Brands as Friends : An Investigation into Consumers’ Motivations to form Relationships with Brands in Online Social Networks

Titelangaben

Gimpel, Henner ; Graf-Drasch, Valerie ; Semmler, Jakob:
Brands as Friends : An Investigation into Consumers’ Motivations to form Relationships with Brands in Online Social Networks.
2016
Veranstaltung: 78. Wissenschaftliche Jahrestagung des VHB , 18. bis 20. Mai 2016 , München, Germany.
(Veranstaltungsbeitrag: Kongress/Konferenz/Symposium/Tagung , Paper )

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Abstract

Digitization and associated technologies change the way businesses and customers interact. This change also affects the respective relationships between both parties by enabling interaction within communities – i.e., brand communities – in Online Social Networks, such as Facebook or Twitter. While research on customers’ motivations for brand community participation is mature in offline and digital contexts, this study addresses the differences originating from the contextual change. We develop and validate a theoretical model for participation in brand communities as a specification of general communities. Further, we compare the model’s factors in the digital and offline context. With a series of survey-based empirical studies, we find that digitization does not radically change the customer brand interaction. However, digitization increases the relevance of particular factors (five out of nine factors) motivating customers to participate in brand communities, indicating that digitization shifts the focus of customer brand interaction.