Establishing a strong brand is a goal that companies aspire to accomplish because of the many possible benefits that may result. To gain a better understanding of how brand equity is constructed, several models of brand building have been put forward (e.g., Aaker, 1992; Keller, 1993). Essentially, all of these models explain branding effects in terms of customers’ knowledge of a brand and the way in which this knowledge affects their behavior. Thus, Keller (1993) proposed a customer-centric definition of brand equity as the unique impact that brand knowledge has on a customer’s reaction to the brand’s marketing efforts. This definition suggests that the power of a brand comes from the knowledge, emotions, observations, and other associated experiences customers have had with the brand over a prolonged period. In other words, a brand’s power lies in how it is perceived by customers. The task of marketers in cultivating a strong brand is to give that customers favorable experiences with the brand, facilitating the association of desired thoughts, feelings, beliefs, images, and opinions with the brand. Companies thereby strive to seek effective means of inducing positive customer experience, leading to increased brand equity.

Social media has spread widely and radically transformed marketing practices. The rapidly growing social media marketing channel, which had reached 4.62 billion internet users worldwide as of 2022 (Kemp, 2022), is redefining what companies can do and how they can reach and interact with their customers. Social media is becoming increasingly convenient and vital, making it essential for many companies to use these platforms for marketing and brand management. Meanwhile, social media marketing has received much attention from researchers (e.g., Yadav & Rahman, 2017). The issue of brand equity has been a focus of recent studies on social media marketing. For example, in their survey of luxury brand customers, Godey et al. (2016) showed a positive effect of social media marketing on brand equity. Aljumah et al. (2021) also found a positive association between social media marketing and brand equity. Similarly, Koay et al. (2020) reported that social media marketing is positively related to brand equity, and that brand experience mediates this relationship. Zollo et al. (2020) also observed that social media marketing is both directly and indirectly related to brand equity via the mediators of customer experience and benefits. However, Ebrahim (2020) revealed a nonsignificant association between social media marketing and brand equity, but stated that the indirect effect may be significant in shaping brand equity through the mediator of brand trust. Even so, there is still room to further investigate how social media marketing is related to brand equity.

WeChat, Weibo, and other Chinese social media sites attracted approximately 1.02 million users in 2022, making China the largest social media market in the world (Thomala, 2022). Social media is not only a communication tool for Chinese people but also a primary source of news and entertainment, e-payments, and shopping advice. Considering the vast user base of social media in China, it is valuable to explore how social media marketing is linked to brand equity in the Chinese context. Additionally, brand engagement is one key driver of brand equity creation (Kuvykaite & Piligrimiene, 2014). As per Solem’s (2016) definition, brand engagement is a multifaceted psychological occurrence that manifests through emotional, cognitive, and intentional states resulting from interactive experiences, which form the basis of behavioral interactions. Consequently, in this study we explored the relationship of social media marketing with brand equity and examined whether brand engagement plays a mediating role in this relationship. The proposed framework is shown in Figure 1.

Method

Participants and Procedure

This study was conducted according to the ethical guidelines of our university. We selected WeChat as the focal social media site due to its widespread usage in China. WeChat is a versatile social app that encompasses various functionalities such as texting/calling, photo and video sharing, dating, gaming, shopping, ride-hailing services, and financial services. To collect data, we utilized a survey approach and recruited participants via convenience sampling. The participants were college students from a public university in China, chosen as an appropriate target sample due to their active usage of WeChat. The selected respondents were required to follow a brand’s social media page on WeChat For at least 2 weeks, which allowed them to select a brand of their choosing for reference purposes in answering the survey. After removing incorrect and incomplete responses, 275 valid respondents were identified (rate of return = 91.67%). Table 1 shows the demographic characteristics of the respondents.

Measures

The questionnaires used in this study were adopted from the existing literature. A bilingual researcher translated the original scales into Chinese and then back to English, and slight modifications were made to fit the context of this study. All items were measured using a 7-point Likert scale ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 7 = strongly agree.

Social Media Marketing

Social media marketing was measured with 12 items from Cheung et al. (2021), which are divided equally into four dimensions. Sample items are “It is fun to collect information on products through this brand’s WeChat site” (entertainment), “It is possible to have two-way interaction through this brand’s WeChat site” (interaction), “This brand’s WeChat site provides customized services” (customization), and “Content found on this brand’s WeChat site is up-to-date” (trendiness).

Brand Engagement

Brand engagement was measured with nine items from Solem (2016), which are divided equally into three dimensions. Sample items are “I feel energetic during contact with the brand on its WeChat site” (emotional engagement), “When using the brand’s WeChat site I become absorbed by the brand” (cognitive engagement), and “I am very active in relation to the brand on its WeChat site” (intentional engagement).

Brand Equity

Brand equity was measured using four items from Yoo and Donthu (2001), which was developed in line with Keller’s (1993) definition of customer-based brand equity. A sample item is “It makes sense to buy this brand instead of any other brand, even if they are the same.”

Data Analysis

SPSS 22.0 and Amos 20.0 were utilized to analyze the data.

Results

In the measurement model, all standardized item loadings were above .65 (p < .01), and Cronbach’s alpha and composite reliability values exceeded .70. The average variance extracted scores surpassed .50, indicating sound convergent validity. Additionally, the square root of average variance extracted for each construct was higher than the corresponding interconstruct correlations, indicating adequate discriminant validity. Table 2 displays information about reliability, validity, descriptive statistics, and correlations.

We tested the hypotheses using structural equation modeling. To assess the significance of the structural model, we conducted a bootstrapping procedure with 4,000 resamples. The fit of the model was satisfactory, chi square (χ²) = 65.58, χ²/df = 1.60, goodness-of-fit index = .96, comparative fit index = .98, Tucker–Lewis index = .98, normed fit index = .96, root mean square error of approximation = .05. In terms of our hypotheses, the results showed that social media marketing had a significant and positive relationship with both brand equity, β = .32, p < .01, 95% confidence interval (CI) [0.20, 0.44], and brand engagement, β = .24, p < .01, 95% CI [0.09, 0.37], providing support for Hypotheses 1 and 2. Likewise, brand engagement was significantly and positively related to brand equity, β = .41, p < .01, 95% CI [0.30, 0.53], which supported Hypothesis 3. In addition, the bootstrapping analysis revealed a significant indirect effect of social media marketing on brand equity through brand engagement, β = .10, p < .01, 95% CI [0.04, 0.17], which supported Hypothesis 4. Thus, brand engagement functioned as a mediating mechanism in the relationship between social media marketing and brand equity.

Discussion

Theoretical Implications

As an essential digital marketing tool, social media is effective for engaging customers and enhancing brand equity. Nevertheless, researchers have encountered difficulties in providing empirical evidence of the influence of social media marketing on brand equity and the underlying mechanism that is responsible for this effect. This study addressed this research gap by emphasizing brand engagement as a mediator of the relationship between social media marketing and brand equity. The results show that social media marketing is an important driver in enhancing brand equity, which is in line with prior research (Godey et al., 2016; Zollo et al., 2020). This means that customers who use social media frequently are more likely to be exposed to social media marketing activities, and it will be easy for them to build a positive brand impression and brand image.

The results also show that social media marketing affects brand engagement and, consequently, brand equity. These findings bolster the key role brand engagement plays in modern marketing, namely, marketing that makes use of electronic devices (Jain & Yadav, 2017). Moreover, this indirect relationship propagates the notion that social media marketing functions as a stimulus that activates customers’ inner state of engagement. This is demonstrated by the results showing that when customers have a positive perception of a brand’s social media marketing, this favorable attitude is likely to create positive, subjective, internal customer responses, such as engagement toward the brand. As a consequence, brand engagement contributes to enhancing brand equity. 

Practical Implications

From a managerial point of view, this study offers useful implications regarding brand-building strategies. Marketers should use social media marketing to enhance brand engagement and brand equity, and should consider developing social media marketing programs that focus on entertaining, interactive, trendy, and customized content. Brands should strive to promote these aspects on their social media platforms. In particular, marketers should prioritize leveraging the interactive features of social networking sites to enhance customer engagement with the brand. They can achieve this by positioning their social media brand pages as a platform that offers solutions to customers’ product-related issues; reflects customers’ needs, interests, and values; and provides ample opportunities for customers to express themselves.

Limitations and Directions for Future Research

This study has the following limitations, which present avenues for future research: First, our use of cross-sectional data and a college student sample limit the generalizability of our findings. Future research could employ a longitudinal design and use a more varied sample to increase generalizability. Second, the social media platform used in this study was WeChat, which limits the findings being applied to other social media platforms, such as Douyin, which is a Chinese social media platform that allows users to create and share short videos, usually with music in the background. It is also known as TikTok in other countries. In contrast to Douyin, WeChat handles text and sends documents and is also a convenient way to make payments. Future research could focus on other social media platforms to facilitate generalizing our findings to wider social media contexts. Third, this study did not consider the effect of traditional marketing. Future research could examine the interactive effect of social media marketing and traditional marketing on customers’ brand engagement and brand equity.

The data that support the findings of this study are available on request from the corresponding author.

Zhe Wang, School of Intelligent Finance, Tianfu College of SWUFE, No. 29 Hangtian Road, Longtan Street, Chenghua District, Chengdu, Sichuan, 610000, People’s Republic of China. Email: [email protected]