FACTORS AFFECTING FEMALE’S INTENTION TO VOLUNTARILY FOLLOW FASHION BRANDS ON INSTAGRAM

• Main Author: Asyari (NIM 19014105), Saskia
• Format: Final Project
• Language: Indonesia
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/24230
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

As a social media platform in which the majority of its users are mostly women, Instagram is now also broadly utilized for commercial purpose, especially in the fashion industry. It is the commodity on Instagram that dominates the market the most by encompassing 52.5% of the traded products on Instagram. Therefore, competition in the fashion industry is inevitable. Followers are deemed to be one of the criteria to measure the success of a brand. However, if among the followers a brand have are mostly generated artificially, a number of followers they have would only remain to be a set of <br /> <br /> trivial numbers. Therefore, it is important to have an active customer pool by having people who voluntarily follow the brand since active followers are the key to brand’s survival on social media. The purpose of this research is to identify factors affecting female’s intention to voluntarily follow fashion brands on Instagram as well as the variables that significantly distinguish users to different level of follow intention groups (high, moderate, low) and to disclose the channels drive women to fashion brands on Instagram the most. Group interview with 7 female Instagram users and structured interview with 7 fashion brands and 1 digital marketing agency were conducted to complement the quantitative results from 408 respondents. Descriptive analysis, multiple linear regression, and discriminant analysis were performed to analyze the data. The findings indicated that “Entertainment”, “Visual”, “Investigation, and “Social Proof” as the predominant factors. User’s frequency of fashion brand exposure has a significant impact on user’s follow intention. Endorsement from public figure is the channel that drives women to fashion brands on Instagram the most. Friend’s recommendation, explore page, following list of public figure, creative market event, and suggested profile page are the channels that partially more effective to filter users with a higher follow intention. Variables that significantly differentiate among users who have high follow intention, moderate follow intention, and low follow intention are “Entertainment”, “Social Proof”, “Investigation”, and “Visual”