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Ngatno, & Apriatni, E. P. (2021). The Moderating Effect of the Status of Using a Product on the Relationship between Brand Experience and Word of
Mouth Recommendations. Archives of Business Research, 9(2). 41-59.
URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.14738/abr.92.9677. 42
information from a personal referral source is stronger in influencing behavior, trust, and
attitude towards the company.
Marketing research into WOM recommendations has tried to answer three questions 1) What are
the consequences of WOM recommendations and their influence on consumer behaviour? 2)
What are the antecedents that motivate consumers to engage in WOM recommendations? (Khan
& Rahman, 2015). 3) What strengthens or weakens the relationship between the antecedents and
WOM recommendations? (Khan and Rahman 2015). Previous studies have focused on the
consequences of communicators investigating "what happened to communicators after the WOM
event?" Other studies have focused on the antecedents of communicators investigating the issue
of "what makes people talk?" between variables stronger or weaker? In studying WOM
recommendations can not only be studied as an independent variable, but must be studied
comprehensively by investigating the antecedents, the mediator, and the moderator (Wien and
Olsen 2012).
Some authors have claimed that a WOM recommendation is an antecedent of consumer behavior
(Daugherty and Hoffman 2014), purchasing decisions (Voyer and Ranaweera 2015), brand equity
(Virvilaite, Tumasonyte, and Sliburyte 2015), customer satisfaction (Shi et al. 2016), consumer
judgment (Jeong and Koo 2015), and new product adoption (López and Sicilia 2013). However,
research examining WOM recommendations as a result variable is still limited. A number of
studies have shown that several antecedent variables influence WOM recommendations. Chung
and Tsai (2009) showed that this binding force effect only applies to WOM providers who focus
on prevention but not to WOM providers who focus on promotion. Sweeney, Soutar, and
Mazzarol (2008) showed that the potential of WOM recommendations to affect perception or
action depending on the relationship between sender and receiver, message content, delivery
method and situation factors. Ismail and Spinelli (2012) revealed that direct brand love was a
determinant of WOM recommendations, while the direct brand image was insignificant. Several
variables can affect WOM recommendations, including product quality, customer satisfaction,
customer loyalty, consumer trust, and perceived value (De Matos and Rossi, 2008). Jill Sweeney,
Soutar, and Mazzarol (2014) showed that relative expertise, perceptual homo-philia, WOM
recommendation strength, previous experience, and perceived brand equity had a positive
impact on positive WOM recommendations. Although a number of studies that focussed on brand
experience have shown the positive influence of several variables on WOM recommendations,
there have been few studies of brand experience as an antecedent of WOM.
When studying consumer behaviour, the causal relationship between variables needs to consider
moderating variables, because the strength of this relationship is likely to apply to one group but
not to other groups. In recent years, the use of moderating variables has increased in the
management literature, including the marketing literature, especially in predicting consumer
behaviour. Some variables that can moderate the relationship include individual characteristics
that cannot be controlled such as age, income, gender, and education (De Matos and Rossi, 2008),
and situational characteristics such as perceived risk, shopping experience and length of
relationship, continuance commitment, and brand-connection (Ranaweera & Menon, 2013;
Sicilia, Delgado-Ballester, and Palazon, 2016).
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Archives of Business Research (ABR) Vol 9, Issue 2, February-2021
In this study, we propose the status of using a product as a moderating variable which is expected
to influence the strength and weakness of the relationship between brand experience and WOM
recommendations. Thus, this research developed a more comprehensive WOM model by
integrating brand experience as an antecedent of WOM recommendations, satisfaction and
loyalty as mediators, and the status of using a product as a moderator. Therefore, this study seeks
to examine the moderating effect of the status of using a product on the relationship between
brand experience and WOM recommendations. This research contributes to the literature on
WOM recommendations and the results of this study could also be useful for marketing managers
in developing marketing strategies, especially in efforts to improve marketing performance.
LITERATURE REVIEW, HYPOTHESIS, AND CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
The Relationship between Brand Experience, Brand Satisfaction, Brand Loyalty, and WOM
Recommendations
WOM is defined as informal, person-to-person communication between communicators and
recipients that are considered non-commercial regarding products, services, brands, and
organizations (Harrison-Walker, 2001). Brakus, Schmitt, and Zarantonello (2009) defined brand
experiences as sensations, feelings, cognition, and behavioural responses to brand-related
stimuli. According to Oliver (1997), satisfaction is defined as the pleasure of fulfilment. This
means that consumers feel happy because their wants, needs and goals in using a product can be
fulfilled. Consumption thus produces feelings of pleasure rather than displeasure.
Loyalty is a psychological process consisting of behavioural and attitude components. Hellier et
al. (2003) defined loyalty as "the extent to which customers have demonstrated, to repeat the
buying behaviour of a particular company's product or service". Brand loyalty is the decision of
consumers to buy certain brands. Thus, brand loyalty is the power of desire to prefer one brand
rather than one of the other available brands.
Worldwide, more than two-thirds of marketers surveyed agreed that brand experience is an
effective way to achieve their organizational goals. Consumers are faced with the attributes and
stimuli associated with the brand when they are going to buy a product (Babin, Hardesty, and
Suter 2003). Customer responses to brand-related stimuli can be subjective internal responses
(Brakus, Schmitt, and Zarantonello 2009) such as brand sensations, feelings, and cognition. Thus
the more a product or service is used, the more consumer experience of the brand is used as an
indication of happiness or satisfaction with the brand. This relationship is supported by several
studies that show that brand experience as a construct affects the level of consumer satisfaction
(Chen et al., 2014; Khan and Rahman, 2015; Klaus and Maklan, 2013). Therefore, in this study, we
proposed the hypothesis:
H1: There is a positive effect of brand experience on satisfaction.
Brand loyalty has been proposed as the result of brand experience (Brakus et al., 2009;
Ramaseshan & Stein, 2014). In general, marketers think that brand experience is very good for
building loyalty. When companies treat consumers well and give them experiences that they
cannot find with other brands, loyalty will grow. When customers use a brand that provides a
pleasant and memorable experience, the brand will be remembered by the consumers and result
in a desire to repeat the purchase (Oliver 1997). Thus, a good brand can increase brand loyalty
(Schmitt 2003). This is supported by several recent studies that show that brand experience