Marka gerçekliğinin, marka güveni ve müşteri-marka kimliklendirmesi aracılığı ile, marka savunuculuğu üzerine etkisi, Türkiye'de bir araştırma

Underpinned from the fact that investing in relationship marketing is crucial for companies and brands today, and the demand for trustworthy and truthful consumer-brand relationship is rising, this study took brand authenticity as the core construct that is stated to create trust and enhances emotional bonds between the consumer and the brand in the prior literature studies. Brand Authenticity is one of the most recent constructs in marketing literature and there has been increasing number of academic studies worldwide since mid 2000s. The initial purpose of this study was to examine strong consumer brand relationship benefits when a brand intrinsically positions itself as authentic and the sequential consumer and brand benefits of brand authenticity. Aimed at stressing the casual relationship between the constructs, we aimed to contribute and extend the literature through a new model which tested the mediation effects of Brand Trust and Consumer-Brand Identification between Brand Authenticity and Brand Advocacy. Testing both mediators in a Brand Authenticity study as well as testing Brand Advocacy as an outcome construct is new to the Brand Authenticity literature. Eventhough there have been models tested in the global literature, the construct demonstrated a less tapped area in the academic research in the Turkish culture; therefore, we extended the literature to a new geographic location. The complementary objectives of this study was to find a Turkish definition of Brand Authenticity as there are different usages in the few academic studies, and to find the first authentic brand rating in the Turkish culture and comparing it with global ratings. All of these objectives aimed at contributing and extending the Brand Authenticity literature and taking researchers' further attention. Before studying on the methodology and reaching our model, it was critical for us to understand the Brand Authenticity construct from all angles. Therefore, we examined the literature on definition, conceptualization, antecedents and attributes, further cues, and consequences of brand authenticity. While examining more than 70 studies, we explored each of the studies' model, methodology and sample characteristics to understand the current situation in the existing literature. We used four sequential stages in the methodology with exploratory and descriptive techniques to achieve our research objectives. We conducted the main research instrument on 400 people in January 2020, through a professional online survey panel and the gathered data is analysed by Structural Equation Modelling. The findings revealed the positive relationships between all constructs and Brand Trust and Consumer-Brand Identification as intermediate in the casual sequence such that the indirect effect of Perceived Brand Authenticity is higher on Brand Advocacy when the mediators exist. Furthermore, our sample defined authentic brand as "gerçek" and proposed an authentic brand rating. Grounding from the literature survey and new findings, the managerial and academic implications were presented as well in the final sections.