What keeps me engaging? A study of consumers’ continuous social media brand engagement practices

Purpose – This study examines some pertinent individual-level factors and consequences of consumers’ continuous social media brand engagement (SMBE) practices. Further, it examines the moderating effect of other-efficacy to deepen our understanding. Methodology – Online survey data collected from 785 respondents, through a convenience sampling technique on Facebook, was analysed through structural equation modelling with AMOS 23.0. Findings – The findings suggest that compatibility with lifestyle, perceived information quality, and escapism, significantly drive consumers’ continuous engagement with brands on social media. However, perceived enjoyment does not. Other-efficacy duly moderates consumers’ continuous SMBE practices. While continuous SMBE significantly drives consumer-based brand equity, it does not have any significant relationship with consumers’ subjective wellbeing. Research limitations/implications – This study reports robust findings on the effects of individual-level factors that drive consumers’ continuous SMBE practices. However, the study only focused on Facebook brand pages. This is a limitation for generalizability of results because the research did not take a holistic view of all types of social media. Practical implications – The research suggests a need for managers to project their brands and share relevant and stimulating information throughout their continuous SMBE with consumers to build strong consumer-brand relationships. Managers should also engage consumers with interesting social media messages as well as both informative and transformative creative strategies to excite them. This will further give consumers a reason to continuously interact with the brand on social media platforms. Originality –This study is one of the very few works to tease out pertinent factors that drive consumers’ continuous SMBE practices. The paper integrates the consumer-level factors and moderating effects of Other-efficacy through the lens of Social Cognitive Theory and Uses and Gratification Theory, to make a significant contribution to the SMBE literature