What is it about?
Marketing has evolved from being mainly transactional-based to relationship driven. As social media platforms facilitated a two-way communication channel between brands and consumers, they also made it possible for brands to have their own conversations. In fact, such brand-brand conversations are found on Twitter and are increasingly going viral as followers become intrigued and excited around such creative brand exchanges. Interestingly enough, when non-human brands engage in relational moments, they forge even further their brand personalities and become highly anthropomorphized by their followers. These relational moments present high risks and opportunities for companies and are still under-researched.
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Why is it important?
The findings map 6 brand-brand relational moments alongside the different inherent strategies, objectives, and desired outcomes from such conversations. This research is among the first to establish the grounds for a brand-brand relationship alongside a typology for such relational moments. While most of the literature focus on relational building between brands and consumers, this research shows that brand-brand relationship moments could be an influencing factor on consumers’ brand perceptions.
Perspectives
Brand management will become ever more complex as brand-brand conversations should be well scrutinized so that they do not become at odds with the set brand personality and values. Failing to integrate the communication strategy with brand relational moments would lead to a schizophrenic brand that would confuse consumers. Indeed, community management on social networking sites will not be confined anymore to managing the relationship with consumers but will also be based on managing a conversational triangulation between the company’s brand, consumers, and other brands. As these three parties join the overall conversation, the brand-consumer relationship will be co-owned with other brands.
Dr. Zahy B Ramadan
Lebanese American University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Brand–brand relational moments, Journal of Brand Management, July 2019, Springer Science + Business Media,
DOI: 10.1057/s41262-019-00163-9.
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