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Higher Price: A Benefit of Online Value Co-Creation Activities in Sponsored Communities
Abstract
This study examines how online value co-creation activities benefit brands in the form of willingness to pay a higher price (WPHP). We propose a framework of value co-creation in three management fields (product design, marketing, and after-sales service) and empirically examine the relationships among co-creation activities, customer-brand relationships, and customers’ WPHP. Interestingly, we find that the co-creation activities in two of the three management fields can enhance both customers’ brand passion and self-brand connection, which increases their WPHP only through the full mediation of brand satisfaction. Our findings contribute to theories on IT value and value co-creation.
... For Gouvêa et al. (2018), the brand adds value (in intangible as well as in tangible benefits) that the buyer is willing to pay. The proximity with the brand brings pride, comfort and happiness to customers, these positive feelings are developed based on the frequent interaction between customer and brands over time (Chen et al., 2022), where the customers can have favorable affections toward object which are important to their lives or perceived value in it. The symbolic value the brand image can bring out empathy or emotional response to the customers (Sudaryanto et al., 2022). ...
... . ParaGouvêa et al. (2018), a marca agrega valor (tanto em benefícios intangíveis quanto em benefícios tangíveis) no que o comprador está disposto a pagar. A proximidade com a marca traz orgulho, conforto e felicidade aos clientes, sentimentos positivos que são desenvolvidos com base na interação frequente entre cliente e marcas ao longo do tempo(Chen et al., 2022), com a qual os clientes podem ter afetos favoráveis para objetos que são importantes para suas vidas ou valores percebidos neles. O valor simbólico da imagem da marca pode trazer empatia ou resposta emocional aos clientes(Sudaryanto et al., 2022).Com isso, uma marca associada a alto valor simbólico está positivamente relacionada à percepção de valor, emoção positiva e, como resulta em maior disposição a pagar, também à equidade de preço em um determinado nível de preço. ...
Objetivo: O objetivo desta pesquisa é analisar como o conhecimento da marca e a faixa de preço moderam as relações entre as dimensões cognitivas (percepção de valor e nível de preço) e afetivas (emoção e valor simbólico) da visualização de preço de um varejista e seu impacto na intenção de compra.Desenho/metodologia/abordagem: O estudo é baseado em uma pesquisa com 856 universitários brasileiros em uma grande cidade brasileira. A estrutura teórica básica inclui cinco parâmetros latentes e dois moderadores e suas relações são analisadas usando modelos de equações estruturais com análises multigrupo e de mediação moderada usando PROCESS.Originalidade: Os resultados são importantes para o fortalecimento da pesquisa acadêmica na visualização de preço de marcas e apresentam de forma integrada a relação entre faixa de preço e valor percebido mediada pelo valor simbólico e emoções positivas e moderado pelo conhecimento da marca.Resultados: Os resultados mostram que, para marcas conhecidas, o valor simbólico, o valor percebido e a intenção de compra são mais fortes em níveis de preço alto versus baixo, enquanto esses efeitos não existem para marcas desconhecidas. Além disso, um posicionamento de baixo preço reduz o valor simbólico e o valor percebido para marcas conhecidas, enquanto não tem efeito sobre o valor simbólico e aumenta diretamente o valor percebido de marcas desconhecidas.Implicações práticas: Os resultados podem ajudar gestores de preços a direcionar melhor suas estratégias de precificação com base em como o conhecimento da marca e a faixa de preço impactam a percepção e as relações entre valor simbólico, valor percebido, emoções e intenção de compra do consumidor.
... Adomavicius et al. [1] found that the online recommender system affects consumers' preferences and their consequent willingness-to-pay judgments. Other factors that affect consumers' willingness to pay include consumers' brand perception and passion [7,18], perceived social or emotional value [60], sustainability perceptions [51,95], trust in seller [118], consumers' purchase experience [100], and linguistic style of the title of the property [44]. For example, Heo and Park [44] focused on the peer-to-peer accommodation context and found the language used in the title of the property affects the room rate. ...
The worldwide popularity of blind boxes is growing rapidly. A blind box contains one of a series of products, which is not revealed until after a consumer receives and opens it. This separation of the transaction and fulfillment processes creates a mystery and excitement when purchasing a blind box. Thus, online information provision plays an important role for consumers to understand blind box and generate their willingness to pay. This study investigates the link between the format of online information provision and the market price of a blind box, focusing on a comprehensive examination of the linguistic characteristics of sellers’ product descriptions. This study finds that a U-shaped relationship exists between the subjectivity, diversity, and readability of the blind box product description and its market price. This calls online sellers to use an “extreme-point” approach when crafting their product descriptions. However, the findings suggest that an inverted U-shape relationship between ambiguity and the market price. That is, online sellers should provide the necessary information but in a brief way to keep the mystery of blind box. In addition, the findings suggest that ambiguity of the product description plays the most important role in affecting the blind box price. However, when a blind box is open, ambiguity does not play a significant role, and the impact of diversity is reversed. The findings offer guidelines for online sellers to implement their optimal information provision strategy to enhance the product attractiveness and increase consumers’ willingness to pay and thus their financial performance.
... Consumers are willing to pay high prices if mediated by brand satisfaction (A. Chen et al., 2022). This proves emotional labor as an important role in tourism (Shyju et al., 2023). ...
Purpose: This study aims to see the extent of Borobudur temple as heritage tourism with neuromarketing/nostalgia as its main indicator. Theoretical Framework: The basic theory used is neuromarketing theory. Nostalgia as neuromarketing is defined as an emotion that has implications for a series of complex psychological processes, including social behavior. This social behavior is also related to a person's consumption behavior towards certain purchases which creates a nostalgic impact on that person. This consumption behavior is related to the marketing strategy implemented by the marketing object. Design/Methodology: The research method used is the Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) SmartPLS version 4 model. With validity, reliability and goodness of fit analysis tools to answer the research hypothesis. Findings: The results obtained by nostalgia marketing have a positive and significant effect on brand reputation, service quality, and premium price. Brand reputation and premium price do not mediate nostalgic marketing on customer satisfaction, while service quality mediates. Last result, brand reputation and premium price had no effect on customer satisfaction, while service quality had a positive and significant effect. Practical and Social Effects: Tourists' perception of tourist attractions is formed not only on the basis of individual knowledge and beliefs about the characteristics of the site, but also their feelings and perceptions of the destination. Thus, if we want to strengthen again, there is a need for an age-old relationship between tourists and brands. With constant satisfaction, respondent satisfaction remains high to an insignificant price, and commitment and loyalty will be formed. Value or Origin: The many historical tourism sectors in Indonesia and the high number of older visitors make this sector a source of economic and regional growth. This is reinforced by data from Borobudur Temple as the largest Buddhist temple heritage tourist attraction in the world, where 23% of visitors or tourists are over 50 years old. At that age, what motivation makes them visit if not memories and historical facts of the past. Remembering the past, it is easiest to visit the subject directly, this is important in studying neuromarketing and emotions in business.
... some consumers love the MacBook because it represents them). In the latter case, the link appears because the brand offers benefits that are meaningful in terms of fulfilling instrumental values (i.e. the MacBook is essential for some consumers to do their work or for entertainment purposes) (Chen et al., 2022). Thus, if a brand is able to forge a link with a consumer's identities, goals and concerns, SBC will have been achieved (Lin et al., 2021). ...
Purpose
In the channel-mix era, the customer journey involves combining channels during all the stages of the decision-making process, such that creating and maintaining relationships with consumers poses a challenge to retailers. This work aims to explore what role brands play in this issue by analyzing what impact the perceived benefits of brand channel-mix have on consumer self–brand connection (SBC) and what their effect is in enduring consumer–brand relationships (i.e. future channel-mix use and word of mouth [WOM]). This paper also explores the moderating role of product involvement in these relations.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors carried out a personal questionnaire with a sample of 288 consumers who were recruited after leaving one of the stores of a clothing brand that is a successful example of distribution channel management.
Findings
Insofar as consumers perceive channel-mix benefits, SBC will be higher and (or as a result) their future intentions with the brand will be more intense. In addition, the results show that product involvement moderates the relationship between SBC and channel-mix use intention and WOM.
Originality/value
This work contributes to channel-mix, relationship marketing, brand and product involvement literature by analyzing how customers may be retained in the channel-mix era through brand management and by considering product category involvement. This study merges brand and product variables to explore their impact on relationship marketing within channel-mix behaviors.
... This difference in perspective could change the application of current knowledge on the process of managing cocreation and affect its outcomes. Models to manage the co-creation process for collaborations between firms (Haukipuro et al., 2018;Hidalgo and Herrera, 2020;Nobari and Dehkordi, 2023) or between a firm and its customers (Patricio et al., 2020;Sjödin et al., 2020;Ebrahim and Yordanova, 2018;Chen et al., 2022) have A. Dion-Poulin et al. been proposed in the literature. Given the different dynamics in universityindustry collaboration in which the university aims to develop useful knowledge that will become products to be commercialised by the industrial partner, existing models are difficult to apply (De Silva and Rossi, 2018). ...
Co-creation is recognised in the literature as fostering successful collaboration between academia and industry. Although models do exist, they only contain general principals and provide no details about the process from ideation to value creation. Moreover, they are established based on a consideration that industry submits a problem and the university provides solutions. However, with increasing pressure on researchers for their research to lead to tangible applications, universities must now also turn to firms to pinpoint their needs and practices. The purpose of this paper is to understand how a researcher can implement and manage a co-creation project in collaboration with firms to foster innovation. A university research team in food science and technology, in response to the issue of allergen management in the food service industry, more specifically the use of eggs in pastries, has led a co-creation project with six professional pastry chefs to improve cake formulations, in which eggs were replaced with legume puree. Based on the results and the literature, a model to manage the co-creation process between academia and industry that incorporates a collaboration platform is proposed. This paper also identifies the concrete practices that foster creativity and interaction among participants and that lead to innovation.
Advancements in social media technology have empowered brands to engage in virtual Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) co‐creation activities, which are crucial for CSR success and sustainability. Employing four scenario‐based experimental studies (1049 samples in total) alongside analyses of variance (ANOVA) and regression methodologies, we investigate how virtual CSR co‐creation activities impact consumer emotional reactions and branding behaviors. The SPSS software and the Process macro were used for data analysis. The results reveal that higher persistence (Study 1) and deeper participation (Study 2) in virtual CSR co‐creation are more likely to enhance brand passion. Flow experience mediates the above positive relationship between virtual CSR co‐creation and brand passion. Furthermore, when virtual CSR co‐creation activities take place in private settings rather than public settings, the positive effects of consumers' participation persistence and depth on brand passion will be attenuated. This work advances the theoretical understanding of brand passion within the domain of virtual CSR co‐creation. It provides new perspectives and practical implications for enhancing consumer‐brand relationships through virtual CSR co‐creation activities.
Customers’ online value co-creation activities can occur the whole management domain (i.e., product design, marketing, and customer relationship management) of a product. Previous studies have researched value co-creation from different angles, customers’ online value co-creation activities are more complex and its formation mechanism still worth exploring. Online communities need to create different environments according to different management fields to stimulate customers to participate in Online Value Co-creation activities. Existing research confuses different value co-creation activities in the entire management field without considering the different antecedents of Online Value Co-creation activities in different situations and different management domains. The purpose of this paper is to explore the formation mechanism behind customers’ online value co-creation activities during the whole management domain. Drawing on social learning theory, this study examines the influential role of environmental factors (i.e., innovation climate and social climate) of online communities and personal need factors (i.e., brand passion, satisfaction, dissatisfaction and desire for control) on customers’ value co-creation activities in the three fields of the management domain. Empirical analyses in this study reveal that these factors play different roles in shaping value co-creation activities in the three fields. The findings enrich our understanding of customers’ value co-creation activities in online communities and offer a broadened view of the value co-creation framework and climate theory. Understanding the factors that motivate consumers to engage in co-creation activities in different management domain enables firms to strategically manage their co-creation relationships and innovation processes.
Companies across industries are shifting toward a platform ecosystem strategy. By leveraging cloud computing technologies, companies aim to benefit from collaboration with a wide range of third-party developers within emergent platform ecosystems. To succeed, these companies need to develop new organizational capabilities to co-create and capture value in platform ecosystems. To understand what capabilities are crucial to establish platform ecosystems and how they contribute to value co-creation and value capture, we conducted a multi-year, in-depth case study of SAP’s cloud platform project. We identified (1) technology-related capabilities (cloud-based platformization, open IT landscape management) and (2) relationship-driven capabilities (ecosystem orchestration, platform evangelism, platform co-selling) and illustrate how these capabilities help the platform owner to enable and balance value co-creation and value capture in an emergent platform ecosystem. With our findings, we contribute to the discussion on how companies can overcome the challenging emergent phase of platform ecosystems. We thereby bridge literature on value creation in platform ecosystems and on organizational capabilities. Though we conducted our study in the context of the enterprise software industry, we discuss how our findings apply to prospective platform owners from different contexts.
Current research marks the first attempt to investigate the precursors and consequences of brand love in the process of service co-creation in the hospitality sector by taking diners' participation and perceived value as antecedents and three types of diners' well-being as the outcomes of brand love in a realistic co-creation setting (a Chinese hotpot cuisine restaurant). Using 500 responses, this study finds that information-seeking, responsible behavior and personal interaction increase perceived value, whereas information-seeking, personal interaction, and perceived value increase brand love. Perceived value mediates the relationships of information seeking, responsible behavior and personal interaction with brand love. Brand love directly effects all dimensions of diners' well-being, whereas, information-seeking, responsible behavior and personal interaction indirectly impact all dimensions of well-being. Furthermore, self-perceived mastering negatively moderates the participation perceived value, and participation-brand love relationships.
Given the scale and scope of consumer conversations on social media, it is both possible and challenging for organizations to identify valuable ideas from those conversations that could lead to successful innovations. We examine how a large retailer developed a new capability to leverage public social media conversations for innovation through a process of filtering, assessing, converting, and deploying. By inductively developing a process model of how the retailer managed to convert consumer conversations on social media into organizational innovation, our study sheds light on the microfoundations of this important capability.
Electronic word of mouth (eWOM) is a prevalent consumer practice that has
undeniable effects on the company bottom line; yet it remains an over-labeled and under-theorized concept. Thus, marketers could benefit from a practical, science-based roadmap to maximize its business value. Building on the consumer motivation–opportunity–ability framework, this study conceptualizes three distinct stages in the eWOM process: eWOM creation, eWOM exposure, and eWOM
evaluation. For each stage, we adopt a dual lens—from the perspective of the
consumer (who sends and receives eWOM) and that of the marketer (who amplifies and manages eWOM for business results)—to synthesize key research insights and propose a research agenda based on a multi-disciplinary systematic review of 1,050 academic publications on eWOM published between 1996 and 2019. We conclude with a discussion of the future of eWOM research and practice.
Open access: https://rdcu.be/b3jZ6
This study analyzes the influence of apparel/clothing brand social media marketing activities (SMMAs) on brand equity and customer response in Pakistan. First, the current SMMAs are examined; then, we propose new attributes, i.e., fundamental social media marketing activities (FSMMAs) and sophisticated social media marketing activities (SSMMAs) such as interactions, sharing, and trendiness. Second, the influence of innovative components, i.e., FSMMAs and SSMMAs, are analyzed regarding brand equity and customer response toward apparel brands. A survey was conducted with a total of 406 Pakistani customers who used apparel brands, and the collected data were analyzed through confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and Hayes PROCESS macro in SPSS. From the empirical results, we concluded that apparel brand equity (i.e., brand awareness, brand image) significantly mediates the relationship between FSMMAs and customer response (price premium willingness, customer loyalty). Moreover, it is also determined that SSMMAs moderate the indirect association of FSMMAs and customer response via brand equity.
Social media platforms provide an enormous public repository of textual data from which valuable information can be extracted. We show that firms can extract business intelligence from social media data bearing on an important business application, measuring brand personality. Specifically, we develop a text analytics framework that integrates different distinct sources of social media data generated by consumers, employees, and firms, to measure brand personality. Based on Elastic-Net regression analyses of a large corpus of social media data, including self-descriptions of 1,996,214 consumers who followed the sample of brands on social media, 312,400 employee reviews of the brands’ firms, and 680,056 brand official tweets, we develop a brand personality model that achieves prediction accuracy as high as 0.78. Among key insights, we find that the profile of individuals who choose to associate with brands on social media is an important predictor of brand personality; this provides the first real-world evidence for a consumer identity-brand personality link. We also identify a link between an organization’s internal corporate environment as perceived by employees and brand personality as judged by consumers. We further illuminate the practical implication of our predictive model by building a cloud-based information system that allows managers and analysts to explore and track personality of their own brands and their competitors’ brands.
To advance understanding of how well different types of brand relationships drive customer brand loyalty and to help companies improve the effectiveness of their relationship-building investments, this article conducts a meta-analysis of the link between five consumer-brand relationship constructs and customer brand loyalty. The analysis of 588 elasticities from 290 studies reported in 255 publications over 24 years (n = 348,541 across 46 countries) reveals that the aggregate brand relationship elasticity is .439. More importantly, results demonstrate under what conditions various types of brand relationships increase loyalty. For example, while elasticities are generally highest for love-based and attachment-based brand relationships, the positive influence of brand relationships on customer brand loyalty is stronger in more recent (vs. earlier) years, for non-status (vs. status) and publicly (vs. privately) consumed brands as well as for estimates using attitudinal (vs. behavioral) customer brand loyalty. Overall, the results suggest that brand relationship elasticities vary considerably across brand, loyalty, time, and consumer characteristics. Drawing on these findings, the current research advances implications for managers and scholars and provide avenues for future research.
Brand love is the most emotionally intense connection between consumers and their brands. Referring to their interpersonal counterpart, it is assumed that consumer–brand relationships change their nature over time. However, most studies in this field do not take into consideration this dynamic characteristic. As part of a dynamic perspective of emotionality within consumer–brand relationships, this study is the first to integrate traditional relationship lifecycle concepts and interpersonal love theories. Addressing the developmental path of brand love dimensions over the course of a relationship, the analysis shows that the emotional bond with a brand as represented by brand love and its subdimensions do not follow a prototypical trajectory as assumed by traditional lifecycle concepts. Instead of forming an inverse U‐shape, the respective dimensions show divergent paths rather resembling the development of their interpersonal correspondent. Comparing hedonic and utilitarian brand concepts, it is shown that brand love can arise for hedonic brands and, just as well, for brands perceived as predominantly utilitarian. Moreover, the results advocate the singularity of brand love among relational constructs, thereby paving the way for a distinct theoretical approach centering on the lifecycle of love. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.
Provides a nontechnical introduction to the partial least squares (PLS) approach. As a logical base for comparison, the PLS approach for structural path estimation is contrasted to the covariance-based approach. In so doing, a set of considerations are then provided with the goal of helping the reader understand the conditions under which it might be reasonable or even more appropriate to employ this technique. This chapter builds up from various simple 2 latent variable models to a more complex one. The formal PLS model is provided along with a discussion of the properties of its estimates. An empirical example is provided as a basis for highlighting the various analytic considerations when using PLS and the set of tests that one can employ is assessing the validity of a PLS-based model. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
How is value created in an online community (OC) over time? We explored this question through a longitudinal field study of an OC in the healthcare arena. We found that multiple kinds of value were produced and changed over time as different participants engaged with the OC and its evolving technology in various ways. To explain our findings, we theorize OC value as performed through the ongoing sociomaterial configuring of strategies, digital platform, and stakeholder engagement. We develop a process perspective to explain these dynamics and identify multiple different kinds of value being created by an OC over time: financial, epistemic, ethical, service, reputational and platform. Our research points to the importance of expanding the notion of OC users to encompass a broader understanding of stakeholders. It further suggests that creating OC value increasingly requires going beyond a dyadic relationship between the OC and firm to encompassing a more complex relationship involving a wider ecosystem of stakeholders.
This research examines the relationship between desire for control and acceptance of new
products. We hypothesize that desire for control—the need to personally control outcomes in one’s life—acts as a barrier to new product acceptance. Three experiments provide support for this hypothesis. This effect holds when desire for control is high as a dispositional trait (Studies 1 and 3) and when it is situationally induced (Study 2). We also identify an intervention to increase new product acceptance based on the idea that new products threaten one’s sense of control. Specifically, framing new products as potentially increasing one’s sense of control increases acceptance of new products by those high in desire for control (Study 3). This finding offers some evidence for the underlying process and helps guide managerial actions.
Many companies have found that for their products to be successful in the market, they must first pay for word of mouth marketing and then utilize other types of ads. Previous studies have not paid enough attention to the value of target consumers. This study evaluates the roles of value congruity, brand love, and brand image in creating a consumer commitment that leads to positive word of mouth. The sample is comprised of makeup consumers in Rasht, Iran. At first, thirty stores were selected in the city center. Then, 384 questionnaires were distributed with sampling available in selected stores. Amos 22 was used to test the conceptual model. The results show that the value congruity of the brand consumer has a positive impact on the brand image and brand commitment. Moreover, brand love and brand commitment have a significant positive impact on positive word of mouth. But the impacts of brand image and brand love on brand commitment are rejected. Also, brand image has a significant positive impact on brand love.
Access-policy violations are a growing problem with substantial costs for organizations. Although training programs and sanctions have been suggested as a means of reducing these violations, evidence shows the problem persists. It is thus imperative to identify additional ways to reduce access-policy violations, especially for systems providing broad access to data. We use accountability theory to develop four user-interface (UI) design artifacts that raise users' accountability perceptions within systems and in turn decrease access-policy violations. To test our model, we uniquely applied the scenario-based factorial survey method to various graphical manipulations of a records system containing sensitive information at a large organization with over 300 end users who use the system daily. We show that the UI design artifacts corresponding to four submanipulations of accountability can raise accountability and reduce access policy violation intentions. Our findings have several theoretical and practical implications for increasing accountability using UI design. Moreover, we are the first to extend the scenario-based factorial survey method to test design artifacts. This method provides the ability to use more design manipulations and to test with fewer users than is required in traditional experimentation and research on human-computer interaction. We also provide bootstrapping tests of mediation and moderation and demonstrate how to analyze fixed and random effects within the factorial survey method optimally.
The term ‘customer engagement’ has been increasingly used in academic marketing literature. Empowered by the rise of the internet, customers are no longer a ‘passive audience’ but ‘active co-producers’ and engage in behaviours that strengthen their relationship with the product, company or brand, such as collaborating to co-create value through innovation. However, few studies exist on collaborative innovation and how to engage customers in co-creation, namely in specific virtual environments. Drawing on insights from product innovation and virtual communities, our study seeks to understand why customers participate voluntarily and freely in co-creation online activities, by testing a conceptual model which considers an integrated set of motivations for members to engage in collaborative innovation. On a managerial level, our study intends to provide valuable insights to firms on how to create an experience to engage consumers in co-creation in virtual communities.
Participation in sponsored online co-creation is said to be driven primarily by an individual’s intrinsic motivation, which in turn may be crowded-out, or undermined by financial incentives. The effect of financial incentives, specifically in a company-sponsored online co-creation brainstorming (COCB) context, however, remains unexplored. In this study, we use LEGO Ideas, a prominent COCB, as an exemplar and employ a between-subjects randomized experimental design to examine the effect of different types of financial incentives on intrinsic motivation’s impact on participation intention in a COCB context, either directly or indirectly through personal innovativeness in the domain of information technology. Our findings suggest that focused financial incentives, representing situations where financial rewards are administered exclusively on the basis of excellent performance, offer the best outcome for predicting participation intention. These findings contribute to our knowledge of the use of financial incentives in sponsored online co-creation generally, and specifically in COCBs.
Purpose
Drawing on consumer brand relationship theory, this study aims to investigate online brand engagement, brand trust and consumer brand identification as antecedents of brand love, amongst Generation Y and Z consumers. It explores the role of brand love in predicting consumers’ intention to co-create value and willingness to pay a premium price for the brand, for brands followed on social media.
Design/methodology/approach
Data from a study of 332 followers of brands on social media were analysed using structural equation modelling.
Findings
Results highlight the role of brand love in mediating the relationship between antecedents online brand engagement and consumer brand identification on intention to co-create value and willingness to pay a premium price. Consumers who trust the brand are more likely to intend to co-create value and are more willing to pay a price premium and these relationships are enhanced when the brand is loved.
Practical implications
Findings provide guidance for managers seeking to build brand friendship relationships with young consumers through social media. Results caution against a form of “superficial” friendship where the consumer may interact and co-create value online, yet fail to value the brand, evidenced through a willingness to pay a premium price.
Originality/value
The research identifies the critical role of brand love in fostering relationships with brands that young consumers follow on social media. The study reveals that neither online brand engagement nor consumer brand identification will result in co-creation of value or willingness to pay a premium price unless the consumer experiences brand love.
Virtual communities form the principal environment favoring provider-client interaction. However, questions regarding the way to manage these communities so that they might generate value have yet to be resolved. Following an inductive approach, seven Lego virtual communities, classified following their governance form and objectives, were analyzed. It is found that different kinds of virtual communities appear as complementary tools to favor value co-creation and enhance members’ performance by constituting a system of value co-creation. Moreover, these community features can help firms achieve a better adjustment between their strategies and their decision-making process relative to the use of social networks.
How can we know what stakeholders think and feel about brands in real-time and over time? Most brand reputation measures are at the aggregate level (e.g., the Interbrand “Best Global Brands” list) or rely on customer brand perception surveys on a periodical basis (e.g., the Y&R Brand Asset Valuator). To answer this question, brand reputation measures must capture the voice of the stakeholders (not just ratings on brand attributes), must reflect important brand events in real-time, and must connect to a brand’s financial value to the firm. This paper develops a new social media-based brand reputation tracker by mining Twitter comments for the world’s top 100 brands using Rust-Zeithaml-Lemon’s value-brand-relationship framework, on a weekly, monthly, and quarterly basis. The paper demonstrates that brand reputation can be monitored in real-time and longitudinally, managed by leveraging the reciprocal and virtuous relationships between the drivers, and connected to firm financial performance. The resulting measures are housed in an online longitudinal database and may be accessed by brand reputation researchers.
We investigated factors that facilitate and constrain value co-creation in organization-sponsored online communities. We drew on sociomateriality and analyzed 28,000 online posts and 26 interviews from two Indonesian online communities. Results revealed new facilitators and constraints, including transparency, participatory leadership, content quality, social hierarchy, sense of community, flexibility, and privacy. All facilitators and constraints were associated with four actors: individual participants, organization, technology, and sociality. Findings showed that any factor could act as a constraint or a facilitator depending on the community, individual perceptions, and other circumstances, and that a dynamic tension exists between facilitators and constraints in online communities.
This research develops a conceptual framework that delineates the interplay between brand relationship norms and ease of sharing on electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) and willingness to pay (WTP). We find that when sharing is difficult, compared to those in a communal relationship, consumers in an exchange relationship are more likely to generate eWOM and pay a higher price premium. Conversely, when sharing is easy and self-brand connection is deep, consumers in a communal relationship are more likely to contribute eWOM and a higher WTP than those in an exchange relationship. Our findings offer significant theoretical and practical implications on managing consumer outcomes in the digital media era.
There is a need to examine the productivity of marketing investments in brand social media communication, specifically the implications for brand value enhancement. Adopting a consumer perspective, we examine how consumer evaluation of brand social media communication influences consumer willingness to pay a price premium for a brand. Building upon frameworks of marketing led brand value creation, we conceptualize two pathways to enhancing consumer WPP: one mediated through consumer brand attitude, the other through consumer brand trust. Structural equation modeling using US consumer survey data supports the research framework. We present brand attitude and brand trust as pre-conditions for enhancing consumer willingness to pay a price premium for a brand. Overall, the study clarifies the efficacy of brand social media communication as a brand-building tool.
External knowledge is widely acknowledged to be critical for organizational innovation. However, we lack understanding of how different sources of knowledge—namely knowledge from customers and partners—influence innovation. Grounded in the knowledge-based view of the firm, we theoretically develop and empirically test a model of mechanisms through which two forms of external knowledge acquisition i.e., customer co-creation and partner sourcing, foster knowledge creation and innovation. We posit that the different forms of external knowledge acquisition contribute differentially toward innovation outcomes. Finally, we examine the moderating role of knowledge dissemination capability on the relationships between external knowledge of both forms. We test our proposed model using data gathered from 655 organizations in two knowledge intensive sectors i.e., financial and information technology. Our model explains 65% of the variance in knowledge creation and highlights that organizations with higher degree of knowledge creation are more likely to innovate through new patents. We extend prior research on customer co-creation and organizational innovation by identifying intervening organizational variables and mechanisms that explicate the effects of external knowledge on innovation. The results provide important implications for organizations regarding the capabilities needed to utilize external knowledge for innovation.
This study investigates the effects of information technology (IT) identity on the use of personal health devices (PHDs). We conducted an online survey of individuals who used a PHD to achieve a health-related goal. The results confirm that IT identity is a multidimensional construct with three reflective dimensions. The results exhibit that the identity verification process (IT characterizes through IT experience) fosters IT identity, which, in turn, encourages individuals to engage in beneficial post-adoption behaviors such as feature use and enhanced use. The findings also reveal that perceived health status moderates the relationship between IT identity and positive use behaviors.
Customer engagement (CE) is critical for firms to cultivate and improve customer brand experience in the customer journey. However, few studies are available on the effects of customer-based driving forces on CE in a defined brand experience context. Given the multidimensional nature of CE, the interrelationships among CE dimensions and various dimensional effects on the customer–brand relationship, represented by brand intimacy, have not been thoroughly explored. To address these research gaps, this study explores three customer- and context-based forces that drive CE in social media contexts from a consumer’s perspective. CE is operationalized as a second-order construct consisting of three dimensions (i.e., consumption, contribution, and creation) to reflect its multifaceted nature. An online survey was used to collect data. The results suggest that customer-based forces, advice seeking, and self-image expression exert positive influences on behavioral CE dimensions. The effect of a context-based factor, that is, fashion involvement, is salient only when gender difference is integrated. Moreover, the three facets of behavioral CE affect brand intimacy to different extents. Brand intimacy is the most affected by creation followed by consumption. The research findings contribute to the literature on CE and brand intimacy and also offer practical insights on marketing communications and segmentation.
This research examines the role that dynamic brand experience can play as a marketing tool for firms in the context of social networks. It seeks to reveal how the source and motivation of value co-creation impact the dynamic brand experience. The work also analyzes the influence of dynamic brand experience on customer equity, and investigates the moderating role of electronic word-of-mouth (E-WOM) in the relationship between dynamic brand experience and customer equity. The findings show that the source and motivation of value co-creation positively affect dynamic brand experience. Also, a positive association is found between dynamic brand experience and customer equity, while E-WOM acts as a moderator on the relationship between dynamic brand experience and customer equity.
Smart cities are developing at increasing speed. Smart cities rely on the deployment of information and communication technology (ICT) that is digitally transforming our habitats. Digital transformation affects several areas from transportation, energy, government to the environment. But, primarily, it affects citizens. Therefore, the adoption of all areas of the smart city holds great research potential. The purpose of this paper is thus to provide an insight into millennials’ adoption of autonomous vehicles (AV), which are at the forefront of future transport. Millennials are an important focus group for smart city concepts since they are keen to adopt technology and new transport modes. Our research focuses on technology adoption, perception of the benefits, security, safety, mobility-related efficiencies and concerns as the key AV adoption factors. The impact of these factors is empirically tested with structural equation modelling using data from 382 millennials. We confirm the perceived benefits of AV are vital factors for AV adoption whereas the perceived safety of AV significantly reduces the influence of various concerns regarding AV.
Contemporary business organizations are increasingly turning their attention to value co-creation using social media between individual customers and business organizations in the process of new product development (NPD). However, little is known about the mechanisms underlying social-media-based customer-firm co-creation and their implications for business value in NPD. To address this knowledge gap, this study develops a model from the perspective of organizational learning and social capital to examine how the social-media-based customer-firm co-creation mechanism conceptualized as the structural, cognitive, and relational dimension of social capital influences the first-order knowledge outcome (knowledge transfer effectiveness) and second-order dynamic capability outcome (absorptive capacity), and how these co-creation outcomes ultimately influence organizational performance. The model is tested using survey data from 149 Chinese mobile application developers. The results indicate that social-media-based structural, cognitive, and relational linkage, in particular the structural linkage, is an important co-creation mechanism to improve organizational performance. Knowledge transfer effectiveness and absorptive capacity have significant mediating effects in this co-creation mechanism-outcomes-performance framework. Further, the moderating effects of social media use level on the relationships between co-creation mechanism and outcomes are largely supported. The study contributes to theory and practice by shedding light on the social-media-based customer-firm co-creation in NPD at a process level.
Literature investigating social media-based innovation has grown considerably in the last years, making a timely review. Accordingly, we systematically review studies of the so-called “latency phase” (2003-2013) outlining a framework based on two main actors – innovation seeker and innovation provider – and three main questions – why (determinants), how (activities), and what (outcomes). This framework is instrumental to unveil the foundational ideas and concepts, gaps, and contradictory results. On the basis of their impact and evolution in the “growth phase” (2014-2017), we outline a research agenda, suggesting research directions that remain unaddressed and deserve further study.
Social media are frequently used in enterprises for both work-related and non-work-related (social) purposes. Drawing on the organizational commitment theory, we developed a research model to explore how different purposes of social media usage affect employees’ job satisfaction and turnover intention in the Chinese context. Online and offline surveys were conducted in China, generating 298 valid responses for analysis. The results suggest that the following: (1) work-related and social-related social media usage positively affects employees’ organizational commitment through their organizational engagement; (2) social media usage improves job satisfaction and reduces employees’ turnover intention through improving their engagement and organizational commitment; and (3) in the process of social media usage influencing employees’ job satisfaction and turnover intention, employees of different genders show significant differences.
The rise of mobile apps is compelling ambitious companies to rush to market their own branded apps in hopes of building customers’ brand loyalty. By applying service-dominant logic, the lens of affordance, and two brand perceptions (brand competence and brand warmth), this study explores critical determinants of app continuance intention and brand loyalty among app users. Five affordances of branded apps are linked to value-in-use, which contributes both directly and indirectly to the two loyalty-related outcomes, through either brand competence or brand warmth. Data collected from 634 app users support all proposed hypotheses. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
Despite the growing importance of customers as value co-creators, little is known about their reasons for voluntarily participating in value co-creation activities. Based on expectancy-value theory, this paper empirically examines the specific benefits that customers anticipate from engaging in certain co-creation activities. Furthermore, it examines the manner in which interactions between customer benefits and joint activities/industry types influence customers’ intentions to continuously engage in value co-creation in the context of corporate social networking service (SNS)-based virtual customer environments (VCEs). Study data were collected from 327 corporate Facebook and Twitter VCE users through an online panel survey. Results of the main effect relationships reveal that all three customer benefits – cognitive, social integrative, and hedonic – significantly impacted customer intentions to continuously participate in value co-creation. Furthermore, the benefit–intention relationships differed depending upon the type of co-creation activities (e.g. ideation, design, testing, support, and marketing) and industry characteristics. Theoretical discussions about these results are provided, and implications for future research and practice are presented.
This study seeks to clarify the antecedents and consequences of trust and commitment within the brand fan page context on Facebook, using structural equation modeling. The results highlight the positive effect of economic and hedonic benefits on trust and commitment within the brand fan page. Mediation analysis reveals that trust and commitment developed within the brand fan page will be transformed into positive “word of mouth” for the respective brand if fans have a strong relationship quality with the brand. Further, we found that young and female fans with a high level of engagement, having a strong relationship with the brand, spread positive WOM. Our findings broaden ways for developing relational governance in a firm-initiated virtual brand community by providing new levers and guidance for marketers to build strong customer relationships.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0378720618301538
The aim of this study is to introduce a Consumer-Based Brand Performance Model (CBBPM) to measure brand success. The CBBPM consists of four critical constructs—brand equity, brand trust, brand satisfaction, and brand loyalty—and is applied across different product categories and brands. In total, 881 consumers participated in the survey, and a structural equation modeling approach was employed to test the research hypotheses. The findings of the study suggest that the CBBPM is valid and reliable. Brand equity is positively associated with brand satisfaction, brand trust, and brand loyalty. The positive effects of brand trust and brand satisfaction on brand loyalty are supported. The study suggests that the CBBPM should be used as a strategic brand management tool to track brand performance and to compare them with competing brands.
Crowdfunding is a new financing channel for small and medium-sized enterprises and individual entrepreneurs to raise funds for innovation projects online. In reward-based crowdfunding, project sponsors invest money and receive rewards as a return. They may also participate in product development and project implementation as value cocreators. This paper investigates how sponsors' cocreation behaviours lead to their generation of psychological ownership in the crowdfunding projects. The research model was developed, and data were collected from sponsors on Zhongchou (www.zhongchou.com), a well-known crowdfunding platform in China. The results indicated that psychological ownership is an important mental state for sponsors in crowdfunding, which significantly affects their commitment to projects. We also identified the important routes to sponsor psychological ownership in crowdfunding: perceived control and intimate knowing, through which sponsors' cocreation significantly influences the emergence of psychological ownership. The effects of cocreation process are moderated by 2 important factors: entrepreneur activeness, and sponsor's social connection, in the crowdfunding projects. This paper contributes to crowdfunding research and has practical implications for crowdfunding projects and platforms.
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to examine cognitive, emotional, and behavioral reactions caused by online petition campaigns against cases of perceived corporate malpractice, while also contributing to the ongoing debate over the spill-over effects of online activism to offline contexts. A dual pathway model is advanced based on the individual’s motivation to help the people affected by irresponsible corporate behavior and punish the deviant corporation.
Design/methodology/approach
Two studies (USA and UK) are used to gather cross-sectional and longitudinal data, which are analyzed using structural equation modeling.
Findings
Online petition campaigns relying on the display of victims affected by irresponsible behavior trigger feelings of compassion and anger. While the former leads to campaign support motivated by a desire to help, the latter causes intentions to punish. Intentions to support the petition resulting from this dual pathway influence the actual signing of the petition online and self-reported offline negative word of mouth against the company.
Social implications
Both identified pathways should be activated by online petition campaigns to increase online support and spreading offline negative word of mouth. To do so, such campaigns need to increase perceptions of unfairness and victim’s similarity, and likeability.
Originality/value
Scant research has examined the psychological processes that explain the effectiveness of online petition campaigns against businesses and the motivations to sign an online petition and engage in subsequent offline behavior. Implications for businesses are also discussed.
The proliferation of social commerce has changed customers’ purchase decision-making process. However, few studies have investigated the roles of social commerce factors on customers’ purchase decision-making. Based on the social learning theory, we develop a research model to examine how customers’ learning behavior along three main social commerce components (SCCs) affects customers’ attitude in both cognitive and affective dimensions and how such attitude determines customers’ purchase intention. The results from a survey of 243 actual users of social commerce websites suggest that cognitive and affective appraisals are the main predictors of purchase intention, with cognitive appraisal having a higher predictive power than affective appraisal. In addition, learning from forums and communities and learning from ratings and reviews have significant influences on both cognitive and affective appraisals, while learning from forums and communities plays a more important role in formulating affective appraisal and learning from ratings and reviews plays a more important role in determining cognitive appraisal. Contrary to our expectation, learning from social recommendations has no significant influence on either cognitive or affective appraisal. In summary, these findings provide a comprehensive understanding about customers’ purchase decision-making process and extend the application scope of social learning theory. The findings also provide social commerce managers guidance in designing more effective websites and allocating resources and efforts reasonably on different SCCs.
This exploratory study examines the processes of value co-creation and co-destruction between luxury brands and consumers from the consumer perspective using the social resource theory. The study adopted a qualitative, inductive approach using a sample of 24 in-depth interviews with luxury customers, both local residents and tourists, in Thailand. Love, status, information, and services are the four main types of resources involved in online interactions between luxury brands and customers. It is acknowledged that customers have different expectations, determining the way which they use their resources in interaction with the brand. In addition, the co-creation and co-destruction of the luxury brand experience include conversations and sophisticated interactions between many parties, such as the brand itself, staff, customers, and other related groups, for example, consumption communities and social network users.
The statistical tests used in the analysis of structural equation models with unobservable variables and measurement error are examined. A drawback of the commonly applied chi square test, in addition to the known problems related to sample size and power, is that it may indicate an increasing correspondence between the hypothesized model and the observed data as both the measurement properties and the relationship between constructs decline. Further, and contrary to common assertion, the risk of making a Type II error can be substantial even when the sample size is large. Moreover, the present testing methods are unable to assess a model's explanatory power. To overcome these problems, the authors develop and apply a testing system based on measures of shared variance within the structural model, measurement model, and overall model.
We propose that consumers appropriate brand symbolism that comes from celebrity endorsements to construct and communicate their self-concepts. We also argue that consumers with high need to belong (NTB) look to celebrities to a greater extent than those who have lower needs to belong, because high-NTB consumers are more likely to look to celebrities for cues about which brands may aid these consumers' attempts to meet their affiliation needs. High-NTB consumers are also prone to develop one-sided (parasocial) relationships with celebrities, and these parasocial relationships mediate the celebrity endorsement effect on self–brand connections. Three studies support these proposed relationships. Furthermore, the third study also manipulates the degree to which the celebrity's image matches that of the brand being advertised, revealing that a symbolic match between the celebrity image and brand image is important for consumers who do not form parasocial relationships with celebrities (i.e., low-NTB consumers).
The concept of value co-creation and the service encounter as locus of this value co-creation gained much academic interest, notably in marketing research and service sciences. While the current research discourse mainly follows conceptual perspectives, there has been little research on the practical implications on service agents' enabling co-creation of value in the information technology (IT)-supported service encounters with clients. In this paper, we seek to bridge this gap and first use the example of IT-supported citizen advisory services to show the fundamental deficiencies in current service agents regarding the implementation of value co-creation work practices. We introduce the concept of service encounter thinklets, adapted from collaboration engineering, to overcome these deficiencies and to empower service agents to put value co-creation into practice. We show how service encounter thinklets can complement existing advisory support measures to enable service agents to transform the IT-supported customer service encounter into a collaborative work environment, bringing together themselves, customers and supporting information systems to co-create the advisory's value. A test with employees in a public administration's front office has provided first evidence that service encounter thinklets can effectively empower service agents on the job to adapt their work practices and to bring value co-creation into practice.
Consumers who generate online reviews provide a vital information service for the buying public, influencing nearly half of all purchase decisions. This study focuses on factors that motivate online reviewer engagement (ORE). ORE is a contextually dependent psychological state characterized by varying degrees of altruistic and egoistic market-helping motives coupled with an individual's intrinsic motivation to review when needs for autonomy, competence, and social relatedness are fulfilled. Amazon.com's top reviewer community, which uses a public ranking system to motivate, recognize, and influence reviewer behavior, provides the study's context. Three reviewer types - Indifferent Independents, Challenge Seekers, and Community Collaborators - all report altruistic motives; however, egoistic motives associated with rank and psychological need fulfillment vary. Indifferent Independents fulfill autonomy needs by using the platform for self-expression, with rank exerting little influence. Challenge seekers view rank as a game to master. Community Collaborators, who have fully integrated the ranking system, perceive reviewing as an enjoyable, socially embedded experience that merits advocacy. This study extends engagement theory by linking market-helping motives and psychological need fulfillment with high behavioral engagement. Thus, findings may help managers tailor reviewing environments to attract and retain a diverse and highly engaged reviewing community.
This article contributes to e-commerce research by providing an enriched understanding of how social climate of friendship group affects members’ intention to purchase and their actual purchase behavior. Data collected from 215 group members within a WeChat friendship group show that social climate significantly affects group members’ social value, hedonic value, self-discovery value, informational value and their member intention to purchase together. This study highlights the importance of the proximal social network in voluntary settings, illustrating that social climate influences friendship group members’ purchase behavior through affective channels rather than through cognitive channels.
Scant evidence is available on of how social media marketing activities influence brand equity creation and consumers' behavior towards a brand. This research explores these relationships by analyzing pioneering brands in the luxury sector (Burberry, Dior, Gucci, Hermès, and Louis Vuitton). Based on a survey of 845 luxury brand consumers (Chinese, French, Indian, and Italian), who follow the five brands studied on social media, the study develops a structural equation model that helps to address gaps in prior social media branding literature. Specifically, the study demonstrates the links between social media marketing efforts and their consequences (brand preference, price premium, and loyalty). The study measures brands' social media marketing efforts as a holistic concept that incorporates five aspects (entertainment, interaction, trendiness, customization, and word of mouth). Another contribution of the study is that it finds that SMMEs have a significant positive effect on brand equity and on the two main dimensions of brand equity: brand awareness and brand image.
Co-creation for brand innovation is an intriguing and rapidly growing trend in the current competitive market. Past research emphasizes the economic gains of consumer co-creation, with limited research focusing on the psychological effects engendered in the process of consumer brand co-creation. Drawing from self-determination theory and implicit self-esteem theory, the present research proposes an integrative framework for synthesizing the perceived psychological benefits and distinctive motivations in the brand co-creation process. The results indicated that brand self–connection and three perceived benefits of brand co-creation tasks (autonomy, competence, and relatedness) facilitate consumer motivations to participate in brand co-creation campaigns. These motivations facilitate the establishment of brand co-creation engagement, which in turn leads to strengthened brand relationship behavior. This research exemplifies that a well designed brand co-creation contest is a potent means which can not only enhance consumer engagement with the co-creation contest, but also turn engaged consumers into intangible assets for brand innovation.