The advent of and expansion of social media has significantly transformed brand–consumer communication, positioning social media influencers (SMIs) as influential intermediaries in contemporary marketing. SMIs, a distinct category of digital content creators, possess strong online visibility, personal branding, and complex commercial relationships with firms through which they promote sponsored products and services. Unlike traditional endorsers, SMIs influence consumers not only by disseminating product information but also by shaping aspirational lifestyles, values, and consumption norms. In recent times influencer marketing has emerged as a cost-effective strategy that often escapes consumer resistance to paid advertising, enabling brands to reach highly targeted audiences. By consistently sharing personal content related to daily life, interests, and social relationships, influencers cultivate perceived closeness and relatability, blurring the boundary between authentic recommendation and commercial persuasion. This study contributes to branding literature by examining the distinct roles of influencer attributes—attractiveness, trustworthiness, and experience—in shaping affective and behavioural outcomes. The findings reveal that influencer attractiveness plays a dominant role in fostering brand love, highlighting the symbolic and affective nature of emotional brand attachment, where visual appeal and aspirational identity outweigh credibility-based evaluations. In contrast, trustworthiness and experience exert stronger influence on purchase intention, emphasizing the importance of expertise and credibility in transactional decision-making. Notably, brand love does not significantly predict purchase intention, indicating a decoupling between emotional attachment and purchasing behaviour. Instead, purchase intention appears to be driven more directly by influencer attributes than by emotional bonds with the brand. These insights suggest that marketers should prioritize aesthetic and symbolic cues to build emotional attachment, while emphasizing credibility and expertise to stimulate purchase intentions