Social media lovers in Colombia: the role of online brand communities in developing brand love

Abstract

Considering the increasing popularity of Social Media Marketing, strategists have begun to explore the ability of Brand Communities to enhance consumers’ emotional bonds and develop, in turn, higher levels of brand loyalty, trust, brand reputation and positive word-of-mouth. For this reason, the arising of Brand Love as a managerial construct seems to be deeply involved with the online consumer behaviour patterns within Brand Communities. In order to uncover the relationship between both phenomena, a quantitative empirical research was conducted on the basis of and online survey with 251 respondents. The result of be-varied correlation analysis showed that social media based brand communities can directly influence the creation of positive emotional connection with the brand, as a constitutive component of Brand Love prototype. Furthermore, related analyses were run to determine the moderating effect of the level of participation within the brand community in the model’s overall performance. Finally, implications for marketing strategy and recommendation for further research are presented to conclude the investigation.