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    • COVID-19 Business Impact Center
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      From Sweetheart to Scapegoat: Brand Selfie-Taking Shapes Consumer Behavior
      17 Mar 2020Working Paper Summaries

      From Sweetheart to Scapegoat: Brand Selfie-Taking Shapes Consumer Behavior

      by Reto Hofstetter, Gabriela Kunath, and Leslie K. John
      Using a dataset of more than 280,000 user reviews on Yelp, this paper describes a series of eight studies exploring how brand selfie-taking affects consumers’ behavior and sense of connection toward a brand.
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      Author Abstract

      Increasingly, consumers are taking self-photos and marketers, eager to capitalize on this trend, have been asking consumers to take self-photos with brands (i.e., brand selfies). We suggest that consumer compliance with such requests sparks a self-inferential process that leads the consumer to feel connected to the brand (e.g., “If I took the brand selfie, I must feel connected to this brand”), increasing brand preference. Eight studies support this account. In a dataset of 283,140 user reviews from Yelp, study 1 documented a positive association between a reviewer’s propensity to take a brand selfie and the star rating he gives the restaurant. Seven experiments point to causality. Participants randomized to take brand selfies felt greater self-brand connection and exhibited heightened brand preference, relative to those randomized to take: no photo at all (study 2a); a selfie (without the brand, studies 2b–6); or a photo of the brand (without the self, study 3). Two studies point to process in convergent ways, via serial mediation (study 4) and moderated mediation (study 5). A final study documented a crucial moderator: dissatisfaction with one’s appearance in the selfie triggers defensive processing, reducing self-inference and, thereby, the capacity for brand selfie-taking to increase brand preference.

      Paper Information

      • Full Working Paper Text
      • Working Paper Publication Date: February 2020
      • HBS Working Paper Number: HBS Working Paper #20-085
      • Faculty Unit(s): Negotiation, Organizations & Markets
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      Leslie K. John
      Leslie K. John
      Marvin Bower Associate Professor
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