The role of electronic word of mouth communication on brand image and brand preference

Technology presents an opportunity to share unlimited information and comments as an effective fact in shaping the image and preference of brands. With the developments in the field of technology in recent years, the Internet has provided new channels for brands to continue their communication activities. With the social media concept that emerged with internet technologies, the ways in which target groups acquired and spread information about brands also changed. The word-of-mouth communication activities carried out in the traditional sense of brands have been moved to the virtual environment with the developments in the field of technology. The concept of electronic word of mouth communication has emerged thanks to the structure of social media that allows to disseminate information regardless of time and place, to express opinions and suggestions, and to reach other users' evaluations on certain topics. The emergence of electronic word-of-mouth communication has paved the way for the sharing of positive or negative comments, opinions and evaluations about the brands of destinations where consumers have abstract evaluation and experience, rather than concrete products, through social media. It has been concluded that this situation may have developed various image perceptions with the experiences and evaluations shared by other consumers about destination brands and that their preferences for brands can be shaped accordingly. With the research, it was aimed to examine whether or not consumers are affected by electronic word-of-mouth communication contents in their image and preferences to brands in the focus of destination brands. For this purpose, a survey was carried out with the participation of 388 people, using the survey technique, which is one of the quantitative research methods. In the study, which took place between the dates of June 8 and June 18, 2020 with the participation of 406 people, 388 of the forms that did not encounter any problems returned were analyzed. The findings reached in the direction of analyzing and interpreting the data obtained from the research with the SPSS program indicated that the contents of the electronic word-of-mouth content on the social media affect the perception of the participants' choice and image of the destination brand. In addition, according to the demographic characteristics of the participants, it was revealed whether the situation of responding to the search for information about the destination brands of social media, shaping the image and influencing the preference, and determining the motivations of the social media users to search and share information about the destination brands had a statistically significant difference between the groups. The findings obtained through the tests were interpreted within the scope of the study. The findings obtained as a result of the research conducted in order to test the accuracy of the information obtained in the literature review and to reach new information on the subject under investigation pointed out that electronic word-of-mouth communication contents should be considered as an effective factor, although it cannot be evaluated as very powerful in terms of developing brand image and preference for destination brands; It has shown that consumers tend to trust the opinions, suggestions and comments of other users on social media regarding their destination brands. It is thought that the findings obtained from the research may be directive in terms of destinations aiming to create attractiveness through branding.