The influence of passion/determination and external disadvantage on consumer responses to brand biographies

To elicit positive consumer responses, many brands use underdog brand biographies in their brand communication strategies. Underdog brand biographies highlight a brand’s passion and determination in overcoming the external disadvantages the brand initially faced. This article examines to what extent consumers’ perceptions of passion/determination and external disadvantage reflected in an underdog brand biography independently influence narrative transportation, post-message engagement, and purchase intentions. Based on a study involving experimental manipulations of underdog and top dog brand biographies, this research contributes to the brand biography literature by demonstrating that passion/determination and external disadvantage have differential effects on narrative transportation, post-message engagement, and purchase intentions. It is also the first to empirically test the sequential mediating roles of narrative transportation and post-message engagement. For managerial practice, this research suggests that underdog brand biographies should emphasize the brand’s passion and determination and highlights the importance of post-message engagement in terms of information seeking, post-message elaboration, and social sharing in increasing purchase intentions.