Aided by the development of information technology, the balance of power in the market place is rapidly shifting from marketers towards consumers and nowhere is this more obvious than in the online environment (Denegri-Knott, Zwick, & Schroeder, 2006; Moynagh & Worsley, 2002; Newcomer, 2000; Samli, 2001). From the inception and continuous development of the Internet, consumers are becoming more empowered. They can choose what they want to click on the Internet, they can shop and transact payments, watch and download video, chat with others, be it friends or even total strangers. Especially in online communities, like-minded consumers share and exchange information, ideas and opinions. One form of online community is the online brand community, which gathers specific brand lovers. As with any social unit, people form different roles in the community and exert different effects on each other. Their interaction online can greatly influence the brand and marketers. A comprehensive understanding of the operation of this special group form is essential to advancing marketing thought and practice (Kozinets, 1999). While online communities have strongly shifted the balance of power from marketers to consumers, the current marketing literature is sparse on power theory (Merlo, Whitwell, & Lukas, 2004). Some studies have been conducted from an economic point of view (Smith, 1987), however their application to marketing has been limited. Denegri-Knott (2006) explored power based on the struggle between consumers and marketers online and identified consumer power formats such as control over the relationship, information, aggregation and participation. Her study has built a foundation for future power studies in the online environment. This research project bridges the limited marketing literature on power theory with the growing recognition of online communities among marketing academics and practitioners. Specifically, this study extends and redefines consumer power by exploring the concept of power in online brand communities, in order to better understand power structure and distribution in this context. This research investigates the applicability of the factors of consumer power identified by Denegri-Knott (2006) to the online brand community. In addition, by acknowledging the model proposed by McAlexander, Schouten, & Koenig (2002), which emphasized that community study should focus on the role of consumers and identifying multiple relationships among the community, this research further explores how member role changes will affect power relationships as well as consumer likings of the brand. As a further extension to the literature, this study also considers cultural differences and their effect on community member roles and power structure. Based on the study of Hofstede (1980), Australia and China were chosen as two distinct samples to represent differences in two cultural dimensions, namely individualism verses collectivism and high power distance verses low power distance. This contribution to the research also helps answer the research gap identified by Muñiz Jr & O'Guinn (2001), who pointed out the lack of cross cultural studies within the online brand community context. This research adopts a case study methodology to investigate the issues identified above. Case study is an appropriate research strategy to answer “how” and “why” questions of a contemporary phenomenon in real-life context (Yin, 2003). The online brand communities of “Haloforum.net” in Australia and “NGA.cn” in China were selected as two cases. In-depth interviews were used as the primary data collection method. As a result of the geographical dispersion and the preference of a certain number of participants, online synchronic interviews via MSN messenger were utilized along with the face-to-face interviews. As a supplementary approach, online observation was carried over two months, covering a two week period prior to the interviews and a six week period following the interviews. Triangulation techniques were used to strengthen the credibility and validity of the research findings (Yin, 2003). The findings of this research study suggest a new definition of power in an online brand community. This research also redefines the consumer power types and broadens the brand community model developed by McAlexander et al. (2002) in an online context by extending the various relationships between brand and members. This presents a more complete picture of how the perceived power relationships are structured in the online brand community. A new member role is discovered in the Australian online brand community in addition to the four member roles identified by Kozinets (1999), in contrast however, all four roles do not exist in the Chinese online brand community. The research proposes a model which links the defined power types and identified member roles. Furthermore, given the results of the cross-cultural comparison between Australia and China showed certain discrepancies, the research suggests that power studies in the online brand community should be country-specific. This research contributes to the body of knowledge on online consumer power, by applying it to the context of an online brand community, as well as considering factors such as cross cultural difference. Importantly, it provides insights for marketing practitioners on how to best leverage consumer power to serve brand objective in online brand communities. This, in turn, should lead to more cost effective and successful communication strategies. Finally, the study proposes future research directions. The research should be extended to communities of different sizes, to different extents of marketer control over the community, to the connection between online and offline activities within the brand community, and (given the cross-cultural findings) to different countries. In addition, a greater amount of research in this area is recommended to determine the generalizability of this study.

品牌，對現今的行銷及組織經營而言早已成為相當重要的課題，因為它不僅是一個圖像或名稱，而是讓組織與商品得以在眾多的競爭者間脫穎而出的策略；而品牌必須要不斷的擴大顧客對於品牌的終生貢獻價值，即顧客權益（customer equity）的擴張，因此當忠誠度能夠幫助顧客權益的擴張時，組織如何建立忠誠度即成為廣受關注的議題，而能幫助忠誠度發展的「品牌社群」便漸漸吸引許多學者的研究。 本研究以McAlexander、Schouten與Koenign（2002）三位學者提出的「品牌社群關係模型（brand community relationship model）」為基礎，希冀以品牌社群成員的觀點研究「品牌社群經營」、「品牌社群關係」與「品牌忠誠度」間關係，並進一步探討品牌的「理性傾向」對於上述「品牌社群經營」、「品牌社群關係」以及「品牌忠誠度」關係的影響。 本研究以多個不同品牌的品牌家族為研究對象，透過Swatch、Samsung以及Sony三個品牌家族的經營者進行深入訪談後，以Swatch、Seiko、Samsung三個不同品牌的品牌家族為問卷調查對象，經由一系列的量化分析後得出以下研究結論： 一、品牌社群關係與品牌忠誠度 品牌社群內的社群成員與品牌的關係好壞對品牌忠誠度是有正向驅動關係；而透過比較不同品牌社群的品牌社群關係構面對品牌忠誠度的作用，發現不同品牌會呈現不同的強弱影響關係。 二、品牌社群經營與品牌社群關係 社群成員在品牌社群中，對於「人際相關的社群活動（communal community program）」的參與較能幫助成員與品牌的關係，而「實質利益相關的社群活動（non-communal community program）」的經營與品牌社群關係的好壞並無顯著的關係，因此品牌社群若能提供社群成員良好的「人際互動經驗」較能明顯幫助品牌社群關係的建立。 三、社群成員對品牌的理性傾向與品牌社群經營 理性傾向將會降低品牌社群成員對於人際相關活動的參與情形，連帶的降低社群活動期望的正向差距，因此消費者對品牌的態度越理性，對於品牌社群的經營就有較不利的影響。 四、品牌理性傾向與品牌忠誠度 雖然「理性傾向」對於品牌社群的經營有不利的效果，不過在研究中發現到當品牌給社群成員越多理性的資訊時，社群成員會藉由增強對經營公司的好感以幫助品牌忠誠度的建立。 / Brand has become an important issue to marketing and organization management nowadays, for it is not only a logo or a name but a strategy that distinguishes an organization and its products from numerous competitors. A brand must continuously expand its customers’ lifetime contribution value, namely the increase of customer equity. Therefore, when loyalty helps increase customer equity, how an organization establish loyalty becomes a critical issue, while “brand community” that assists developing loyalty gradually arise many scholars interest in research. The research adopts “brand community relationship model” by McAlexander, Schouten and Koenign (2002), attempting to study relationship among “brand community management”, “brand community relationship” and “brand loyalty” via perspective of brand community members, and further discussing influence of brand “rational inclination” on the aforementioned “brand community management”, “brand community relationship” and “brand loyalty”. The research uses multiple-brand family as research subject, conducting in-depth interview with managers of three brand families of Swatch, Samsung and Sony, and choosing brand families of Swatch, Seiko and Samsung as questionnaire targets. The following conclusions are derived after a series of quantitative analysis: 1. Brand community relationship and brand loyalty Relationship between members of brand community and brand has positive correlation to brand loyalty. By comparing different brand community’s effect of brand community relationship dimension on brand loyalty, the research found different brands generate different level of influence relationship. 2. Brand community management and brand community relationship Participation in “communal community program” by members of brand community reinforces relationship between members and brand, yet no significant relationship is found between management of “non-communal community program” and brand community relationship. Thus, it is more obvious in establishing brand community relationship if brand community provide members with satisfactory “interrelationship experience” 3. Community members’ rational inclination toward brand and brand community management Rational inclination will reduce brand community members’ participation in interrelationship activities, which reduces positive gap in social activity anticipation. Hence, the more rational attitude consumers hold toward a brand, the less favorable effect it has on management of brand community. 4. Brand rational inclination and brand loyalty Although “rational inclination” has less favorable effects on management of brand community, the research found that when more rational information is provided to community members, they will enhance establishment of brand loyalty by increasing goodwill toward the company.