An Exploration into the Brand Personality Traits of Social Media Sites
Keywords:
Brand Personality, Big Five Model, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Snapchat, InstagramAbstract
The brand personality framework has emerged as a strong predictor of consumers’ feelings toward a brand. Despite its widespread use in other product categories, to date no research has examined the brand personality characteristics of major social media platforms. Major social networking sites (SNSs) are powerful brands and, like other brands, they are at the mercy of consumer perception. With the role SNSs play in marketing communication continuing to grow, an understanding of consumer perception of these platforms may suggest certain platforms have more desirable associations than others. This analysis examines the five brand personality traits of sincerity, excitement, competence, sophistication and ruggedness for six prominent social media platforms. Results of this analysis suggest that the social media platform with the most defined personality is Pinterest, which scored highest for sophistication and sincerity while being the least rugged. Using hierarchical regression analysis, we also determined how the Big Five human personality characteristics, combined with brand personality characteristics, influence the use of specific social media platforms.
References
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Aaker, J., Fournier, S., & Brasel, S. A. (2004). When good brands do bad. Journal of Consumer Research, 31, 1-16.
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Finn, S. (1997). Origins of media exposure. Communication Research, 24(5), 507-529.
Gensler, S., Volckner, F., Liu-Thompkins, Y., & Wiertz, C. (2013). Managing brands in the social media environment. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 27, 242-256.
Goldberg, L. R. (1992) The development of markers for the Big-Five factor structure. Psychological Assessment, 4, 26-42.
Grohmann, B. (2009). Gender dimensions of brand personality. Journal of Marketing Research, 46, 105-119.
Heinonen, K. (2011). Consumer activity in social media: Managerial approaches to consumers’ social media behavior. Journal of Consumer Behavior ,10, 356-364.
Haythornthwaite, C. (2002). Strong, weak, and latent ties and the impact of new media. The Information Society, 18, 385–40.
Huang, H. H., Mitchell, V. W., Rosenaum-Elliott, R. (2012). Are consumer and brand personalities the same? Psychology & Marketing, 29(5), 334-349.
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Jin, S. A. (2013). Peeling back the multiple layers of Twitter’s private disclosure onion: The roles of virtual identity discrepancy and personal traits in communication privacy management on Twitter. New Media & Society, 15(6), 813-833.
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Mady, T. T. (2011). Sentiment toward marketing: Should we care about consumer alienation and readiness to use technology? Journal of Consumer Behavior 10, 192-204.
Mangold, W. G. & Faulds, D. J. (2009). Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix. Business Horizons, 52, 357-365. Retrieved from http://itu.dkk/~rkva/2001-Spring-EB22/readings/Mangold-SocialMedia.pdf .
McCracken, G. (1993). The Value of the Brand: An Anthropological Perspective. In Aaker and Biel, Brand Equity & Advertising: Advertising’s Role in Building Strong Brands (pp.125-139), Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.
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Nienstedt, H. W., Huber, F., & Seelmann, C. (2012). The influence of the congruence between brand and consumer personality on the loyalty to print and online issues of magazine brands. The International Journal on Media Management, 14(1), 3– 26.
Nunnally, J. C. (1978). Psychometric Theory, 2nd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Papacharissi, Z., & Mendelson, A. (2011). Toward a new(er) sociability: uses, gratifications and social capital on Facebook. In S. Papathanassopoulos (Ed.), Media Perspectives for the 21st Century. London: Routledge.
Park, J. K., & John, D. R. (2010). Got to get you into my life: Do brand personalities rub off on consumers? Journal of Consumer Research, 37, 655-669.
Rogers, E. M. (2003). Diffusion of innovations (5th ed.). New York: Free Press.
Ross, C., Orr, E. S., Sisic, M., Arseneault, J. M., Simmering, M. J., & Orr, R. R. (2009). Personality and motivations associated with Facebook use. Computers in Human Behavior, 25, 578-586.
Sheldon, P. (2008). Student favorite: Facebook and motives for its use. Southwestern Mass Communication Journal, 23(2), 39-55.
Snapchat. (2015). Learning the Basics: Snaps. Retrieved from https://support.snapchat.com/ca/snaps
Sung, Y., & Kim, J. (2010). Effects of brand personality on brand trust and brand affect. Psychology & Marketing, 27(7), 639-661.
Treem, J. W. (2013). Technology use as a status cue: The influences of mundane and novel technologies on knowledge assessments in organizations. Journal of Communication, 63, 1032-1053.
Van Dijck, J. (2013). ‘You have one identity’: performing the self on Facebook and LinkedIn. Media, Culture & Society, 35(2), 199-215.
Vernuccio, M. (2014). Communicating corporate brands through social media: An exploratory study. International Journal of Business Communication, 5(3), 211-233.
Aaker, J., Fournier, S., & Brasel, S. A. (2004). When good brands do bad. Journal of Consumer Research, 31, 1-16.
Anaza, N. A. (2014). Personality antecedents of customer citizenship behaviors in online shopping situations. Psychology and Marketing, 31(4), 251-263.
Batra, R., Lehmann, D. R., & Singh, D. (1993). The brand personality component of brand goodwill: Some antecedents and consequences. In D.A. Aaker, D.A. & A.L. Biel (Eds.), Brand Equity and Advertising (pp. 83-96). Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Benton, J. (2015). The triumph of the social platform. Nieman Reports, 69(1), 46-47.
boyd, D. (2014). It's complicated: The social lives of networked teens. Yale University Press.
boyd, D., & Ellison, N. B. (2008). Social network sites: definition, history, and scholarship. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 13, 210-230.
Butler, E., McCann, E., & Thomas, J. (2011). Privacy setting awareness on Facebook and its effect on user-posted content. Human Communication, 14(1), 39-55.
Correa, T. Hinsley, A., & Gil de Zuniga, H. G., (2010). Who interacts on the Web? The intersection of users’ personality and social media use. Computers in Human Behavior, 26, 247-253
Costa, P. T., & McCrae, R. R. (1990). Personality disorders and the five-factor model of personality. Journal of Personality Disorders, 4, 362-371.
Duggan, M., Ellison, N. B., Lampe, C., Lenhart, A., Madden, M., Rainie, L., & Smith, A. (2015). Social media update 2014: While Facebook remains the most popular site, other platforms see higher rates of growth. Pew Research Center. Retrieved from http://www.pewinternet.org/files/2015/01/PI_SocialMediaUpdate20144.pdf
Eysenck, H. J. (1990). Biological dimensions of personality. In L.A. Pervin (ed.), Handbook of Personality (pp. 244–76). New York: Guilford Press.
Finn, S. (1997). Origins of media exposure. Communication Research, 24(5), 507-529.
Gensler, S., Volckner, F., Liu-Thompkins, Y., & Wiertz, C. (2013). Managing brands in the social media environment. Journal of Interactive Marketing, 27, 242-256.
Goldberg, L. R. (1992) The development of markers for the Big-Five factor structure. Psychological Assessment, 4, 26-42.
Grohmann, B. (2009). Gender dimensions of brand personality. Journal of Marketing Research, 46, 105-119.
Heinonen, K. (2011). Consumer activity in social media: Managerial approaches to consumers’ social media behavior. Journal of Consumer Behavior ,10, 356-364.
Haythornthwaite, C. (2002). Strong, weak, and latent ties and the impact of new media. The Information Society, 18, 385–40.
Huang, H. H., Mitchell, V. W., Rosenaum-Elliott, R. (2012). Are consumer and brand personalities the same? Psychology & Marketing, 29(5), 334-349.
Hunt, D. S., Atkin, D. J., & Krishnan, A. (2012). The influence of computer-mediated communication apprehension on motives for Facebook use. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 56(2).
Hunt, D. S., & Langstedt, E. (2014). The influence of personality on digital photo sharing. The Journal of Social Media in Society, 3(2), 42-63.
Hunt, D. S., Lin, C. A., & Atkin, D. J. (2014a). Communication social relationships via the use of photo-messaging. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 58(2), 234-252.
Hunt, D. S., Lin, C. A., & Atkin, D. J. (2014b). Photo-messaging: Adopter attributes, technology factors and use motives. Computers in Human Behavior, 40, 171-179.
Jin, S. A. (2013). Peeling back the multiple layers of Twitter’s private disclosure onion: The roles of virtual identity discrepancy and personal traits in communication privacy management on Twitter. New Media & Society, 15(6), 813-833.
John, O. P., & Srivastava, S. (1999). The big five trait taxonomy: History, measurement and theoretical perspectives. In L. A. Pervin & O. P. John (Eds.), Handbook of personality: Theory and research (2nd ed., pp. 102–138). New York: Guilford.
Johnson, T. J., & Perlmutter, D. D. (2010). Introduction: The Facebook election. Mass Communication and Society, 13, 554-559.
Keller, K. L., & Richey, K. (2006). The importance of corporate brand personality traits to a successful 21st century business. Brand Management, 14(1/2), 74-81.
Kim, D. H., & Sung, Y. (2013). Gucci vs. Old Navy: Interplay of brand personality and regulatory focus in advertising persuasion. Psychology and Marketing, 30(12), 1076-1087.
Khang, H., Ki, E. J., & Ye, L. (2012). Social media research in advertising, communication, marketing, and public relations, 1997-2010. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 89(2), 279-298.
Lenhart, A. (2015). Teens, social media and technology overview 2015. Pew Research Center. Retrieved from http://www.pewinternet.org/files/2015/04/PI_TeensandTech_Update2015_0409151.pdf
Leonardi, P. M., Huysman, M., & Steinfield, C. (2013). Enterprise social media: Definition, history, and prospects for the study of social technologies in organizations. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 19, 1-19.
Li, C., & Bernoff, J. (2011). Groundswell: Winning in a world transformed by social technologies. Harvard Business Press.
LinkedIn. (2015). About. Retrieved from https://www.linkedin.com/about-us?trk=hb_ft_about.
Mady, T. T. (2011). Sentiment toward marketing: Should we care about consumer alienation and readiness to use technology? Journal of Consumer Behavior 10, 192-204.
Mangold, W. G. & Faulds, D. J. (2009). Social Media: The New Hybrid Element of the Promotion Mix. Business Horizons, 52, 357-365. Retrieved from http://itu.dkk/~rkva/2001-Spring-EB22/readings/Mangold-SocialMedia.pdf .
McCracken, G. (1993). The Value of the Brand: An Anthropological Perspective. In Aaker and Biel, Brand Equity & Advertising: Advertising’s Role in Building Strong Brands (pp.125-139), Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.
McDermott, J. (2014, February 20). Pinterest: the no-bro zone. Digiday. Retrieved from http://digiday.com/platforms/why-pinterest-is-still-a-predominantly-female-platform/
Mulyanegara, R. C., Tsarenko, Y., & Anderson, A. (2009). The Big Five and brand personality: Investigating the impact of consumer personality on preferences towards particular brand personality. Journal of Brand Management, 16, 234-247.
Nienstedt, H. W., Huber, F., & Seelmann, C. (2012). The influence of the congruence between brand and consumer personality on the loyalty to print and online issues of magazine brands. The International Journal on Media Management, 14(1), 3– 26.
Nunnally, J. C. (1978). Psychometric Theory, 2nd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Papacharissi, Z., & Mendelson, A. (2011). Toward a new(er) sociability: uses, gratifications and social capital on Facebook. In S. Papathanassopoulos (Ed.), Media Perspectives for the 21st Century. London: Routledge.
Park, J. K., & John, D. R. (2010). Got to get you into my life: Do brand personalities rub off on consumers? Journal of Consumer Research, 37, 655-669.
Rogers, E. M. (2003). Diffusion of innovations (5th ed.). New York: Free Press.
Ross, C., Orr, E. S., Sisic, M., Arseneault, J. M., Simmering, M. J., & Orr, R. R. (2009). Personality and motivations associated with Facebook use. Computers in Human Behavior, 25, 578-586.
Sheldon, P. (2008). Student favorite: Facebook and motives for its use. Southwestern Mass Communication Journal, 23(2), 39-55.
Snapchat. (2015). Learning the Basics: Snaps. Retrieved from https://support.snapchat.com/ca/snaps
Sung, Y., & Kim, J. (2010). Effects of brand personality on brand trust and brand affect. Psychology & Marketing, 27(7), 639-661.
Treem, J. W. (2013). Technology use as a status cue: The influences of mundane and novel technologies on knowledge assessments in organizations. Journal of Communication, 63, 1032-1053.
Van Dijck, J. (2013). ‘You have one identity’: performing the self on Facebook and LinkedIn. Media, Culture & Society, 35(2), 199-215.
Vernuccio, M. (2014). Communicating corporate brands through social media: An exploratory study. International Journal of Business Communication, 5(3), 211-233.
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