Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270

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Computers in Human Behavior

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/comphumbeh

Full length article

Spreading love through fan page liking: A perspective on small scale

entrepreneurs
Chetna Kudeshia a, *, Pallab Sikdar b, Arun Mittal a
a
Birla Institute of Technology (BIT) Mesra, Noida Campus, India
b
Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan's Usha & Lakshmi Mittal Institute of Management (BULMIM), New Delhi, India

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: Growing popularity of Facebook has made it a value-adding marketing channel for the small and me-
Received 16 January 2015 dium sized businesses. As a marketing medium characterized by low cost and minimum risk it attracts
Received in revised form small scale entrepreneurs to utilize this new platform i.e. brand fan page of Facebook as a business
30 July 2015
communication tool for reaching out to customers. Considering the significance of Facebook as social
Accepted 4 August 2015
Available online xxx
media marketing platform for businesses and the lack of understanding of this area, the present study
investigates whether there exists a significant relationship between brands “liked” on the Facebook fan
pages and brand love, word of mouth, and purchase intention from potential buyer perspective. The
Keywords:
Fan page
research was conducted taking five popular small scale entrepreneur backed firms on the basis of the
Facebook number of likes on their fan pages. Respondents of the survey were followers of fan pages of sampled
Fan-page liking firms. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) was applied using primary data collected from 311 re-
Brand love spondents. The study reveals a positive relationship between “liked” brands on Facebook fan-page and
brand love. Further, the study finds that liking the fan pages is essentially converted into WOM, and it
results into purchase proposition.
© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
The definition of business has changed in India with the growth
of various social media platforms. Despite technological pro-
gressions over the years, one thing which remains unchanged is the
acknowledgement that consumer is always the king. However with
the emergence of web the channels of engaging with the customers
have changed, but the goal remains same that is how to bring the
brands closer to the customer's heart.
Social media is changing the way people use to communicate
and this is making it an important business tool for the marketers.
These network platforms provide marketers number of opportu-
nities to engage with the customers in a better manner. Social
media is bringing the customers and marketers closer by removing
geographical as well as the emotional barriers.
One of the most popular social media tool being adopted by the
modern day marketers as an important marketing communication
tool is “Fan-page” of Facebook. With 16 percent of web entrance
India has almost 243 million internet users and is emerging as the
* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: ckudeshia@yahoo.com (C. Kudeshia).
second biggest web base after china [Internet and Mobile
Association of India (IMAI), 2014]. The nation has 100 million
Facebook users making it the most popular social networking
platform among Indians (Nielsen, 2014). An online networking
platform which was once started to make friends and bring people
closer has proved to be a successful marketing weapon for the 21st
century marketers. The popularity of this website among Indian
social networking users has made it the principal choice of the
organizations to connect with their customers.
There are many reasons which altogether make it a successful
business solution. Being a user-friendly social networking interface,
Facebook not only help companies in interacting with the cus-
tomers, but also in gauging their behavior and securing instant
feedbacks and responses. Brand pages or fan pages of Facebook
offer numerous means to the companies towards contacting and
interacting with their customers (fans) (Jahn & Kunz, 2012) addi-
tionally offering the customers a platform to correspond with other
customers, with regard to any brand.
Borle, Dholakia, Singh, and Durham (2012) explored that
brand pages is a platform through which companies can deliver
lots of interesting content to attract the customers towards the
brand. It is thus not surprising that small scale businesses are
also using online networking platforms not only to reach and

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2015.08.003
0747-5632/© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
258 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270
engage with the existing and potential customers, but also to
have a better brand awareness of their products. Unlike estab-
lished firms Small Scale Businesses facing meager investment
requires different alternatives from the customary marketing
strategies not only for today's survival but for tomorrow's exis-
tence as well. Facebook page results into more selling opportu-
nities for small scale organizations by driving more traffic to their
websites (Matista, 2015). Small scale entrepreneurs, see Facebook
as a cost effective and easily managed promoting apparatuses
that can pull in new clients and help them collaborate with
existing ones.
1.1. Fan page
In 2007 Facebook launched ‘Fan Pages’ which allow users to
interact and affiliate with businesses and organizations in the same
way they interact with other Facebook user profiles. Customers can
connect with their favorite brands through fan pages and can also
show to their friends, which brand they care about. They can also
recommend the brands by adding pages to their personal profile. So
when a customer like a brand he became a fan of a brand, and that
information is posted on his wall. With the look and feel of indi-
vidual pages, these pages have the unique feature of rapidly
sending messages to a huge number of fans. And this is why or-
ganizations are using them as a business communication tool for
establishing on-going dialogues with their customers.
Growing acceptance of Facebook as an interesting online social
networking service for customers and businesses call for new
knowledge to understand its effect on consumer behavior more
importantly, how organizations can use it. Many of the studies in
the past focused on the motivation to use Facebook (Joinson, 2008;
Pempek, Yermolayeya, & Calvert, 2009; Ross et al., 2009) and liking
of page (Lin & Lu, 2011) by the consumers. Studies also explored
companies posting behavior (McCorkindale, 2010) and the effect of
Facebook on brand awareness (Dennhardt, 2014) and Social capital
(Ellison, Steinfield, & Lampe, 2007).
But fan page based outcomes are scant within the extant liter-
ature. In the present study brand love, WOM and purchase inten-
tion have been taken as the expected outcomes of fan page liking.
Brand love is ‘the degree of passionate emotional attachment that a
person has for a particular trade name’ (Carroll & Ahuvia, 2006, p.
5). In the era of digital marketing social media platforms give
numerous opportunities to the customers to show their emotional
attachment and engagements with brands they admire and Face-
book is one among them.
In a non-virtual environment, studies identified relationships
between brand engagement and brand love. Carroll and Ahuvia
(2006) found that self-expressive brands had a positive effect on
brand love and WOM. Albert, Merunka, and Valette-Florence (2008,
p. 73) showed that consumers may love a brand due to “self-image
motives and self-esteem motives, yet little is known about the
relationship between consumer's brand “likes” on a social network
and their behavior in relation to that brand (Wallace, Buil, & de
Chernatony, 2014). Few studies in the past examined the relation-
ship between liking a brand on the Facebook fan page and possible
outcomes. Wallace et al. (2014) examined this relationship by
taking fan pages of nine diverse product categories of big com-
panies. The study which was focused on college students' Facebook
habits found that there exists a positive relationship between the
self-expressive nature of brands “liked” and brand love (Wallace
et al., 2014).
The present study thus builds on previous studies on brand love
and WOM in an e-environment focusing on the small scale entre-
preneur initiated ventures having active presence on Facebook. The
paper starts by a brief review of social media, Facebook and fan
page. On the basis of the theoretical research discussed in the paper
the hypotheses investigating the relationship between fan page
likings, brand love, WOM and purchase intention have been
developed. Moderating effects of gender groups across the hy-
pothesized relations have also been explored. Succeeding sections
specifies research methodology and discusses the statistical results.
The paper finally summarizes the findings and discusses the im-
plications for both research and practice.
2. Theoretical background
2.1. Facebook fan-page
Companies' fan pages are emerging as a widely accepted mar-
keting channel and their contribution towards achieving sales has
been found to be significant (Po €yry, Parvinen, & Malmivaara, 2013).
The motivation for the marketers behind accepting social media as
a marketing tool could be competitor's presence, headquarters'
strategy, or pressure for cost reduction (Tsimonis & Dimitriadis,
2014).
The firms that interact with Facebook pages positively impacts
stakeholder's perception of the organizationepublic relationship,
corporate social responsibility and purchase intent (Haigh,
Brubaker, & Whiteside, 2013). Participating in consumers' com-
munity on Facebook has a significant positive effect on brand trust
and community identification (Ho, 2014).
On an average 100 million connections are made on Facebook
pages every day globally (DMR Report, 2015). Increasingly, brands
are putting the social aspect first and people at the center of their
marketing campaigns to create significant brand impact (Mckinsey,
2011). According to Po € yry et al. (2013) consumers' have hedonic and
utilitarian motivations for using Facebook pages. Technical charac-
teristics and ease of use of Facebook page influences user's moti-
vation for accessing it (Chen, Papazafeiropoulou, Chen, Duan, & Liu,
2014). Further the study observed that ease in customer effort
significantly impacts the brand experience and eventually loyalty to
brand Facebook pages and eWOM. Satisfaction with a brand's
Facebook page serves as a positive predictor of favorable attitude
toward it (Jin, 2012). Examining a luxury brand's fan page (Jin, 2012)
found that brand attitude post visiting the brand's Facebook page
serves as a positive antecedent of consumer's interest in utilizing
Facebook for online shopping as well as a more recent phenomenon
of Research Online and Purchase Offline (ROPO).
2.2. Small scale businesses and social media networks
More than 30 million small businesses have pages on Facebook
which are updated at least once per month (DMR Report, 2015). As
per Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises Development (MSMED)
Act 2006, a small enterprise is an enterprise where the investment
in plant and machinery is more than Rs. 25 lakh but does not exceed
Rs. 5 crore. A significant 17 percent of India's GDP comes from its 40
million SMEs (IBEF Report). A recent study by Internet Advertising
Bureau UK, found that businesses with strong social media pres-
ence attract 80 percent more customers in future (Coleman, 2013).
Thus it is very important for small scale businesses having limited
budget to implement effective social media marketing strategies to
expand and promote their business. The average cost per thousand
impressions (CPM) across other media formats on the internet is
US$2.5, thus social media being the least expensive at US$0.56 is
becoming popular among the entrepreneurs with small marketing
budget (The Facebook Ads Benchmark Report, 2013).
Social networking platforms are the best channels to maintain
organization's identity as well as to maintain online existence
(Yeung, 2014). A recent report by McKinsey says that the SMEs, who
 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270 259

are highly active on various social media avenues reports, double

the revenue growth of those who are not using it. Out of the
40 million small entrepreneurs around 5 lakh SMEs in India have
their strong presence on social media. Assocham and Com Score
reports that internet users in India are expected to touch
350e450 million by 2015e16 and this will act as a catalyst in the
growth of Small and Medium Businesses (SMBs).
In the era of internet-savvy customers online reputation has
become an important element for the success of business. Online
presence enables firms to be updated with their customer's feelings
about the brand and also give opportunities to combat the negative
thoughts (if any). The above position is reinforced by the fact that 11
percent future recruitments by small local businesses will be for the
positions of social media managers (Local-Vox, 2015). Fig. 1. Conceptual framework.
The increasing traffic on different social media platforms,
especially Facebook popularity in India has made it important for
networks yield positive consequences for brand assessments and
the small scale entrepreneurs to use it as a strong market
buying expectations (Naylor, Lamberton, & West, 2012). Research
communication tool. Statistics has revealed that around 80 percent
has demonstrated that social media can decipher into increments
customers connect with brands via Facebook pages (Coleman,
in deals (Stephen & Galak, 2012).
2013). Creating a Facebook page for making the business popular
Activities on social media, specifically on the Facebook page of
is much easier than using traditional ways of marketing. It provides
companies, not only affect the perception of brands, but brand
many lucrative options that firms can exploit as per their specific
based user interactions on this platform also influences consumers
requirements. An appealing profile page on Facebook is usually
purchase decision (Hutter, Hautz, Dennhardt, & Füller, 2013).
used for showcasing products and services, interact with existing
Consumers share their product experiences and read peer con-
and potential customers and highlighting unique selling points of
sumers' product evaluations on different platforms including re-
the organization (Mershon, 2011).
tailers' web sites, brand community, independent web sites, and
One of the major reasons for the adoption of social media
consumer blogs (Lee & Youn, 2009). As customers perceive online
platform for businesses is the growing popularity of these tools
reviews to be as dependable as company websites, such reviews
among youngsters. Survey of 18,196 high school students aged
posted on different platforms have different effects on the evalua-
12e18 years as a part of TCS Gen-Y Survey (2013e14) found that 74
tions of consumers (Lee & Youn, 2009).
percent of the respondents prefer Facebook to communicate with
Communications with brands increment the likelihood that the
their friends. Since the largest active social media audience in the
brand is incorporated in the client's evoked set (Cobb-Walgren,
country comprises people between the ages of 15e25 years (Ernst
Ruble, & Donthu, 1995). Examining the Facebook page of major
& Young Report, 2014) this segment of the population represents a
European travel agency (Po € yry et al., 2013) found that the hedonic
very important demographic that modern day marketers can't
motivations not only stimulate the browsing of the pages but also
afford to ignore.
effects purchase intentions.
Companies are preferred on Facebook platforms by the users
Recommendations from friends drive people to buy from third-
(Hansson, Wrangmo, & Søilen, 2013), and they want them to up-
party websites. As Facebook enable companies to sell products
load meaningful posts without unsolicited sales messages. Users
directly from its website consumers don't have to click off to a
like to search for the companies themselves rather than being
third-party site rather if they intend they can purchase directly
bombarded by company messages (Hansson et al., 2013).
through Facebook (Geron, 2011). Thus, considering the consumers'
Conducting businesses through Facebook by small size firms not
activity on the brand fan page we propose:
only increases its direct value on the basis of increased transactions
and increased turnover which it gets by connecting with new H1. Liking the brand on Facebook fan page affects its purchase
customers, and organizational growth, but also gives rise in the intention.
indirect value through word-of-mouth, positive recommendations
and the relative influence that followers exert on each other 3.2. Fan page liking and WOM
(Hopkins, 2012).
Associating with brands on online platforms positively effects
3. Conceptual framework and development of hypotheses consumer satisfaction and affective word-of-mouth behavior
(Royo-Vela & Casamassima, 2011). One of the sources of informa-
Considering the past studies on brand fan pages we made a tion for customers in the purchase decision making process, WOM
framework on the thoughts of fan page liking (Dholakia, Bagozzi, & through social media platforms not just affects brand awareness;
Pearo, 2004), WOM (Hennig-Thurau et al., 2004), brand love (Batra, however it additionally expands sales and ROI significantly (Kumar
Ahuvia, & Bagozzi, 2012; Carroll & Ahuvia, 2006) and the purchase & Mirchandani, 2012).
intention (Reitz, 2012). The schema depicts the relationship be- Consumers while browsing the brand pages encounter number
tween liking a brand on fan page of Facebook and resulting brand of information in addition to a variety of marketing messages and
love, WOM and purchase intention (Fig. 1). other information from the host company they also find posts by
other members. Such content are many a times forwarded to other
3.1. Liking a fan page and intention to purchase users with a motivation to help them (Henning-Thurau, Gwinner,
Walsh, & Gremler, 2004; Po € yry et al., 2013).
Short-term behavior of a customer in which he decides to pur- Hence it is important for marketers to understand what moti-
chase the unique product while having substitute in the competi- vates followers to share brand content. Pereira, de Fatima Salgueiro,
n,
tive market can be defined as purchase intention (Fandos & Flavia and Mateus (2014) observed that majority of followers share con-
2006). Associations with purchasers made through social media tent if they feel an affinity for the content or are involved with the
260 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270
Fig. 2. Individual constructs.
brand. A consumer, who is passionate about a brand, participates in
a substantially more passionate association and this brand passion
leads to positive word-of-mouth activity (Matzler, Pichler, &
Hemetsberger, 2007). Individuals who are associated and con-
nected with the brands through facebook are prone to build brand
dedication and additionally produce positive WOM (Swani, Milne,
& Brown, 2013).
Consumers' affective commitment and loyalty to the brand can
be considered as an antecedent of consumer referral intent, i.e.
saying good things about the company (Zeithaml, Berry, &
Parasuraman, 1996). Liking fan pages may be an indicator of the
member's affective commitment which leads to positive word-of-
mouth activity (Dick, & Basu, 1994).
Consumers who engage with the brand by “liking” will offer
WOM when they perceive a genuine congruency between the
brand meaning and their self-identity (Schau & Gilly, 2003). Fan
pages not just gives the consumers opportunity to enthusiastically
captivate with the brands but likewise offers chances to the users to
talk on behalf of the organizations making them the substance
distributers. Therefore, we suggest that consumers, who “like” their
brand on Facebook, will offer WOM for that brand. Based on these
discussions, the following hypothesis is proposed:
H2. Liking a fan page results into positive word of mouth about
the brands.
3.3. Fan page liking and brand love
Consumers can experience a feeling of love toward a brand in
the same way they identify with other individuals (Fournier, 1998).
When consumers develop strong relationships with brands love
could be the center components of customers' associations with
brands. Generating the theory of love marks which is about
building and strengthening emotional bonds between brands and
consumers, (Pawle & Cooper, 2006) found that brands are like
people. Some people we are passionate about, some we love, some
we just like, some we are indifferent to, and some we actively
dislike. With the advent of technology and changing consumer
behavior, marketing communication needs to be redesigned,
making emotional intelligence more central to advertising devel-
opment (Pawle & Cooper, 2006). Consumers are no longer moti-
vated by brand loyalty, but by Love marks e emotional attachments
to products and services (Dixon, 2006). ‘When consumers interact
and form relationships with the brands they develop feelings
which range from ‘antipathy, to slight fondness, all the way up to
what would, in personeperson relations, amount to love’ (Shimp &
Madden, 1988; pg. 163). ‘Brand love includes passion for the brand,
attachment to the brand, positive evaluation of the brand, positive
emotions in response to the brand, and declarations of love for the
brand’ (Carroll & Ahuvia, 2006; pg. 81).
While investigating the concept of brand love using triangular
theory of Sternberg (Shimp & Madden, 1988) defined brand love as
the ‘combination of three components: passion, intimacy, decision/
commitment, which in the context of consumption may be inter-
preted as yearning, liking and decision/commitment’. In the era of
web 2.0 individuals show their intimacy, and adoration towards
their most loved brand through liking and following them on varied
social networking sites. Among all the social media avenues
growing popularity of Facebook makes it the most acknowledged
stage for demonstrating affection towards the brand.
Individuals love brands when they feel they belong to it and
liking a brand may give that feeling of belongingness. Fan pages
empower buyers not just to voice their sentiments and give positive
criticism to different shoppers but additionally it also diminishes
the mental separation, which likewise comes about into a superior
brand association.
(Carroll & Ahuvia, 2006, p. 5) states that brand love is “the de-
gree of passionate emotional attachment that a person has for a
particular trade name” and as the brand page conveys high contact
recurrence with the brand, brand affinity ought to be influenced
absolutely. Carroll and Ahuvia (2006) propose a brand love scale
comprises of 10 items incorporating diverse aspects like wonderful
brand, feeling good, feeling awesome, neutral feelings, resultant
happiness, loving this brand, no particular feelings about the brand,
pure delight, passion towards brand, and brand attachment.
For the extant study to test the relationship between love feeling
for a brand and Facebook fan page liking, positive emotional con-
nections with the brand, happiness, satisfaction and passion is
taken as the as the principle variables (Batra et al., 2012; Carroll &
Ahuvia, 2006). Based on these discussions, following hypothesis is
proposed:
H3. Liking the brand on Facebook fan page influences brand love
positively.
 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270
3.4. Brand love and WOM
‘Interpersonal communication towards evaluation of products
or service of interest can be defined as WOM’ (Arndt, 1967). Word-
of-Mouth (WOM) information plays a major role in influencing
consumer decision making process (Lai Ying & Chung, 2007).
If the customers are highly engaged with the brands they tend to
show their affection towards it by recommending and informing
about it to others (Hollebeek, 2011). Individuals spends brand-
related time/effort by publicly sharing their affection on various
social networking sites (Hollebeek, 2011) and thus consumers who
like brands on social networks are considered as potential brand
activists (Bergkvist & Bech-Larsen, 2010). Loving a brand gives an in
turn desire to the consumers to recommend it to their friends and
relatives (Ismail & Spinelli, 2012).
Following brands on Facebook give opportunity to the brand to
connect with those individuals who have emotional bonds with the
brand and participate with the brand through high involvement
and positive WOM (Wragg, 2004). Consumers who feel love for a
brand are more likely to talk about it, through a process of identity
construction (Batra et al., 2012) and the influence of brand love on
positive word-of-mouth has been demonstrated (Carroll & Ahuvia,
2006). The present study thus proposes that customers who like
brand pages all over Facebook emerge as the evangelists for that
brand, coming about into positive word of mouth. These brand
darlings not just interface with others inwardly, they likewise have
an enthusiastic holding with the brand based on which they intend
to proliferate the brand amongst others (Wragg, 2004). Consumers
who “like” a brand on a social network such as Facebook may do so
as part of impression management (Schau & Gilly, 2003).
Lot of exploration intends to research how advertisers are uti-
lizing Facebook as a terminus of offering messages to push e-WOM
in Business-to-Business (B2B) and Business-to-Consumer (B2C)
segments (Swani et al., 2013). The ease in customer's exertion to
utilize Facebook impacts its brand experience and therefore reli-
ability to brand Facebook pages and e-WOM (Chen et al., 2014).
Brand love is emphatically connected with WOM (Carroll & Ahuvia,
2006) since brand love predicts dynamic engagement (Bergkvist &
Bech-Larsen, 2010).
Along these lines of discussion and aligned with the body of past
research following hypothesis is proposed:
H4. There exists a significant relationship between Brand Love
and Word of Mouth
3.5. Brand Love and Purchase Intention
The rise of consumers' awareness among the products leads
them choose the products favorable and familiar to them. In the era
of hyper informed consumers, if marketers want to beat their
competitors, they have to make consumers love their brand (Chi,
Yeh, & Yang, 2009). Different studies on brand love discovered
willingness to pay a value premium as one of the results of brand
love (Batra et al., 2012). If a consumer loves a brand he is ready to
pay more for that, since the loss of a loved brand would be costly, in
the form of distress and anxiety (Albert et al., 2008). A loved brand
also is valued and perceived as unique (Albert et al., 2008). There-
fore, a consumer intends to purchase the brand at any price since he
wants the benefit to continue in terms of the positive emotions
linked to the loved brand (Albert & Merunka, 2013). Sarkar and
Sreejesh (2014) indicated that impulsive purchasing is the
consequence of brand love. The qualitative study discovered some
level of hastiness in the purchasing conduct of the respondents in
terms of the brands they loved. As the examination lacks explora-
tion, on the premise of the given discussion we propose:
261
H5. There exists a significant relationship between Brand Love
and Intention to purchase.
4. Rationale of the study
Many studies in the past have focused on individual's motiva-
tion for social media usage (Pempek et al., 2009; Ross et al., 2009).
Examining the reasons for Facebook usage by applying uses and
gratifications theory (Joinson, 2008) found social connection,
shared identities, content, social investigation, social network
surfing and status updating to be the major motivators for using
Facebook.
Kang, Tang, and Foire (2014) explored four benefit components:
functional benefits, socialepsychological benefits, hedonic benefits,
and monetary benefits obtained by the fan page members while
following a brand. Individual while using Facebook may like the fan
page of any brand which attracts them. Thus reason for liking a
brand page could be different for individuals.
But does this like emotionally connect the consumer with the
brands resulting into brand love and positive brand outcomes (such
as WOM and purchase intention) remain unexplored. Thus it is very
important for the marketers to understand that brand love is
different from simple brand affect (i.e., brand “liking”). Support for
this comes from research showing that interpersonal love is not
merely an intense form of interpersonal liking, but at the same time
a conceptually and empirically distinct construct. Similarly brand
love is a more intense emotional response than liking, and a
conceptually different construct (Carroll & Ahuvia., 2006). Inte-
gration of the brand into the consumer's sense of identity results
into brand love however such assimilation need not occur in simple
brand affect (Carroll & Ahuvia., 2006).
The extant literature studying the relationship between brand
engagement and brand love have examined the same in an offline
environment (Bergkvist & Bech-Larsen, 2010; Ismail & Spinelli,
2012; Sarkar & Sreejesh, 2014). A similar relationship remains
majorly unexplored in context of online channels. The present
study thus aimed to fulfill this gap by examining whether liking a
brand page results into brand love, positive word of mouth and
intent to purchase.
5. Methodology of research
An ad-hoc survey on Facebook fan pages was conducted to test
the main hypothesis in our conceptual framework. The study is
centered on the utilization of fan pages by the small scale entre-
preneurs of India. Five popular small scale organizations which are
highly active on fan page with a huge base of Facebook clients have
been selected. These companies are doing their business on a
hybrid model i.e. online and offline and are using fan page as a
strong marketing tool. The present study was carried out utilizing a
self-administered structured questionnaire sent to the fan page
followers of these five organizations.
The survey was focused around the findings of the literature
review. The scale embodies four significant constructs i.e. Fan-page
Liking, Brand Love, WOM and Purchase Intention. Each construct in
turn is explained via distinct sets of statements being measured on
a common intensity based 5 point Likert scale [Totally Disagree (1)
e Totally Agree (5)]. The questionnaire was administered to 350
respondents on the judgmental basis. A total of 311 valid and
complete responses have been used for the final study. Age-range
of the respondents varied between 18 and 55 years. Manifest
measurement items were adapted from extant literature. Structural
Equation Modeling (SEM) was used to evaluate the research model
and test the proposed hypotheses.
262 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270
The study aims:
▪ To empirically test the impact of fan page liking on the proposed
outcomes.
▪ To empirically test the two intereoutcome relations
hypothesized.
▪ To investigate the moderating effect of Gender on the proposed
hypotheses.
5.1. Sampling framework
As the research is centered on Indian small scale entrepreneur
backed firms having a vivid presence on Facebook as well as other
social media platforms, hence selection of firms comprised of a
critical component of the overall research methodology. To begin
with the researchers out of personal inclination reviewed the
Facebook (FB) success stories within the ‘Advertise on FB’ section.
Fan-page of Chumbak, an Indian small-scale entrepreneur dealing
in lifestyle accessories was ‘liked’ by the authors. Chumbak pos-
sesses a high visibility on FB and receives sizeable patronage as
evident by above 3.5 lakh likes registered till date. Upon liking the
fan-page, over a period of time researchers started received sug-
gestions towards liking fan-pages of similar scale entrepreneur
backed firms marked by sizeable number of ‘likes’ received from FB
users. The suggestions comprised of firms involved in diverse
businesses. Using such FB suggestions as sampling frame, re-
searchers zeroed upon top five small entrepreneur backed firms
using the judgemental criteria of number of ‘likes’ registered on
their respective fan-pages. The final set of firms whose followers
served as the study respondents comprises of Chumbak, Fab
Furnish, Pepper Fry, Happily Unmarried and India Circus. Number
of ‘likes’ registered on the respective FB fan-pages of these firms are
compiled in Appendix 2.
A web-linked version of the survey instrument was made
accessible to the followers of the five sampled firms. The re-
spondents were those followers who were actively involved in the
interactions taking place on the fan-page of these firms. 80 re-
spondents from each firm were randomly selected and the web-
link of the questionnaire was personally in-boxed to them. 340
filled questionnaires were returned, out of which 311 were found
complete and valid, and thus considered for the study.
5.2. Constructs of the research model
Our proposed model incorporates four latent constructs viz. Fan
page Liking, Word of Mouth, Brand Love and Purchase Intention
(Fig. 2). As per (Hair, Black, Babin, & Anderson, 2010) “a latent
construct cannot be measured directly but can be represented or
measured by one or more variables (indicators). An observed
(measured) variable is a specific item or question, obtained either
from respondents in response to questions in a questionnaire or
from some type of observation”. Measured variables are used as the
indicators of latent constructs. Within the final measurement
model, Fan page Liking comprise of six measured variables, while
Word of Mouth, Brand Love and Purchase Intention comprise of
four manifest items each (Appendix 6).
6. Data analysis and findings
6.1. Exploratory factor analysis, reliability and validity analyses
The factor-item composition considered as part of our study was
further verified by undertaking Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA).
KaisereMeyereOlkin (KMO) statistic of sampling adequacy was
found to be 0.91 evidencing the suitability of the study sample for
undertaking EFA. A KMO statistic greater than 0.60 can be consid-
ered as ideal (Kaiser & Rice, 1974). Further, the Bartlett's Test of
Sphericity was recorded as significant indicating the presence of
multi-collinearity amongst variables, a pre-requisite for EFA pro-
cedure (Appendix 3). Principal Component Analysis (PCA) based
factor extraction coupled with Varimax Rotation supported the
factor-item composition adapted from the extant literature. All the
variables achieved factor loadings above the floor criteria of 0.50
(Guadagnoli & Velicer, 1988) (Appendix 5). Further, all factors
achieved a cumulative variance explanation of 68 percent, much
above the minimum recommended explanation based on Variable-
Factor ratio (Costello & Osborne, 2005) (Appendix-4).
All constructs were found to be reliable as their individual
Composite Reliability (CR) values are greater than the floor estimate
of 0.7 (Nunnally, 1978) (Table 1).
Towards establishing validity of independent constructs and
over all measurement model Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)
has been carried out. Validity measures are mainly of two types viz.
Content Validity and Construct Validity (comprising of Convergent
Validity and Discriminant Validity).
6.1.1. Content validity
The content validity of a construct can be defined as the degree
to which the measure spans the domain of the construct's theo-
retical definition. For the purpose of this study, content validity of
the instrument was established in consultation with academicians,
professional domain experts.
6.1.2. Construct validity e convergent and discriminant validities
It involves the assessment of the degree to which an oper-
ationalization correctly measures its targeted variables (O'Leary-
Kelly & Vokurka, 1998). According to them, establishing construct
validity involves the empirical assessment of unidimensionality,
reliability and validity (convergent and discriminant). In the pre-
sent study, in order to check unidimensionality, a measurement
model was specified for each construct and CFA was run for all the
constructs. Individual items in the model were examined to see
how closely they represent the same construct. A Comparative Fit
Index (CFI) of 0.90 or above for the model implies existence of
strong unidimensionality (Byrne, 1994). The CFI values obtained on
the basis of all four constructs in administered scale is above 0.90
(Table 2) indicating a strong unidimensionality for the scale. Upon
satisfaction of unidimensionality and reliability parameters, the
scale was further subjected to empirical validation analysis.
Convergent validity refers to the degree to which multiple
methods of measuring a variable provide the same results (O'Leary-
Kelly & Vokurka, 1998). Convergent validity can be established with
the help of CR based on Cronbach Alpha (Cronbach, 1951) and
Average Variance Explained (AVE). Following criteria must be
satisfied towards ensuring convergent validity: CR > 0.7, CR > AVE
and AVE > 0.5 (Hair et al., 2010). Alpha value of all four constructs
were found to be greater than 0.7. AVE of all individual constructs
were found to be greater than 0.5. Further, in case of all four
Table 1
Reliability and validity for individual constructs.
CR AVE MSV ASV Convergent Discriminant
Validity Validity
Brand Love 0.823 0.539 0.386 0.343 Yes Yes
FPL 0.857 0.501 0.367 0.332 Yes Yes
WOM 0.899 0.692 0.386 0.368 Yes Yes
Purchase Intention 0.882 0.654 0.372 0.366 Yes Yes
Source: Gakingston statistical toolkit output.
 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270 263

Table 2 markedly high estimates as inferred from the AMOS output

Model fit indices.
Indices Recommended value Model fit indices
GFI
0.95 0.997
P-value
0.05 0.167
CFI
0.95 0.999
CMIN/df <3 1.655
AGFI
0.80 0.973
RMSEA 0.05 0.046
P close
0.05 0.356
Source: AMOS output.
individual constructs, the CR (Alpha) statistic is significantly greater
than their respective AVE statistic (Table 1).
Discriminant validity is the degree to which the measures of
different latent variables are unique. Discriminant validity is
ensured if a measure does not correlate very highly with other
measures from which it is supposed to differ (O'Leary-Kelly &
Vokurka, 1998). Discriminant validity is established on the basis
of AVE and Maximum Shared Variance (MSV). Criteria for ensuring
discriminant validity are MSV < AVE and ASV < AVE (Hair et al.,
2010). Within the present study, MSV and ASV for each of the
four individual constructs have been determined. Thus measure-
ment model was found to be majorly valid in terms of discriminant
validity as both MSV and ASV of all four individual constructs were
found to be lower than their respective AVE estimates (Table 1). The
discriminant validity statistics for the individual constructs were
determined using Microsoft Excel based Validity Concerns Toolkit
developed by Prof. Gakingston.
6.2. Assumptions in the conduct of SEM analyses
Particularly problematic to SEM analyses are data that are
multivariate kurtotic, the situation where the multivariate distri-
bution of the observed variables has both tails and peaks that differ
from those characteristic of a multivariate normal distribution.
West, Finch, and Curran (1995) and Kline (2011) considers rescaled
beta values equal to or greater than 7 to be indicative of early de-
parture from normality. Using this value of 7 as guide, a review of
kurtosis values revealed no item to be substantially kurtotic.
A common approach to the detection of multivariate outliers is
the computation of the squared Mahalanobis distance (D2) for each
case. This statistic measures the distance in standard deviation
units between a set of scores for one case and the sample means for
all variables (centroids). Typically, an outlying case will have D2
value that stands distinctively apart from all other D2 values. A
review of these values reported in figure shows minimal evidence
of serious multivariate outliers.
(Table 3).
A pre-requisite for multi-group moderation analysis includes
ensuring invariance of manifest item estimates with respect to their
constructs. Invariance test was done to ascertain the validity of this
assumption. Invariance test outcome (Table 6) exhibits each of the
four constructs forming the part of proposed model is not signifi-
cantly varying across gender categories in terms of latent con-
struct's explanation by individual manifest items as indicated by
standardized Z scores.
Multi-group moderation analysis was undertaken towards
identifying Gender based differences in terms of hypothesized
relationships as part of the proposed structural model. The anal-
ysis outcomes can be referred in Table 7. Effect estimates of the
hypothesized relations within individual gender groups are sig-
nificant as indicated by P values < 0.05. From the moderation test
results we infer that Gender as a variable moderates four out of
the five hypothesized relations significantly, the significant
moderating effects are evidenced by hypothesis wise Z-score
statistic. As per the moderation analysis findings, H2 and H4
significantly differ across gender groups, while H3 and H5 differ
to a moderate extent. The final measurement model has been
included as part of Fig. 3.
6.4. Common method bias
In the domain of applied statistics, Common Method Bias (or
Common Method Variance) refers to presence of spurious variance
attributable to the measurement method instead of the constructs
the manifest items are deemed to represent (Podsakoff, MacKenzie,
Lee, & Podsakoff, 2003). It may also be interpreted as systematic
error variance shared among manifest variables with and intro-
duced as a function of the same method and/or source. If the
manifest variables are affected by common method bias, the in-
tercorrelations among them can be inflated or deflated depending
upon several factors.
In the present study, presence of Common Method Bias (CMB)
was evaluated by applying multiple techniques. To begin with,
Harman Single Factor Test (Podsakoff & Orgon, 1986) was applied.
All four factors were constrained to a single factor using Factor
Analysis in SPSS predictive software. As per the un-rotated factor
Table 3
Regression estimates of construct items.
Items Path Construct Unstdzd. Stdzd. P C.R.
Estimates Estimates Value

FPL1 ) Fan Page Liking 1.000 0.710 0.857

***
6.3. Model fit estimation, invariance and multi-group moderation FPL2 ) Fan Page Liking 1.023 0.729
***
FPL3 ) Fan Page Liking 1.059 0.772
analyses ***
FPL4 ) Fan Page Liking 1.209 0.800
***
FPL5 ) Fan Page Liking 0.993 0.657
Upon satisfaction of reliability and validity of individual con- FPL6 ) Fan Page Liking 1.101 0.793 ***

structs as well as the overall measurement model, the study pro- WOM1 ) Word of Mouth 1.000 0.828 0.899
***
ceeded to determine fitness of the overall measurement model WOM2 ) Word of Mouth 0.905 0.821
***
WOM3 ) Word of Mouth 0.833 0.777
based on model fit indices generated as a part of AMOS output. WOM4 ) Word of Mouth 0.853 0.916 ***

Model fit is assessed on the basis of CMIN/df, P-value, Comparative BL1 ) Brand Love 1.000 0.773 0.823
***
Fit Index (CFI), Goodness of Fit Index (GFI), Adjusted Goodness of Fit BL2 ) Brand Love 0.885 0.716
***
Index (AGFI), Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA) BL3 ) Brand Love 0.884 0.770
***
BL4 ) Brand Love 0.806 0.689
and P close. Model fit indices for all the individual constructs were
PI1 ) Purchase Intention 1.000 0.825 0.882
calculated and the results have been indicated in Table 2. All four PI2 ) Purchase Intention 0.924 0.686 ***

constructs i.e. Fan page Liking, Brand Love, WOM and Purchase PI3 ) Purchase Intention 1.016 0.774 ***
***
Intention generated good results in terms of the specified indices PI4 ) Purchase Intention 1.055 0.909
(Hu & Bentler, 1999) and hence were deemed fit. All 18 measured ***
( : P-value < 0.01).
variables loaded significantly on their respective constructs with Source: AMOS output.
264 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270

Table 4
Summary of support for hypotheses (based on the results of SEM in structural model).

Path proposed (hypothesis) Estimate t-Statistic R2 p-value Supported?

(H1): FPLa / Purchase Intention (PI) 0.263 7.546 0.410 0.000(S) H1 (Yes)
(H2): FPL / Word of Mouth (WOM) 0.160 5.025 0.405 0.000(S) H2 (Yes)
(H3): FPL / Brand Love (BL) 0.666 22.284 0.447 0.000(S) H3 (Yes)
(H4): BL / WOM 0.711 24.499 0.672 0.000(S) H4 (Yes)
(H5): BL / PI 0.563 16.245 0.546 0.000 (S) H5 (Yes)
a
FPL: Fan Page Liking.
Source: Compiled from AMOS and SPSS output.

Table 5
Cumulative squared multiple correlation coefficients (R2).

Predicted construct R2

Purchase intention 0.583

WOM 0.688
Brand love 0.444

Table 6
Invariance analysis.

Male Female z score

Estimate P Estimate P

FPL2 ) Fan Page Liking 0.879 0.000 0.928 0.000 0.332

FPL3 ) Fan Page Liking 1.097 0.000 0.954 0.000 0.669
FPL4 ) Fan Page Liking 1.250 0.000 1.337 0.000 0.347
FPL5 ) Fan Page Liking 0.965 0.000 1.070 0.000 0.503
FPL6 ) Fan Page Liking 1.135 0.000 1.135 0.000 0.001
WOM2 ) Word of Mouth 0.905 0.000 0.922 0.000 0.157
WOM3 ) Word of Mouth 0.840 0.000 0.883 0.000 0.350
WOM4 ) Word of Mouth 0.852 0.000 0.853 0.000 0.013
BL2 ) Brand Love 1.283 0.000 1.305 0.000 0.234
BL3 ) Brand Love 1.055 0.000 1.152 0.000 0.531
BL4 ) Brand Love 0.883 0.000 1.094 0.000 1.190
PI2 ) Purchase Intention 0.930 0.000 1.025 0.000 0.627
PI3 ) Purchase Intention 1.019 0.000 1.124 0.000 0.758
PI4 ) Purchase Intention 1.064 0.000 1.061 0.000 0.029

Notes: *** p-value < 0.01; ** p-value < 0.05; * p-value < 0.10.
Source: Gakingston statistical toolkit output.

Table 7
Multi-group moderation output (Grouping variable: Gender).

Male Female z-score

Estimate P Estimate P

H3 BL ) FPL 0.664 0.000 0.976 0.000 2.575** Fig. 3. Measurement model.

H2 WOM ) FPL 0.714 0.000 0.275 0.010 3.166***
H1 PI ) FPL 0.616 0.000 0.401 0.000 1.632
H4 WOM ) BL 0.339 0.000 0.822 0.000 4.685***
construct indicators is 0.61, while the average method variance is
H5 PI ) BL 0.377 0.000 0.572 0.000 2.025**
0.01. The resultant ratio of substantive variance to method variance
Notes: *** p-value < 0.01; ** p-value < 0.05; * p-value < 0.10. is 67:1, with no significant method factor loading detected for all
Source: Gakingston statistical toolkit output.
but four items at p < 0.01. Thus, the outcome re-confirmed the fact
that CMB did not impact our study findings.
solution, percentage variance explanation by the single factor was
found to be 39 percent which below the mark of majority (i.e. 50 6.5. Structural model
percent) (Table 9). This confirmed the absence of CMB in our study.
To complement the Harman Single Factor Test, an additional Empirical support was found for the inter-construct relation-
analysis i.e. Common Latent Factor test forwarded by (Klein, Rai, & ships as hypothesized within the proposed structural model. The
Straub, 2007; Podsakoff et al., 2003) was undertaken towards structural model is evaluated by inspecting the path coefficients
evaluating CMB. As a part of this test, in addition to the substantive (Beta weights) which outline the quality of the relationship be-
constructs, a common latent factor (or method factor) is introduced tween dependent and independent variables. The coefficients
into the measurement model whose indicators comprise of all the ought to be significant and consistent with expectations (Chwelos,
substantive construct items within the original measurement Benbasat, & Dexter, 2001).
model. The test outcome is the proportion of the variance explained From the five paths proposed in the model, all were found to be
by the common method. As reported in Table 10 and Fig.4, our statistically significant and depicting positive impact on predicted
results indicate that the average explained variance of substantive/ construct. Path from FPL to Purchase Intention recorded (b ¼ 0.26,
 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270 265

Table 8 7. Discussions
Social media platform preference for brand engagement.

Response alternatives Frequency Percentage Past studies have investigated how customer Engagement
Facebook 260 83.6
through fan pages affects brand relationships and Loyalty In-
Instagram 4 1.3 tentions. Studies also examined how consumers can be converted
Pinterest 2 0.6 into fans through fan page engagement (Jahn & Kunz, 2012, 2014).
YouTube 10 3.2 But very few studies explored how customer's likes on the brand
Company Website 29 9.3
pages of small scale entrepreneur based firms effects their brand
Others 6 1.9
love, WOM and purchase intention towards that brand. The present
Source: Compiled from SPSS output.
fills this gap and examines whether “liking” a fan page significantly
influences brand love, WOM and the purchase intention of the
t ¼ 7.54, p < 0.05), the path from FPL to WOM (b ¼ 0.16, t ¼ 5.03, brands.
p < 0.05), path from FPL to Brand love (b ¼ 0.67, t ¼ 22.28, p < 0.05), To understand this Squared multiple correlation (R2) co-
path from Brand love to WOM (b ¼ 0.71, t ¼ 24.50, p < 0.05) and efficients were estimated for each individual relationship pro-
final path from Brand love to Purchase Intention (b ¼ 0.56, posed as a part of model hypotheses. On the basis of the R2
t ¼ 16.25, p < 0.05). These results statistically supported H1, H2, H3, coefficients we infer that fan page liking has relatively weaker
H4 and H5. The summary of this causal model is illustrated in direct positive impact on purchase intention, word-of-mouth and
Table 4. The final imputed structural model has included as Fig. 5. brand love as indicated R2 coefficients of 0.410, 0.405 and 0.447

Table 9
Common method bias analysis (Herman single factor test output).

Total variance explained

Component Initial Eigenvalues Extraction sums of squared loadings

Total % of Variance Cumulative % Total % of Variance Cumulative %

1 7.042 39.121 39.121 7.042 39.121 39.121

2 1.783 9.905 54.026
3 1.343 7.463 61.489
4 1.184 6.578 68.067
5 0.852 4.735 72.802
6 0.629 3.497 76.299
7 0.558 3.102 79.401
8 0.526 2.923 82.324
9 0.430 2.388 84.712
10 0.412 2.287 86.999
11 0.391 2.171 89.169
12 0.381 2.118 91.288
13 0.347 1.926 93.214
14 0.327 1.819 95.033
15 0.319 1.774 96.807
16 0.248 1.377 98.184
17 0.196 1.090 99.274
18 0.131 0.726 100.000

Extraction method: principal component analysis.

Source: SPSS output.

Table 10
Common method bias analysis (common latent factor test output).

Construct Substantive factor loading (R1) P-Value (R1)2 Method factor loading (R2) P-Value (R2)2
*** **
Fan Page Liking FPL1 0.710 0.504 0.138 0.019
*** ***
FPL2 0.729 0.531 0.121 0.015
*** *
FPL3 0.772 0.596 0.018 0.000
*** ***
FPL4 0.800 0.640 0.096 0.009
*** *
FPL5 0.657 0.432 0.136 0.018
*** **
FPL6 0.793 0.629 0.040 0.002
*** *
Word of Mouth WOM1 0.828 0.686 0.037 0.001
*** *
WOM2 0.821 0.674 0.072 0.005
*** **
WOM3 0.777 0.604 0.116 0.013
*** *
WOM4 0.916 0.839 0.132 0.017
*** **
Brand Love BL1 0.773 0.598 0.086 0.007
*** ***
BL2 0.716 0.513 0.089 0.008
*** ***
BL3 0.770 0.593 0.143 0.020
*** **
BL4 0.689 0.475 0.098 0.010
*** *
Purchase Intention PI1 0.825 0.681 0.030 0.001
*** **
PI2 0.686 0.471 0.093 0.009
*** **
PI3 0.774 0.599 0.019 0.000
*** *
PI4 0.909 0.826 0.120 0.014
Average 0.775 0.605 0.088 0.009

Notes: ***p-value < 0.01; **p-value < 0.05; *p-value < 0.10.
Source: compiled from AMOS output.
266 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270
Fig. 4. Measurement model with common latent factor.
respectively (Table 4). On the contrary, a realized brand love is
likely to have strong positive impact on customer's word-of-
mouth practices and future purchase intentions evidenced by R2
coefficients of 0.672 and 0.546 (Table 4). All the impacts though
have been found to be statistically significant based on p-value
estimates below 0.05. The squared multiple correlations (R2) value
indicates the amount of variance in a predicted variable explained
by predictor variable(s). It reflects predictive power of the model.
Table 5 incorporates R2 values of individual predicted constructs
forming the part of structural model. The study also tried to
analyze social media platform preference towards brand engage-
ment based on descriptive. As per the findings Facebook recorded
maximum preferential inclination. Out of 311 respondents sur-
veyed, 260 respondents (84%) revealed preference towards it.
Refer (Table 8).
Fig. 5. Structural model.
8. Research implications
8.1. Managerial implications
Brands on their fan pages get millions of likes, but does this like
really reflects consumers' love for the brand and whether it results
into WOM and purchase intention remains unexplained. The
study sought to gain insights into the attitudes of consumers who
“like” brands on Facebook. Findings of the study have implications
for managers seeking to harness fan pages to build brand re-
lationships. The paper has discovered noteworthy relationship
between liking a brand on fan page and rising brand love, positive
WOM and purchasing aim (Hutter et al., 2013; Wallace et al.,
2014). The paper thus recommends marketers to be as much
intelligent and proactive on these pages as possible. For a better
and emotional engagement with the followers, marketers are
advised to use real time and content marketing strategies. Firms
should not merely use this platform to push their product; rather
they must know that their customers want to hear something
closer to them apart from the brands. Such ‘on the moment
marketing’ provides marketers plenty of opportunities to engage
with their audience via promotions and contents related to a
particular current event or cultural happening (Jahn & Kunz,
2014).
An examination of gender based differences in the hypothesized
relations revealed significant patterns providing noteworthy im-
plications. Gender can be conceptualized as a moderating variable
in the context of social media behavior of consumers (Duggan &
 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270 267

Brenner, 2013). The results of the moderation test found that the media users (Duggan & Brenner, 2013) moderation analysis was
effect of fan page liking on WOM is stronger amongst males than undertaken. It was found from the results of moderation that
females (Table 7). The results of the study thus suggest managers to liking a fan page significantly results into word of mouth among
emphasize on those social media platforms which are popular male followers than female follower. But the relationship be-
among the male. Creating fan pages on Facebook could thus be an tween liking and brand love to purchase intention is more
effective online communication platform to judge e-WOM behavior prominent in female followers. Our study fills an extant gap in
as well as to adapt various advertising strategies to build strong this context by examining how liking a fan page on Facebook
consumerebrand relationships (Chu & Kim, 2011) in masculine prompts brand love, purchase intention and constructive word
products. of mouth about those small scale businesses which predomi-
Our results further indicate that the relationship between fan nantly engage with the customers via fan pages. We believe that
page liking, brand love and intention to purchase the followed our findings gives new insight for future research, and helps
brand is more significant among female followers than the male marketers in understanding Facebook as an effective marketing
followers (Table 7). This should encourage marketers to establish communication tool.
emotional and passionate connection with the female followers
through fan pages evoking love (Ruiz-Mafe, Martí-Parren ~ o, & Sanz-
Blas, 2014) Fan page platform could be used extensively for pro- 10. Limitations and scope for future research
motional strategies as well, especially in the feminine categories
leveraging the strong buying intentions generated by liking activ- Although this study makes several contributions, it has few
ities (Shao & Ross, 2015). limitations that make a case for future exploration and research.
As a major chunk of the study sample comprises of younger First, the sample includes only small scale entrepreneur initiated
population in the age group of 18e25 (which may be explained by firms as this populace is important for this study, however it cannot
the nature of study), the observed outcomes are of particular sig- fully represent all brands that appear on social networking sites,
nificance to current marketers given the fact that present national thus inhibiting generalization of the research. Thus taking the re-
demographic pie shows a predominance of younger population spondents from multinational companies who have strong pres-
(“India has world's largest”, 2014). ence and fan following on Facebook brand pages could shed a new
insight to a similar study framework.
8.2. Theoretical implications Social networking gives a stage to the clients to express not just
their positive emotions about the brand rather it is a capable me-
With the advancement of social media avenues, it has been the dium for communicating the negative audits as well. The present
most cherished subject of examination for the academicians. framework can, therefore, be used to do more studies on under-
Though existing academic research has significantly advanced our standing if negative e-WOM given on fan pages by the followers
understanding on Facebook fan pages, much of it is focused on impact the brand attitude and purchase intention of other cus-
consumers motivation to post on the Facebook page of the brands tomers following the same brand.
(Shao & Ross, 2015), influence of different type of content in brand Further, constraints of this study identify with the examination
pages on online engagement (Luarn, Lin, & Chiu, 2015) and of buyer points of view in a particular geographical setting and
exploring key drivers of consumer loyalty to Facebook fan pages timeline. Considering view point of the start-up women entrepre-
(Ruiz-Mafe et al., 2014). Further, few researches in this area have neurs using WhatsApp messenger, a cross-platform mobile
examined the effect of liking fan pages on brand loyalty and messaging app in India, for assessing its effect on the brand
customer relationships (Jahn & Kunz, 2014). awareness offers an interesting research scope.
Present study enriches the existing literature by linking the
concepts of fan pages and brand love (Wallace et al., 2014) in the
Appendices
context of small scale entrepreneurs backed initiated firms.
Additionally the study contributes to the conceptual and empirical
understanding of fan pages by examining its effect on WOM and
A1: Respondent profile
resultant purchase intention (Hutter et al., 2013; Po € yry et al.,
2013).
The findings evidence that the correspondence via fan pages not Variable Response categories Frequency Percentage
only impacts the brand love however conjointly affects the pur- Count Fan pages involved
chase intention and word of mouth about it. Such findings are in
Gender Male 46 Chumbak 27
agreement with (Hutter et al., 2013; Wallace et al., 2014). The re- 35 PepperFry 20
sults would help academicians to know about Facebook and its fan 52 FabFurnish 30
page in a better way giving new encounters to research Facebook 20 Happily Unmarried 12
with certain undiscovered variables. 19 India Circus 11
Total 172 100
Female 32 Chumbak 23
9. Conclusion 42 PepperFry 30
15 FabFurnish 11
The extant study sought to understand the relationship between 39 Happily Unmarried 28
brands “liked” on Facebook and brand love. Further, it explored 11 India Circus 8
Total 139 100
whether “liking” a fan page results into WOM and purchase
Age (in years) Below 25 23 Chumbak 23
intention of the followed brands and whether such advocacy out- 20 PepperFry 20
comes were influenced by brand love. 21 FabFurnish 21
Findings indicate that “Liking” of a brand's fan page signifi- 25 Happily Unmarried 25
11 India Circus 11
cantly results into brand love, and followers of the fan pages
Total 100 100
offer WOM and intend to buy the brands liked on Facebook.
(continued on next page)
Considering the existence gender differences found in the social
268 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270

(continued ) A5: Rotated component matrix

Variable Response categories Frequency Percentage

Count Fan pages involved

25e35 31 Chumbak 32
27 PepperFry 28 Component
16 FabFurnish 16 1 2 3 4
14 Happily Unmarried 14
10 India Circus 10 FPL4 0.781
Total 98 100 FPL3 0.765
35e45 13 Chumbak 20 FPL6 0.754
12 PepperFry 18 FPL2 0.739
22 FabFurnish 34 FPL5 0.630
15 Happily Unmarried 23 FPL1 0.554
3 India Circus 5 WOM4 0.883
Total 65 100 WOM2 0.784
45 & Above 11 Chumbak 23 WOM1 0.753
18 PepperFry 38 WOM3 0.670
8 FabFurnish 17 PI2 0.829
5 Happily Unmarried 10 PI4 0.824
6 India Circus 13 PI3 0.736
Total 48 100 PI1 0.658
BL3 0.804
BL4 0.779
BL2 0.726
A2: Small scale entrepreneur backed firms in sample BL1 0.639

Extraction method: principal component analysis.

Rotation method: varimax with Kaiser normalization.
Firms Likes registered a. Rotation converged in 6 iterations.
FabFurnish 825,000 Source: SPSS output.
PepperFry 473,756
Happily Unmarried 445,348
Chumbak 353,818
India Circus 353,496 A6: List of Variables
Total 2,451,418

Source: Facebook. Fan Page Liking (FPL) (adapted from Cheung, Chiu, & Lee, 2011;
Jahn & Kunz, 2012; Park, Kee, & Valenzuela, 2009)
A3: KMO and Bartlett's test
▪ FPL1: I find those products to be unique.
▪ FPL2: To get my queries solved.
KaisereMeyereOlkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy. 0.909 ▪ FPL3: Makes myself look cool.
Bartlett's Test of Sphericity Approx. Chi-Square 3257.451
▪ FPL4: To know more about it.
Df 153
Sig. 0.000 ▪ FPL5: To have direct interaction with the company.
▪ FPL6: To interact with people like me on this fan page.
Source: SPSS output.

Brand Love (BL) (adapted from Albert & Valette-Florence, 2010;

A4: Total variance explained Batra et al., 2012; Wallace et al., 2014)

Component Initial Eigenvalues Extraction sums of squared loadings Rotation sums of squared loadings

Total % of Variance Cumulative % Total % of Variance Cumulative % Total % of Variance Cumulative %

1 7.942 44.121 44.121 7.942 44.121 44.121 3.579 19.881 19.881

2 1.783 9.905 54.026 1.783 9.905 54.026 3.080 17.113 36.994
3 1.343 7.463 61.489 1.343 7.463 61.489 2.845 15.806 52.800
4 1.184 6.578 68.067 1.184 6.578 68.067 2.748 15.267 68.067
5 0.852 4.735 72.802
6 0.629 3.497 76.299
7 0.558 3.102 79.401
8 0.526 2.923 82.324
9 0.430 2.388 84.712
10 0.412 2.287 86.999
11 0.391 2.171 89.169
12 0.381 2.118 91.288
13 0.347 1.926 93.214
14 0.327 1.819 95.033
15 0.319 1.774 96.807
16 0.248 1.377 98.184
17 0.196 1.090 99.274
18 0.131 0.726 100.000

Extraction method: principal component analysis.

Source: SPSS output.
 C. Kudeshia et al. / Computers in Human Behavior 54 (2016) 257e270
▪ BL1: I feel emotionally connected with the brand.
▪ BL2: Following this brand makes me happy.
▪ BL3: This brand leaves me satisfied.
▪ BL4: I am passionate about this brand.
Purchase Intention (PI) (adapted from Batra et al., 2012; Jahn &
Kunz, 2012; Reitz, 2012)
▪ PI1: I purchase the same brand when required as I like it on FB
page.
▪ PI2: I buy its products directly from FB when required.*
▪ PI3: I intend to purchase this product/brand in future as well.
▪ PI4: I am loyal customer of the brand I ‘like’ on Facebook.
Word of Mouth (WoM) (adapted from Batra et al., 2012; Jahn &
Kunz, 2012; Wallace et al., 2014)
▪ WoM1: I often talk positive about this brand because I am
following it on Facebook fan page
▪ WoM2: I recommend this brand to friends and family.
▪ WoM3: Information shared on the fan page of the brand in-
fluences my buying intentions.*
▪ WoM4: I introduce this brand to other people.
(*Item developed newly within the study)
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