konsumen. Bisnis yang beroperasi di industri di mana persaingan antar merek sangat ketat, seperti industri makanan dan minuman, harus mampu beradaptasi dan mengikuti perubahan ini untuk mempertahankan keunggulan kompetitif di pasar. Penggunaan platform media sosial Instagram dalam aktivitas sehari-hari merupakan salah satu contoh transformasi besar yang terjadi pada banyak pelanggan. Banyak bisnis yang memanfaatkan pergeseran ini sebagai peluang untuk melakukan aktivitas pemasaran di media sosial Instagram sebagai platform untuk mengkomunikasikan konten promosi mereka. Kegiatan pemasaran media sosial diharapkan menjadi alat pemasaran baru yang dapat menghubungkan merek dan pelanggan lebih erat dengan menghilangkan hambatan ruang dan waktu. Penelitian kuantitatif ini dilakukan untuk menguji pengaruh pemasaran media sosial suatu merek terhadap niat beli pelanggan yang diukur melalui ekuitas merek dan e-WOM. Sebanyak 277 pengguna Instagram Generasi Z yang juga merupakan pelanggan suatu brand makanan dan minuman dikumpulkan melalui metode purposive sampling dan dianalisis menggunakan metode pemodelan Partial Least Squares – Structural Equation Model (PLS-SEM). Temuan penelitian ini mengungkapkan bahwa aktivitas pemasaran media sosial memengaruhi niat beli, dan aktivitas pemasaran media sosial memengaruhi ekuitas merek, ekuitas merek memengaruhi e-WOM, dan e-WOM memengaruhi niat beli.

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In the midst of today's technological advancements, many sectors are influenced, including shifting in consumer marketing patterns. Businesses operating in industries where brand rivalry is fierce, such as the food and beverage industry, must be able to adapt and keep up to these changes in order to maintain a competitive advantage in the market. The usage of the Instagram social media platform in daily activities is one example of a huge transformation that has happened in many customers. Many businesses are taking advantage of this shift as a chance to conduct marketing activities on Instagram social media as a platform to communicate their promotional content. Right now, Social media marketing activities are one of the most significant marketing tools that may connect brands and customers more intimately with eliminating space and time barriers. This quantitative research was conducted to examine the influence of a brand's social media marketing on customer's purchase intention as measured through brand equity and e-WOM. A total of 277 Generation Z Instagram users who are also customers of a food and beverage brand were collected through purposive sampling method and analyzed using the Partial Least Squares – Structural Equation Model (PLS-SEM) modeling method. The findings of this study reveal that social media marketing activities affect purchase intention, and that social media marketing activities affect brand equity, brand equity has an effect on e-WOM, and e-WOM has an effect on purchase intention.