Brand relationship

A consumer brand relationship (CBR), also known as a brand relationship, is the relationship that consumers, think, feel, and have with a brand. The first article written about CBR was by Max Blackston (1993) with "Beyond Brand Personality: Building Brand Relationships", then followed Fajer and Schouten (1995) and Fournier (1998). Fournier (1998) proposes a relationship theory in consumer research and argues that brand relationships are complex, multidimensional, and dynamic. Since then, hundreds of articles and a few books (MacInnis, Park and Priester, 2009; Fournier, Breazeale and Fetscherin, 2012;Fetscherin and Heilmann, 2015) have been published. There is also a conference dedicated to this topic, the International Consumer Brand Relationships Conference.

Types

There is an ongoing debate in the literature whether this relationship is bi-directional or uni-directional. For example the majority of studies about brand love is based on Sternberg' Triangular theory of love. Authors argue brand love is similar to interpersonal love and therefore bi-direction. However, more recently, there is increasing number of researchers (e.g., Batra, Ahuvia, and Bagozzi, 2012) arguing that "there are compelling reasons these conceptualizations of interpersonal love should not be applied directly to brand love" (Batra, Ahuvia, and Bagozzi, 2012, p. 1). Some suggest brand love is more a parasocial love relationship (Fetscherin, 2014)

Related concepts

There are many different concepts and facets studied and related to consumers' relationships to brands (e.g., love styles). These relationships can be positive or negative (love hate relationships). Below a few of those concepts studied in brand relationships:

Typology

Fajer and Schouten (1995)) present the Typology of Loyalty-Ordered Person-Brand Relationships as summarized below in the table.[1]

Lower-order relationships Higher-order relationships
Potential friends / Causal friends Close friends / Best friends / Crucial friends
Brand trying / Brand liking Multi-brand loyalty / Brand loyalty / Brand addiction

Later, Fournier (1998) presents the Typology of Consumer Brand Relationship (see table below).[2]

Compartmentalized friendships Arranged marriage Rebounds Dependencies Secret affairs
Marriages of convenience Committed partnerships Best friendships Childhood friendships Flings
Kinships Courtships Enmities Enslavement Casual friends/buddies

This resulted then in the brand relationship quality, consisting of the following:

More recently, Fetscherin and Heinrich (2014), present the Brand Connection Matrix. as summarized below in the table.

Low Emotional Connection High Emotional Connection
High Functional Connection Functionally invested Fully Invested
Low Functional Connection Un-invested Emotionally invested

Fetscherin and Heinrich (2014) also present another taxonomy, the Brand Feeling Matrix as summarized below in the table.

Weak Relationship Strong Relationship
Positive Feelings E.g., Brand Satisfaction E.g., Brand Passion/Brand Love/Brand Loyalty
Negative Feelings E.g., Brand Avoidance E.g., Brand Hate/Brand Divorce

References

  1. ↑ http://www.acrwebsite.org/search/view-conference-proceedings.aspx?Id=7831
  2. ↑ http://bear.warrington.ufl.edu/weitz/mar7786/articles/fournier%20%281998%29.pdf

Bibliography

External links