1) Online brand communities: introduction and context

This chapter sets the scene by setting out a number of reasons why an online brand community (OBC) is an integral part of digital marketing strategy. This chapter explains and discusses the relevance of OBCs and how a detailed knowledge of them could enhance the creation of an effective digital marketing strategy. The evolution from material consumption to information consumption, knowledge sharing and interactive communication processes, combined with the rise of the internet, has led to the emerging concept of OBCs. Despite their categorisation as a digital media platform or a form of social media, OBCs have distinctive features that differentiate them from other digital platforms, such as social networking sites, blogs and forums, which are widely accessible to general audiences compared to the exclusivity that OBCs emphasise. This chapter introduces the concepts and features of OBCs, beginning with their development in the digital revolution and their integration into social media activity.

2) Participation and customer involvement

This chapter explores consumers' participation in OBCs, focusing on the various levels of participation, including antecedents, mediators and moderators. Customers' decision to participate and commit to being involved in OBCs is often influenced by pre-existing bias or experience embedded in their thinking processes, which cause them to perceive an OBC's characteristics and the activity conducted in an OBC from a positive, negative or neutral perspective. This in turn can impact how they will participate in OBCs and whether their participation will present advantages or disadvantages to a brand. Individual customers will have different motivations for participating in OBCs and will deliver different results; thus, OBCs have diverse perspectives and online activity behaviours. In this chapter, we look at the common OBC characteristics that influence customers responses towards OBC content and activities and other participating OBC members, and how the customers' thinking process is effected by the characteristics.

This chapter begins with an important two-part examination of online brand communication and customer loyalty. In this chapter, the focus is on how an OBC is an effective means of influencing customer behaviour. The chapter discusses the link between OBCs and customer loyalty. We explore the rise of OBCs, and explain how loyalty has become more complicated and the emergence of OBC-based types of loyalty. OBCs can contain details about customers' purchasing actions and attitudes towards brands; however, social media managers are having to read between the lines to check whether OBC users' online activity translates into active or passive customer loyalty and whether those users intend to continue to be loyal to the brand in the long term. This chapter provides a framework that provides insight into the different types of loyalty of OBC customers and explores how their OBC activity interconnects with their type of loyalty.

4) Consumer engagement and satisfaction

This chapter focuses on consumer engagement and satisfaction. The chapter discusses a range of consumer engagements which might lead to customer satisfaction. We examine how consumer engagement has major economic and social benefits and can be a key predictor of future business performance. The chapter identifies the importance of understanding engagement and the shifts in consumer-brand interactions, and further discusses that engagement (the consumer or the brand) remains on-going. Engagement is co-created and initiated by either the marketer or consumer. Consumer engagement is multidimensional and an umbrella term for a range of dimensions including cognitive, emotional, behavioural and soci