Social Media Marketing to Enhance Customer Equity on Fashion Apparel Brand among University Students

Introduction

Nowadays, social media has become much more popular among people around the world, and nearly 1.73 billion people use social media network sites. By 2017, the global social network audiences were estimated to be around 2.55 billion people. (Schivinski, Christodoulides & Dacpbrowski, 2016). Social media is also defined as a way of communication between individuals or people where they create, share, and exchange information and ideas through computer- generated groups and networks and is used as a way of boosting interaction among individuals, organisations, and communities (As' ad, & Alhadid, 2014; Andreas, Kaplan, Haenlein Michael, 2010). People have actively used social media platform to search and share product information, as well as work and play (Aksoy et al., 2013; Aljamal, 2018; Al-Afifi 2019; Mohamed Hessian, 2018; M. Nassar, and Battour, 2020). Prior studies show that many businesses introduced social media into their marketing activities so as to take advantage of the opportunity to interact with customers in a faster and direct way, at a relatively lower cost and higher level of efficiency compared to using the traditional medium of interacting with customers and marketing practices (Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010; Hutagalung, & Situmorang, 2018).

The According to Zhung (2017), consumers has started shifting from traditional buying to digital buying. But unfortunately, popular trend is sometimes overlooked by marketers and rather emphasize on traditional marketing platforms. In previous years, businesses relied on one-way communication which is the traditional media. Without the notice of social media but rather focus on traditional media only, which will harm their business in the future. In today’s marketing sphere the communication setting has been transformed by the social media. Social media has turned out to be an effective vehicle for attracting people to shop for their product or service. It has been suggested that social media has considerably impacted marketing communication and created ties between consumers and marketers. This evolution has brought many novel opportunities and potentials within the trade and commerce and increased the accessibility of a variety of products and brands (Zyoud, 2018).

Moreover, the global economic downturn drives have changed the apparel fashion business. Thus, the social media and their application to the field of marketing had a significant impact on business structures. According to Noorshella, Abdullah, Noorul and Rajennd (2019), social media also one of the famous platform for student entrepreneur to sell their products and service and used the platorm to communicate with the consumers. Therefore, the apparel fashion industry needed to make a deep transformation models and make changes with marketing dynamics on their organizations (Wu, 2016). Further, the fashion retailer does not just only rely on brand symbol, but must also focus on value equity, relationship equity, and brand equity to be successful. In fact, less studies have been focused on customer equity on apparel fashion and this open to the threat to the business especially in the highly competitive environment. Furthermore, social media-based marketing is needed for monitoring, and companies must be aware of how consumers respond to their marketing activities because this can impact the value of that brand-related content (Laroche, Habibi, & Richard, 2013).

  Likewise, businesses must recognize that the process of brand-related content in social media requires a close monitoring of the content and not only on brand-based community building (Laroche, Habibi, & Richard, 2013). Most prior studies on social media marketing activities have focused on customer satisfaction and the effect on customers' behavioral intentions, brand awareness, brand image and brand loyalty in other businesses (Sano, 2014; Simona & Tossan, 2018; Bilgin, 2018). There are however little or scarce studies related to student’s engagement in social media marketing, which this study seeks to bridge the gap. The use of students or young people since students constitute huge market in the use of the social media for business transactions especially the generation Y and Z people who use social media for most of their activities (Aksoy, et al, 2013; Joshua Stowers, 2020) This novel study therefore seeks to examine the effect of social media marketing as a way of enhancing customer equity on fashion apparel brand in the apparel fashion sector. The study specifically examines the effect of social media marketing on customer equity of customers, by examining the effect of social media marketing on brand equity of customers, the effect of social media marketing on relationship equity of customers and the effect of social media marketing on value equity of customers in buying fashion apparels online among students of UMK.

Literature Review

Entertainment

Entertainment may be considered as the influence of fun and play emerging from an individual’s encounter with social media experience (Godey et al., 2016). Use and gratifications theory suggests social media participants are likely to desire entertainment and informativeness, but perhaps entertainment is a stronger motivator of engagement with top brands than informativeness (Thorbjørnsen, Pedersen, & Nysveen, 2007).

In the studies of Courtois, Mechant, De Marez, and Verleye (2009), it was revealed that people embark upon entertainment with the aim of relaxation and as a way of avoiding or reducing boredom that usually led people to engage in entertainment, the attractiveness of content on a particular product or service while using the social media. Based on that, social media users patronize brand related content or information as a way of enjoyment, relaxation, and leisure (Muntinga et al., 2011). Zhang, (2010) reported that branded entertainment might foster a stronger relationship between the brand and consumers in the use of social media. Further, students may be attracted to patronize social media marketing as a result of the entertainment and information it offers to customers especially students while buying using social media marketing platforms and is vital as they are carried by entertainment and information acquisition.

Interaction

The social media marketing improves interaction between service providers and customers in recent times than traditional marketing practices. The interaction between both parties also can enhance customer satisfaction. Besides, the two-way nature of communication on social media makes it feasible to answer and respond to customer inquiries or complaints straight away, which greatly affect customer contentment (Sano, 2014). Social media, as an essential tool to enhance interaction between service providers and customers, is expected to play a more important role in this industry (Sano, 2014). Further, social media interaction enables users to contribute to brand- related social media platforms in order to meet the demands of customers, help them to communicate effectively with them about their existing products and services or brands. This agree with Zhu and Chen (2015) who opined that social media can be sub-divided into two strands namely, the profile-based and content-based social media and is usually based on the nature of the connection and interaction. The profile-based social media is hinged on the individual members where the series of information must be centered on the members with the aim of encouraging them to be more connected with the specific information. With the profile-based social media, it promotes the ability of members to be able to get connected since that should be the motive for the users of the profile while using platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and WhatsApp. With regards to the content-based social media, Zhu and Chen (2015) are of the view that its emphasis should be on the contents, discussions, and comments on the posted content by service or product providers. This is meant to help users to get connected with the content being provided while on Instagram, Pinterest, YouTube, or Flickr based on their interest for it (Godey et al., 2016). This supports the view that, a pleasant and interesting content can boost the morale of customers to buy a product or service (Manthiou et al., 2013).

Additionally, Sano, 2014) study indicate that companies also at times create some hot or more interesting topics to attract prospecting customers to their site and enhance their interaction with the customers which at times lead to them making a buying decision. As a result, firms should always aim at attracting large pool of customers with conscious efforts to convert their social media in-teractions to their advantage (Schivinski and Dabrowski, 2015). For instance, Berselli, Burger, & Close, (2012) stated that with a message sent via Facebook page or Twitter account, it can easily alert all followers with a specific message more quickly and at the same time and affirmed Fischer, & Reuber, (2011) study that state that social networking sites enhance superior communication among online users through broadcasting of up-to-date and relevant information to consumers.

Trendiness

Prior studies show that most times, consumers resort to various ways of accessing vital and reliable information before making a purchase decision other than what organizations provide via their traditional promotional activities by using trendiness which is a form of social media used to attain information (Mangold & Faulds, 2009; Vollmer & Precourt, 2008). Based on Muntinga et al. (2011) study, trendy information on social media can be put into four sub-groups namely, surveillance, knowledge, pre purchase information, and inspiration. In explaining the sub- groupings of trendiness as a form of providing information via social media, surveillance describes observing, and remaining updated about one's social environment where knowledge trending information on social media marketing refers to brand related information that consumers obtain to profit from other consumers' knowledge and expertise to learn more about a product or brand. Pre-purchase information represents reading product reviews or threads on brand communities so as to make a well-informed buying decision, while inspiration trendy information on social media signifies how consumers follow brand related information in order to obtain new ideas that the brand related information provide which serves as a source of motivation in making any purchase decision. Godey et al., (2016) also viewed trendiness in relation to the dissemination of the latest and trendiest information about luxury brands.

Customization

Customization can be defined as the act of changing something to suit one’s preferences while serving a particular task. Ding and Keh, (2016); Seo and Park, (2018) argued that customization is a way of making a consumer loyalty dependent on the contact of the business with individual users which agree with (Zhu & Chen, 2015) that two types of posts exist depending on the messages' level of customization, thus a customized message and the other been broadcast. From the perspective of Zhu and Chen (2015), a customized message is always meant for a specific individual or for a small group of people like Facebook users. However, a broadcast encompasses messages that is not sent to any specific group of people but to any individual that is interested as in the case of a Twitter tweets. A classic example of customized message by Sangar (2012) is that, when Burberry and Gucci make significant use of their online presence by sending personalized messages to individual customers, enabling them to customize and design their own products. This research defines customization based on the level at which businesses use social media channels to provide information that can be searched and modified through the services it provides (Godey, et al., 2016).

Value Equity

Value equity is the customer’s objective perception of what a firm offers based on what is received. Key drivers of value equity are features and benefits of the product or service, overall quality, factors that influence customer convenience, and all elements of pricing (Katherine Lemon, 2013). They are important and add value to a product that is been delivered based on the good experience of a customer by using the information technology (IT). Despite that, it can become increasingly complex for firms to create, manage, and attempt to control the experience of each customer (Edelman & Singer 2015; Rawson, Duncan, & Jones 2013). It is believed that the higher the value equity customers have on a firm the stronger it serves as a vital means of attracting new clients as well as maintaining old customers (Hutagalung, & Situmorang, 2018) and therefore suggest that social media marketing has positive impact on value equity of firms. This study hypothesized that:

H1: Social media marketing has positive effect on value equity of UMK students.

Relationship Equity

Relationship equity is crucial to businesses and is used to determine whether the resources within a firm are fairly and equitably distributed to both relational partners. Most people will care whether the relationship is balance or not because the relationship equity is particularly important to them. For a company, the firm will control the loyalty program to enhance relationship equity and get more loyal customers who will stick to their brand/product being offered based on the customer’s promotion and assessments of the brand (Kietzmann, Hermkens, McCarthy, & Silvestre, 2011). Evidence show that firms need to build a strong relationship between customers by offering them various types of alternatives should anything happen to the original products or service of the firm. This is necessary to build the relationship equity with existing and any prospective consumers because they might repurchase with us as reported by Helen, (2015).     

Relationship equity can be possible based on how companies build up customers trust generally to increase their value and as a result, social media has influence on the relationship equity of firms. This means that the more relationship equity firms have, the more benefit they stand to gain (Lindsay, 2018; Hutagalung, & Situmorang, 2018). On that note, this study posits the hypothesis that:

H2: Social media marketing has positive effect on relationship equity among UMK students.

Brand Equity

In recent years, the idea of brand equity has increased significant consideration from analysts and marketing professionals (Ahmad & Sherwani 2015). “It can be deduced from the foregoing definition that brand equity is an important intangible asset of an organization,” a view supported by Subramanian et al. (2014). Apart from limited emulation by competitors, customer brand equity intrinsically connected with execution measurements, such as customer loyalty, customer satisfaction and improved financial performance (Budac & Baltador, 2013).

In addition to that, Shabbir and Rehman (2013) indicated that brand equity is one of the most important impalpable resources, given that purchasers react contrastingly to a marked item contrasted with an unbranded product (Maher, 2014). Brand equity is also seen as a subjective and intangible assessment of a brand by customers, far than the objective perceived value of the brand (As' ad, & Alhadid, 2014). Leone et al, (2006) posit that there are three vital indicators of brand equity like customers awareness of the brand, attitude of customers toward the brand, and customers’ perception of brand ethics, an indication that brand equity is built through image and meaning customers attach to a brand.

Moreover, Hutagalung, and Situmorang, (2018) point out that brand equity is attained based on the image and meaning customers attached to a product or service and can serve as a reminder to customers about the firm’s products and services, act as a magnet to attract new customers to the firm for that product and can also be the customer’s emotional tie to the firm. It is therefore believed that the higher the value of strong brand identities such as a key tool for attracting new clients. Studies however revealed that there is limited empirical studies on how social media marketing activities impact brand equity creation and consumers' behavior towards a brand ((Hutagalung, and Situmorang, 2018; Godey, et al, 2016). This study seeks to fill this gap using students at UMK with the hypotheses that:

H3: Social media marketing has positive effect on brand equity among UMK students.      

Materials and Methods

This study is aimed to examine the social media marketing activities in enhancing customer equity in fashion apparel brand among Universiti Malaysia Kelantan students. This study used a cross-sectional design, and simple random sampling method to collect quantitative data from individuals who purchased apparel brand via online.

Research Design and sampling Strategy

The target population for this study is students from UMK. A list of 5,168 of UMK students was gathered by contacting the academic division of the university. Based on Krejcie and Morgan (1970) sample size determination table, the minimum sample suitable for this study was 361. Therefore, this study managed to get 361 all the respondents who responded to the questionnaire.  firm owners. The surveys were administered for three months from June 2019 to August 2019. This study obtained 213 valid responses for the final analyses.

Data Collection Method

Online survey was conducted using the Google Form platform to collect the data for this study. The questionnaire was developed using a 5 Point Likert scale ranging from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). The questionnaire was translated by a language expert before administering to the respondents who are non-English speakers. The questionnaire design was straightforward and comprehensible, avoiding ambiguous and leading and presumptive questions.

Table 1. Generalisation of Items in Questionnaire

The independent variables of Social Media Marketing (SMM) namely, Entertainment, Interaction, Trendiness, and Customization, are measured by 16 question items with 4 for each variable. The items designed were adapted from Seo and Park (2018). The dependent variable of customer equity has individual variables like, Value equity, Relationship equity, and Brand Equity. The Value equity variable was measured by 6 items designed in part by Berry (1995), Gagliano and Hathcote (1994), Rust et al (2000), and Wiedmann et al (2009). Relationship equity variable was measured by 5 items adapted from Hennig-Thurau et al (2002), and Ju and Chung (2002) and Brand Equity measured by 5 items also designed in part from Aeker (2009) and Yun (2006).

Results

Demographic Profile of Respondents

There were 361 respondents involved in this study made up of UMK students from first year to fourth year. The distribution of the respondents in terms of their background characteristics were analyzed using descriptive statistics involving frequency and percentages. The results are shown in Table 2 below.

Based on Table 2, there were 361 valid number of respondents in this study. The study received a higher participation from female respondents compared with male respondents with 224 and 137 respondents representing 62% and 38% respectively. In terms of year group of respondents, there were 158 (43.8%) fourth year respondents, 85 (23.5%) were third year respondents, while 75 (21.0%) were second year and 43 (12.0%) were first year respondents respectively. In terms of the ethnic background of respondents, majority of them are Malay composed of 210 (58.2%) among UMK students compared to 89 respondents (24.7%) who are Chinese and this is followed by 49 respondents made of about 14% Indian students and finally, 13 (3.6%) of the respondents were of other ethnic background.

Table 2. The Distribution of Respondent’s Background

Furthermore, majority of the respondents answered ‘Yes’ regarding the use of social media including, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter in their daily lives. Moreover, in terms of frequent use of social media, 280 (77.6%) respondents stated that they use social media every day, followed by 61 respondents constituting (16.9%) who indicated that they use social media for 3-4 times a week and lastly, 20 respondents (5.5%) stated that they use social media for 1-2 times a week. In addition to that, regarding the total spending of respondents in purchasing apparel in the last 6 months, it revealed that about 140 of the respondents representing 39% spent between 101RM-300RM in the last 6 months, 100 of them approximately 28% spent between 51RM-100RM within 6 months, with 70 respondents made of 19% who indicated that they spent 401RM-and above of social media within 6 months and 40 respondents constituting 11% spent from 301RM-400RM within 6 months on social media with the least been 11 respondents composed of 3% who spent below 50RM within 6 months on the use of social media.

Reliability Test

Table 3 shows the Cronbach alpha values for each of the dependent and independent variables. For the independent variable, the Cronbach value of 0.861 is entertainment, 0.835 is for interaction, 0.816 for trendiness, and 0.744 for customization. This shows that all the Cronbach alpha values exceeded 0.70 which is an indication that the instrument has an acceptable reliability for measuring the constructs and affirmed Hair et al. (2013), who posit that the reliability score as a measure of Cronbach’s alpha must exceed 0.70 in order to be considered as acceptable. While, for the dependent variable, the Cronbach alpha value of 0.746 is value equity, 0.949 is for relationship equity, and 0.886 is also for brand equity. This further indicate that the instrument has a satisfactory reliability for measuring the constructs being studied.  

Table 3. Reliability Analysis for Dependent and Independent Variables

Pearson Correlation

Table 4 shows that there is a significant relationship between customer equity and entertainment. Since the significant correlation level is 0.01, it indicates that the confident correlation level is 99 percent. The correlation indicates that the r value of the variable dependent is 0.441 and the p value is 0.000. The correlation between ±0, 40–±0, 59 is a moderate correlation indicator according to the Pearson correlation indicator. Therefore, the result shows that the customer equity and entertainment is a moderately correlation. Hence, the conclusion that, there is a relationship between customer equity and entertainment.

Table 4. Measure of Pearson’s correlation coefficient

Next, there is a significant relationship between customer equity and interaction. Since the significant correlation level is 0.01, it indicates that the confident correlation level is 99 percent. The correlation indicates that the r value of the variable dependent is 0.580 and the p value is 0.000. The correlation between ±0, 40–±0, 59 is considered to be a moderate correlation indicator according to the Pearson correlation indicator. Therefore, the result shows that customer equity and interaction is a moderate correlation. Hence, the conclusion that there is a relationship between customer equity and interaction. There is a significant relationship between customer equity and trendiness. Since the significant correlation level is 0.01, it indicates that the confident correlation level is 99 percent. The correlation indicates that the r value of the variable dependent is 0.481 and the p value is 0.000, and the correlation between ±0, 40–±0, 59 is considered to be a moderate correlation indicator according to the Pearson correlation indicator.

Therefore, the result shows that the customer equity and trendiness is a moderate correlation. Hence, the conclusion that a relationship exists between customer equity and trendiness. Lastly, there is a significant relationship between customer equity and customization. Since the significant correlation level is 0.01, and indicates that the confident correlation level is 99 percent. The correlation indicates that the r value of the variable dependent is 0.542 and the p value is 0.000. The correlation between ±0, 40–±0, 59 is considered to be a moderate correlation indicator based on the Pearson correlation indicator. Therefore, the result shows that customer equity and customization is a moderate correlation. Hence, the conclusion that, there is a relationship between customer equity and trendiness.

The strongest factor in social media marketing activities that influence customer equity:

From the Table 5, R square value is 0.418; it means that 41.8% of customization, entertainment, interaction and trendiness were able to explain towards customer equity. Meanwhile, balance of the 58.2 % would be explained by other variables that are not included in this study.

Table 5. Multiple Linear Regression between social media marketing with customer equity

Table 6. Anova

The multiple regression model with all the four predictors produced F (4, 356) = 64.019, the significance value (p-value) of this model is 0.000. As can be seen in the table, entertainment, interaction, trendiness and customization had significant and positive regression and can be concluded that all the variables contribute to the multiple linear regressions.

Table 7. Coefficients

The equation above shows that Yi refers to the dependent variable, which is customer equity. The value of unstandardized coefficients beta (β) has been applied in the equation above to show the value mentioned in the four elements (entertainment, interaction, trendiness and customization) in Social Media Marketing activities (independent variable) whether the value is statistically significant and the direction of the relationship between independent variable and dependent variable. An unstandardized coefficients beta shows the strength of the effect to each individual independent variable to the dependent variable. The higher the absolute value of the beta coefficient, the stronger the effect. For example, interaction, a beta of 0.349 has a stronger effect than a beta of trendiness, which is 0.040. This shows that Interaction has the strongest positive effect to customer equity based on the column of beta coefficients used by researchers to compare the relative strength of the various predictors within the model and referred to the four elements (thus, entertainment, interaction, trendiness and customization) in Social Media Marketing activities (independent variable) on whether they are statistically significant and, if so, the direction of the relationship between independent variable and dependent variable.

Furthermore, interaction (B=0.349) contributes most positive and significantly effect on customer equity in apparel fashion brand and trendiness (B=0.040) it is less significant and has less positive effect on customer equity. Customer equity = 0.967 + (0.056) (entertainment) + (0.349) (interaction) + (0.040) (trendiness) + (0.275) (customization). To summarize, the value for regression coefficient of interaction is higher than the other variables followed by customization, entertainment, and trendiness. Therefore, the result of the multiple regression analysis answered the entire research question number three (3) of this study.

Discussion

Table 8 shows the summary of the results for this study. As can be seen, all hypotheses were supported and have positive effect between social media marketing activities and customer equity. As an integrated marketing medium, effective SSM activities enhanced value equity by providing value to customers that traditional marketing does not provide (Wiedmann, et, 2009).

In other words, the more fashion industry engages social media activities, it will anticipate positive contribution to brands by providing the new apparel fashion value. Additionally, the social media marketing activities is perceived by consumers with distinctive value compared to old fashioned marketing performance. Apparel fashion industry had growing customer interest in every way possible than before. The customer value can influence customer satisfaction and response as well. From the results, the multiple linear regression was positive indicating a positive relationship between the effects of social media marketing with relationship equity.

According to Rust et al. (2004) who tested their previous model proved that “relationship equity is related to customer equity”. This same model is also applied to measuring customer equity of fashion brands in several studies. Therefore, in order to determine the constructs of each customer equity driver and prove the model acceptance in the luxury fashion industry, the following hypothesis were accepted by Zhang, Ko, & Kim, (2010).

The social media platform was offering opportunity for customers to engage in sincere and friendly communication with brand and other users, so the social media activities is positively affected by the relationship equity. Strengthening customer relationship and creating the customer purchase intention is necessary to marketing communication through social media marketing activities. The social media activities can enhance the brand equity and influence the future purchasing behaviour of customers toward a certain brand product (Adam, & Akber, 2016).

The social media activities can also improve product branding and draw customers’ attention and make them lifetime customers. The brand awareness, attitude towards brand and building images through SMM activities will improve customers’ ability to identify the specifics from each other. Likewise, the brand equity will enhance customers purchase intention and increase their degree of satisfaction as well.

Based on the data analysis in Table 6, the results show that interaction is the first concern among the respondents. That means the communication between the apparel fashion brands industry with customers is important and it helps to increase the relationship so that customers can get more information about them.

Table 8. Discussion between social media marketing with customer equity

Conclusion

As a conclusion, this this study conclude that social media marketing plays an important role in enhancing customer equity on fashion apparel brand among Universiti Malaysia Kelantan students. The independent variables involved are entertainment, interaction, trendiness and customization and dependent variables are relationship equity, brand equity and value equity. The survey collected 361 responses from UMK students, and the findings revealed that interaction influenced the buying intention of the respondents most. In other words, the communication between the apparel fashion brands industry with customers is important and it helps to increase the relationship so that customers can get more information about them and make buying decision. This study is vital to the practitioners of apparel fashion brand that uses social media marketing to sell their products in Malaysia especially to UMK students. The study will also serve as one of the sources of reference by researchers as it gives more insight on social media marketing to enhances customer equity on apparel fashion brand focusing on UMK students. Again, this study offers more insight to policy makers to understand the vital role that social media marketing play in enhancing customer equity in fashion apparel brand which can be applicable to the operations of every organization as it helps to attract customers as well as monitor the performance of businesses. Finally, some limitations of this study are that, it should have involved other university students to ascertain which university students used social media marketing the most and again, other statistical software like PLS-SEM could have been used to analyse the data.

Conflict of interest

The corresponding author must inform the editor of any potential conflicts of interest that could influence the authors interpretation of the data.

Acknowledgments

This study was funded by Research Management Innovation Center, Universiti Malaysia Kelantan under Short Term Scheme Grant with allocation RM5000. The authors also would like to thank the final year students who involved in managing the data collection.