Consumer Engagement and Brand Loyalty Towards Apparel Brands’ Social Media Pages: A PLS-SEM and NCA Approach

The study investigates factors influencing consumer engagement and brand loyalty toward apparel brands on social media using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) and Necessary Condition Analysis (NCA). Particularly, we examine the impact of perceptual, content-related, and social factors on consumer engagement and their effect on brand loyalty. We also explore consumer engagement as a mediator and privacy risk as a moderator in the engagement-loyalty relationship. We analyzed the data from 457 fashion brand consumers using SmartPLS 4.0. PLS-SEM-based results indicate that Uses and Gratification Theory (UGT)-based factors (perceptual, content-related and social) positively influence consumer engagement. However, content-related factors like information seeking, and perceptual factors like perceived credibility do not significantly affect brand loyalty. Engagement mediates the relationship between these factors and loyalty, while privacy risk negatively moderates the engagement-loyalty relationship. NCA-based results indicate that information-seeking is not necessary for consumer engagement, while information seeking and social identity are not necessary conditions for predicting brand loyalty. We provide key insights into the direct, indirect, and necessary conditions affecting consumer engagement and brand loyalty in social media contexts, particularly in an emerging market context.