Social Media, Brand Community, User generated comments and Brand Loyalty: Study of Indian Youth

Abstract

The emergence of online social networks influences people in various ways and moreover, the effect is predicted to be high on the young adolescents wherein we find that target group who is more exposed themselves to the online social media. It is believed that the social networks such as online brand communities influence the purchase intentions and in turn enhances brand trust and loyalty. Taking the perspective of the brand community building plus the brand trust and loyalty literatures, our goal is to show how brand communities based on social media influence elements of the customer centric model (i.e., the relationships among focal customer and brand, product, company, and other customers) and brand loyalty. A survey-based empirical study with 441 respondents was conducted. The results of structural equation modeling show that brand communities on social media have positive effects on customer/product, customer/brand, customer/company and customer/other customer relationships, which in turn have positive impact on brand trust and trust has positive impact on brand loyalty. The finding also demonstrates the fully mediating role of brand trust in converting the enhanced relationships in brand community and loyalty