Linking value is especially important for brand

- Linking value is especially important for brand management since the most
important resources that these engagement actors mobilise to create
engagement is the collective brand audience – see for example
crowdsourcing and user generated content campaigns.
What is Co-creation?
- Defines as the ‘function of interaction’.
- A customer- dominant focus that
“positions the customer in the centre,
rather than the brand”.
YouTube creators listen to and interact
with their fans, resulting in
communities than look more like
friendships than fanships.
- 70% of teenage YouTube
subscribers say they relate to
YouTube creators more than
traditional celebrities.
- 4 in 10 millennial subscribers say their favourite creator understands them
better than their friend.
Are they Authentic?
- Authenticity is defined as “what is genuine, unique, real and true” (Ilicin and
Webster 2016).
- Beverland (2006) influencers are socially constructed interpretations by
consumer, based on observations and experiences.
- Consumers are seen as co-creators of authenticity.
- Djafarova and Rushworth (2017) influencers are “based upon elements such
as admiration, association, aspiration or recognition”.
- “consumers want to learn more
about the celebrity as a
person... not just lives, as
opposed to the imager….
Conveyed through the
traditional media”.

MKTG203 LECTURE 7
What about lack of authenticity?
- Trust, people trust social networks, brands, and ads less than ever, they will
stop buying from a company that can trust, regardless of the influence
promoting its products.
- “a brand without trust is just a products, the differences between the two is
trust”/ CMO Unilever.
- Fraud, Fake followers, like, view counts, clicks, and engagement.
- Regulation, or lack thereof - little transparency of social media platforms,
influencer dealt etc.
The effects are profound:
Outcomes:
- Diluted brand reputation.
- Consumer antagonism
- Disenfranchisement, and loss of
goodwill.
- Value resuction.
- Malevolent behaviours.
- Retalitory behaviours and anger activism
(collective anger shared).
- Sabotage.
- Very dangerous in social media – contagious nature of the online
environment.
CONSUMER CO-DISTRACTION OF VALUE