User-Generated Content and its Impact on Branding

The emergence of social media as one of the driving forces of consumers’ online experiences today also challenges our current understanding on marketing and brand management. The effects of brands’ social media involvement are to this day uncertain. Severin Dennhardt shows that social media and user-generated brands do have a strong influence on brands. Four independent studies demonstrate that first, successful brands can be created in virtual worlds, second, user-generated content drives the creation of unique brands, third social media strongly influences the social value perception of brands, and fourth,  social media impacts consumers’ purchase decision process.

Table of Contents

Part A –Research Overview
Chapter 1 Introduction
Chapter 2 Theoretical Framework
Chapter 3 Research Setting
Chapter 4 Methodology

Part B –Articles Contributing to this Doctoral Thesis
Chapter 5 Overview of Papers Included in Doctoral Thesis
Chapter 6 User-generated Brands: What Corporate Brands Can Learn from Brand Management in Virtual Worlds
Chapter 7 Perception of User-generated Brands: A New Power in the Minds of Consumers?
Chapter 8 The Value-enhancing Role of Social Networks Around Brands: The Concept of Social Brand Value
Chapter 9 The Impact of User Interactions in Social Media on Brand Awareness and Purchase Intention: The Case of MINI on Facebook
Chapter 10 Contributions and Implications
Chapter 11 Limitations and Future Research
Chapter 12 References