Critical strategic discussion: brand communities

It is only very recently that I have been able to hear the term of «brand communities" in my marketing courses. Since I resumed my studies this year, the notion of community, have not really been addressed in my previous courses. Indeed, I have always considered a community of consumers as a group of individuals who share the same representations and values of attachment to a brand. There are therefore several different brand communities, centered on the same brand but preferring a different system of standards and a cultural identity that may vary from one community to another but the notion we saw goes beyond that definition.

However, the growth of information technologies, especially internet and social networks, has allowed the development of spaces dedicated to them. Having worked on the development of a carpooling platform, my notion of community was reduced to the problems of: developing critical mass, making carpooling easier and improving service to create and animate the community. For me, the notion of community was closely linked to the collaborative economy. With the brand communities, the concept of co-creation of value is pushed to the limit since it transforms the brand into a virtual platform on which aggregate personal contact and consumers united by the same passion.

What this course has taught me goes beyond this basic notion of community. Indeed, consumption has long been centered on the heuristics of individual choices, whereas today it tends to apprehend consumer activity in a systematic way and thus to focus more and more on the environment in which individuals are acting. This concept makes it possible to understand the changes in consumption considering the increase in groups, cultures, identity and emotions and experiences in individual practices. These practices are integrated into a broader sociocultural concept that is the social group, bearing norms, values, representations, which means: a culture.

Tribe, social movement, subculture, communities, are terms that have emerged in marketing as part of a paradigmatic evolution emphasizing the identity, social and cultural aspects of consumer behavior. The brand community allows the cohesion of a group of people and to carry out collective actions towards a brand, to share experiences of consumption.

On the other hand, the consumer tribes is a group with deep interpersonal connections built through shared experiences, ritual and traditions. The tribe or some of its members can perform rituals in “meeting-places”. Everyone has a basic need to connect with each other’s. We want to share experiences and develop relationships. Consumer tribe is then: an expression of selfidentity. People are emotionally connected by similar consumption values and usage, who use the social linking value of products and services to create a community and express identity. Then, the link is more important than the thing.

Example: Lululemon