eThesis - School of Business electronic theses

Objective:

The objective of this thesis is to introduce the idea of brand blogging community. Brand blogging community is identified as an online brand community, where bloggers, brand representatives, and readers act together and commonly form a community that produces blog content. This thesis contributes to a research gap in brand community research, and aims to complement the research field by establishing a lacking definition for this specific type of brand community. The research defines what a brand blogging community is, what characteristics it has, for what purposes bloggers participate in them, and what drives reader affection towards them. The theoretical background for brand blogging community concept is grounded by consumer behavior, marketing, sociological research, and new media studies, and the analytical framework is mainly formed upon theories about brand communities, and value co-creation.

Methodology:

This research is carried out in a qualitative manner, and it is interpretative in nature. The research focuses on investigating two Scandinavian case communities; Lily.fi and Nouw.com. The research is carried out using netnographic research method, supported with four interviews with two bloggers, a blog reader, and a brand representative.

Key Findings:

This research finds out that brand blogging community is a multi-dimensional community that is constructed with brand elements, a technical web platform, social factors, and functional and personal motives of readers and bloggers. The basic characteristics for a brand blogging community are brand elements, communal spirit, and a content promoting website. Bloggers participate in brand blogging communities from social integration purposes, image purposes and because of a personal interest towards blogging in general, or the brand. For readers, brand blogging communities are attractive because they serve selected, relevant blog content, are linked with a recognizable brand, and have a detectable sprit. This research proves that brand blogging communities are specific type of brand communities, which create significant value for consumers and companies.