A Conceptual Study of Brand Communities

Harsh Arora*

It is a common strategy for every brand in the world to develop a strong base of brand loyal
customers. Due to immense competition, brand loyalty has become a ‘Holy Grail’ for the brands.
All brands are running to build brand loyal customers. Therefore, the pertinent question is how
to develop this base of brand loyal customers? According to Porter (1990), in the world of
competition, the companies, which want to get success, have to follow any of the three generic
strategies. These are cost leadership, differentiation and focus. Some international brands have
followed the strategy of differentiation and initiated ‘brand communities’. These brand
communities are not specific to any particular product category. Be it a motorcycle brand as Harley
Davidson, or Apple Computers, all are putting considerable emphasis in developing brand
community for their brands. Through these brand communities, they will be able to develop a strong
bonding of their customers with their brands, which can further deepen the brand loyalty. This
paper studies the concept, and its positive and negative facets by emphasizing on its management
perspectives for the international brands.

Introduction
From the time the orientation of businesses shifted from production to marketing, the
entire focus of the companies moved from product to customers (Sheth et al., 1988).
The companies have realized that the customers are the beginning and the end of any
business. A business can only survive with growth, if it find out and satisfy the needs and
wants of the customers. Later the idea to satisfy the customers further looked upon and
the businesses moved ahead of mere customer satisfaction, to customer’s delight. The
increase of competition in the marketplace which gave an opportunity to the customers
to choose among various alternatives, reinforces the idea of customer’s delight for the
businesses. The sole reason of this is to create loyal customer base of a company. This loyal
customer on one hand will continue buying the company’s product. On the other these
loyal customers act as an advocate of the product. This advocacy for the product will
generate positive word-of-mouth communication (Brooks, 1957; Engle et al., 1969;
Haywood, 1989; and Ennew et al., 2000).
Later on with the emergence of globalization in the economy of many countries, the
competition has increased massively. In this context, Mr. Rajeev Bakshi, managing
director, Cadbury’s India, in an interview to Indian Express (August 31, 2000)1 mentioned

* Lecturer, Eastern Institute for Integrating Learning in Management, Kolkata 700091, India.
E-mail: harshiimt@gmail.com

1
http://www.financialexpress.com/old/fe/daily/20000831/fst29027.html (Dated: December 28, 2008 at 11:30 h).

© Conceptual
A 2009 The Icfai University
Study of BrandPress. All Rights Reserved.
Communities 7
that “customer loyalty is fast becoming a disappearing phenomenon, with an increasing
demand for brand variety”. Although the environment was asking for something more
than brand loyalty among the customers, many businesses were striving to achieve the
requirement of brand loyalty among customers. Businesses were running to achieve brand
loyalty as ‘Holy Grail’ (McAlexander et al., 2002). As stated by Rosenberg and Czepiel
(1984) “customer loyalty erodes when there is a wide range of nationwide products and
retailers” (p. 46). The objective of customer retention by developing loyal customers,
market-oriented companies (Gronroos, 1989) were forced to innovate continuously to
offer customers something different from its competitors, in view of gaining high
acceptability followed by retention substantiated with loyality.
When businesses are striving to gain better acceptability and success among the
competitors, Porter (1985) recommends three generic strategies to gain success and
competitive advantage in the marketplace. These are cost effectiveness, differentiation
and focus. Later, Porter (1990) reinforces the idea of differentiation by saying, “advantage
once gained is only sustained by a continual search for different and better ways of doing
things and through modifications in firm behavior within an overall strategic context.
The firm competing with a differentiation strategy, for example, must find a stream of new
ways to add to its differentiation, or, minimally, improve its effectiveness in differentiating
in old ways” (p. 580).
Later, during the advent of globalization, companies considered Porter’s (1990) view
and looked forward towards differentiating their brands from their competitors in some
old ways. Here, old ways can be interpreted as strategies that the industry has already
applied in the past but, currently, it is not in use. It can also be an idle resource in the
organization (Abrahamson, 2004). In this context, companies on the one hand relooked
the concept of symbiotic marketing (Adler, 1966), which deals with the mutual beneficial
relationship among various entities, and on the other, thought of reorienting an existing
nature of human civilization. Here, existing nature of human civilization means the
nature of human beings to live in communities developed by like-minded people. Among
customers, companies have traced out like-mindedness, which have formed informal
networks (Abrahamson, 2004). These networks are a promising source of attaining
sustainable competitive advantage.
It is the brand which plays a central role in these informal networks. Members of these
networks have something in common. They hold an emotional association with the
brand. For the companies, to achieve sustainable competitive advantage, they need loyal
emotional association of the customers towards the brands (Martesen and Gronholdt,
2004). They thought of developing a community that will have an overlapping
relationship, i.e., relationship between the customers and a common brand with which all
have a positive association. Shang et al. (2006) have mentioned with respect to the virtual
community for a particular brand that “since the impact of lurking and the impact of the
perceived attitude of the messages on loyalty are independent, companies should
encourage the establishment of communities about their products and try to attract

8 The Icfai University Journal of Brand Management, Vol. VI, No. 2, 2009
consumers to participate in virtual communities, even if someone else operates it”
(p. 413). Companies, irrespective of their product category, consider this idea as a way to
take the concept of brand loyalty to a new height. Companies, like Harley Davidson,
Apple Computers, Nikon, Chrysler, Saab, Starbucks and many other, have initiated this
idea and promoted it. On the assumption of raising the association (both rational and
emotional) with the brand, like-minded people having one to one relationship with the
brand put together to form a formal community (Martesen and Gronholdt, 2004). It is
nothing but to put informal group of people into a structured community with common
goals and orientation. Although the companies name these communities (viz., Apple
Newton, Nikonians, Harley Davidson Owner’s Group, etc.) as per their suitability, the core
idea behind is to bring up a ‘brand community’.

Brand and Community

As for an individual, its name creates a distinctive image among other people, for a
product or a company, it is the brand which serves the similar purpose. According to
Haigh and Knowles (2004) “brand includes everything from simple logos and trademarks
up through the creation of a brand-focused company culture” (p. 24). Brand is not a new
concept and it has received considerable attention since the late 1950s (Zinkhan and
Hirschheim, 1992). Brand is something, which separates it from the rest of the world.
Companies give a distinctive name, logo or symbol, etc., to create distinctiveness for
themselves and their offering, from its competitors (Gunther and Kling, 2001). As stated
by Dolak (2001)2, “the word ‘brand’, when used as a noun, can refer to a company name,
a product name, or a unique identifier such as a logo or trademark. In a time before fences
were used in ranching to keep one’s cattle separately from other people’s cattle, ranch
owners branded or marked their cattle so that they could later identify their own herd”.
But, what the companies will achieve if they create a distinctive image for themselves
among their competitors? The answer is very clear: when a customer identifies a need, he
should recall a distinctive brand to satisfy his needs among the competitors. If this
happens, the expectation of the company that the customer will go for a specific brand
will hold true. And the customer will continue its association with the brand. This, in
turn, develops a sense of loyalty towards the brand (Martesen and Gronholdt, 2004).
However, this recall will only happen when the customers will be convinced of the value
the brand is going to provide to them and if this recall happens then the companies
consider brand as a competitive advantage (Gunther and Kling, 2001).
In this regard, the brand conveys the value proposition. As mentioned by Dolak (2001)
“a brand is an identifiable entity that makes specific promises of value”. The literature also
reveals the concept of brand loyalty. Shang et al. (2006) has said, “brand loyalty originally
referred to consumers’ repeated purchasing” (p. 401). But, just repeat purchase cannot give
2
Dolak Dave (2001), “Building A Strong Brand: Brands and Branding Basics”, available at http://www.metro.as/
index.php/content/content/download/185/806/version/file/36BuildingAStrongBrand.pdf (Dated: December 30,
2008 at 12:40 h).

A Conceptual Study of Brand Communities 9

a clear perspective of brand loyalty. Sheth and Park (1974) put forth the multidimensional
factors in defining brand loyalty as, “a positively based emotive, evaluative and/or
behavioral response tendency towards a branded, labeled, or graded alternative or choice
by an individual in his capacity as the user, the choice maker, and/or the purchasing agent”
(p. 449). If a company can find out and evaluate brand loyalty, it can offer more and more
personalized offers with the brand to the loyal customers for their delight. This act will
bind the customers with the brand tightly followed by their retention with the brand. This
bondage with the brand can be furthered with the feeling of emotional association of the
customer with the brand (Martesen and Gronholdt, 2004).
Now, if we look at the researches done by social scientists, it reveals that the basis of
a community kind of societal structure, formed with the like-minded people, is the
emotional association and togetherness among the members. These people share a social
bonding and behavioral rootedness (McMillan and George, 1986). It is also revealed that
community is based upon two factors, i.e., geography/territory (neighborhoods) and
relationship (professional, spiritual, etc.), (McMillan and George, 1986). Later on,
MacQueen et al. (2001) defined community as “a common definition of community
emerged as a group of people with diverse characteristics who are linked by social ties,
share common perspectives, and engage in joint action in geographical locations or
settings” (p. 1929). At the same time, Muniz and O’Guinn (2001, p. 413) after reviewing
the literature on community came across with three core components on which a
community is build. These three core components are:
• Shared consciousness, a way of thinking about things that is more than shared
attitude or perceived similarity.
• Presence of shared rituals and traditions.
• Sense of moral responsibility, which is a felt sense of duty or obligation to the
community as a whole, and to its individual members.
Both the terms, brand and community, are studied exhaustively in their respective
domains. However, if both the terms are put together, it becomes the matter of study in
the domain of marketing. It is quite natural that when people with same need and choice
meet together, a sense of togetherness evolves among them. As a result, they start sharing
their experiences and if the experiences are positive, it creates a positive word-of-mouth.
This, in turn, not only develops their knowledge-base on the matter of common choice
but also develops a sense of emotional association with it. Ultimately, this togetherness
and emotional association enable these people to form a community. Moreover, if it is a
brand, which is common among people, forming a community, due to the basic nature of
the community, these members or people develop a sense of loyalty, emotional association
with the brand. They share a common belief about the brand, the information about the
brand (Luedicke, 2006), advocate the brand selection to others (Jang et al., 2008), also at
times spread negative word-of-mouth for the opponent brands (Hickman and Ward, 2007;
and Thompson and Sinha, 2008).

10 The Icfai University Journal of Brand Management, Vol. VI, No. 2, 2009
 The purpose of this paper is to understand, if these two terms put together, as ‘brand
community’. Although some work is available on brand community, still there is a scope
for understanding its perspective. Its scope is increasing considerably with the rapid
growth of information technology. Again globalization and increasing competition is
compelling the companies to think differently to acquire and retain their customers.
These in turn enhance the need to understand the concept of brand community as an
opportunity for the companies to get success. At the same time, it is some sort of a
challenge for both the marketer and academicians to relook the concept of brand
community periodically, for changes in managing the application of it (McAlexander
et al., 2002). As stated by Amine and Sitz (2004)3, “the brand community presents a special
interest both for the marketing researchers and brand managers because it gives new
theoretical perspectives on key concepts (e.g., the brand loyalty, word-of-mouth, and lead
usership) and because of its considerable implications for marketing strategies” (p. 2).
Therefore, this paper looks into the perspective of brand community, its managerial
implication along with the advantages and disadvantages, the sustenance and growth of
itself and the brand under consideration.

Brand Community
The current marketing orientation and cutthroat competition in the global sphere had
enforced marketers and academicians to look into the matter of customer relationship
building in view of retaining the customers. In this regard, consumer behavior has
considerable importance. The focus of the companies is to get closer to the customers to
retain them and make them loyal towards the brand. On the other hand, customers once
get the value for their money followed by satisfaction of their need from a particular brand,
compel them to come closer to the brand. They prefer to maintain a rational and
emotional relationship with that brand (Martesen and Gronholdt, 2004). Martesen and
Gronholdt (2004) have measured brand equity based on the rational and emotional
variables (Figure 1).
It is not only relationship, but also the feeling of pride to be associated with the brand
as, for example, owners of Harley Davidson motorcycle (McAlexander et al., 2002; and
Cova and Pace, 2006), owners of GM’s Hummer vehicle (Luedicke, 2006), users of Apple
Newton computers (Schau and Muniz, 2006). The owners also share their satisfaction with
the prospective and existing customers. The tendencies to share views, opinions regarding
the product they are associated with, make them come closer to the brand and to the
existing customers of the brand. These in turn form a community and in marketing, it is
called brand community.
Many social scientists have studied the idea of community and many researchers in the
area of marketing have studied brands. However, brand community, as an idea, was
3
Amine Abdelmajid and Sitz Lionel (2004), “How Does a Virtual Brand Community Emerge? Some Implications
for Marketing Research”, University of Paris, available at http://lionel.sitz.googlepages.com
Howdoesabrandcommunityemerge.pdf (Dated: December 30, 2008 at 15:00 h).

A Conceptual Study of Brand Communities 11

 Figure 1: The Customer-Based Brand Equity Model

Brand Brand Evaluations

Associations

Product Quality

Service Quality Rational

Evaluations
Price
Customer-
Brand Relations
Promise
Emotional
Differentiation Evaluations
(feelings)
Trust and Credibility

Source: Martesen and Gronholdt (2004).

introduced by Muniz and O’Guinn (2001), and defined as “a specialized,

non-geographically bound community, based on a structured set of social relationships
among admirers of a brand” (p. 412). From this definition of brand community, it is easily
revealed that the notion of brand community is a specialized structure. The companies
plan it purposely to increase retention of brand loyal customers and initiate positive
word-of-mouth. Generally customers for the brands having a strong image, a rich and
lengthy history (Muniz and O’Guinn, 2001), usually form this kind of communities by
themselves. However, to reap benefits from the brand communities, formed by the
customers, the management of the company needs to put considerable effort. At the same
time some companies, whose customers are not aware of the concept of brand community,
which are interested in brand community, need to put considerable effort to build and
manage a community for their brand. As also mentioned by Prykop and Heitmann (2006),
“a community usually builds around a common interest and a shared set of values.
Companies use that social phenomenon to initiate communities that encourage
interaction about their brands and to establish a link between their customers” (p. 302).
As stated by Thompson and Sinha (2008), “Apple actively supports the formation of
customer-run Macintosh user groups. Although, these groups are founded by volunteers
and enthusiasts, the company encourages customers to join and participate in them
through the Apple website, in mailings to registered customers, and by hosting events at
conferences, such as MacWorld. By encouraging customers to join this community, Apple
hopes to foster greater loyalty among its customers and thus enhance its bottom line” (p. 65).

12 The Icfai University Journal of Brand Management, Vol. VI, No. 2, 2009
In addition, with the increasing use of Internet, the scope of building brand communities
among different countries has increased manifold (Prykop and Heitmann, 2006).
It is true that information technology, especially World Wide Web, has given enormous
opportunities to the companies to build brand communities globally. However, at the same
time, the advent of Internet has raised the communities considerably formed by the
customers by themselves (Amine and Sitz, 2004; and Jang et al., 2008). At times,
companies are not even aware of these types of brand communities formed by its
customers, e.g., ‘Microsoft Xbox Game Consol’ (De Almeida et al., 2007). In general, as the
relevant literature on brand community reveals, there are two forms of brand community,
i.e., customer initiated and managed brand communities and company initiated and
managed brand communities (De Almeida et al., 2007; and Jang et al., 2008).
The studies by De Almeida et al. (2007) find out the differences between firm-managed
and customer-managed brand communities, which reveals certain facts. These are:
• “Many of the most active participants tended to post and respond to messages
actively in both community venues.
• Firm-managed communities tended to be employed primarily for instrumental
purposes by customers, such as seeking assistance with a specific problem, learning
about upcoming product launches, events, etc. In contrast, customer-managed
communities allow more for broader ‘off topic’ interactions not necessarily
involving the firm’s products and brands. In these communities, we found the
emergence of small friendship groups of a firm’s customers.
• Firm-managed communities to be largely targeted toward specific, well-defined
consumer segments by the firm. In contrast, customer-managed communities
appeared less clearly targeted, and were likely to be formed by members of customer
groups that the firm may have overlooked. As such, customer-managed communities
may enable the discovery of new marketing opportunities for the firm” (p. 645).
Another aspect of the definition of brand community given by Muniz and O’Guinn
(2001), says that it is non-geographically bound. With the spread of information technology
upcoming social sites (www.orkut.com, www.facebook.com, etc.) are enabling people around
the world to share their thoughts. This is allowing the users to develop virtual
communities. It gives considerable emphasis for the companies to build brand
communities globally by removing the political and geographical boundaries (Shang et al.,
2006). In the era of globalization when companies are going global, their customer-base
is also becoming global. However, getting a global base of customers is not enough; the
pertinent issue for the companies is how to retain and manage diverse customers
belonging to diverse culture from various countries? At the same time, the growth in
information technology in the world enabled these companies get the diverse customers
come closer and form a community. This in turn, gave the companies the opportunity, to
get homogeneity out of heterogeneous customers in the world. As stated by Jang et al.
(2008), “firms like Dell and Cisco Systems have transformed suppliers and customers into
members of their corporate communities, thereby enabling exchanges of valuable

A Conceptual Study of Brand Communities 13

information and knowledge with them. More and more firms are recognizing the
advantages of online brand communities, which include the opportunity for effective
communication with customers and of obtaining valuable ideas” (p. 60). These online
brand communities allow existing and new users for a particular brand to get information
and give a platform to share opinions about the brand. As also stated by Jang et al. (2008),
“many companies have established online brand communities, accessible through the
company’s home page or online portal. In addition, active consumers have built their own
online brand communities that respond to the members’ needs by providing plentiful
information about the pre-purchase, purchase, and after-service of branded products and
services” (p. 57).
The third aspect of the definition given by Muniz and O’Guinn (2001), says that the
brand community is based on a structured set of social relationships among admirers of
a brand. Let it be a brand community in physical or an online brand community, the
members use to share their views and thoughts about the brand they are associated.
As stated by Schau and Muniz (2006), “they are stories told by consumers to consumers,
to remind themselves of the brand history, the brand meaning, and educate users on issues
related to product use and community ethos. They infuse the brand community with
focused, brand-related, product-oriented energy to thwart the stigma of using a now
obsolete technological device and to defy the marketplace logics. They inspire users and
codify the tenets of the brand community” (p. 32). The members of the brand community
consider the brand as a part of their lives. They develop an emotional bondage with the
brand (Martesen and Gronholdt, 2004) similar like a fan develops with a superstar whom
he/she admires (Cova and Pace, 2006). This bondage is the same bondage, which a person
develops with a school. The feeling of bondage, based upon the nostalgic feeling of
association with the institution, celebrity or brand develops strongly when the same
feeling is found with some more people. There are various alumni associations of schools
or colleges, which share the same kind of structured social relationship among the
members. This social relationship with a brand converts the members into a loyal admirers
of the brand (Cova and Pace, 2006; and Jang et al., 2008). As stated by Rosenbaum (2005),
“customers who socially interact with other customers via participation in brand
communities, often exhibit an intense loyalty to the sponsoring brands” (p. 222).
Apart from Muniz and O’Guinn (2001), some other researchers have defined brand
community with a different perspective. McAlexander et al. (2002) from a customer point
of view defined “a brand community from a customer-experiential perspective is a fabric
of relationships in which the customer is situated. Crucial relationships include those
between the customer and the brand, between the customer and the firm, between the
customer and the product in use, and among fellow customers” (p. 38). Jang (2008) tried
to explain brand community as, “a community that consists of personal and institutional
relationships between the members, their interactions, the atmosphere, the evolution of
individual and collective identities, and last but not least, physical or virtual spaces for
meeting” (p. 58). Shang et al. (2006) defined a different form of brand community. They
explained it as, “the increasing number of people chatting in cyberspace may have

14 The Icfai University Journal of Brand Management, Vol. VI, No. 2, 2009
potential social influences and create characteristics similar to traditional communities.
These communicating groups in cyberspace have been called virtual communities”
(p. 398). Study done on virtual communities for brand by Shang et al. (2006), also reveals
that the emotional belongingness is less in virtual communities than it is there in physical
brand communities. Mostly people involve into this kind of brand communities to get the
information related to a brand.

Management Implications of Brand Community

Brand community as a concept is not very old. It is less than a decade the concept has
evolved and attracted the of the academicians and managers. However, in this short span
of time it got considerable attention by the multinational companies. It is all because of
its advantages. It has been experienced by the companies and studied by the researchers
that a brand community is capable of developing brand loyalty of the customers of a brand
(Martesen and Gronholdt, 2004; Amine and Sitz, 2004; Parkins, 2004; Rosenbaum et al.,
2005; and Thompson and Sinha, 2008). This in turn enables the company to increase the
brand equity in the market place (Martesen and Gronholdt, 2004). As soon as the brand
satisfies a customer’s need, the customer turn out to be a loyal customer of the brand, and
it becomes an advocate of the brand. He not only continues with the brand, but also
initiates positive word-of-mouth to help company in its promotional activities. A brand
community is a group of brand loyal customers, which actively instigates positive
word-of-mouth (Amine and Sitz, 2004; and Jang et al., 2008). It is a general human
tendency that whenever few people meet and form a structure of community, they tend
to share various experiences. Moreover, if that community is a brand community, its
members, along with the positive word-of-mouth, share the information and experiences
related to the brand with other members of the community and to the new members and
prospective customers of the brand (Luedicke, 2006; Shang et al., 2006; and Jang et al.,
2008). This act of the community members helps company to gain new customers without
any additional attraction cost. These loyal members of the brand community become brand
ambassador and promote the brand. In addition, in a brand community, irrespective of its
initiator, i.e., company initiated or customers initiated, brand loyal customers are associated
both rationally and emotionally (Martesen and Gronholdt, 2004) with the brand.
It is not that brand communities have only advantages for a company. It also has
certain disadvantages too. Some of the disadvantages are quite natural, as brand
communities for a particular brand oppose the competitor’s brand (Hickman and Ward,
2007; and Thompson and Sinha, 2008). They not only oppose the competitors’ brand,
they also spread negative word-of-mouth among the community members as well as
outside the community about the rival brand (Hickman and Ward, 2007). For this reason,
most of the time rival brands find it very difficult to make the customers, for a particular
brand in the particular brand community, shift to their brand. They impose a threat to
the competitors to acquire and retain customers for their brand.
As the members of a brand community are associated with the brand, they also expect
the company owning the brand to share the same association with them. They expect that

A Conceptual Study of Brand Communities 15

the company to support them and satisfy them by delivering the quality service
continuously along with branded goods. But, if the company fails to do so in spite of
repeated recommendations by the customers, and on the contrary if the competitor
provides satisfactory goods and services as per the need of the customers, there is a chance
that the customer will shift. As stated by Martesen and Gronholdt (2004) “if the company
for some reason cannot live up to the expectations, and a gap results between the promise
that the company has given and the experience the consumers perceive,
it may create negative brand associations and evaluations” (p. 41). This will prove to be
a disadvantage for the existing brand of the brand community and advantageous for the
competing brand. However, the chances are less, as stated by Thompson and Sinha (2008)
“in the case of new products, this process would involve comparing the new product from
the preferred (or rival) brand with equivalent products from the rival (or preferred) brand.
Because participation strengthens social identity, higher levels of participation enhance
negative bias toward comparable products from other brands in terms of the type of
information discussed and attitudes toward the products. In turn, this negative out group
bias increases oppositional loyalty and leads to a reduced likelihood that a member will
adopt a new product from a competing brand, given the presence of a comparable product
from the preferred brand” (p. 67). Again, it is evident that if the brand owning company
fails to comply with the needs and wants of the customers, especially the brand community
members, and if the emotional bondage between the brand and community members is
considerably strong, the community member takes the responsibility of its upbringing and
helps it to sustain its existence. Take, for example, Apple Newton brand. Muniz and Schau
(2007) revealed that “the consumers of the abandoned Apple Newton brand are now
charged with responsibility for the entire brand-sustaining experience: modifying,
repairing, and innovating the product, as well as creating and sustaining brand meaning
and community. As a part of these activities, members engage in vigilante marketing”
(p. 45). Thus strong brand communities can act as an opportunity if properly managed by
the companies, otherwise they pose a threat if ignored or the management is unable to
manage it.
Management’s Initiatives to Manage Brand Communities
The companies having operation internationally need to look the concept of brand
community as an opportunity for their growth. Customers with diverse cultures in
different countries believe more their fellow citizens than a foreign company initially.
For this, internationally operated companies can promote an existing brand community
initiated by its customer or initiate brand community for their brand internationally.
It may ask its members to take the advantage of information technology to increase the
member-base internationally. This will give the scope to the customers in various
countries to join these communities. They can seek information regarding the brand from
the people of their origin in foreign countries who are also members of the community.
This generates a positive communication for the brand and an international company can
gain the advantage of acquiring new customers easily. This is not all, the companies need

16 The Icfai University Journal of Brand Management, Vol. VI, No. 2, 2009
to support the activities. A study in the context of the brand community of Jeep and
Harley Davidson, McAlexander et al. (2002) revealed that “marketers may also take an
active role in establishing the shared rituals, traditions, and meanings that foster
consciousness of kind. Tools such as a ‘History of Jeep’ exhibited at Camp Jeep and Jeep
101 helped underscore a sense of similarity, authenticity, and exclusivity among
participants. Promotional materials that depict the product in use may help establish
shared aspirations” (p. 42). In the same context, McAlexander et al. (2002) again said that
“as community members, marketers also contribute to the process of community building
by creating the context in which owner interaction occurs” (p. 42).
At times, it is observed that strong brand communities do not allow the companies
to improve over the brand. Due to their high emotional attachment with the existing
brand, the change is restricted. At that time although it is difficult for the management
to make the community members understand the need but still if the management is
closely tied up with the brand community it can have an advantage over the community
members to convince them over the change and still be loyal to the brand. Another aspect
is, there may be a difference in the opinion among the community members. A study by
Luedicke (2006), about the Hummer Brand Community (HBC), found that “within the
HBC, differences exist about the importance of social distinctiveness. Among the urban
H2-fractions of the HBC (approx. 70,000 owners), design and social attention are more
likely to be predominant motives for purchase. H1-owners (approx. 10,000) seem to be
more attracted by the vehicle’s off-road capability. However, these particularities of the
HBC’s social distinctiveness presuppose social environments that pay attention and
feedback to the community. In this empirical context, social attention appears to be given
for both sides” (p. 489). Thus, segmented brand community can be an option in
minimizing this kind of discrepancy, leading to unsatisfied customers of the brand. There
is another facet of brand community, which requires attention from the managers as it can
lead to problems from the brand community. As research done by Cova and Pace (2006),
reveal that with the advent of internet, many virtual brand community members, not only
share the information about the related brand, they also share products that can be shared
using internet, like movies, etc. This compels other industries, like the entertainment
industry, which have no stake over the brand community, as the brand community is for
a product not related to entertainment industry, to incur losses. The findings reveal that
the community members of the non-convince products were sharing the movies online
among the members. To protect the empowerment companies like Coca Cola, Red Bull
formed online communities but restored the options of community members to see the
information on the community sites but can share their feeling only with the companies.
With the advent of internet and increase in the scope of online brand community, it is
a challenge for the companies initiating online brand community to manage the unwanted
information over the net. Even though the chance of spreading rumor over various online

A Conceptual Study of Brand Communities 17

communities remain, the company needs to keep a close vigil so that it can prevent itself
from the ill effects of those rumors. At the same time, although difficult, the companies
need to look into the profile of the members of the brand communities, as it is also
possible that the competitors are trying to include their people to spread negative
word-of-mouth about the brand among the members of brand community.

Conclusion
The concept of brand community is emerging. It has gained momentum among many
multinational companies like Harley-Davidson, Hummer, Apple Computers, Nikon,
Chrysler, Saab, Starbucks, etc. It has also found attention by many eminent scholars and
researchers. But, still it is in its nascent state. With the development of World Wide Web
both customers and companies or brands have taken the opportunity to form online brand
communities to share information, experiences (both positive and negative), promote,
ideas to improve, suggestions, etc. This poses the advantage of developing brand loyalty
among the customers by involving them into a community structure. It allows companies
to promote their brand to retain them by developing a sense of emotional and rational
association with the brand. This enables to instigate positive word-of-mouth and protect
its image by developing a sense of relationship among the brand, customer and other
community members, which usually restrict the rival company’s positioning.
In the Indian scenario, although the multinational companies, which have online
brand communities, allow customers to join these communities but lack of awareness
about the concept of brand communities and its advantages, restrict the customers to join
these communities. Recently some of the companies have been taking certain steps to
promote and apply the concept of brand community in India. Among them, Cadbury’s
India recently introduced an online community, meethamoments.com4 for Indian
customers. Chevrolet SRV5 has started hosting space over their website for the Indian
customers where visitors can sign in to get an opportunity for a test drive. PepsiCo India6
allows customers in India to share their association with the brand on its website. Rediff,
Yahoo, Gmail are also attracting customers to initiate brand communities. ITC has its
e-choupal7 where it allows customers to get together to share information related to their
business. But, still a lot is to be done in creating awareness about the brand communities
in the country.
Although, Indian customers and companies need to understand the concept of brand
community, companies have already applied this as a tool to promote and generate loyal

4
http://www.meethamoments.com
5
h t t p : / / w w w. c h e v r o l e t . c o . i n / a c t i o n / r b C N B r o c h u r e B y M a i l A c t i o n ? a c t i o n =
MA&cnInput=TESTDRIVE&cntry_cd=IN&lang_cd=en&website_cd=GBPIN&MMNAMPLT=001
6
http://www.pepsiindia.co.in/pwp.html
7
www.echoupal.com

18 The Icfai University Journal of Brand Management, Vol. VI, No. 2, 2009
customers who can keep a close watch on its activities and proceedings. If the activities
are not managed properly, the companies may get their brand image hampered, lose
control over decision making on the brand, and cannot achieve competitive advantage
through it. Therefore, the application of brand community has considerable management
implications. These aspects of brand community in the current marketing environment
provide scope for further research. Again, the dynamic nature of the customers gives an
opportunity to the researchers to explore the concept further. The concept is important
for brand managers, consumers and marketing researchers in the current competitive
environment. Hence, its implementation, management and control require more
researches to validate and generalize its applicability. 
References
1. Abrahamson Eric (2004), Change Without Pain’: How Managers Can Overcome Initiative
Overload, Organizational Chaos, and Employee Burnout, HBS Press Book.
2. Adler Lee (1966), “Symbiotic Marketing”, Harvard Business Review, Vol. 44, pp. 59-71.
3. Brooks Jr Robert C (1957), “‘Word-of-Mouth’ Advertising in Selling New Products”,
Journal of Marketing, Vol. 22, No. 2, pp. 154-161.
4. Cova Bernard and Pace Stefano (2006), “Brand Community of Convenience
Products: New Forms of Customer Empowerment—The Case “My Nutella the
Community”, European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 40, Nos. 9-10, pp. 1087-1105.
5. De Almeida, Stefânia Ordovás, Dholakia, Utpal M and Vianello Silvia (2007),
“Understanding Differences Between Firm-Managed and Customer-Managed Brand
Communities”, Advances in Consumer Research—North American Conference
Proceedings, Vol. 34, pp. 645-646.
6. Engle James F, Kegerreis Robert J and Blackwell Roger D (1969), “Word-of-Mouth
Communication by the Innovator”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 33, No. 3, pp. 15-19.
7. Ennew Christine T, Banerjee Ashish K and Li Derek (2000), “Managing Word of
Mouth Communication: Empirical Evidence from India”, International Journal of Bank
Marketing, Vol. 18, No. 2, pp. 75-83.
8. Gronroos Christian (1989), “Defining Marketing: A Market Oriented Approach”,
European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 52-60.
9. Gunther Thomas and Kling Catharina K (2001), “Brand Valuation and Control:
An Empirical Study”, Schmalenbach Business Review, Vol. 53, pp. 263-294.
10. Haigh David and Knowles Jonathan (2004), “How to Define Your Brand and
Determine Its Value”, Marketing Management (AMA), Vol. 13, No. 3, pp. 22-28.
11. Haywood Michael K (1989), “Managing Word of Mouth Communication”, The Journal
of Services Marketing, Vol. 2, No. 3, pp. 55-67.

A Conceptual Study of Brand Communities 19

12. Hickman Thomas and Ward James (2007), “The Dark Side of Brand Community:
Inter-Group Stereotyping, Trash Talk, and Schadenfreude”, Advances in Consumer
Research, Vol. 32, pp. 314-319.
13. Jang Heehyoung, Olfman Lorne, K O Ilsang, Koh Joon and Kim Kyungtae (2008), “The
Influence of On-Line Brand Community Characteristics on Community Commitment
and Brand Loyalty”, International Journal of Electronic Commerce, Vol. 12, No. 3,
pp. 57-80.
14. Luedicke Marius K (2006), “Brand Community Under Fire: The Role of Social
Environments for the HUMMER Brand Community”, Advances in Consumer Research,
Vol. 33, pp. 486-493.

15. MacQueen, Kathleen M, McLellan Eleanor, Metzger David S, Kegeles Susan, Strauss
Ronald P, Scotti Roseanne, Blanchard Lynn, Trotter II and Robert T (2001), “What
Is Community? An Evidence-Based Definition for Participatory Public Health”,
American Journal of Public Health, Vol. 91, No. 12, pp. 1929-1938.

16. Martesen Anne and Gronholdt Lars (2004), “Building Brand Equity: A Customer-Based
Modelling Approach”, Journal of Management Systems, Vol. 16, No. 3, pp. 37-51.

17. McAlexander James H, Schouten John W and Koenig Harold F (2002), “Building
Brand Community”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 66, No. 1, pp. 38-54.

18. McMillan David W and George David M C (1986), “Sense of Community:

A Definition and Theory”, Journal of Community Psychology, Vol. 14, pp. 1-19.

19. Muniz Jr. Albert M and O’Guinn Thomas C (2001), “Brand Community”, Journal of
Consumer Research, Vol. 27, No. 4, pp. 412-432.

20. Muniz Albert M Jr. and Schau Hope Jensen (2007), “Vigilante Marketing and
Consumer-Created Communication”, Journal of Advertising, Vol. 36, No. 3, pp. 35-50.

21. Porter Michael E (1985), Competitive Aadvantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior
Performance, The Free Press.

22. Porter Michael E (1990), The Competitive Advantage of Nations: With a New Introduction,
The Free Press.

23. Prykop Catja and Heitmann Mark (2006), “Designing Mobile Brand Communities:
Concept and Empirical Illustration”, Journal of Organizational Computing and Electronic
Commerce, Vol. 16, Nos. 3-4, pp. 301-323.

24. Rosenbaum Mark S, Ostrom Amy L and Kuntze Ronald (2005), “Loyalty Programs and
a Sense of Community”, Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 19, No. 4, pp. 222-223.

20 The Icfai University Journal of Brand Management, Vol. VI, No. 2, 2009
25. Rosenberg Larry J and Czepiel John A (1984), “A Marketing Approach for Customer
Retention”, The Journal of Consumer Marketing, Vol. 1, No. 2, pp. 45-51.

26. Schau Hope J and Muniz Jr Albert M (2006), “A Tale of Tales: The Apple Newton
Narratives”, Journal of Strategic Marketing, Vol. 14, pp. 19-33.

27. Shang R, Chen Y and Liao H (2006), “The Value of Participation in Virtual
Communities on Brand Loyalty”, Internet Research, Vol. 16, No. 4, pp. 398-418.

28. Sheth Jagdish N and Park Whan C (1974), “A Theory of Multidimensional Brand
Loyalty”, Advances in Consumer Research, Vol. 1, pp. 449-459.

29. Sheth Jagdish N, Gardner David M and Garrett Dennis E (1988), Marketing Theory:
Evolution and Evaluation, Wiley Publication.

30. Thompson Scott A and Sinha Rajiv K (2008), “Brand Communities and New Product
Adoption: The Influence and Limits of Oppositional Loyalty”, Journal of Marketing,
Vol. 75, pp. 65-80.

31. Zinkhan George M and Hirschheim Rudy (1992), “Truth in Marketing Theory and
Research: An Alternative Perspective”, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 56, pp. 80-88.

Reference # 25J-2009-06-01-01

A Conceptual Study of Brand Communities 21