Research On The Impact Of Consumers’ Creativity On Product Innovation Behavior In Virtual Brand Community

By understanding and predicting consumers’needs, to create consumers favorite products, so as to occupy the ideal market position and achieve competitive advantage, this is the goal of every enterprise pursuits. With the increasingly fierce global competition and mass dissemination of network information, well-informed consumers demand for products is higher and higher, and product’ life cycle is shorter and shorter, the competitive advantages of enterprises are increasingly difficult to maintain. In order to obtain competitive advantage,enterprises innovation model change from the traditional closed innovation to collaborative innovation, open innovation and co-innovation. Innovation became the fourth wave of revolutions after the agricultural revolution, the industrial revolution, the information revolution(Sang,2012). Enterprises innovation boundary change from internal to external. Prahalad and Ramaswamy (2004) put forward the consumers-oriented products innovation. They focus on how the organization better close to the consumers from the perspective of external organizational, to enable an organization obtain new method to sense external consumers’needs and the dynamic capabilities. More and more enterprises to obtain sustainable competitive advantages through co-innovation with consumers:to identify new market opportunities faster than its competitors, more effectively "sublation" set up hypothesis and practical, better and faster response of potential consumers’ needs, shorten error learning cycle, and create more new products, expand market share, generate extra returns and efficiency (Lawer, 2005). More and more evidences show that enterprises new product success rate is higher through co-innovation with consumers.Internet technology makes the world into a community. Enterprises reduce the transaction cost, create sales miracle and find a lot of good ideas by internet technology (Kotler,2003, P.59-63,2009, P.242-243). Many companies use virtual brand communities to innovation. As more and more companies co- innovation with consumers in virtual brand communities, the research of individual innovation behavior across the field of psychology, marketing scholars study of consumers innovation mechanism and innovation ability have also been gradually increased. Consumers’ contribution to innovation are different; to identify and select the right consumers is very important. Studies of consumers innovation behavior are relatively less in domestic. Through review the relevant research literature the author found that the relationship of consumers’ knowledge and creativity is controversial. The effect of material incentive and reputation incentive on consumers’product innovation behavior is controversial. The influences of free atmosphere to the consumers’product innovation behavior need to be researched. Consumers’different innovation behaviors need what factors of creativity combination need to be researched. Based on these controversy and deficiencies of existing research, the author determines the research questions of this paper mainly include:structure dimensions of consumer creativity and product innovation behavior; consumers different product innovation behavior need what combination of creativity dimentions; the regulatory role of environmental factors on the relationship of product innovation behavior and the consumer creativity elements; demographic variables impact on virtual brand community consumer creativity. The author uses the psychology of creativity theory, social exchange theory of sociology and the theory of relationship between attitude and behavior to construct the research model and put forward the research assumptions. The author studies three software virtual brand communities. Using the method of literature research, ethnography, half open interview determine the dimensions of consumers’creativity, product innovation behavior, form the consumer creativity, product innovation behavior, the virtual brand community environment scale in order to effectively test the influence mechanism of virtual brand community consumers’ creativity to product innovation behavior and identify community environment to help consumers to participate in the enterprise product innovation activities.Through empirical analysis, this paper gets the following conclusion:Consumers different creativity dimension combination significant effects on the different product innovation behavior. Consumers’ knowledge has the greatest influence on product innovation behavior. Principle of consumer product innovation behavior is reward motivation. Consumers’ locus of control has no significant influence on product innovation behavior. Free atmosphere exists positive regulatory role on the relationship between the reward motivation and product innovation behavior. Reputation incentive exists positive regulatory role on the relationship between the consumers’ knowledge and product promotions behavior. Reputation incentive exists positive regulatory role on the relationship between the reward motivation and product promotions behavior. Reputation incentive exists positive regulatory role on the relationship between the interest motive and product text behavior. Reputation incentive exists negative regulatory role on the relationship between the products love motive and product promotions behavior. Material incentives exists positive regulatory role on the relationship between the consumers’ knowledge and product promotions behavior. Material incentive exists positive regulatory role on the relationship between the reward motivation and product text behavior. Material incentive exists positive regulatory role on the relationship between the products like motive and product promotions behavior. This paper found some different conclusions about creativity to formal organization:The principle of virtual brand community consumers innovation is to get reward motivation. Consumers’interest motivation has no significant effect on product innovation behavior. Material incentives does not exist regulating effect on the relationship between the consumers’ interest motivation and product innovation behavior.At last, the paper discusses the conclusions and management implications. Enterprise should improve the quality of community content, understand the consumers’ different participation motivations in the process of the management of virtual brand communities and satisfy the consumers’ different motives, use different incentives methods to encourage consumers to participate in the enterprise product innovation activities, create different atmosphere according to the different stages of product innovation, be good at using incentive methods, establish information feedback mechanism, make good products, make consumers feel happy in the innovation process.Finally the paper points out the shortages of this study and future research direction. There are a lot of problems and phenomenas need to be researched in this new emerging field. This article explores the virtual software brand community. There is large explore space in this field. Many problems are looking forward to be explored by more and more scholars for our country enterprise innovation.