Research On Co-Creation Value In Virtual Brand Community Based On The Perspective Of Customer Participation

With the customers’role gradually changed from passive to active, value co-creation has become a source of enterprises gaining competitive advantage. Marketing scholars and practitioners have realized that virtual brand community has become the typical platform of value co-creation between enterprises and customer, customer and customer, but no scholars systematically studied the behaviors, motivations and results of value co-creation of virtual brand community from the perspective of customer participation. In order to enrich the research achievements of value co-creation, the paper made a systematical and exploratory research on customer participation in value co-creation of virtual brand community. Around these research contents, the main work was as following.First, the paper defined the relevant concepts of customer participation in value co-creation of virtual brand community, reviewed research on value co-creation at home and abroad, found that the shortage of the research is mainly manifested in the following aspects:In the academia, there is lack of empirical research of value co-creation, lack of systematically research on the antecedents and consequences of customer participation in value co-creation, lack of research on value co-creation under online circumstance and lack of research on brand value co-creation. Bsed on these, the paper put forward the research perspective and contents:systematically studied the motivations, behaviors, and results of customer participation in value co-creation of virtual brand community. According to the research perspective and contents, the paper introduced relevant motivation theory, brand experience and brand equity theory which layed the theoretical foundation for analyzing the mechanism of customer participation in value co-creation of virtual brand community.Second, the paper analyzed the relationship mechanism of customer participation in value co-creation of virtual brand community. The paper defined the concept of customer participation in value co-creation of virtual brand community and divided value co-creation of virtual brand community into two types:sponsored value co-creation and autonomous value co-creation. With the theoretical and interview analytical method, the paper analysed the motivation factors of these two types of value co-creation behaviours and found that economic interest need is also the main motivation factor. So the paper incorporated economic interest need into Use and Gratification theory to study the motivation of customer participation in value co-creation of virtual brand community. The paper also analysed and found there is the relationship between customer participation in value co-creation, brand experience and brand equity. These analyses layed the theoretical and practical foundation for constructing research model and putting forword the hypotheses.Third, in the empirical research, the paper constructed the research model with "Motivations-Behaviours-Results" as the main line, proposed hypotheses and made the empritical test using valid data. The study found that the personal integrated needs motivation, social integrated needs motivation and economic interests needs motivation were the main motivation facors of customer participation sponsored value co-creation, customer participation sponsored value co-creation had significant effects on sensory experience, thinking experience, behaviour experience, and the three dimensions of brand equity; cognitive needs motivation, personal integrated needs motivation, social integrated needs motivation and hedonic needs motivation were the main motivation facors of customer participation autonomous value co-creation, customer participation autonomous value co-creation had significant effects on five dimensions of brand experience and three dimensions of brand equity, brand experience played an intermediary role in the relationship between customer participation in value co-creation and brand equity. The study also found that brand awareness/association infulunced perceived quality and perceived quality influenced brand loyalty. So customer participation in value co-creation had direct effect on brand loyalty and also had indirect effect on brand loyalty through brand awareness/association.The innovative points of this paper are reflected in the following three aspects:First, the paper constructed the research model with "Motivation-Behaviour-Results" as the main line, and the paper studied motivation and results of customer paticipation in value co-creation of two fields (production and consumption) at the same time. The paper constructed the research model with "Motivation-Behaviour-Results" as the main line, which revealed the mechanism of customer participation value co-creation in virtual brand community. Most research studied value co-creation of one fields, but customer paiticipation in value co-creation behaviour in virtual brand community is more complex, which includes production and consumption fields. Therefore, the paper divided value co-creation of virtual brand community into two types: sponsored value co-creation and autonomous value co-creation, developed the scale of customer participation in these two types of value co-creation in virtual brand community and made an empirical research.Second, the paper expanded the theoretical framework of Use and Gratification Theory and validated the applicability of this theory for researching motivation of customer participation in value co-creation of virtual brand community. Use and Gratification Theory is a relatively completed theoretical framework of studying the media use motivation, but with the important role of community media in21century, Use and Gratification Theory framework should be expanded in the future(Ruggiero,2000). The paper found that economic interest need is also the main motivation factor. So the paper incorporated economic interest need into Use and Gratification theory, validated the applicability of this theory for researching motivation of customer participation in value co-creation of virtual brand community through empirical research.Third, the paper tested and verified that brand experience had the mediating effect on the relationship between customer participation in value co-creation of virtual brand community and brand equity. Research on value co-creation in virtual brand community is inseparable from the research on the brand experience, and the current research in the field of value co-creation ignores the relationship between value co-creation and brand experience. Customer participation in value co-creation can enhance corporate brand value, but there is lack of empirical test. The paper verified that customer participation value co-creation in virtual brand community had significant effects on brand experience and brand equity, brand experience also had significant effects on brand equity. So the paper verified the mediating effect of brand experience.