Is Digital Social Communication Effective for Social Relationship? A Study of Online Brand Communities

Abstract

The rise of the Internet has enabled the consumers to share their brand related emotion in social media brand communities. Members of brand communities frequently use the company’s intellectual and cultural assets, which further foster the forming of close bonds. It improves community members’ social ties and reciprocity standards. As a result, the brand community members become more cooperative. The stimulus-organism-response paradigm has been followed as theoretical framework to determine consumers’ social participation as stimuli which affect their social capital—bridging and bonding (organism) that ultimately improves their brand commitment (response). Select Facebook brand communities provided the data for this investigation. Also, structural equation modeling, which uses different fit indices to test the theoretical framework, has been done. Innovative aspect of this study is how online social interactions between consumer brand communities influence consumers’ social capital, which in turn influences consumers’ brand attitude. Additionally, by creating brand communities for their brands, brand managers can capitalize on the satisfactions of the members. Based on the uses and gratification theory, the study that highlights members’ desire to participate in brand communities’ events can be used by brand managers to advance their businesses.