An analysis of the effect of word of marketing and brand equity on the consumer purchasing process

Purchase intention refers to consumers' efforts to make a purchase and even implies a conscious plan. Consumer based brand equity and word of mouth marketing play decisive roles within the framework of the relationship consumers have established with the brand in both traditional and digital environments. The main objective of the study is to identify and evaluate the effects of these two variables on consumers' purchase intentions in the context of e-commerce sites and to contribute to the literature both theoretically and empirically. To obtain research data in line with this main objective, both online and face to face surveys were conducted with 404 participants aged 18 and over who reside in Konya and shop online. SPSS 23.0 software was used to test the hypotheses proposed in line with the conceptual model of the research. The analysis results reveal that the intensity and content dimensions of word of mouth marketing have no significant effect on purchase intention, whereas the positive value and negative value dimensions have a significant effect. Furthermore, when analyzing the effects of consumer-based brand value dimensions on word of mouth marketing and purchase intention, it was found that brand loyalty and perceived quality dimensions did not show a significant effect, and only the brand awareness/association dimension was found to be decisive on both variables. This study contributes to the literature by clarifying the role of word-of-mouth marketing and consumer based brand equity on purchase intention in terms of their dimensions. The findings of the study provide guidance for understanding consumer based brand equity perceptions and word of mouth marketing behaviors towards e-commerce sites.