23.10.2018
At this year's annual conference of the Association for Consumer Research (ACR) Marcus Opitz and Sabine Einwiller presented research - entitled ‘That’s (Not) My Business’: Examining Behavior, Interactions and Implications of Consumer Brand Advocates and Brand Adversaries in Social Media - on the behavior and interactions of brand advocates and brand adversaries. Based on a content analysis of the Facebook pages of 20 beer brands we find that advocacy posts outnumber adversary post, yet critics are vocal. If the two groups interact, the discussion becomes significantly less respectful.
Word-of-mouth and related advocacy and adversary behavior disseminated by consumers in an online environment are among the most trusted forms of brand communication. This study offers a first systematic content analysis of the communicative behavior of advocates and adversaries and the factors influencing it within the context of brands’ Facebook profiles.
