Offstone JUNE 2023 EDITION

44 SOCIAL MEDIA AND THE PROMOTION OF ISLAMIC BRANDING OF PRODUCTS AND SERVICES By: Dr. Rosninawati Hussin & Amirul Zahid Amadnoh ninahussin@usim.edu.my The first author is a senior lecturer at USIM. She is attached to Communication Program at the Faculty of Leadership and Management (FKP). She teaches many courses under mass communication including advertising and broadcasting courses. Her research interest is mass communication and media studies. ABSTRACT Social media is becoming more popular and important. This study was conducted to investigate the relationship between social media, Islamic branding, and consumer purchase intentions. An online survey was conducted among Malaysians. The result shows that information from social media can lead users to develop more interest, satisfaction and enjoyment in their preferred brand. Introduction Social media is an essential part of human development and progress. Looking at social media users in Malaysia, statistics show that as of January 2022, about 91.7 percent of Malaysians were active social media users. This trend has accelerated since the internet became accessible through mobile phones/smartphones. Smartphones offer various features such as SMS, MMS, chat, email, browsing to social media. Exchanging messages (information) over the Internet involves not just a few people, but millions of people around the world. Activities are not limited to social networking but have been expanded to include multipurpose functions such as content sharing and discovery, community building, information and news sharing,