The effect of the valence of word-of-mouth on consumers' attitudes toward co-brands: The moderating roles of brand characteristics

Although Lovett et al. (2013) demonstrated that brand characteristics simulate word-of-mouth (WOM) as WOM antecedents, there has been relatively little attention to understanding a moderating role of brand characteristics between WOM and consumers' attitudes toward brands. Understanding the role of brand characteristics in WOM is critical for marketers and marketing scholars to maximize the impact of WOM in branding activities. The current study aims to fill this gap by examining the role of brand characteristics as a moderator between the WOM valence and consumers' attitudes toward co-brands. The results revealed that with co-brand characteristics highly related to the social and emotional drivers, the favorable effect of positive WOM on consumers' attitudes was significantly higher than that with cobrand characteristics less related to the social and emotional drivers. On the other hand, with co-brand characteristics less related to the social and emotional drivers, the negative effect of negative WOM on consumer's attitude was significantly higher than that with cobrand characteristics highly related to the social and emotional drivers. The results indicate that marketers should make efforts to impress consumers by developing and emphasizing new co-brand characteristics associated with the social and emotional drivers.