Understanding relationship benefits from harmonious brand community on social media

Abstract

Purpose – Brand communities have been labeled as a social aggregation of brand fans and businesses. Yet, limited research has examined customers’ perceived relationship benefits in brand community on social media. Drawing from social capital theory and relationship benefits research, the purpose of this paper is to discover how online harmonious brand community influence customers’ perceived relationship benefits (i.e. confidence, special treatment, social and honor). Design/methodology/approach – Hypotheses are tested by applying a structural equation modeling and the data are collected from a survey of smartphone community members (n=543) based on Sina Weibo. Findings – The results suggest that harmonious brand communities strengthen customers’ perceived relationship benefits on social media, which are the important factors to form community satisfaction and positive word-of-mouth of community. And community engagement amplifies the influence of harmonious brand communities and has a moderating effect on the role of harmonious community relationships in confidence benefits. Originality/value – The present study extends prior research on relationship benefits from the perspective of brand community based on social media and reveals the role of harmonious community relationships in developing community satisfaction and positive word-of-mouth.