Search results
1 – 10 of over 43000The development of online brand communities employed by marketers to maintain consumer relationships and brand building is increasing. This study aims to explore how value…
Abstract
Purpose
The development of online brand communities employed by marketers to maintain consumer relationships and brand building is increasing. This study aims to explore how value co-creation practices can cultivate consumers' brand loyalty.
Design/methodology/approach
Using partial least squares modeling, the hypotheses testing involves the utilization of and data collection from 599 Chinese consumers who actively engage in brand communities in China.
Findings
Value co-creation practices in brand communities cultivate consumers' affective commitment and psychological brand ownership, which in turn can further contribute to consumers' brand loyalty.
Originality/value
By offering a more comprehensive insight into how affective commitment and psychological brand ownership act as intermediaries between value co-creation practices and consumers' brand loyalty, this research enhances the existing knowledge on value co-creation and brand management.
Details
Keywords
Purpose – This conceptual chapter clarifies concepts of marketplace community.Methodology/Approach – Through a review of selected CCT studies, the chapter explores and reviews…
Abstract
Purpose – This conceptual chapter clarifies concepts of marketplace community.
Methodology/Approach – Through a review of selected CCT studies, the chapter explores and reviews theories of subcultures of consumption, brand communities and consumer tribes.
Findings – Subcultures of consumption, brand communities and consumer tribes exhibit divergent qualities that are summarised in a typology of communities.
Research implications – The perspectives offered by tribal studies present powerful tools that compliment subcultural and brand community approaches to understanding the construction of marketplace cultures.
Practical implications – Theory that improves the understanding of different features of marketplace communities can help marketing practitioners to determine more appropriate communal marketing strategies.
Originality/Value of paper – This chapter recommends a consistent and commonly shared set of descriptive and theoretical terms for different kinds of marketplace community.
Details
Keywords
María Sicilia, Mariola Palazón and Manuela López
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…
Abstract
Purpose
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.
Methodology/approach
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.
Findings
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.
Social implications
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.
Originality/value
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.
Details
Keywords
Henri Weijo and Jukka Rintamäki
The purpose of this study is to investigate how brand communities collectively react towards brand transgressions, an area where previous research has been scant.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to investigate how brand communities collectively react towards brand transgressions, an area where previous research has been scant.
Methodology/approach
This study adopts a netnographic approach in studying the reactions of one particular brand community and its reactions to a marketer-initiated brand transgression.
Findings
Building on coping theory, we find evidence of brand community coping, a temporally bounded process in which the community seeks to come to terms with and even overturn the transgression. Overall, we define the brand community coping process as unfolding through three overlapping and temporally bounded stages of (1) making the problem communal, (2) exploring the problem’s meaning, and (3) co-creating responses.
Originality/value
Studies of consumer coping particularly in cases of brand transgressions have predominantly adopted an individualistic approach to coping, or have treated communities as coping resources for individual consumers. This study is the first study to truly look at brand communities’ collective coping endeavors. We also offer managerial implications by questioning the overtly positive tone of brand co-creation literature and underline potential threats to marketers when consumers decide to use their co-creative practices to punish the marketer.
Details
Keywords
Bernard Paranque and Bernard Cova
The aim of the chapter is to focus on the connections between three types of actors who build the new world of brands – consumers, marketers, and financier – by focusing on the…
Abstract
Purpose
The aim of the chapter is to focus on the connections between three types of actors who build the new world of brands – consumers, marketers, and financier – by focusing on the co-creation of value between the brand community and the company owning the brand.
Methodology/approach
The chapter use three case vignettes to highlight the dual process at play when a community of consumers co-create brand value.
Findings
The chapter not only highlights a value-creating trajectory for companies but also shows how a reverse process can destroy value for the very same companies. It suggests that marketers’ desire to maximize the value co-created between the company and the community in order to answer the financial requirement of brand valuation could damage the value co-creation process. According to our case vignettes’ results, these marketers are exposing themselves to the risk that consumers/fans will rebel as a result of this branding maximization, leading in return to the creation of a competitor in the form of a community brand.
Research limitations/implications
Future research will have to investigate how by cutting across organizational boundaries and functional areas, brand communities would reshape the marketing–finance interface.
Practical implications
The chapter stresses the need for companies to manage carefully the triadic relationship community/marketing/finance in order to avoid the development of a reverse brand value destruction process. In addition, the chapter contributes to research on the marketing–finance interface by highlighting the need to look beyond this level of interaction when it comes to branding.
Originality/value
Starting with the principle that consumers grouped into communities are increasingly responsible for making brands through their value-creating practices, the chapter highlights the problems raised by the company’s will to transform them into value for shareholders.
Details
Keywords
Bob Heere, Daniel Lock and Danielle Cooper
The purpose of this article is to propose an overall framework for brand community formation that separates antecedents that lead to the formation of a brand community from those…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this article is to propose an overall framework for brand community formation that separates antecedents that lead to the formation of a brand community from those outcomes that are associated with established communities.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors approached this review through an interdisciplinary literature review that delineated psychological, structural and behavioral processes that underline the formation of the brand community, often illustrated by contemporary cases in the sport industry.
Findings
The findings outline 18 different constructs, categorized in three overarching dimensions, separating structural, behavioral and psychological constructs. The authors posit these 18 constructs are at the heart of brand community formation. These constructs provide managers with a guide to inform their efforts to form a new brand community.
Originality/value
It is emphasized that brand community formation is a complex process that is paradoxical in nature and requires organizations to balance a non-interventionist approach that would allow for consumer empowerment, with a pro-active approach that creates conditions for a successful brand community formation process.
Details
Keywords
This study explores the creation of online brand relationships from the personal, social and brand perspectives of social media and its influence on the community citizenship…
Abstract
Purpose
This study explores the creation of online brand relationships from the personal, social and brand perspectives of social media and its influence on the community citizenship behavior to establish an integrative model. With social identity theory (SIT) and the theory of socially shared cognition (TSSC) as the theoretical basis for model integration, this study identifies the key factors that maintain the relationship between online community members and brands and prompt brand members to establish a close emotional connection with the brand and generate community citizenship behavior for the brand.
Design/methodology/approach
This study examines community members who own products from luxury fashion brands (e.g. Louis Vuitton, Chanel and Hermès) and have followed the official Instagram account of the luxury fashion brand for at least 1 year, with a total of 582 valid samples. Structural equation modeling (SEM) is used to test the model.
Findings
All except for one of the hypotheses are supported, and the theoretical model exhibits acceptable goodness-of-fit. The strongest effect is that of brand community identification on affective brand commitment, followed by that of online co-creation on community citizenship behavior and that of brand commitment on community citizenship behavior.
Originality/value
SIT was used as the basis and extended to the TSSC to integrate the theoretical perspectives. This study identifies the online brand relationship between service providers and consumers, explores possible causes and consequences from multiple perspectives and proposes conclusions and practical management implications as references for marketing personnel.
Details
Keywords
Amit Rakesh Sethi, Satyabhusan Dash, Abhishek Mishra and Dianne Cyr
Online customer communities have become a strategic tool for business-to-business (B2B) firms to drive collaboration among customers around the company’s products and services…
Abstract
Purpose
Online customer communities have become a strategic tool for business-to-business (B2B) firms to drive collaboration among customers around the company’s products and services. This paper aims to argue that the three social capital dimensions, that is, structural, relational and cognitive, themselves driven by brand community trust, can affect brand loyalty for the organization.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors use a survey to collect data and structural equation modeling to test the conceptual framework by collecting data from 214 participants across three online B2B communities operated by three technology firms in India.
Findings
Brand community trust is found to have a strong association with social network ties, identification and norm of reciprocity and shared vision. These three have concomitant effects on the quality of customer-to-customer (C2C) interactions. Such communication generates functional, emotional and social benefits, which, in turn, curate brand loyalty.
Practical implications
The authors’ findings guide community managers in leveraging such conversations in shaping customer loyalty for the corporate brand.
Originality/value
This work provides an integrated framework to explain the important role of C2C interactions in B2B online brand communities.
Details