Emotional or Functional Positioning? Exploring Drivers of Purchase intention for High-end Consumer Brands

Abstract

This research study aims to investigate the impact of functional and emotional benefit positioning on purchase intention with the mediating role of brand attitude and moderating role of subjective norms. The study has been conducted on high end clothing brands catering to the female target audience. Data was gathered from a sample of 200 female users of these brands and analysis was done using Process macro by Hayes moderated mediation model 14 in SPSS. Results of the analysis supported five of the proposed hypotheses showing that functional benefit has the strongest relationship with purchase intention, followed by emotional benefits. The moderator subjective norms and mediator brand attitude did not have a significant impact which implies that choice of selecting clothing brands is mainly influenced by the quality, design, functional attributes and qualities. Furthermore, consumers value those emotional benefits which satisfy their social expression needs. Consumers buy their favorite, well known brands mainly on the basis of brand performance as compared to influence by subjective norms, i.e., opinion of family or friends. Our research provides a theoretical contribution by applying the renowned Theory of reasoned action to a new avenue of study. It also widens the range of factors that can help brands in adopting positioning strategies. It enhances knowledge and understanding of the variables and their relationships which can help in devising actionable strategies that can be used by brands.