Online Popularity of Luxury Brands and Its Impact on the Brand Value

Currently, there are many luxury brands on the market. Many brands have found that luxury contributes to their competitiveness, and most consumers have a positive attitude towards luxury brands. Along with the growing interest in luxury brands, luxury company managers strive to increase brand value in accordance with the key characteristics of exclusivity and uniqueness, which are a prerequisite for luxury. The aim of this article is to define the theoretical basis of online communication and brand value from the viewpoint of domestic (Slovak) and foreign authors. This includes a regression and correlation analyses focused on investigating the dependence between the online popularity (represented by website traffic, social media audience and social media engagement) and brand value of luxury goods. The basic sources of research were secondary data obtained from worldwide surveys in the form of rankings published by Interbrand, annual reports of companies and published professional publications. General scientific methods were applied for the processing of the data, as well as mathematical-statistical methods to evaluate the data collated from the results of regression and correlation analyses and test the linear independence. The results of analyses show that the web traffic and brand value are linearly dependent; specifically, it is medium-strong direct linear dependence. Therefore, the web traffic has a direct effect on brand value of luxury goods. Conversely, the brand value of luxury brands is not primarily dependent on the level of social media audience and social media engagement.