Sports celebrity and brand image: The impact of athletes brand image on fans purchase intention (case study: Vorya Ghafouri)

Brands are a symbol of the identity of products and people, and the importance of the brand informing communication and business-related flows is irrefutable (Lair et al., ۲۰۰۵). That is why organizations spend significant money building psychological relationships between consumers and celebrities, such as athletes and artists. Therefore, it seems that these people can use them as a mark or brand in the sales industry.The methodology of the present study is a descriptive survey and applied from the perspective of purpose. The study s statistical population consists of Vorya Ghafouri fans, the Esteghlal team player. ۳۰۲ fans were randomly selected and available as a sample. For collect data, Three questionnaires of athletes brand image (Arai, Ji Koo, Kaplanido, ۲۰۱۳), brand loyalty (Carroll and Ahovia, ۲۰۰۶) and purchase intention (Diallo, ۲۰۱۲) were used. Their reliability was evaluated by Cronbach s alpha and combined reliability. Five researchers in sports brands confirmed the content validity of the questionnaires. Also, AMOS software has been used to fit the structural equation model.The fit indices showed that the model has a good fit. The relative Chi-square index was ۴.۵۴, CFI was ۰.۹۱, and the RMSEA was estimated to be ۰.۰۴. Also, the path coefficients of the brand image components, including sports performance, attractiveness, and marketable lifestyle, were estimated to be ۰.۵۷, ۰.۶۶, and ۶۹, respectively. Finally, brand image, loyalty, and purchase intention were ۰.۹۷ and ۰.۹۸, respectively. All path coefficients were significant with a confidence level of ۰.۰۰۰.According to findings, it can be seen that the brand image of this player, if he promotes a product, have a positive effect on brand loyalty and the desire of fans to buy that product. However, another finding of this study shows that sports performance has the most negligible impact, and a marketable lifestyle has the most impact on brand image. The present study indicated that the marketable parts of the lives of sports players are more attractive to fans.

کلیدواژه ها:

brand image ، fans ، personal brand ، loyalty