This study aims to describe and analyse consumer behaviour in social media toward fashion brands. Specifically, it is analysed consumers’ motivations to follow fashion brands on social media, activities developed on social platforms concerning to fashion brands and level of engagement regarding fashion brands on social media.

The purpose of this research was to see at which extent the game League of Legends, during the world championship, could be seen as a brand community. I have used a quantitative content analysis where the variables that were measured consisted of the elements from the theory of brand community. The elements were (1) consciousness of kind, (2) rituals and traditions, (3) moral responsibility. I used the following research issues: <ul type="disc">What physical evidence is there to support that the League of Legends scene is evolving? What qualitative, visual changes have been made over the years (in League of Legends world championship finals)? At what frequency does the elements of Brand Community, as an amount of mentions by the commentators, occur in League of Legends (E-sport, world championship finals)? My findings suggest that the League of Legends E-sport scene is a brand community that is evolving; according to the set criteria’s for a brand community; and that the world championship can be seen as a brand fest, a gathering of a brand community.

Bakgrund och problemformulering - Vi har valt att studera och analysera i vilket avseende det sker user innovation på ett forum skapat av företaget Salesforce. Forumet är ett brand community för användare som utvecklar Salesforce tjänster. Frågeställningarna behandlar om det sker olika typer av user innovation och vad det är som driver användarna till att innovera på det forum vi har valt att studera. Vår studie syftar till att bidra med en bredare kunskap och förståelse kring ämnet då det finns begränsad forskning kring user innovation inom online brand communities idag. Teori - Begreppet brand communities förklaras utifrån Muniz och O’Guinns (2001) synsätt som innebär att ett online brand community är en samlingsplats på internet dedikerat till ett specifikt varumärke. På vårt valda brand community innoverar användarna och vi utgår från Gault (2012) för att redogöra för begreppet innovation som i sin tur möjliggör en fördjupad förståelse för user innovation. Vi utgår från en definition av user innovation som innebär att användare innoverar för sin egen skull (von Hippel &amp; Euchner 2013). Metodologi - Vi eftersträvar en djupare förståelse för user innovation på vårt specifika forum och då lämpar sig en kvalitativ explorativ ansats bäst. Inspiration har hämtats från Kozinets (2006, 2011) kvalitativa metod netnografi som innebär en deltagande-observerande forskning på nätet. Resultat - I detta avsnitt presenterar vi de likheter och skillnader som Salesforce forum har med Muniz och O’Guinns (2001) kriterier för vad ett brand community är. Vidare presenteras vårt resultat i form av två kategorier av user innovations: modifierade innovationer och skapande innovationer. Kategorierna förklaras och illustreras med exempel som klargör deras innebörd. Analys och diskussion - I analysen diskuterar vi vad som driver användarna på vårt valda forum att innovera och analyserar likheter och skillnader med redan befintliga teorier kring user innovation. Vi resonerar oss fram till en ny term vi väljer att kalla user co-innovation samt spekulerar i huruvida innovationerna genererar någonting för Salesforce. Slutsats - Vårt teoretiska bidrag till forskningen presenteras genom vår modell som illustrerar sambandet mellan user innovation, user co-innovation och våra två kategorier. Modellen innefattar vilka användare som innoverar, vilkafaktorer som driver dem till att innovera och resultatet av user co-innovation på vårt valda brand community.Nyckelbegrepp - Innovation, user innovation, lead users, brand community, online community, netnografi. / Background and problematization -We have chosen to study to what extent user innovation occurs on a forum created by the company Salesforce. This forum is a brand community devoted to user development of Salesforce services. Our main research question is whether there occur different types of user innovations on the brand community we are studying and what it is that drives these users to innovate. Our study aims to contribute with a wider knowledge and understanding of user innovation on brand communities since the research of today on the subject is limited. Theory - In this chapter we explain the concept of brand community based on Muniz and O’Guinns (2001) definition which implies that an online brand community is an online meeting place for people dedicated to a specific brand. User innovation occurs on our chosen brand community and we base ourselves on Gaults (2012) theory to explain innovation in order to explain the term user innovation. We use one definition of user innovation which implies that users innovate for themselves (von Hippel &amp; Euchner 2013). Methodology - We seek a deeper understanding of user innovation on our specific brand community and that makes a qualitative exploratory approach best suited. Inspiration has been taken from Kozinets (2006, 2011) netnography which is a qualitative method and involves participatory observation research online. Results - In this chapter we present the similarities and differences that we have been able to identify between Salesforce forum and the criteria for a brand community set by Muniz and O’Guinn (2001). Furthermore we introduce our result which consists of two categories of user innovations: modified innovations and creativity innovations. The categories are explained and illustrated with examples that clarify their meaning. Analysis and discussion - In this chapter we discuss what drives users on our chosen brand community to innovate and analyze similarities and differences between already existing theory on user innovation. Our discussion results in a new term which we choose to name user co-innovation. We also speculate whether the user innovations generate something of value for Salesforce. Conclusion - Our theoretical contribution to the subject is presented by our model that illustrates the connection between user innovation, user co-innovation and our two categories. The model includes which users that innovate, the factors driving them to innovate and the results of user co-innovation on our chosen brand community.

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近年來有關於品牌的研究逐漸朝向品牌社群的相關研究，探討其中的社會性意義與品牌認同、忠誠意向的關係。但過往在研究品牌社群上，皆側重於探討社會性的影響因子，諸如關係品質、互動品質等等，而較少著墨於其他的影響媒介，諸如資訊品質。資訊品質是影響虛擬社群成員滿意度與忠誠意向的關 鍵因素(Andersen,and Srinivasan,2003; Parks, and Kory,1996; Zeithaml and Berry,1996)。國內學者江義平與林佳蓁(2006)的研究也指出資訊品質會對虛擬社群成員的滿意以及信任有正向的影響。Jang, Olfman, Ko, Koh and Kim (2008)則指出資訊品質對於虛擬社群成員的承諾並無顯著關係。然而，資訊品質與實體的品牌社群之間的相關性研究則有待進一步探討。 本研究針對大台北區實體有機食品商店社群成員，採用問卷調查法，以結構方程式模型作為分析方法，欲探討在資訊發展較不完整的有機食品產業中，消費者所關心的資訊品質是否會影響其對於社群的認同進而影響社群忠誠意向。本研究的實證結果顯示： 1.資訊品質會透過品牌社群認同而影響品牌社群忠誠意向，其中以資訊品質的正確性、完整性、攸關性、及時性與一致性呈現正向而顯著的關係。 2.品牌社群認同除了會透過品牌社群承諾而影響品牌社群忠誠意向之外，也會直接對品牌社群忠誠意向產生正向而顯著的影響。 3.品牌社群認同並未透過規範性壓力而影響品牌社群忠誠意向。 / In recent years, researches on the brand gradually emphasize brand community studies, which explore the influence of social meaning and the relationship between brand identification and loyalty intentions. But the researches on brand communities in the past focused more on the impact of social factors, such as relationship quality, interactive quality, etc., and less investigated the impact of information quality. Information quality is regarded as one of the key factors of the satisfaction and loyalty intentions for the members of virtual community (Andersen, and Srinivasan, 2003; Parks, and Kory, 1996; Zeithaml and Berry, 1996). Jiang Yiping (2006) also pointed out that the quality of information has a positive influence on the virtual community members’ satisfaction and trust. Yet, Jang, Olfman, Ko, Koh and Kim (2008) pointed out that the information quality has no significant influence on the virtual community members’ commitment. However, the relationship between information quality and physical brand community is to be further explored. This research focuses on the members of the physical organic food store communities in Taipei area. It tests the hypotheses by estimating a structural equation model with survey data from a sample of the members of the organic food store culbs in Taipei area. After questionnaire investigation and SEM analysis, the empirical results are divided into three parts: 1.Information quality affects brand community loyalty intention through the mediation effect of community identification. And the accuracy, completeness, relevance, timeliness and consistency of the information quality have positive and significant effects on brand identifiaction. 2.Brand community identification not only influences the brand community loyalty intention through brand community commitment, but also directly affects the brand community loyalty intention positively and significantly. 3.Brand community identification doesn’t affect the brand community loyalty intentions through the mediation of normative pressure.

Studien syftar till att undersöka engagemang i ett online brand community (OBC) för att få en djupare förståelse för medlemmars engagemang i Sverige. Empirin samlades in genom en kvalitativ metod bestående av 13 semistrukturerade intervjuer med aktiva medlemmar. För att analysera empirin utgår studien från tre engagemangsdimensioner: affektivt, kognitivt och beteendemässigt engagemang. Resultatet visade hur aktiva medlemmars engagemang i OBC framkom genom en upplevd gemenskap, egennytta och vilja att tillgodose andra. Det framkom även att aktiva medlemmar har en betydande roll för interaktionen i OBC. Studien bidrar med en förståelse för medlemmars engagemang i ett svenskt OBC. / The study aims to investigate engagement in an online brand community (OBC) to gain a deeper understanding of members' engagement in Sweden. The empirical data was collected through a qualitative method consisting of 13 semi-structured interviews with active members. To analyze the empirical data, the study is based on three dimensions of engagement: affective, cognitive and behavioral engagement. The results showed how active members' engagement in OBC emerged through a perceived sense of community, self-interest and willingness to serve others. It also emerged that active members have a significant role in the interaction in OBC. The study contributes to an understanding of members' involvement in a Swedish OBC. This study is written in Swedish.

The importance of online brand communities has received increasing attention from both academia and industry. This paper reports a case study. It explains successful online strategies developed by two leading brands, Samsung mobile and Chungjungwon, in Korea. The current study has shown that the online brand community can act as a marketing tool to develop a group of loyal consumers around the brand. This study provides marketers with insights into and some useful guidelines for the creation and maintenance of successful marketer-generated online brand communities. The findings also suggest that there are differences in community development and management strategies, according to the characteristics of product category and community members, as well as in the purpose of the community operation. / text

The purpose of this dissertation is to demonstrate how individual consumers negotiate in the collective community in order to co-create value. By making use of the concepts of ‘resources’ from the Service Dominant Logic of Marketing and ‘cultural lens’ from Consumer Culture Theory, this dissertation considers both individual and collective interaction in order to demonstrate the roles of individual consumers in the value creation process and how the value creation process works. A comprehensive and up to date review of literature provides a guide to the theory and a path for research. This dissertation employed netnography to understand social and cultural aspects of consumption from an online football fan community. The data collection also included participant and non-participant observations, and local fans interviewings. Hermeneutical framework of interpretation was used to analyse data. The findings show that consumers can co-create value among themselves through the roles of ‘provider’ and ‘beneficiary’. It shows the dynamic movement of individual consumers within the continuous learning process of value creation. This dissertation demonstrates that brand community plays a role as a platform of value creation. Consumers can co-create value among themselves through the process of engaging, educating and enriching. The finding demonstrates active roles of consumers in value creation process. This dissertation also discusses how inequalities between resources of consumers in brand community can cause conflicts among them and how these conflicts stimulate consumers to co-create the collective resources. Within this process, consumers have collectively balanced the power through the social interaction in order to eliminate the domination and conflicts. This dissertation extends the previous researches in value creation within brand community by demonstrating how individual consumers engage and negotiated in value creation process. It contributes to respond working consumers and double exploitation through ‘sacrifice’.

The professional sport market and its established teams offer consumers a service and experience that is typically high in social identification, emotional involvement (Underwood, Bond & Baer, 2001) and a sense of community or social belonging (Heere & James, in press). The strong social attachment to a sports organisation and its brand is proposed here to closely resemble the concept of a brand community (Muñiz Jr & O'Guinn, 2001). For newly-established teams without a considerable history, along with having to compete with their established competitors, there is generally a lack of consumer identification or emotional investment in the team.This study aimed to investigate newly-established teams within the New Zealand sports market with two specific research questions: 1) What issues affect the development of a new sports team brand, and 2) Do managers of new sports teams use antecedents of brand community or social identification in their branding strategies, and if so, how?A qualitative, case study approach was used; featuring both interviews with managers of three newly-established New Zealand sports teams and direct observations of their stadiums. Findings suggested that the managers believed that existing image and awareness, audience nature, win-loss record, quality of the team or competition, and a lack of history were the main issues affecting the development of their brands. Respondents largely considered the antecedents of a brand community as important, with the exception of history. Promotion of these antecedents was largely absent from each of the team's branding strategies. Along with providing a detailed review of brand community literature, this thesis provides recommendations for managers of new teams on how to develop and position branding strategy toward the long-term goal of creating a community around their team brand.

This research was initiated due to the popularity brand community phenomenon is gaining among companies through last several years. Growing number of companies on the market and shortening of the life cycle of products, make companies work hard in order to retain existing customers and gain new ones. Brand communities may provide many benefits to companies such as ability to build customer loyalty, increase of the marketing efficiency and enhancement of a brand. We wish to explore brand communities from two perspectives: inside, factors that may influence brand community members in particular purchase of augmented products and word of mouth communication and outside, the perception of brand communities as a future value by prospective customers.Due to our philosophical considerations and non-geographical nature of brand communities, the research method that we have chosen is quantitative. In order to collect a large amount of primary raw data we have used a survey approach. Therefore the self-administered questionnaire was designed. Two sampling techniques were used in data collection process – convenience and snowball. The survey was distributed via e-mail and Internet. The predetermined respondents were asked to answer questionnaires and distribute them further. During the data collection period 258 respondents were surveyed.The findings of this research suggest that prospective customers, who have a favorite brand, see brand community as a future value, hence may have an incentive to buy products or services of a particular brand. A managerial implication in this case is that brand communities are a good opportunity for a company to build long term relations with existing customers by involving them in brand community activities. Brand community events such as meetings, festivals, and promotional activities also influence an incentive of consumers to buy augmented products or services of a company; hence giving a firm an opportunity to earn additional profits by selling more additional products, paid services or accessories. Word of mouth communication is another valuable asset that companies may use. In our research we have proved that word of mouth inside brand communities may influence its members to buy products or services of another brand under the influence of an opinion leader or the majority. So managers of companies that sell related or supplemented products may jointly organize events, and reach more consumers.