Abstract

With the growth of the appearance of celebrities in digital marketing, several factors seem to be influential in the success of these programs. This study aims to investigate the moderating effect of attitude toward celebrities on the relationship between perceived credibility and brand loyalty in mobile products on Instagram. The data has been gathered using a questionnaire from 340 students of Shiraz University as participants who were selected by the non-probability sampling method. Consequently, confirmatory factor analysis was used to confirm the model, and a PLS model was used to analyze the data. The findings show that if the consumer perceives the celebrity endorser as a person with knowledge, expertise, and experience about a product, this will increase the consumer’s attention and recalls of the message. Also, the consistency of the celebrity endorser with the product leads to brand loyalty, and either positive or negative attitude of the consumer toward the source of the message (celebrity endorser) affect the formation of feelings toward the promoted product and the behavioral response of the consumer (brand loyalty). In addition, the moderating effect of attitude toward celebrity endorsers on the relationship between expertise and perceived appropriateness of celebrity endorsers and brand loyalty was also acknowledged.