Title: Effects of Halal social media and customer engagement on brand satisfaction of Muslim customers: Exploring the moderation of religiosity
Authors:
1. Dr.
Syed Alamdar Ali Shah 2. Prof.
Dr, Raditya Sukmana, SE,.MA. 3. Bayu Arie Fianto, SE., MBA., Ph.D
4. Muhammad Ali Ahmad
5. Dr.
Indrianawati Usman, SE., M.Sc. 6. Waqar Ahmed Mallah
Department: Sharia Economics
Journal Name: Journal of Islamic Marketing
Type of Journal: Scopus Q3
Keywords: Moderation; Religiosity; Halal social media; Social media disguised snowball sampling
Arab countries were among the last to adopt the internet.
The first country was Tunisia in 1991 and the last two were Saudi Arabia and Iraq around 2000 (Alllagui, 2017). Islamic leaders and preachers in the twenty-first century began using the web to spread the religion (Bunt, 2000; Ibahrine, 2007). Social media has helped remove geographical boundaries for brands (De Mooij, 2013). In 2017, around 33 percent of global advertising was done through digital channels, which is expected to grow. Thus, the majority of future advertising will be on digital devices (Stephen, 2016). Therefore, it is necessary to study various dimensions of consumer behavior in such an environment (Stephen, 2016). The results of social media activities are often less than satisfactory (Zhu and Chen, 2015).
The main reason is that the threats and opportunities of social media are not taken into account in the true sense. Social media is a new opportunity as well as a threat where, to be successful, one needs to have the right knowledge of products and appropriate platforms (Zhu and Chen, 2015). This can help in gathering experience, seeking and acquiring knowledge, guidance and knowledge transfer (Gupta et al., 2010). Social media can also lead to increased company performance if synergized with optimal expertise (Alavi and Leidner, 2001). According to Rasmussen et al. (2011), the success of brand innovation depends on knowledge from the external environment, such as social media, along with various internal factors. In the Islamic context, religiosity is the belief that Allah guides Muslims through his final messenger Muhammad SAW and the Koran.
Rasulullah SAW also guided Muslims through various explanations as mentioned in the hadith books. Eid and El-Gohary (2015) found that religiosity is a significant factor that can influence customer satisfaction, and therefore, can moderate the relationship between customer value and satisfaction. Therefore, the interaction of religion and religiosity and its impact on consumer attitudes is an increasingly developing area in Islamic marketing (Wahyuni and Fitriani, 2017). Shariah-compliant marketing on social media has become as important as Shariah-compliant marketing in other business activities. Although it is believed that Sharia-compliant social media can increase the number of Muslim subscribers, it still has the potential to be influenced by religiosity (Eid and El-Gohary, 2015). The aim of this research was to examine the relationship between "halal social media" customer engagement and brand satisfaction and to test the role of religiosity as a moderating variable between "halal social media" customer engagement and brand satisfaction. The research results show that religiosity has a moderating effect on the relationship between halal social media and brand satisfaction of Muslim customers and even a higher moderation effect on the relationship between customer engagement and brand satisfaction of Muslim customers.
For the complete article, please visit: https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/JIMA-06-2019-0119/full/html
