Page 576 - MARSIUM'21 COMP OF PAPER

This study has empirically tested the factors that drive purchase intention of bakery ingredients and tools, identified the social
media communication strategies to increase the brand passion and purchase intention of Pro Bakers Enterprise, and the effectiveness
of the proposed strategies, however, there are limitations to be considered. Firstly, the study is only limited to Facebook users.
There are also baking products sellers who promote their products through other social media platform such as Instagram and
Twitter. Thus, the perspective of the users of other social media platform must be considered. Hence, future researchers are
recommended to investigate users from other social media platforms such as Instagram and Twitter who have the intention to
purchase baking ingredients and tools.
Secondly, the sample for the study was relatively small, which is lack of generalizability. The small sample size might
not be generalized to the consumers of baking products. Therefore, future studies are suggested to use larger sample size with more
representations from different states in the country and age groups for a better consumer insight. Thirdly, the survey strategy of the
study is also considered as the limitation. To collect primary data for the research, questionnaire was used as the instrument,
precisely Google Form which can be done online. Even though Google Form is easy to be conducted and distributed to respondents,
there are some disadvantages of questionnaire that cause it becomes limitation of the study such as dishonest answers and
differences in understanding and interpretation of the questionnaire items. Therefore, future researchers are suggested to explore
other research methodologies for data collection such as interview-based survey for deep understanding of purchase intention
bakery ingredients and tools.
Lastly, the result of the relationship between user-generated social media communication and brand passion in the current
study was insignificant though the user-generated social media communication was proven as a strong association for brand passion
by past researchers such as Mukherjee (2020), Fischer and Reuber (2011), Habibi et al. (2014), and Demba et al. (2019). Future
researches can further examine the relationship between user-generated social media communication and brand passion using
increased sample size, different age of respondents, improved measurement items, and different data collection methods.

5.4 Conclusions
In conclusion, the findings from the study revealed the positive relationships between firm-created and user-generated social media
communication, firm-created social media communication and brand passion, as well as brand passion and purchase intention of
bakery ingredients and tools. The findings for this study are in favour of the most findings from previous studies. There are various
social media marketing strategies can be implemented such as posting daily on Facebook page, sharing variety of contents, using
relevant hashtags for postings, using video as part of the promotional tools, and asking thought-provoking question in a post as a
way to interact and engage with the audience. However, this study found that only publishing post or story on Facebook page daily,
using relevant hashtags for every post, and sharing of variety of contents could show significant result in increasing the brand
passion and purchase intention of bakery ingredients and tools.
This study is able to contribute to the retail businesses, especially the one that are new or have poor social media marketing
performance such as the bakery supply retailers in the study by providing them better insights on how they should manage their
social media and utilize the benefits of social media in this rapid technological advancement era where majority of people are using
social media to not only communicate with their friends, but also to shop, discover new businesses and products. This study can
motivate marketers to create creative, appealing, and interactive contents to engage consumers with the brand as well as disseminate
positive word-of-mouth in the social media community. Furthermore, purchase intention is critical to help businesses to understand
why consumers decide to purchase from a brand. In addition, there are limited studies about the combination of variables, namely
firm-created and user-generated social media communication, brand passion, and purchase intention. Hence, this study can be
served as guideline for future researchers.

555