Does Source Credibility Affect How Credit Cards Are Marketed to College Students?

Source credibility is especially important when advertising services, due to their innate intangibility and the increased uncertainty and risk that are associated with choosing a service. This paper examines the traditional dimensions of source credibility (expertise, trustworthiness and attractiveness) along with similarity and likeability to determine how they influence a consumer’s attitude toward the advertisement. Moreover, this paper identifies the relationships between a consumer’s attitude toward the ad, brand attitude and purchase behavior and proposes a model of these relationships. Results indicate that expertise, attractiveness and liking were all significant factors influencing a consumer’s attitude toward the ad, as well as supporting the hypothesized relationships between attitude toward the ad, brand attitude and purchase intent.