study used linear and multiple regressions for hypothesis testing and applied t-tests and one-way ANOVA to explore differences between start-ups and SMEs, as well as other factors like firm age and size. The results showed strong relations between brand storytelling and brand positioning which serves as the bridge between a brand's identity and its perception by customers. This is the first study to explore brand storytelling by distinguishing and empirically validating two dimensions: strategic storytelling (i.e. the brand as a story) and tactical storytelling (i.e. stories about the brand). Additionally, it provides practical implications for SME entrepreneurs on utilizing brand storytelling to enhance SME branding efforts.