A behavioural perspective to consumer engagement

This research adopts a behavioural perspective on consumer engagement, building on its definition by Van Doorn et al. (2010, p.254) as behaviours that “ go beyond transactions, and may be specifically defined as a customer’s behavioural manifestations that have a brand or firm focus, beyond purchase, resulting from motivational drivers”. The focus on behavioural manifestations as opposed to a multi-dimensional perspective is because a recurrent outcome of consumer engagement is behavioural changes. Many of the other psychological states associated with consumer engagement, such as trust and commitment (Bansal, Irving, & Taylor, 2004; Garbarino & Johnson, 1999), brand experience (Brakus, Schmitt, & Zarantonello, 2009), consumer identification (Ahearne, Bhattacharya, & Gruen, 2005), brand-consumer connections (Fournier, 1998) and loyalty (Jahn & Kunz, 2012) have a behavioural outcome. Research in CEBs focuses on customer involvement in product development and innovation and customers’ communication about products and brands (Jaakkola & Alexander, 2014). This has given risen to increasing interest in research that focuses on behavioural outcomes of consumer engagement (Jaakkola & Alexander, 2014; Van Doorn et al., 2010a). Behavioural manifestations of consumer engagement have also been investigated in the context of online environments. Jahn and Kunz (2012) see consumers’ fan page engagement as an interactive and integrative participation in that fan page’s brand community. They posit that engagement behaviours are determined by the social interaction value that the consumers allocate to the interaction with brands and other consumers in these environments. Both company-consumer interaction and consumer participation have a behavioural connotation within marketing literature and have been found to affect the consumption experience. Company-consumer interaction (social exchange) generates value for the consumer (Wikström, 1996).

In the previous two sections, the concept of engagement was discussed both in the wider management and within the marketing literature. However, empirical research in the field of marketing is still limited and can be summarised in Table 18. Most of this research focuses on behavioural manifestations of engagement. Even those studies that claim a multidimensional perspective on engagement (e.g. Brodie et al. 2013) used a behavioural proxy to determine the level of engagement that then led to a netnographic study, as it

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was based on behavioural outcomes (i.e. length and number of posts). Behavioural outcomes in online environments can be measured in terms of specific activities that can take place in the platform, such as liking, sharing and commenting on content (as was the case in the studies of the studies of (W.-H. S. Tsai & Men, 2013; Gummerus & Liljander, 2012) or to more generic metrics of behaviours, in terms of participation and the generation of word-of-mouth (Chu & Yoojung, 2011; Jahn & Kunz, 2012).

Table 18- Empirical studies on engagement

A behavioural perspective on consumer engagement is also shared by marketing practitioners. For example, Haven and Mittal (Haven & Vittal, 2008) argue that engagement measures include quantitative and qualitative metrics that can be collected both online and offline. They see four components of engagement: involvement, interaction, intimacy, and influence (the metrics are summarised in Table 19). Although their work does not expand on the distinctions between each of these components, many of the suggested metrics have strong links to the constructs of interaction, participation, consumer identification, trust, and commitment that have been discussed in this section. It is worth noting that several of the metrics for involvement are behavioural in nature, such as visits to a site or time spent on it. Clicks and participation with the online community by uploading videos or photos, as well as word-of-mouth communication in the form of blog posts and comments are also suggested to be manifestations of the engagement that users can have with brands.

Year Author(s) Concept Behavioural Cognitive Emotional Manifestation

2005 Algesheimer et al. Community Engagement • Motivation to participate

2009 Calder et al. Online Engagement • • Stimulation, enjoyment, social facilitation

2011 Chu et al. Consumer Engagement • eWOM

2011 Abdul-Ghan et al. Engagement • • Time spent on site, money spent

2012 Gummerus and Liljander Customer Engagement • Likes, comments, frequency of visits, playing

2012 Jahn and Kunz Fan Page Engagement • • Interaction, participation, identification, integration

2013 Brodie et al. Consumer Engagement • • • Length and number of posts

2013 Tsai and Men Consumer Engagement •

Viewing, reading, watching, liking, having conversations, sharing content,

recommending, uploading 2014 Jaakkola and Alexander Customer Engagement

Behaviour •

Augmenting, codeveloping, influencing, mobilising behaviours

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Table 19- Components and metrics for consumer engagement

Component Metric

Involvement

Number of visitors Time spent on the site Visits to physical store

Interaction Click-through rates Online transactions In-store purchases Uploaded videos/pictures Intimacy Sentiment measurement Blog posts Blog comments Discussions in forums Influence Brand awareness Loyalty Affinity Repurchase Satisfaction ratings. Adapted from: (Haven & Vittal, 2008).

Thus, the selection of consumer engagement behaviours is justified by the importance that they have in other studies, and their measurability in the online context, where behaviours such as likes and comments are normally already quantified by marketing academics and practitioners as manifestations of consumer engagement. Furthermore, the meso level nature of this study, makes behavioural interactions a better representation of engagement and better suited for a social influence theory that is intended to predict influence at this level among consumers. The following section will look at the evidence in the literature that supports the use of consumer engagement as the determinant variable, by examining empirical studies that support a social influence perspective on this construct.

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