Impact of social media on children´s relationship with brands

University of Economics in Bratislava, Faculty of Business management, Department of Business Finance, Bratislava

^* Corresponding author: nikoleta.hutmanova@euba.sk

Abstract

The paper focuses on how social media usage by children determines their interactions with consumer brands. First it describes how and when young children develop brand awareness and which are the most important predictors of this development. Those findings are then put in connection with the impact of social media. We elaborate on a deeper level how children approach online communications with brands in the social media context. Our assumptions are supported by a research conducted on a group of New Zealand children, both boys and girls in the age group of 11-14 years. This qualitative approach was implemented using in-depth interviews and identifies three key modes of brand interaction behaviour when young consumers use social media. According to these findings we assume that there is a connection between the use of social media and children´s relationship with consumer brands.