Abstract
Online community marketing and social media influencer marketing have aroused the interest of many researchers and practitioners around the world. Companies building online content communities to implement community marketing and influencer marketing has become a new corporate strategy, especially in the tourism and hotel industries in which experiential products are sold. However, based on the content community, maintaining the sustainable development of a consumer advice network composed of opinion leaders and consumers is a major challenge. This paper selects the travel content community of Qunar.com as the research object to study the role of opinion leaders in the sustainable development of corporate-led consumer advice networks (CANs). Empirical evidence based on network evolution data from 1356 “Hotel Sleep Testers” across 11 years shows that: (1) the creation and provision of information can obviously increase the probability of the relationship construction and increase the number of relationships, thus facilitating the formation of opinion leadership (OL); (2) active participation in interactions and withhigh-quality information brings greater effects; (3) the network structure variables, such as preferential attachment, structural equivalence, and similarity, can also better predict the probability of a potential relationship; and (4) reciprocity in consumer advice networks has no significant impact on the establishment of network relationships.
Highlights
As market competition intensifies and advertising costs increase, it has become increasingly difficult and expensive for companies to acquire new customers and maintain old customers
The theoretical goal of this study is to explore the factors influencing the establishment of network relationships among members in consumer advice networks in terms of two dimensions, namely network structure and behavioral activities of opinion leaders, so as to reveal the mechanisms of sustainable development of such networks
While reviewing the literature on social media influencer (SMI), we found that much of the prior research leaned towards investigating the relationship between SMIs and their followers from the SMIs’ perspective [22,23]
Summary
As market competition intensifies and advertising costs increase, it has become increasingly difficult and expensive for companies to acquire new customers and maintain old customers. Current high-cost and low-efficiency marketing strategies have become unsustainable. In this context, on the one hand, more companies use social media to build online brand and content communities to cultivate potential customers [1,2,3]; on the other hand, consumers are increasingly using social media to obtain information on which to base their decisions [4]. The network formed by corporate-led brand communities and content communities is different from traditional social networks. The formation mechanism and role of opinion leaders in the network are very different.
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
