Indulgent visuals go viral? Brand luxury matters

From decadent desserts to sensual imagery, brands often generate visually indulgent content in the hope of motivating consumers to share (or repost) it on social media, thereby enhancing brand visibility. But is this strategy truly effective? An analysis of 98,081 social media images, complemented by controlled experiments, reveals that the impact of visual indulgence on sharing intention depends on brand luxury. For low-end mainstream brands, greater visual indulgence reduces sharing intention, primarily because consumers anticipate reputational costs (e.g., signaling undesirable personal traits) when sharing such content. However, as brand luxury increases, these reputational concerns diminish. For high-end luxury brands, visual indulgence increases sharing intention primarily by eliciting emotional arousal without triggering reputational concerns. Together, these findings contribute to research on indulgence, social media sharing, and luxury brand strategy.