Using emojis to build luxury brands: why scenario matters

Luxury brands have been discouraged from using emojis in consumer interactions. However, there is limited understanding of how emoji effects may vary across different contexts and how they influence consumer perceptions of luxury brands. This research gap is filled by studying the impact of emoji use on consumer perceptions of luxury brand value in two communication scenarios. Two experimental studies (Ntotal = 535) examined how emoji use affects psychological distance and brand value perceptions. Results show that in public communication, emoji use decreases psychological distance, reducing perceived brand luxuriousness—especially for luxury brands versus mass brands. However, in private customer service, emoji use doesn’t affect luxury brand perceptions through psychological distance but positively impacts customer satisfaction. This study provides a context-dependent framework for emoji use, identifying psychological distance as a key mediating mechanism and highlighting private customer service as a favorable scenario for emoji use in luxury marketing.