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Brand pages are a very popular tool for companies to communicate with consumers in SNSs. Although brand pages could be considered virtual brand communities, they differ in several aspects. Thus, this chapter reviews the literature on brand pages attending to the main differences with other virtual communities, the motivations to join brand pages and its consequences for consumers and brands.

The studies reviewed have allowed us to identify the main characteristics of brand pages as a communication tool, as well as the definition of an important research agenda for this topic.

We have identified the main unique aspects that characterize brand pages as a virtual brand community. The motivations to become members of brand pages are analyzed as well as the positive consequences of these pages on the marketing variables. We also identified the research needs on brand pages.

This chapter can be useful to both, marketers, by showing them how brand pages work and what motivate consumers to join it; and researchers, by showing them the main gaps on brand pages that should be addressed in future studies.

This chapter highlights the role of brand pages as a communication tool. It constitutes an attempt to review the literature and organize knowledge on brand pages. The characteristics of brand pages and virtual brand communities, the motivations to participate, the consequences for the brand and an important research agenda are developed.

The health industry is rapidly adopting digital services and face-to-face offerings are being replaced by e-services. One example is peer-to-peer survivor networks for cancer patients. This study investigates the virtual exchanges in survivor networks and whether these exchanges are valued for economic, symbolic, or expressive worth. The research seeks to address whether the alleviation of loneliness is possible.

The qualitative work in this study utilizes netnographic explorations and in-depth interviews with cancer survivors, average age 62, to investigate the social exchange continuum in peer-to-peer online patient survivor networks.

This study shows that technological innovations can aid survivorship when the exchanges are meaningful. Meaningful interactions within gift systems are valued for expressive worth and are established upon the notion of selfless gifts where the giver expects nothing in return. For networks to operate via expressiveness, informants must be open and vulnerable to others. Findings show that biographical narratives are useful tools for creating an expressive environment and givers become more giving after engaging in selfless acts. The intangibility and immaterial nature of virtual gifts creates a collective identity and fosters an aggregate extended self.

Implications emphasize the need among survivors of trauma to connect with others. Digital technologies allow connections on a global scale, so survivors can find others with similar needs. Peer-to-peer networks provide a way for survivors to meet, interact with, and extend their aggregate selves through other survivors, while experiencing a transcendent sense that they are part of something bigger than self alone.

Marketing academics and practitioners have acknowledged that consumers form specific relationships with brands that are able to create unique and memorable qualities. As a result, the concept of consumer–brand relationship has been of great interest for marketers. Indeed, consumer–brand relationships are very complex and multidimensional in nature. A common perception is that brand management should create ultimate offerings and communication to have successful relationships with its consumer base. However, how consumers construe their relationships with brands is mostly out of the brands’ control. It is an emotion-intense realm and necessitates careful study of the consumers as well as the context. After summarising the current literature on brand relationships, we focus on Turkish consumers’ relationships with brands.

By focussing on a range of global and local brand studies, this chapter offers a comprehensive and well-informed analysis of the issues and practices involved in consumer–brand relationships in the Turkish context. The chapter is organised into three parts. The first part focusses on antecedents of consumer–brand relationships such as the global or local identity of the brand and brand personality. The second part presents detailed explorations of various brand relationships such as brand love and brand trust. The third and the final part focusses on an important phenomenon, the stage for various brand relationships, being online brand communities. The chapter concludes with the future research directions in these three main areas together with a discussion of offline and online branding opportunities in the Turkish market.

The circular economy (CE) proposes that all materials flow in a close-looped system. Waste generated by one production stage may be useful in another. Thus, the idea of a CE is linked to the goal of zero waste (ZW) and promotes a range of sustainable economic, social and environmental benefits in each sector. When we apply this to construction waste management, waste can be managed through reducing, recycling, upcycling and reusing. However, there is an inevitable cost implication associated with this process due to the additional requirement of inventory and waste processing, and this becomes a disincentive to implementing the CE. Formal institutions, referring here to legal rules and regulations, play a critical role in motivating firms and individuals towards a CE. As different countries have different government rules and regulations, and there is limited research on their differences, we review Asia’s and Europe’s legal rules and regulations relevant to the goal of ZW and CE in the construction sector.

This paper investigates the impacts of globalization processes on the Swiss business elite community during the 1980–2010 period. Switzerland has been characterized in the 20th century by its extraordinary stability and by the strong cohesion of its elite community. To study recent changes, we focus on Switzerland’s 110 largest firms’ by adopting a diachronic perspective based on three elite cohorts (1980, 2000, and 2010). An analysis of interlocking directorates allows us to describe the decline of the Swiss corporate network. The second analysis focuses on top managers’ profiles in terms of education, nationality as well as participation in national community networks that used to reinforce the cultural cohesion of the Swiss elite community, especially the militia army. Our results highlight a slow but profound transformation of top management profiles, characterized by a decline of traditional national elements of legitimacy and the emergence of new “global” elements. The diachronic and combined analysis brings into light the strong cultural changes experienced by the national business elite community.