Customer engagement, moral identity and oppositional brand loyalty in virtual communities
Abstract
Purpose
Oppositional brand loyalty poses a challenge to the management of virtual communities. This study aims to categorize these loyalty behaviors into positive (willingness to pay a price premium and brand evangelism) and negative (schadenfreude and anti-brand actions) dimensions. It then explores how customer engagement and moral identity influence these dimensions in the context of brand competition.
Design/methodology/approach
Structural equation modeling was conducted to analyze the main and moderating effects, using survey data obtained from 498 valid responses out of a total of 636 responses from Xiaomi's virtual communities.
Findings
The results indicate that customer engagement significantly influences all four dimensions of oppositional brand loyalty. The relationship between customer engagement and brand evangelism is notably stronger among customers with a strong moral identity. Conversely, the effects of customer engagement on schadenfreude and anti-brand actions are attenuated for these customers.
Originality/value
Anchored in theories of brand tribalism, social identity and brand polarization, this study bifurcates oppositional brand loyalty into directions of preference and antagonism, empirically showcasing moral identity's moderating effect. It contributes to the literature on antagonistic loyalty and moral identity, offering strategic insights for companies to navigate schadenfreude and anti-brand actions in online communities.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
This project is supported by High-level Talent Enlightenment Program of Yibin University (2023QH32); The National Office for Philosophy and Social Sciences of China (Grant No. 18AGL010) and the Major Program of the Sichuan Office of Philosophy and Social Science of China (SC22ZD008).
Conflict of interests: The authors report no conflict of interest.
Citation
Cheng, G., Han, X., Yu, W. and He, M. (2024), "Customer engagement, moral identity and oppositional brand loyalty in virtual communities", Journal of Product & Brand Management, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/JPBM-11-2023-4831
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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