An empirical study of luxury brand marketing effectiveness and its impact

on consumer engagement on Facebook

Chedia Dhaoui

Insight Social Networks, Sydney, Australia

[email protected]

Abstract: Luxury brands have embraced the social media era through marketing
communication pointing out the particular attributes of luxury such as high quality, rich
pedigree, rarity, personality, placement, public relations and figures as well as a
typically high pricing, to drive consumer engagement. This paper provides empirical
findings about the effectiveness of luxury brand marketing to drive consumer
engagement on social media platforms. An empirical study on 52 luxury brand's
Facebook pages has been conducted. The findings of this study provide valuable
guidance for luxury brand managers and marketing researchers on how to formulate
and implement effective social media marketing strategies to leverage their luxury
brand potential.

Keywords: Consumer Engagement; Social Media Marketing; Online Marketing;

Luxury Brand Management; Facebook
1 Introduction

Over the last decade, social media has changed the way brands interact with their customers

leading to new online marketing practices. Facebook, among other social networking

website, became a major marketing communication channel that allows marketers to promote

their brand and engage their customers and audiences. Social media has also been considered

as particularly suitable for developing customer relationships (Kane et al., 2009) creating the

need for a dedicated research effort around the concept of online consumer engagement.

The social media era has brought new challenges to the luxury market which has been

historically reluctant to any mass availability medium like the Internet (Okonkwo, 2009;

Geerts & Veg-Sala, 2011). Luxury brands started to increasingly adopt social media (Phan,

2011) in a move to target “emergent afflulents” who are under 35 years old (Ortved, 2011).

This paper provides insights into how luxury brand marketers can formulate and

implement effective social media marketing strategies and how much (and what type of)

engagement they could expect. In this paper, the main attributes of luxury brand marketing

are discussed and their effectiveness at engaging with consumers on social media platforms is

investigated. This paper focuses on Facebook as the chosen social network to support the

empirical study, driven by its popularity and its wide adoption by the business community.

This paper makes several contributions to the research effort around online consumer

engagement. Firstly, a multi-dimensional conceptualisation of consumer engagement is

proposed to allow a more precise measurement of its individual constructs. Secondly, several

attributes specific to luxury brand marketing have been evaluated empirically as to how much

engagement they would create on Facebook. A statistical analysis of full online conversations

has been conducted to gain insights on how to formulate and implement effective social

media strategies.
2 Luxury brand marketing on social networking websites
Luxury brands are described as goods which bring prestige apart from any functional

utility (Grossman & Shapiro, 1988). Many luxury brands have embraced social media to

build up relationships with their customers through online conversations. In particular, luxury

brands actively make use of social media for advertising and marketing (Kim & Ko, 2012).

Social media can be defined as the “online applications, platforms and media which aim to

facilitate interactions, collaborations and the sharing of content” (Palmer & Koenig-Lewis,

2009). Both marketing practitioners and researchers have attempted to understand the scope

of consumer engagement in the context of online social networks as well as its determinants

(Brodie et al., 2013; Cvijikj & Michahelles, 2013; Mollen & Wilson, 2010). However, there

appear to be limited academic research about the effectiveness of social media marketing in

the context of luxury brands (Kim & Ko, 2010; Jahn et al., 2012; Juric et al., 2012; Chu et al.,

2013; Phan et al., 2011).

The literature review shows a lack of consensus of what constitutes a luxury brand

(Vigneron and Johnson, 2004; Vickers and Ronand, 2003; Dubois and Duquesne, 1993). The

luxury brand potential relies on a set of characteristics including exclusive, glamorous,

extremely expensive, high quality, rare, precious, crafted, etc. (Vigneron and Johnson, 2004).

Dubois, Laurent and Czellar (2001) tackled the characteristics of luxury brands using cross-

cultural luxury consumer studies and proposed six main facets of luxury including "excellent

quality", "very high price", "scarcity and uniqueness", "aesthetics and polysensuality",

"ancestral heritage and personal history" and "superfluousness". While these luxury brand

attributes are of particular relevance in the evaluation of luxury brand marketing, very few

studies focused on the characteristics of luxury brand marketing strategies. Rohit Arora

(2012) summarized luxury brand marketing strategies into 8 Pillars, also called the 8 P's. The

8 P's have also been proposed as a framework for luxury marketers to audit their marketing
content and leverage their luxury brand potential. The 8 P’s include the "Performance",

"Pedigree", "Paucity", "Persona", "Public Figures", "Placement", "Public Relations" and

"Pricing" of luxury brands as described in details in Table 1. In this paper, we adopt the 8

pillars of Rohit Arora (2012) as the attributes of luxury brand marketing. The 8 P's model has

been reviewed against the main other models of luxury brand attributes (Vigneron and

Johnson, 2004; Dubois, Laurent and Czellar, 2001) and has been found to be the most

relevant to this study because it specifically focuses on the attributes of luxury brand

marketing strategies rather than more generic marketing attributes.

Table 1. The 8 P’s of luxury brand marketing (Rohit Arora, 2012).

1st P: Performance. The performance of a luxury brand is defined at a product level and at an experiential

level. The quality of luxury products is usually reinforced by generous warranties (Keller, 2009) as well as

investments in innovation and creativity by appointing talented designers and professionals (Fionda & Moore,

2009). Brands not only create functional but also emotional value for consumers (de Chernatony et al., 2011).

A luxury brand must particularly perform well at an experiential level, i.e. the emotional value of the brand the

consumers buy into. The performance of luxury brands, at both product and experiential levels, is important in

the luxury segment as it is instrumental in communicating symbolic meaning (Fionda & Moore, 2009).

2nd P: Pedigree. The pedigree of luxury brands has its roots in the culture and history of the brand. These are

considered as the most important attributes with firms deliberately drawing on their histories in their marketing

(Beverland, 2004). Traditional and fundamentally authentic values of a luxury brand are important in their

brand positioning () both at the brand level and the product level. Authenticity involves elements both intrinsic

and extrinsic to a product (Beverland, 2006). Example of pedigree attributes include the appellation as an

origin of place, the people behind the product, the quest for a unique style, the quality, consistency, honesty

and transparency of the brand and its products.

3rd P: Paucity. The challenge for luxury brands is to increase their success and still preserve the impression of

exclusivity (Dubois, 1992). To achieve that, they strictly control the accessibility of their brand and practice

highly selective distribution (Fionda & Moore, 2009; Keller, 2009). Rohit Arora (2012) identified three types
 of paucity: natural, technology-led and tactical. Natural paucity is due to the scarce ingredients such as

diamonds or to the exceptional human expertise required to create the luxury products.

4th P: Persona. The persona of a luxury brand refers to its symbolic meaning, including the human values and

lifestyles (Vigneron & Johnson, 2004). The persona of luxury products and brands is covered to a large extent

by the concept of brand personality. Heine (2009) considers the five major dimensions of the luxury brand

personality as its modernity, prestige, sensuality, understatement and eccentricity.

5th P: Public Figures. Luxury products are often linked to popular celebrities (Keller, 2009). More generally,

public figures have traditionally been employed as one of the marketing mix in luxury brand advertising Rohit

Arora (2012) including film stars, music personalities, sports personalities or even the designers themselves.

6th P: Placement. The placement of luxury brands “is not limited to the physical environment where the brand

retails, but it extends to all of the environments or consumer touch points that the brand associates itself with”

(Rohit Arora, 2012). This includes placement in selective niche media, festivals (e.g. Cannes), prestigious

events or “an attractive country-of-origin” (Keller, 2009).

7th P: Public Relations. Typical communication tools of luxury brands also include Public Relations (PR)

(Fionda & Moore, 2009) and play an enormous role in image proliferation of the brand, thereby subtly

influencing public opinion (Rohit Arora, 2012). Luxury brands utilise PR to generate buzz and communicate

brand news, point of views of inspirers and influencers, a crucial support for brand activation (like the fashion

weeks, sport-events, themed previews and so on) (Rohit Arora, 2012).

8th P: Pricing. Price is a major indicator of quality and prestige (Keller, 2009). Therefore, luxury brands have

to resist price reductions, which would in fact increase the demand in the short-run, but decrease sales in the

long-run (Dubois, 1992). Sales promotions tend to be handled differently by luxury marketers (Rohit Arora,

2012) such as adding more value to the purchase like gift with purchase, online or email exclusives, etc.

3 Consumer engagement: a multidimensional concept

Brand engagement, customer engagement, consumer engagement, or simply engagement are

among the various names given to the same concept. Since the early stages of social
networking sites, a significant attention has been devoted to foster the concept of consumer

engagement in online communities (Algesheimer et al., 2005). Both practitioners and

researchers from social science, management and marketing disciplines have attempted to

understand the scope of consumer engagement in the context of online social networks as

well as the broader context of business relationships and branding (Appelbaum, 2001).

A review of the related literature reveals a multidimensional conceptualisation of

consumer engagement. The multidimensional nature of consumer engagement is developed

by Hollebeek (2011) who considers “customer brand engagement” as “the level of a

customer’s motivational, brand related and context-dependent state of mind characterized by

specific levels of cognitive, emotional and behavioural activity in brand interactions.”

Consumer Engagement has also been studied within online contexts. Mollen &

Wilson (2010) define engagement in online consumer experience as “the cognitive and

affective commitment to an active relationship with the brand as personified by the website

or other computer-mediated entities designed to communicate brand value”. More recently,

Brodie et al. (2013) proposed a definition of consumer engagement specifically fitting the

context of virtual brand communities as “specific interactive experiences between consumers

and the brand, and/or other members of the community”. More precisely, the authors

consider consumer engagement as “a context-dependent, psychological state characterized by

fluctuating intensity levels that occur within dynamic, iterative engagement processes”.

Similarly to previously cited research, Brodie et al. (2013) consider consumer engagement as

a multidimensional concept comprising cognitive, emotional, and behavioural dimensions. In

this paper, the definition of Brodie et al. (2013) is adopted, including its experiential and

behavioural dual-approach to engagement. However, the focus in this work is on the

measurement of behavioural engagement due to the limited capacity of capturing experiential

engagement on Facebook.
4 Consumer engagement measurement framework

The content shared on Facebook brand pages can take various forms including text, photos,

videos or links. These forms of content are the “stimuli” that appear on the Facebook brand

page’s timeline to create engagement among the brand community. From a community

perspective, various forms of interactions occur on Facebook brand pages, among which the

following are considered in this paper: (1) indicating interest in a content by pressing the

“like” button, (2) sharing a content with friends, and (3) commenting on a content. These

interactions play a crucial role in word of mouth communications by propagating stimuli

across the social network of friends leading towards the goal of viral marketing (Kirby &

Marsden, 2005).

The measurement approach proposed in this paper has been inspired by the levels of

consumer engagement described by Roberts & Alpert (2010) ranging from the purchase of

products/services to their advocacy. However, purchasing products is generally not the first

level of consumer engagement on Facebook, nor is it a condition to engage in the first place.

In this paper, a set of consumer engagement constructs is defined and ranges from the

endorsement of a brand to its advocacy as follows.

The first construct is the “endorsement” of marketing content by Facebook users

when they “like” the content published on the brand’s page. By “liking”, they demonstrate

their endorsement of the brand and/or the values expressed in the content.

The second construct is the “feedback” from Facebook users. Social media can

provide a novel community-oriented and social way of sharing feedback about new products

and concepts (Barker, 2008). When Facebook users comment on a content published on a

Facebook brand page, they provide feedback to the brand and share it with the other

community members. Feedback from the brand’s community is an indicator of how well the
brand is doing to serve the needs and wants of its consumers, and where there is an

opportunity to improve.

The third construct is the “conversation” with/among Facebook users. When

Facebook users reply to a comment, they create engaging conversations and the original

comment becomes source of engagement.

The fourth construct is the “recommendation” of marketing content by Facebook

users. Recommending online content is one of the main drivers of word of mouth in online

social networks and has an important impact on both consumers and brands. This behaviour

is widely adopted as 59% of people report that they frequently share online content with

others (Allsop et al., 2007). As the word implies, the “Share” button on Facebook allows the

users to share a content with their friends. There are various reasons a user may share a

content (post) that they read on Facebook. In this paper, the main intention of “sharing” a

content on Facebook is considered to be recommending friends to read it. Thus, the amount

of “share” generated by a content is associated with the measure of its recommendation.

5 Research methodology

A content analysis of a sample of Facebook brand pages of luxury brands has been performed

to measure the characteristics of the social media marketing messages (posts) as well as its

generated consumer engagement. Kassarjian (1977) defines content analysis as a scientific,

objective, quantitative and generalizable description of communications content. In

marketing research, various studies have been conducted using content analysis for

advertisement content (Grove & Kangun, 1993; Laforet & Saunders, 2005). In this paper, the

analysis concerns content collected from Facebook’s social networking platform.

5.1 Sample selection

The Digital Luxury Group (2013) has published the 2nd edition of World Luxury Index©
China. It is the result of an analysis of Chinese consumer interest for luxury brands and has

been released in partnership with Luxury Society, the world’s largest community of luxury

executives. The report comprises over 400 luxury brands across 6 key segments including

cars, fashion, beauty, hotels, watches, jewellery. For the present study, the top 10 luxury

brands of each of the above segments have been included in the sample resulting in 52 brands

(some brands were in the top 10 of several segments such as fashion, jewellery and watches).

The official (“verified”) Facebook brand page of every selected luxury brand has been

identified. The list of luxury brands considered in this study is provided in the Appendix.

5.2 Measures

Consumer engagement on Facebook corresponds to the various interactive experiences

around the concept of “brand page” and its published content which can be of various types

(status update, link, photo or video). The following notations are used in this paper:

 𝐹𝑏 is the set of Facebook users who “like” the brand page 𝑏 (corresponding to the fans

of the brand), and 𝑃𝑏 is the set of posts published on the Facebook page of brand 𝑏.

 Likes of post. This can be measured as the number of Facebook users who “like” a

content published on the Facebook brand page, equals 𝑝𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒𝑠 for a post 𝑝.

 Shares of post. This can be measured as the number of Facebook users who “share” a

content published on the Facebook brand page, equals 𝑝𝑠ℎ𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑠 for a post 𝑝.

 Comments on post. This can be measured as the number of comments created for the

post p and equals |𝐶𝑃𝑝 |, 𝐶𝑃𝑝 being the set of comments created for the post 𝑝. This

measure excludes comments on comments, also called replies.

 Community replies to comment on post. This can be measured as the number of

comments made by the community members on a comment 𝑐, equals |𝑅𝐶𝑐 |, 𝑅𝐶𝑐

 being the set of replies made by the community (excluding those made by the brand

itself) to a comment 𝑐.

 Brand replies to comment on post. This can be measured as the number of comments

made by the brand itself on a comment 𝑐, equals |𝐵𝑅𝐶𝑐 |, 𝐵𝑅𝐶𝑐 being the set of

replies made by the brand to a comment 𝑐.

 Likes of comment. This can be measured as the number of Facebook users who “like”

a comment on a post published on the Facebook brand page, and equals 𝑐𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒𝑠 for a

comment 𝑐.

 Likes of replies to comment. This can be measured as the number of Facebook users

who “like” a reply to a comment on a post published on the Facebook brand page, and

equals 𝑟𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒𝑠 for a reply 𝑟.

5.3 Dependent variables

The above basic measures are representative of the rich data that can be collected from a

Facebook brand page. These metrics are used to calculate the five constructs of consumer

engagement (Endorsement, Feedback, Conversation and Recommendation) described in the

consumer engagement measurement framework. Consumer engagement rates (dividing each

of the engagement construct measures by the number of fans of a brand) are used to allow the

comparison of brands having Facebook brand communities of different sizes. The following

consumer engagement rates are calculated and form the dependent variables:

 The consumer endorsement rate is the total number of likes for a post 𝑝 on a brand

page 𝑏 divided by the size of its community:

𝑝𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒𝑠
𝐶𝐸𝑅(𝑝) =
|𝐹𝑏 |
  The consumer feedback rate is the total number of comments and replies to comments

for a post 𝑝 on a brand page 𝑏 divided by the size of its community:

|𝐶𝑃𝑝 | + ∑𝑐∈𝐶𝑃𝑝 |𝑅𝐶𝑐 |

𝐶𝐹𝑅(𝑝) =
|𝐹𝑏 |

 The consumer conversation rate is the total number of replies to comments for a post

𝑝 on a brand page 𝑏 divided by the size of its community:

∑𝑐∈𝐶𝑃𝑝|𝑅𝐶𝑐 | + |𝐵𝑅𝐶𝑐 |
𝐶𝐶𝑅(𝑝) =
|𝐹𝑏 |

 The consumer recommendation rate is the total number of shares for a post 𝑝 on a

brand page 𝑏 divided by the size of its community:

𝑝𝑠ℎ𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑠
𝐶𝑅𝑅(𝑝) =
|𝐹𝑏 |

5.4 Independent variables

The independent variables investigated as explanatory of the consumer engagement rates

(𝐶𝐸𝑅, 𝐶𝐹𝑅, 𝐶𝐶𝑅 and 𝐶𝑅𝑅) are the 8 pillars of luxury brand marketing as described in Rohit

Arora (2012). Such 8 P’s being Performance, Pedigree, Paucity, Persona, Public figures,

placement, public relations and pricing are identified for every collected post including text,

photos, videos or related links.

5.5 Data collection

The data collection phase has been conducted using Facebook’s social graph (Graph API)

which allows to access all public conversations on any Facebook brand page as well as their

related comments, likes and shares. The Graph API has been used to collect all data fields
related to the entire public interactions within each of the 52 Facebook brand pages in the

sample. Two months’ worth of interactions have been collected covering the period ranging

from 15st July 2013 to 15th September 2013.

The data collection included posts (status updates, links, photos and videos) as well as their

corresponding number of likes and shares, all comments and replies to comments, likes on

comments and likes on replies to comments.

5.6 Data coding

Every post on each of the selected brand’s Facebook pages is a marketing message that

enacts one or more of the 8 P’s of luxury brand marketing strategies. In order to identify

which P’s are enacted in a post, a qualitative data coding process has been conducted using

the coding scheme of the 8 P’s. The coded data has then been further analysed as described

below.

6 Data analysis and Findings

The R statistical package (R Core Team, 2013) has been used to conduct the statistical

analysis of the data set. The findings are presented in two parts. The first part reports some

descriptive statistics. The second part presents the results of statistical hypothesis testing

using a multiple regression model.

6.1 Descriptive statistics

Fifty two (52) brands published content in English on their Facebook pages while 1 brand

published non-English content. Due to the qualitative coding process, which is a human

intensive process, brands that published content in English have been maintained in the

sample. Furthermore, one brand page was inactive on its Facebook page and has been
excluded. This resulted in a final sample size of 51 luxury brands and have been selected for

the rest of the analysis.

The median number of posts published on brand pages was 39 over a 2 months period

with the largest by a brand of luxury cars (135). The distribution of median frequencies of

posts per segment is shown in figure 1.

Figure 1. Frequency of posts per industry.

In regard to the content collected, the dataset comprised 2,372 posts (2092 photo posts

(88.19%), 149 video posts (6.28%), 82 link posts (3.45%), 49 status update posts (2.06%).

All comments on posts have also been collected totalling 10,780 comments. In addition,

information about posts and comments have been collected including the number of likes and

shares for posts and comments totalling 321,858 likes and 1,569,452 shares.

While 59.61% of posts received no comments at all, the average number of comments

received by a post is 4.54 and only 23.6% of all posts received a brand reply to comments.

Furthermore, 13.65% of posts received no likes at all, while the average number of likes of a

post is 135.75. Finally, 8.73% of posts do not get shared at all, while the average number of

shares of a post is 661.66.

In order to get a sense of the relationship between the 8 P’s and the consumer

engagement rates, figure 2 illustrates the mean values of consumer engagement rates
depending on which P’s are enacted in the post’s message. It shows that there are noticeable

differences in the consumer engagement rates of depending on which of the 8 P’s are

enacted. In particular, it shows that a performance, public figures, placement, public relations

and pricing generate more consumer feedback. It also shows that pedigree, paucity and

persona generate more consumer recommendation.

Figure 2. Effect of the 8 P’s on consumer engagement.

Figure 3 illustrates the distribution of P’s among the 6 segments considered in this

study. It mainly shows that the luxury car segment significantly emphasizes on its pedigree

while jewellery and watches use more paucity than other segments. It also shows that

placement as well as pricing are mainly used by the hospitality segment. Another noticeable

finding is that the fashion segment uses public figures more than other segments.
Figure 3. Distribution of P’s among the 6 industries.

6.2 Multiple regression analysis

In order to verify whether the relationship between the use of the 8 P’s in social media

marketing communication and the various consumer engagement rates is statistically

significant and to better estimate the relative level of impact of each of the 8 P’s on consumer

engagement measures, a multiple regression analysis has been conducted. Outliers have first

been removed to avoid the bias of extreme values of either endorsement rate, feedback rate,

conversation rate or recommendation rate. The remaining dataset of 2355 posts (N=2355) has

been used for a multiple regression analysis where the dependent variables are the

endorsement, feedback, conversation and recommendation rates, while the independent

variables are the 8 P’s. The findings of such analysis are described as summarized in table 2.
Table 2. Multiple regression analysis of the effect of the 8 P’s on consumer engagement rates.
Endorsement Rate Feedback Rate Conversation Rate Recomm. Rate

B S.E. B S.E. B S.E. B S.E.

Intercept 3.784e-05*** 3.599e-06 6.624e-05*** 6.345e-06 3.188e-06*** 5.179e-07 2.413e-04*** 2.390e-05

Performance 1.988e-06 3.690e-06 7.522e-06 6.505e-06 1.055e-07 5.310e-07 8.972e-05*** 2.450e-05

Pedigree 1.623e-05* 6.892e-06 -3.528e-06 1.215e-05 -5.247e-08 9.919e-07 6.809e-05 4.577e-05

Paucity 1.322e-05 8.748e-06 7.807e-05*** 1.542e-05 1.339e-06 1.259e-06 6.114e-04*** 5.809e-05

Persona 2.907e-06 6.935e-06 5.301e-06 1.223e-05 -6.725e-07 9.980e-07 3.866e-05 4.605e-05

Public figures -1.747e-05*** 4.852e-06 -3.972e-05*** 8.555e-06 -2.106e-06** 6.983e-07 -1.543e-04*** 3.222e-05

Placement -5.318e-06 3.863e-06 -2.842e-06 6.812e-06 7.241e-07 5.560e-07 4.690e-05. 2.566e-05

Public relations 3.472e-06 4.291e-06 -8.527e-06 7.566e-06 -7.118e-07 6.176e-07 -5.330e-05. 2.850e-05

Pricing -1.126e-05 9.418e-06 -4.066e-07 1.661e-05 2.016e-07 1.355e-06 3.554e-05 6.254e-05

Likelihood ratio χ2 31.247*** 60.654*** 13.827. 178.93***

(8,N=1228)
 Table 2 shows that the multiple regression model comprising all of the 8 P’s is

significant as a whole for all the endorsement rate, feedback rate and recommendation rate

with a likelihood ratio χ2 (8, N=2355) = 31.247 (endorsement), 60.654 (feedback) and 178.93

(recommendation) with p<0.01. The model comprising all of the 8 P’s is not strongly

significant for conversation rate although p<0.1 (likelihood ratio χ2 (8, N=2355) = 13.827). It

can however be considered as acceptable for conversation rate as p<0.1.

Regarding the effect of the 8 P’s of luxury brand marketing on the endorsement rate,

the results reveal that the Pedigree has a statistically significant relationship with an increase

in the endorsement rate (B=1.623e-05, p<0.05). It has also been found that the use of Public

Figures has a statistically significant relationship with a decrease in the endorsement rate

(B=-1.747e-05, p< 0.001).

The results reveal that Paucity has a statistically significant relationship with an

increase in the feedack rate (B=7.807e-05, p<0.001). It has also been found that the use of

Public Figures has a statistically significant relationship with a decrease in the feedback rate

(B=-3.972e-05, p< 0.001), a decrease in the conversation rate (B=-2.106e-06, p< 0.01), and a

decrease in the recommendation rate (B=-1.543e-04, p< 0.001).

Furthermore, the results reveal that two P’s have a statistically significant relationship

with an increase in the recommendation rate. These P’s include Performance (B=8.972e-05,

p<0.001) and Paucity (B=6.114e-04, p<0.001).

7 Discussion and managerial implications

The empirical findings discussed in the previous section provide luxury brand managers with

valuable guidance on how effective are each of the 8 P’s of luxury brand marketing on social

media. They also allow luxury brand managers to gain insights on how to formulate and

implement effective social media marketing strategies to leverage their luxury brand
potential. Some of the 8 P’s are more fundamental than others to create consumer

engagement. The main marketing implication to be drawn from this study is that the

individual constructs of consumer engagement could ultimately be controlled by emphasizing

certain attributes of luxury brand marketing rather than others.

More specifically, factors contributing to higher endorsement rates are found to be

primarily articulated around the Pedigree of luxury brands. Factors contributing to higher

feedback rates are found to be articulated around the Paucity of luxury brands. This study is

however not conclusive about whether any of 8 P’s significantly contributes to the higher

conversation rates. Finally, Performance and Paucity of luxury brands seem to be the main

drivers of recommendations on Facebook brand pages for luxury brands. Therefore, it would

seem advisable to make an effort to focus more on the above mentioned attributes of luxury

brands to increase consumer engagement. It is also important to note that the use of Public

Figures has been found to be related to a decrease in all of the engagement constructs.

Interestingly, the results differ from one luxury brand segment to another. Therefore,

findings depend on the segment and specific characteristics of the segment can also play an

important role in consumer engagement. The experimental settings created for this study can

also serve as a “benchmark” for a particular segment of luxury brands so that brands can be

compared and their engagement rates can be evaluated comparatively.

8 Conclusion and future research perspectives

This research has attempted to provide insights into the effectiveness of key attributes of

luxury brand marketing at engaging consumers on social media platforms. These insights

would allow managers to better design and implement social media marketing strategies

generating higher consumer engagement in online social networking websites.

 Despite these contributions, a number of limitations of this work provide a platform

for the undertaking of further research in this emerging area. First of all, this empirical study

was limited to Facebook brand pages. Other social networking websites could widen the

scope of this research as it would be interesting to investigate additional constructs of

consumer engagement on different platforms.

Moreover, this empirical research has covered a large number of luxury brands

spanning across 6 segments. However, as a consequence of the large number of industries,

this research did not get into the specificities of each industry domain that may display

different engagement behaviour. For example, the hospitality segment has clearly a tendency

to focus on the placement and pricing attributes, while the fashion segment does not use the

pricing attribute at all. Thus, it is perhaps of a greater importance to take a deeper look at

attributes of social media marketing strategies that are specific to a particular industry

segment. Finally, future research is also needed to investigate additional attributes of luxury

brand as noted by Rohit Arora (2012).

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Appendix. The sample of luxury brands considered in this study:

 Cosmetics: Biotherm, Givenchy, Guerlain, La Prairie, Lancome, Sisley.

 Fashion and cosmetics: Chanel, Christian Dior.

 Fashion: Ermenegildo Zegna, Fendi, Ferragamo, Giorgio Armani, Hermes, Louis

Vuitton, Prada, Versace.

 Jewellery: Boucheron, Bvlgari, Cartier, Chaumet, Harry Winston, Mikimoto,

Montblanc, Van Cleef & Arpels.

 Liquor: Dom Perignon, L'or De Jean Martell, Louis XIII, Macallan, Perrier Jouet,

Ron Zacapa.

 Resorts: Amanruya, Armani Hotel Dubai, Fregate Island Private, Hotel Le Toiny,

Hotel Turtle Island, Le Sirenuse, W-Hotel-Puerto Rico.

 Watches: Audemars Piguet, Blancpain, Breguet, Franck Muller, IWC, Jaeger-Le

Coultre, Piaget, Rolex, Vacheron Constantin.

 Yachts: Azimut, Beneteau, Ferretti, Itama, Lurssen, Pershing, Princess, Riva,

Sunseeker, Wally.

 Cars: Aston Martin, Bentley, Bugatti, Ferrari, Koenigsegg, Lamborghini, Maserati,

Pagani, Rolls-Royce, Spyker.

 Aircrafts: Bellhelicopter, Bombardier, Cessna, Cirrus, Eurocopter, Gulfstream,

Hawker Beech, Sikorsky.

 Innovative brands: Bose, Harley Davidson, Lotos, Segway PT, Steinway.