Consumer responses to weakness revelation of human brands: The role of authenticity

Abstract

Human brands are an integral part of modern marketing and have proliferated in recent years, becoming one of the corner stones of the creator economy. There is a growing need to understand what specific strategies human brands, traditional ones and creators alike, can use to market and present themselves and the situational nuances of these strategies. While previous research has suggested that human brands should be generally presented in a positive light, this research shows that when human brands reveal their own weaknesses, it can lead to favorable consumer responses because of the heightened sense of authenticity. Moreover, the present research identifies three theoretically meaningful and practically relevant boundary conditions for the effect. Specifically, the effect is attenuated when the revelation is frequent and when the source of revelation is not the human brand itself, and reversed when the revealed weakness is severe. We use a mixed-method approach and provide converging support for our theorization across ten studies. This research contributes to a nuanced understanding of the weakness revelation effect in human brand marketing, and adds to the research on human brand authenticity. We further offer an explicit action plan to professional and self managers of human brands and outline the potential future research areas.