Abhatoo - Centre Nationale de Documentation

During the last few years, the information technologies have been developing at breakneck speed and the Internet in particular has become a new playground for marketers willing to attract and retain customers. New marketing concepts have flourished and best practices as well. One of the biggest characteristics of the Web 2.0. is about networking; a trend that marketers can tap into thanks to new services such as Social Networking Sites that gather million of users worldwide.

This thesis is an investigation of the impact of brand pages on Social Networking Sites in the creation of brand commitment. The main determinants of brand page commitment are evaluated before assessing the impact of brand page commitment on brand commitment. Subsequently, some of the potential consequences of brand commitment are assessed from the consumers’ point of view. The article by Kim et al. (2008) on online communities and brand commitment served as a model for the research.

The empirical part of the study was conducted in collaboration with Netlog, the first European Social Networking Site, created in 2004 by two Belgians and based in Ghent. A questionnaire assessing the 9 variables of the model thanks to 7- point Likert scale questions was answered by a sample of 125 Netlogers.

The results show that the main determinants of brand page commitment are the freedom to express on the brand page and the recognition for contributing to it. The support for communicating with other brand page members and the brand page value do not exert relevant impact on brand page commitment. Furthermore, the study revealed a favorable impact of brand page commitment on brand commitment. The two validated consequences of brand commitment in such a context are the intention to generate positive word-of-mouth about the brand and to co-produce, that is to say participate in customer research, give opinions on product related issues and participate in product development. Based on these results and within the scope of this study, recommendations are formulated for the use of practitioners.