The Effects of Consumer Engagement Behavior on the Growth of Social Media Brand Community: Evidence from an SME

In recent years, there has been increasing attention to how consumers' roles and behaviors can shape and affect social media based brand communities. In this study the authors examine the dynamic relationships between specific consumer engagement behaviors and the growth rate of social media brand community over time. The results of their study suggest that the overall consumer engagement behavior has a significant predictive relationship with the growth rate of brand community in both short term and long term. While each type of positive consumer engagement behavior alone is not a significant indicator of the growth rate of brand community, a combination of them, as a whole, has a positive predictive relationship with the growth rate of brand community. When the effect of promotional posts is taken into consideration, consumer sharing is found to have relatively stronger and faster predictive relationship with the growth rate of brand community, followed by commenting and liking, than other consumer engaging activities. Negative consumer engagement behaviors in general do not play a significant role in predicting the growth rate of brand community in long term, but it does lead to adverse effect in the short term. This study sheds insights on the dynamic effects of consumer engagement behavior in building and growing social media based brand communities.