Title: Influence of sense of virtual brand community on value co-creation

Authors: Bingzhou Li; Wei Yu

Addresses: Department of Marketing, School of Management, Xiamen University, No. 422, Siming South Road, Siming District, Xiamen City, Fujian Province, 361005, China ' Department of Marketing, School of Management, Xiamen University, No. 422, Siming South Road, Siming District, Xiamen City, Fujian Province, 361005, China

Abstract: The research objective is to formulate and verify a theoretical model about the influence of sense of virtual brand community on value co-creation of enterprises with self-efficacy and psychological contract as moderating variables. Four hypotheses are presented based on theoretical deduction. This article uses the empirical research design and survey methodology. The data analysis approaches include reliability test, validity analysis, descriptive statistics, variance analysis, correlation analysis, regression analysis, path analysis of structural equation model and hierarchical regression analysis. By collecting data with 275 valid questionnaires in many virtual brand communities, this research empirically confirms that sense of virtual brand community has a positive impact on value co-creation. Moreover, customer self-efficacy and psychological contract with an enterprise respectively positively moderate the relationship between sense of virtual brand community and value co-creation. However, the model does not give the specific mediating influence mechanism of sense of virtual brand community on value co-creation. An enterprise should enhance the cultivation of sense of virtual brand community and improve a customer's self-efficacy and psychological contract. Theoretically, this article enriches the human sense and communication analysis in the marketing context and explores new antecedents and moderating factors of customer value co-creation for the whole enterprise.

Keywords: sense of virtual brand community; value co-creation; self-efficacy; psychological contract; communication platform.

DOI: 10.1504/IJNVO.2024.138483

International Journal of Networking and Virtual Organisations, 2024 Vol.30 No.3, pp.221 - 245

Received: 12 Jan 2023
Accepted: 17 Sep 2023
Published online: 07 May 2024 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article