Habibi, M. R., Laroche, M.,

From Digital Culture & Society

[edit] The Roles Of Brand Community And Community Engagement In Building Brand Trust On Social Media

With social media and digital consumption so prevalent in the industry a lot of the times brand communities will overlap with social media. Brand communities rely on strong social media platforms to develop strong presence in the industry. The journal looks at the benefits and consequences of brand communities within the industry. Taking a focus on the social media uses for building a strong brand identity. With focus on how consumers will look at the business through the brand, product, company and other consumers through social media platforms. With the growing integration of social media in the industry businesses struggle with maintaining one on one relationships long-term. The second is the ability to track consumer’s behavior based on these online interactions. It allows the marketers to put consumers into categories to develop the brand and divide consumers into different categories to help develop and shape the brand image for each group.

The journal clearly notes the positive impact that social media has on the brand, product and the company overall. However, the drawback from social media would be through other consumers and how social media has a negative impact on the brand image through this. Brand community is created through the relationships which are develops within the brand, the company and the consumers of that product. The role that the community must help build relationships with the consumers. Acknowledging that the business has no control over the consumer to other consumer market, since it is unpredictable and it would be more beneficial for the business to focus on what they can control like the customer/brand, customer/product and customer/company perception.

Habibi, M. R., Laroche, M., & Richard, M. O. (2014). The roles of brand community and community engagement in building brand trust on social media. Computers in Human Behavior, 37, 152-161.