Examining drivers and outcome of influencer-based brand community engagement

Influencers are of utmost importance to brand managers due to their ability to generate brand community engagement (BCE). Understandably, brand managers allocate significant resources towards identifying and involving appropriate influencers to generate BCE. Therefore, by adopting the tenets of the theory of self-congruity and the phenomenon of psychological ownership, this work demonstrates that an influencer’s personality traits, such as intimacy, self-congruence, and familiarity, impact BCE. Moreover, we also study how these constructs impact brand ownership. In doing so, we address the gap in the extant literature emanating from its previous focus on identifying factors associated with the brand and consumers that elicit BCE. Therefore, this work is the first dedicated research on identifying influencer-related factors that impact BCE. Lastly, we combine literature from social psychology, branding, and influencer marketing to develop a coherent understanding of efficiently using resources for social media marketing.