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relation to stakeholders that are involved in activities on social media, such as individual users (Marwick, 2005) and SMIs (Audrezet, Caffier de Kerviler, & Moulard, 2018; De Veirman et al., 2017). But only few researchers investigated brand authenticity dimensions in a social media context (Guèvremont, 2018). In addition, those who investigated social media as a driver of brand authenticity treated social media as an overall construct (Dwivedi & McDonald, 2018) and did not distinguish between different forms of social media marketing, such as the use of SMI or CA endorsers.
Researchers, who investigated SMIs and CAs, focused on their effect on a number of brand constructs such as brand awareness, purchase intention (Hambrick & Mahoney, 2011; Lou & Yuan, 2019), and brand loyalty (Bush et al., 2004), but not on the construct of brand authenticity.
Second, literature in the field of social media marketing and sport brands is reviewed. Sport marketers use social media to interact with consumers to support brand messages, strengthen relationships and communities, and to generate sales (Filo et al., 2015; Smith, 2017). Researchers examined in more detail social media usage of athletes (Hambrick & Mahoney, 2011; Pegoraro, 2010), sport club (Parganas et al., 2015), and fans (Clavio, 2011; Clavio & Walsh, 2014). After reviewing some relevant literature, it can be concluded that research rather describes general developments in social media and its impact for sport marketers (Newman et al., 2013; Smith, 2017). Those researchers, who investigated brand endorsers of sport brands, mainly focused on CAs as potential collaboration partners (Brison et al., 2016; Hambrick & Mahoney, 2011; Peetz & Lough, 2015), but only limited literature seems to exist that also takes into account SMIs. In addition, it becomes apparent that most of this research concentrates on social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter while Instagram seems to be neglected in the sport context (Thompson, 2017).
Third, literature in the field of sport brands and brand authenticity is reviewed. Junghagen and Lillo (2017) believe that the sport industry, in particular, is concerned by authenticity due to the highly competitive nature of the industry. Only little research has been conducted in the combined field of sport brands and authenticity. Either researchers only touched upon the topic of authenticity in relation to sport team personality dimensions (Tsiotsou, 2012). Or researchers investigated the role of authenticity in very specific contexts, such as the case of outdoor sports conducted indoors (e.g.
rock climbing, skiing). The researchers’ study consisted of interviews with indoor sport centre providers to see how they deal with the issue of an artificialized setting and consumers’ need for authenticity (Salome, 2010). However, none of the reviewed studies has examined the impact of different marketing activities on a sport brand’s authenticity.
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Already by reviewing literature in these three overlapping research fields, it becomes apparent that there might be a gap in existing literature.
Lastly, literature in the combined fields of brand authenticity, social media marketing, and sport brands is reviewed. Pronschinske, Groza and Walker (2012) examined the relation between professional sport teams’ Facebook page attributes and user participation. They found that attributes that signal authenticity, such as logos and official page statements, are among the ones that have the strongest impact on user participation. In their study, they understood authenticity as something that indicates that the Facebook page is associated with the official sport team instead of being a fake account. Firgolska and Kucharska (2019) conducted a survey among users, who followed a football player and the associated football club on social media. They investigated the influence of football player’s personal and the football club’s brand authenticity on attitudinal loyalty towards the football sport as a whole. The researchers concluded that players’ and clubs’ brand authenticity on social media is a crucial factor for the football sector’s overall success. Söderman and Persson (2016) collected data from online forums, websites and podcasts to investigate football supporters’
perception of a sport clubs’ authenticity in the context of stadium relocations. They found that a football club’s stadium relocation affects mainly objective (e.g. based on perceived originality) and not so much subjective (e.g. based on personal experiences) authenticity perceptions.
It can be concluded that research often focuses on an athlete’s personal or a sport club’s brand authenticity (Firgolska & Kucharska, 2019; Söderman & Persson, 2016). Among the presented researchers, brand authenticity was mainly investigated in relation to sport on websites, forums, podcasts, or Facebook (Pronschinske et al., 2012; Söderman & Persson, 2016).
By reviewing current research literature, it becomes apparent that following aspects have been neglected so far.
First, none of the reviewed literature has examined CA and SMI endorsers as social media marketing types in relation the construct of brand authenticity. Second, even though a lot of researchers have acknowledged the importance of social media for sport brands, only a few have focused on the social media platform Instagram. Lastly, authenticity in the context of sport seems to be limited on investigations regarding the authenticity of athletes or sport clubs. It seems that only little research has been conducted in relation to authenticity of sport corporate brands. By connecting these aspects, it can be concluded that there seems to be a lack of research in relation to the effect of a sport brand’s
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Especially in regard to Instagram, which is a growing social media platform, this has not been researched to a large extent.
The literature reviews of the individual and overlapping research fields were conducted to gain knowledge and to detect a research gap, which leads to the following research question:
How does social media marketing, in form of celebrity athlete and social media influencer endorsers, on Instagram affect consumer-perceived authenticity of sport brands?
Following research purpose can be deduced. By answering the proposed research question, the study aims to add knowledge to the individual and combined research fields of sport brands, brand authenticity, and social media marketing. More specifically, the to be conducted research seeks to investigate the effects of a sport brand’s social media marketing efforts, in form of CA and SMI endorsers, on the brand’s authenticity. This will be examined with regard to Instagram as a social media platform. Furthermore, it is sought to give recommendations to practitioners, such as brand managers and marketers of the sport industry.
Delimitations
Due to the scope and the posed research question of the thesis, certain delimitations seem to be reasonable.
First, as explained in part 2.2 several understandings of authenticity exist in literature. For the course of the study at hand, authenticity is regarded from a brand image perspective rather than from a brand identity point of view. This implies that a brand’s authenticity is determined by consumer perceptions (Morhart et al., 2015) opposed to marketers’ own definition of the brand’s core attributes (Beverland, 2005). Thereby, authenticity is not only understood to be an objective construct, but also as something subjectively formed in consumers’ minds (Leigh et al., 2006). Thus, drawing on Grayson &
Martinec's (2004) two authenticity types, indexical and iconic authenticity; the latter will be the focal aspect for the study at hand. Based on these considerations, in the later course of the study, when brand authenticity is mentioned, it is spoken of consumer-perceived brand authenticity also if not explicitly said otherwise.
Second, the aim of the study is to examine how the authenticity of a sport brand is affected. Therefore, the focus solely lies on the brand’s authenticity rather than on the authenticity of the brand’s products and services. Further, investigations regarding the authenticity of people is not part of this study.
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Third, part 2.1.1 has given an overview of different sport brand categories. This study focuses on the group of classical brands, more specifically on sport corporate brands that produce and sell sporting goods. By this, it is clear that whenever it is referred to sport brands in the study at hand, sport corporate brands are addressed and not sport-specific brands (club, organisation, event, celebrity, and media brands) or certification and label brands.
Fourth, in part 2.3.5 the concept of CAs and SMIs in relation to social media marketing has been introduced. Both are widely utilized as endorsers by brands. For this study, whenever it is referred to CAs and SMIs, they are understood in their role as brand endorsers.