Yes / This study investigates the psychological effects of social identity on both posters and lurkers in online brand communities (OBCs). The results reveal the intermediate mechanisms mediating and moderating members’ social identity effects on members’ brand commitment leading to positive word-of-mouth and their resistance to negative information about the brand. This article treats social identity as a multi-dimensional construct. Differences amongst posters and lurkers on the relationships between the cognitive, affective and evaluative components of social identity are investigated along with their positive effect on brand commitment and behavioral consequences. Using a sample of 752 OBC members, both posters and lurkers emerge as valuable members and equally likely to derive social identity from their membership of an OBC. However, there are counter intuitive results for relationships within the research model between active and passive members of OBCs. These results offer implications for theory and can help managers to be better interactive marketers.

This research focuses on online brand communities from a brand management perspective. The purpose of this study is to contribute to understanding of online brand communities by examining differences in brand-sponsored and consumer-generated online brand communities, and to extend research into online brand communities by examining online brand communities for a sports brand. The first phase of this study investigates how consumption practices differ in brand-sponsored and consumer-generated online brand communities. Online brand communities for the All Blacks brand were selected as a case study for this research. The All Blacks brand-sponsored and consumer-generated online brand communities were observed for eight weeks and afterwards discussions in both communities were analysed for two weeks to identify consumption practices. Ethical issues pertinent to this research design meant raw comments and discussions could not be collected and instead discussions were immediately analysed through a coding process. The second phase of this study investigates marketing industry expert views on brand-sponsored and consumer-generated online brand communities. Interviews with three representatives from service and sports organisations were held. The findings from this research contribute to literature on online brand communities by demonstrating brand-sponsored and consumer-generated online brand communities differ in consumption practices, language, self-expression, modes of interaction, and legitimacy. This study also extends research into online brand communities by investigating online brand communities for sports brands. Findings imply there are minimal differences between online brand communities for service or sports brands compared with online brand communities for goods. The outcomes from this research may also have a number of implications for marketers, hoping to capitalise on the growth of online brand communities.

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

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This paper explores value co-creation and value co-destruction with a focus on the social practices embedded in the online brand community “My Starbucks Idea (MSI).” The objectives of the research are accomplished through a detailed explanation of the study’s stages, starting with the Research design/Planning, and followed by the Community Entry (Entrée), Data collection, Limitations, and Ethical implications. Since the study is exploratory in character, the qualitative research strategy was used. As Bryman and Bell (2011) note, qualitative research gives particular attention to words rather than numbers in the gathering and interpretation of data. This study applied a modified ‘netnographic’ approach, a new qualitative method devised specifically to investigate consumer behaviour vis-à-vis cultures and communities present on the Internet (Kozinets 1998). This study identifies three elements of practice: stalking, gossip, and exhibitionism. It also supports the idea stated by Echeverri & Skålén (2011) that there is no positive without a negative in interactive value formation. Although those authors’ work was focused on the provider-customer interface, the idea proves applicable to the online brand community (OBC) used for illustration in this study. The present study also draws attention to a vital characteristic of practice often forgotten: ‘Language’ as an enabler of all other elements (Whittington 2006). The paper contributes to the knowledge in the practice theory domain, and thus consumer culture, especially relating to OBCs. When using OBCs as a marketing tool, considerable ingenuity must be employed by business managers to gain strategic information and feedback from online forum discussions. Such information can help in the company’s strategic decision making. By building relationships and gaining new customers through the process of collaboration, managers can become more like brand storytellers. Also, such communication can be channelled as a means to create greater awareness, both of the brand and the users’ experiences, along with aiding in the development of better services and products to meet customers’ needs. In the current study, consent was an ethical concern that limited the scope and path taken by the paper. The ten-week research period was another limiting factor in properly covering all of the contextualized consumption activities and gaining sufficient experience within the MSI community.

The use of online brand communities and its effect on brand loyalty has been heavily researched in previous studies. However, online brand communities in the context of motorsport, which is inherently different from other sports, has not been thoroughly researched previously and currently remains unknown. The study aims to understand how motorsport followers become brand loyal within their brand communities and if their identification with the brand has an influence on the process. The following research questions were developed to find these answers: RQ1: "How does involvement in online brand communities affect brand loyalty among motorsport fans?" RQ2: "How do online brand communities influence brand identification for motorsport enthusiasts?" RQ3: "How does member participation in online brand communities contribute to the connection between online brand communities and brand loyalty in motorsport?" A quantitative research design was followed, using a survey with questions developed based on previous research. The final sample size was 403 after the data was cleaned. The findings from the survey suggest that concepts such as brand community engagement had a direct effect on the development of brand loyalty. Other findings also showed that brand identification had a mediating role between certain brand community belonging characteristics and brand loyalty. Additionally, the study found that brand community participation had no moderating effect between brand community belonging characteristics and brand loyalty, however did have a direct link between brand identification and brand loyalty. Further research includes testing the study’s model in other brand communities within the motorsport context to provide more information into this unknown field of sport and its members. / Användningen av online varumärkesgemenskaper och dess effekt på varumärkeslojalitet har undersökts noggrant i tidigare studier. Online varumärkesgemenskaper inom motorsport, som är fundamentalt annorlunda från andra sporter, har dock inte tidigare undersökts ingående och är för närvarande okända. Studien syftar till att förstå hur motorsportföljare blir varumärkeslojala inom sina varumärkesgemenskaper och om deras identifiering med varumärket har inflytande i processen. Följande forskningsfrågor utvecklades för att hitta dessa svar: FF1: "Hur påverkar deltagande i online varumärkesgemenskaper varumärkeslojalitet bland motorsportfans?" FF2: "Hur påverkar online varumärkesgemenskaper varumärkesidentifiering för motorsportentusiaster?" FF3: "Hur bidrar medlemsdeltagande i online varumärkesgemenskaper till kopplingen mellan online varumärkesgemenskaper och varumärkeslojalitet inom motorsport?" En kvantitativ forskningsdesign följdes med hjälp av en enkät med frågor utvecklade utifrån tidigare forskning. Den slutliga provstorleken efter att data rengjorts var 403. Resultaten från undersökningen tyder på att begrepp som engagemang i varumärkesgemenskap hade en direkt effekt på utvecklingen av varumärkeslojalitet. Andra resultat visade också att varumärkesidentifiering hade en medierande roll mellan vissa egenskaper för varumärkesgemenskap och varumärkeslojalitet. Dessutom visade studien att deltagande i varumärkesgemenskap inte hade en modererande effekt mellan egenskaper för varumärkesgemenskap och varumärkeslojalitet, men hade en direkt länk mellan varumärkesidentifiering och varumärkeslojalitet. Vidare forskning inkluderar att testa studiemodellen i andra varumärkesgemenskaper inom motorsportkontexten för att tillhandahålla mer information om denna okända sport och dess medlemmar.