Exploring the influences of virtual brand community members’ interaction on brand loyalty

Abstract

Background: With the rapid development of Internet technology and social media, a growing number of companies now not only transfer their traditional offline business interactions to online but also engage in online customer relationship management, market share expansion and brand building. Consumer interaction in the virtual brand community has become progressively more important in consumers’ purchase decision. Objectives: The purpose of establishing virtual brand community is to obtain brand loyalty, but the existing research rarely discusses the impact of member interaction on brand loyalty. To address this research gap, we explore the influence mechanism between virtual brand community member interaction and brand loyalty. Method: To verify the research hypothesis, we distributed and collected 393 valid questionnaires on wenjuan.com, one of the largest online questionnaire service companies in China. Results: Our results reveal that virtual brand community members’ interaction has a positive impact on brand loyalty. In addition, community identification also has a partial mediating effect. Moreover, media richness regulates the relationship between member interaction and community identification. Conclusion: This article mainly investigates the virtual brand community member interaction behaviours. We also explore the influences of different dimensions of virtual brand community interaction on community identification and member brand loyalty. Contribution: This article deepens our understanding of online platform members’ participance behaviours.

Keywords

• virtual brand community
• community interaction
• brand loyalty
• community identification
• media richness