Telling an authentic story by aligning with your product type and price

Good brand stories grab attention. They are effective ways to communicate with customers. But no matter the nature of the stories, they must be authentic, because customers may doubt that products and services are as good as businesses claim. To explore the effects of authenticity, this research distinguishes two types: indexical and iconic. The authors conduct two studies to determine how these types of authenticity influence customers’ brand attitudes. Results show that both indexical and iconic authenticity positively relate to brand attitudes, indicating that both indexically and iconically authentic storytelling improve consumers’ evaluations of brands and convey brand value to customers. They also show that the effect of indexical authenticity on brand attitude varies according to price level (high or low) and product type (search or experience). These findings provide useful managerial implications for practitioners seeking to use brand storytelling to enhance the attitudes of customers toward their brands.