User-Generated Content about Brands: Understanding its Creators and Consumers (2016) PDF

Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 137–144 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Business Research User-generated content about brands: Understandi...

Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 137–144 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Journal of Business Research User-generated content about brands: Understanding its creators and consumers Sue Vaux Halliday ⁎ Department of Marketing & Enterprise, Hertfordshire Business School, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield, Herts AL10 9AB, UK a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t Article history: This consumer research study investigates the motivations and meanings behind young adults creating and Received 1 November 2014 consuming user-generated content (UGC) about brands. Service-dominant logic suggests that resources are op- Received in revised form 1 May 2015 erant rather than operand and so used/re-used by consumers, eventually breaking down the provider/consumer Accepted 1 June 2015 dichotomy to see the entire logic as working in an actor-to-actor network. This study establishes these two Available online 14 August 2015 theoretical advances empirically. For the participants, the key issue within the UGC interactions is that of who Keywords: to trust i.e. source credibility as the resources were used as part of the ongoing identity project of the young adults Branding participating. The findings support this search being within the frame of persons re-using operant resources as Digital marketing part of their wider lives as persons, rather than merely consumers. In this process, actions creating and consuming SDL UGC also underpin potential for personal transformation as the movie Leaving Pleasantville proposes. Therefore, UGC the study here contributes a person-centric metaphor of the journey that individuals can be understood as par- Identification ticipating in as they interact with brands on the Internet for personal formation and even transformation. The Transformation study provides insight and a metaphor to explain a key driver of UGC creation in 21st century postmodern life. © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction had made those interactions. Service-dominant logic (Vargo & Lusch, 2004) indicates a more active consumer than previously theorized. The Marketers use Web 2.0 to observe and to create virtual space for application of this theory to the problem provides a basis for understand- content creation and yet have still been slow to ask what UGC creation ing the activity motivated by the availability of Web 2.0. As Vargo and and consumption might mean to their customers. This is the case Lusch refined their logic, they moved from thinking of producers and con- despite a decade of research indicating the need for marketing man- sumers to re-conceptualizing parties as “actors” (Lusch & Vargo, 2009). So agers to focus on consumer meaning (Stern, Thompson, & Arnould, this study is underpinned by the service-dominant logic (SDL) that 1998; Strizhakova, Coulter, & Price, 2008). The problem addressed in reframes marketing from being concerned with firms and consumers ex- this study is to understand what motivates young adults (from a sample changing information and knowledge—value in exchange—to focusing on of students aged 20–25) to generate and consume content? It has persons networking in exchange activities, actor to actor—value in use already been established that the technology in Web 2.0 changes (Lusch & Vargo, 2009). Already one of the unintended consequences of power relations between consumers and firms. For Web 2.0 is much Web 2.0 interactivity is that it is not simply a tool for firms to use as more open, user-centric, and responsive than the first-generation web part of their communication with customers. Web 2.0 can empower and although this was quickly seen as likely to empower firms, it has these very same consumers. Web 2.0 can lead them to question the firm's in fact also empowered consumers (Cheong & Morrison, 2008). We authority and trustworthiness and to place their trust elsewhere when focus on the shift in power from the producer to those making various evaluating source credibility. This re-balancing of power in the relation- uses of what is produced in the world of Web 2.0, leading to a culture ship between a firm and its customers is what is at the heart of the of peer-to-peer interaction and new possibilities for personal transfor- Vargo and Lusch insight to rename these players “actors.” We also draw mation. Within this power shift, there is the issue of source credibility. from the consumer culture theory (CCT) approach to investigate the use So our second problem is to consider where users of the product or made by these young people as they make use of business brands in service within this peer-to-peer network find source credibility. their wider lives. Together, these two theories inform our study of what To address these problems, we designed a study that required young motivates them to consume and generate content on branded websites. adult participants to record interactions on the Internet connected to SDL suggests that resources are operant rather than operand and so brands for four weeks. Then they were invited to reflect on why they used/re-used by consumers, eventually breaking down the provider/ consumer dichotomy to see the entire logic as working in an actor-to- ⁎ Tel.: +44 1 707 285405. actor network. This study establishes these two theoretical advances E-mail address: [email protected]. empirically. Smith, Fischer, and Chen (2012) identified three streams http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jbusres.2015.07.027 0148-2963/© 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. 138 S.V. Halliday / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 137–144 of brand-related UGC research. This study contributes to the strand preparing for careers as knowledge workers. Drucker (1994) said that “search by the consumer for trustworthy sources of advice.” Our work this was a coming change in the human condition. Certainly, the focus contributes to the topic of source credibility. We emphasize that it has become very inward (also prophesied by Lasch, 1979). The focus needs to be placed in a wider setting of meaning creation by young is personal, is internal—and personal transformation is on the agenda, persons. We contribute to theory that this is what persons are doing: understood at the very least as change—in an environment where social reworking these resources now available to them, not merely passive change is a given and personally transformative technological advance consumers of brands and advice on whom to trust in a branded an expectation—the very latest being the Apple Watch. Our findings world. These activities offer potential for personal transformation by demonstrate in practice the conclusion of Choi, Ko, and Megehee connecting the content of websites to networks of virtually connected (2014, p. 2918) who note that today “identity is created by informa- persons. To capture that we also contribute a metaphor—the journey tion.” Thus, the purpose of finding the information is to create ourselves. through a labyrinth—a journey both within and beyond the self to supplement current typologies of users to better encapsulate the trans- 3. Concepts relevant to the creation of UGC formative potential of creating and consuming UGC connected to brands transformation, we understand as taking place in the context We focus on how the meaning of the brand is made by consumers in of ongoing exponential social transformation (Drucker, 1994), since the light of recent acceptance of the concept of the customer as co- ongoing identification processes lead to transformation over time. creator of value in the service-dominant view of marketing. We connect The world of Web 2.0 enables the focal point for individuals to be the SDL to consumer culture theory (CCT); this enables us to re-frame the self and self-fulfillment in a virtual world. This enables a move towards a consumer as a person with life projects requiring various resources, “narcissistic” society, to use a term coined by Lasch (1979), for a self- including brands. To develop this understanding of the person “leaving oriented form of formation and transformation to become the daily Pleasantville” and journeying through life, we draw upon social identity life of the person. It also affirms and provides an updated illustration theory for insight from brand identification research. of the focus of Belk's seminal paper where he drew attention to posses- sions as creators of personal identity rather than merely purchased 3.1. Service-dominant logic and CCT goods (1988). Sources of credibility are addressed as a gateway to possessing. This develops Belk's work into the virtual world of Web 2.0. In their seminal paper, Vargo and Lusch (2004) trace the develop- The study finds that young people indeed draw operant resources ment of contemporary marketing thought back to its roots in classical from interaction with branded websites to use in their wider life goals. economics, in which markets are founded on the exchange of tangible For we provide understanding of how young people create meaning goods for money. They argue that early marketing thought tended to (for themselves, as persons, rather than themselves narrowly in the focus on operand resources, that is, resources on which an act is role of consumers) through interactions with brands that embrace this performed to produce an effect. From this starting point, marketing change of power and ownership of brands. In this study of meaning, became the act of embedding value in operand resources to increase we define meaning as that sense of making use of resources to trans- product value to enhance exchange value. This line of theoretical devel- form the self. This draws on McCracken (2008) where the material opment culminated in the marketing mix approach (McCarthy, 1960), world is a world of meanings in use. We interpret practices in terms of in which product characteristics, promotion techniques, and distribu- creating UGC as potentially meaning-laden and therefore to do with on- tion strategies combine to lock value into the product offer. The focus going identity construction as personal transformation. We contribute of marketing theory rested firmly on this ultimate product offer that to this area of anthropological meaning making to interpret those that marketers strove to make as attractive as possible in a given transaction. have been seen as consumers as actually taking part in a wider process Vargo and Lusch note that with the advent in the 1990s of interactive of self-creation and re-creation. This allows us to consider how personal services and relationship marketing, the focus moved to operant transformation might fit as an explanation of behavior in creating and resources as the prime source of competitive advantage. These are ac- consuming UGC. We designed an interpretive consumer study to tive, indeed self-organizing and controlled by their owners. This was explore motivations behind the recent, yet quickly very popular practice not perceived by firms at the advent of widespread Internet access, of UGC. We focused on a small section of the “web-savvy global youth when the manager's imagination led to notions of ever more intrusive culture” (Strizhakova et al., 2008, p.82) to generate this insight. one-way communications through advanced digital marketing (Deighton & Kornfeld, 2009). Yet with hindsight, Deighton and Kornfeld 2. Context note that what empowered firms also empowered consumers. They advocate using the word “person” rather than “consumer,” as the literal Web 2.0 enabled social networking site technology (SNS) that meaning of that word is too narrow for today's empowered buyer. The Wikipedia (2014) defines as “a platform to build social networks or person is the subject not the object in the service for service exchange social relations among people who share interests, activities, backgrounds (Vargo & Lusch, 2004). or real-life connections.” Facebook is a typical site in that every time the The study here conceptualizes SNS UGC as essentially an operant user goes online, a web advertisement takes up a prominent section of resource (see Fig. 1 below) generated outside the organization and the page. Power was thought to lie in the increased ability to advertise therefore out with its direct control. This is not the most common to consumers and to extract sales income from these consumers—this is view among marketers of brands. We find that this nexus of the SDL a picture of a world where producers retain power. But what has hap- literature and the CCT literature provides the space for this work on pened is that the power has been distributed across all users of social how consumers search for information and build trust in their search media. It has been found that social media networking upsets firm- for personal transformation. We consciously develop a further response controlled power relations, particularly in digital marketing communica- to Arnould, Price, & Malshe's 2006 paper “Toward a cultural resource- tions (Deighton & Kornfeld, 2009). Jenkins and Deuze (2008, pp.8–9) based theory of the customer,” in following in their footsteps by summarize the relevant change in power relations now that social depicting “how operant resources of customers and firms come togeth- media are open to all via Web 2.0 when they write, “We also need to fac- er to create value through patterns of experiences and meanings tor changes in consumer behavior and relations… Users are increasingly embedded in the cultural life-worlds of consumers” (p.91). For, as understood as another group which helps to generate and circulate con- Fig. 1 below demonstrates, consumers are in fact engaged on a life tent rather than as simply a market for corporately produced materials.” project with goals and resources that embrace the economic and the Twenty years after Drucker's prediction, our context is a knowledge branded, but are not dominated by them. Hence our focus on a person economy and the young people in this study are all university students or actor or peer rather than the narrower conception: consumer.  S.V. Halliday / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 137–144 139 Social: Family relationships Brand communities Consumer Consumer tribes Commercial relationships Operant Operand Economic: resources resources Material objects Physical spaces Cultural: Specialized knowledge and skills Life expectancies and history Goals: Imagination Life projects Life roles Physical: Sensorimotor endowment Energy, emotions, strength Fig. 1. (Adapted from Fig. 7.1 Arnould et al., 2006 p.96). The re-conceptualized actor or peer or person. Fig. 1 applies this logic via CCT to the consumer broadened from were inactive—a figure which has most probably reduced. Of those merely consuming provided (operand) resources to being in control of who were considered active, the largest percentage was connectors, using resources (operant) for life projects. This extends to the observa- which is a passive role; some 6% were actively promoting goods and ser- tion that the operant resource for the firm's competitive advantage is vices via social media. Crowd members and collectors were connecting now held in the consumer's mind and subsequent actions of the with the social media content but not participating actively—another consumer now seen as person or actor. Indeed, turning the analysis on 23%. Those who are interactive, as predicted by SDL, and termed collab- its head, one might argue that the actor's social skills, in terms of their orators, creators, critics, and conversationalists made up the other 39%. ability to acquire, consolidate, and apply learning about organizations The findings from our study confirm a higher rate of participation, as makes an important contribution to the brand. Personal formation, might be expected among a specifically young age group and a few even transformation, is at the center, rather than the firm and its years later. What is lacking in this categorization is any understanding marketing strategy. And so the brand is not there simply to serve the of what this level of activity or inactivity means to the participants in firm, somewhat unidirectional via the Internet via Facebook, Twitter, the research. Some dynamism is introduced by Forrester (2010)—see the firm's own pages, and Pinterest. This may be a bitter pill to swallow Fig. 2. He has seven steps that a person might make in a climb from for those working for the brand. being inactive, through spectator, joiner (visitor to networks, with a profile), collector, critic (posting reviews for example), conversational- 3.2. Identification ist, and finally creator—initiator of blogs, videos, audios, and other authored material. But there are no clear findings underpinning the no- Identification with the brand is a process that embraces the firm's tion of a climb and then perching at the top! This has given us an idea of resources being used by the consumer. Favorable outcomes accrue to creator and consumer of UGC as needing to be seen as dynamic, interac- the firm from creating customer loyalty and word of mouth recommen- tive in terms of roles and times and more permanent than a ladder dation (Bettencourt, 1997; Bhattacharya & Sen, 2003; Halliday & climb: we have conceptualized this from our findings as like a journey Kuenzel, 2008). Most recently, “our results further indicate that brand around a medieval labyrinth (see Fig. 3). Both Lanson's and Forrester's managers need to highlight self-identity signals in their product devel- lists record what people do; the labyrinth progresses to providing an an- opment and communications/marketing campaigns” (Strizhakova, swer to the why question. Coulter, & Price, 2011 p.349). This is desirable to firms since when cus- tomers identify with a company, they “tend to purchase more and rec- 4. Method ommend the company's products more often” (Ahearne, Bhattacharya, & Gruen, 2005 p.5). Algesheimer, Dholakia, and Herrmann (2005) find 4.1. Design that customers identifying with a brand and the brand's community tend to be supportive and make positive recommendations about the The problem the study is designed to address is two-fold: firstly, brand (Schau, Muniz, & Arnould, 2009). The focus is less on the what motivates young adults to create and consume UGC? Does it consumer's role as consumer of the brand, more on the person con- help them navigate the issue identified in the literature of source structing their own identity and so we expect to find evidence that re- credibility? The research approach we have taken to address this prob- quires a re-thinking of the earlier established approach to a settled lem is that “the task of sociological research is to describe these shared identity for such players. It is a far more fluid set of processes of identi- meanings which may, in turn, make it possible to explain why people fication that consumers are engaged in than living out a number of static behave as they do” (McNeill, 1985 p.113). The design was therefore to roles. Indeed, these actors are not playing a role in the lives of firms or create a record of their normal daily practice. brands: they are engaged on their own identity projects as persons— as increasingly virtually connected persons (Deighton & Kornfeld, 2009). 4.1.1. Sample So far managers have been provided with guidance for this new We selected a cohort of 215 final-year undergraduate students, terrain by answering the question, “What are consumers doing on social global in constituency, based in one geographical setting during the media?” One rather static categorization (Lanson, 2011) can be fitted study. They are aged 20–25. This is a sample of the population sought quite easily into the theoretical frame of SDL. 39% of those researched for this study: young people are the most active in this area of electronic 140 S.V. Halliday / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 137–144 The Social Technographics Ladder Publish a blog Publish your own web pages Upload a video you created Upload audio/music you created Creators Write articles or stories and post them Update status on a social networking site Conversationalists Post updates on Twitter Post ratings/reviews of products/services Critics Comment on someone else’s blog Contribute to online forums Contribute to/edit articles in a wiki Collectors Use RSS Vote for Web sites on line Add “tags” to Web pages or photos Joiners Maintain profile on a social networking site Visit social networking sites Spectators Read blogs Listen to podcasts Watch video from other users Read online forums Inactives Read customer ratings/reviews Read tweets None of the above Fig. 2. The social technographics ladder (Forrester, 2010). social networking and UGC and quite possibly less antagonistic or regarded as being more accurate in tracking events as they occur resistant towards branded products (Strizhakova et al., 2011). So this (Bryman & Bell, 2007), we provided a clear format for the respondents' population, young people, is an attractive market segment, often records. For diary-based research to be successful, researchers must targeted by global firms (Strizhakova, Coulter, & Price, 2012). Since ensure that they continually offer encouragement and reassurance to they are, therefore, sought after for social media interaction by firms participants to ensure they stay motivated and committed to complet- (Muniz & Schau, 2011), findings from researching this sample within ing their diaries (Daymon & Holloway, 2011). We provided for this by this population may well be transferable as it is a leading segment for making the keeping and handing in of weekly diaries part of the consideration of the digitally empowering world. computer-mediated assessment task connected to one particular module. The 100 most fully completed diaries were selected for analysis. The 4.1.2. Stage 1 qualitative data analysis software tool NVivo9 was used to sort and code We tasked participants with creating diaries of their interactions the data. We created 20 nodes, by content analysis to classify the data. with branded websites and creation of and/or commentary upon UGC Nodes are groups of responses that are similar, that is, we created a during a 4-week period. 100 of those submitted provided sufficiently node called “networking.” All websites that were related to social complete entries to create data for analysis. As structured diaries are networking such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter were grouped to- gether. We grouped the top 10 most frequently accessed websites into five activities, with matching motivations and show the resulting themes in Table 1. We used this analysis to facilitate development of an emergent theme by sorting and classifying activities, motivations to nodes. The output provided seemed instrumental in that it met the minimal requirements set and so the structure and setting perhaps led to rather minimalist responses. An example that goes some way to explaining the minimal output was provided in one of the narratives from Stage 2. Clearly this student, a very good student, saw that less effort was needed and therefore the task was given less time and effort. As the diary was structured with specific questions, such as time of accessing the website, minutes spent online, content generated, it presented a way of facilitated expression of a person's actions with- out involving too much time and effort for completion. The task was clear from the beginning and it was interesting to complete, as with the time, I was able to monitor what impact I leave on the websites, Fig. 3. Medieval form of labyrinth. which I visit. (Female 1)  S.V. Halliday / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 137–144 141 Table 1 The conceptual framework for this study at Fig. 1 above therefore Findings from Stage 1. would seem to fit well the findings of this stage of the study. For the 10 most frequently visited websites, Motivation stated for visit and findings illustrate “the person with life projects seeking resources,” in descending order, grouped by related activity rather than finding an active consumer of business brands at the center. activity It is highly relevant for studies into the emerging field of UGC as it is the Networking—Facebook and Twitter To communicate with friends value-in-use element that is not captured using mechanistic records of Need to get updated with information visits to sites and actions taken consequent to site visits. We are devel- Need to get updated with oping the theoretical contribution out of the process of moving from the photos/profiles Shopping—Asos and Amazon Getting product information raw data, and of distilling themes via analysis to gain theoretical insight Visiting website promotions (Bansal & Corley, 2011). We see a person integrating resources, includ- Actually buying ing brands and brand meanings and brand communities, in order to Looking for deals achieve life goals. This is providing a new conceptual understanding of Checking out product reviews Sharing reviews with family and friends the creators and consumers of UGC (Gioia, Corley, & Hamilton, 2012) Audio-video world – Youtube and Updating to see what's new in this as those engaged in personal formation and open to transformation. Skype world Following through on personal interests 4.3. Findings from Stage 2 of the research design News/weather information updates Emailing To alleviate boredom The theme of information use and re-use as a personal resource was Study—Studynet and Learning To keep updated with university used to frame analysis of the reflections. Issues to do with source Resources Various work/study activities carried credibility and self-identity rather than group identity and solitary rou- out tine activity came to the fore in the following extracts from the Entertainment—Fame online and Top Gear To be entertained narratives. 4.1.3. Stage 2 While keeping the diary I became aware that by engaging and In order not to rely on the consumer memory alone (Woodside, leaving a comment or a review, I actually become even more pas- Megehee, & Sood, 2012), these diary records then served as the material sionate about what I have bought or experienced. For example, after for reflection on why they had acted and interacted as they did over ordering a pair of shoes from eBay, I was so delighted to receive my the preceding month. This structure enabled introspection and reflec- shoes along with a Christmas card, signed from the seller, that I tion upon their practice, interacting with their record of this practice, recommended him not only online, but to my closest friends as well. since, on their own; consumers have been found relatively unreflective (Female 1) (Shankar, Elliott, & Goulding, 2001). This two-stage approach to build in reflection also follows Arnould and Wallendorf (1994, p. 499) that a practice often has “layers of meaning that consumers have difficulty ar- This activity shows that I am mainly a Spectator according to ticulating but nonetheless act on.” We are offering context-dependent Forrester's research typographies (2010). I reached this conclusion findings into the population of young adults. because I read blogs, tweets, and customer reviews at least once a One third (28) of these reflections were considered to have created month (Forrester, 2010) as shown by the diary entries… Other on- insight and so were analyzed in this study as there would have been line activity showed that I rate customer reviews highly and these af- too much material had all 100 been included for manual analysis. fect my buying decisions. (Female 2) These were read with a view to seeing where deeper insight was being provided into the theme identified from Stage 1 of the use and re-use of information. A particular theme emerged around source However, I had negative interactions with businesses when logging credibility in the light of perceived dependence upon peer reviews. onto certain social networking sites at times during the diary- Content analysis showed that this was a repeated theme, as was the keeping period. On Facebook, I found a large number of company meaning of the activity being self-affirmation and creating and keeping advertisements appear on my page which can be considered irritat- up to date within, virtual networks. ing. (Female 3) 4.2. Findings from Stage 1 of the research design I found this website useful as I was able to gain a real perspective of The emergent theme is the use and re-use of information as a the product/service quality by those who had experienced it as a resource for self-affirmation. The motivations are listed in Table 1 and consumer. In addition, I liked the fact that I had the ability to post a gave a picture of use and re-use of information to keep in touch and review to share my experience. (Female 4) up to date. Technology fostered this need as the features offered by these websites are free and dynamic. This opportunity for self- affirmation has been found recently to be a key reason for the phenom- My last diary entry shows how much I recognize and respect other enal spread of Facebook (Toma & Hancock, 2013). In turn, this dyna- customer experiences more so than company advertising, and use mism is driving continuous reframing and affirming of identity. This these reviews and discussions to decide which particular product informs Fig. 1; resources are being used in the personal journey of the or service has the right features to meet my personal wants and individual. Networking was integrated across the life of these students; needs. (Male 1) only some of the activity fits in the more standard consumer–firm set of relationships. The possibilities of UCG have created a certain cycle of demands and this is fueling an increasingly narcissistic culture, as I feel that I can trust consumer reviews and rankings on legitimate Lasch (1979) predicts, who saw 21st century persons embracing a sites much more than what the product is trying to sell. (Male 2) search for meaning through never-ceasing self-consciousness. Lasch (1979) predicts these respondents, who, somewhat bored, rather than seeking intimacy with known others, distract themselves on the web, I tended to join brand communities only when necessary to as he estimates a future “life full of distractions” (Lasch, 1979, p.321). purchase an item or gain information. Due to this, it is clear this type 142 S.V. Halliday / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 137–144 of brand interface is not as commonly used as social media. This these young people; it distracts them from boredom and is seen as free- could be because I would only join brand communities once and ing. In the reflections upon the diary records, there were expressions of would do so when purchasing a product or requesting direct infor- frustration at any structure being put upon this random surfing activity. mation from the brand. This type of brand interface however did These stated motivations fit an empowered consumer, or even, as we prove very useful to me and answered all queries and desires I discuss in the literature review and now in the data analysis, a person expected them to. By joining the brand communities and sharing who is using brands and social media interaction with them as my information with them, I was able to access more information resources for life projects as part of their everyday lives. Underlying about the brands and have content directly sent to me to keep me the activity recorded and reflected upon is a universally felt need to up to date with them. This is therefore very useful to me in the remain connected. future, as well as at present, as I can gain information as and when I need it and will not have to share my details any more. (Female 4) 5. Discussion 5.1. A day in the life of a UGC creator and consumer Additionally, as the diary I was keeping was in a categorized format, I felt in some cases, for example under the category “What prompted The findings indicate clearly great use is made of peer review to you to this website?” that I was forced to state a reason, even if it had subvert the monologues emerging directly from the brand owners— been part of a routine or general surfing of the web. (Female 5) this is the empowered consumer in action in everyday life. Reflexivity over the actions recorded in this study would seem to indicate that Forrester's ladder insufficiently pictures what is going on in this virtual During the process of recording my activities I realized how much of world of the person with life goals seeking resources for this project my buying decisions are actually influenced by “ordinary” people's (our conceptualization of the consumer, viewed as person/actor/peer). opinions on products—over 40% of my interactions resulted in a A ladder (see Fig. 2) implies that you can move consumers, as the purchase (e.g. Elf beauty products, Jamie Oliver's DVDs on Amazon) brand owner perhaps, up the ladder, as with the Christopher, Payne, which for me was quite a surprising outcome. (Female 6) and Ballantyne (1991) customer loyalty ladder. Of course, Lanson's typology, discussed above, is a snapshot of what consumers may be doing at any one time. The categories are clearly not inhabited only by Whilst I may not have shared as much as I observed, I did however one segment of consumers—movement occurs. And indeed who, with contribute my opinion on other people's posts on Facebook. On three the ubiquity of reviews, is now inactive? In addition to the need for a recorded occasions I responded to my “friend's” status about the more dynamic picture, these typologies leave us with the question new iPhone, a video link of the iPhone 4S and a photo of some shoes. “why?” as they answer the question “how do consumers use social By my friend posting the image of her new shoes she had literally media”—a question that is easily recorded given the resources of social advertised them to me. I was able to ask her where they were from, media and the digital imprint left by activity. Indeed, big data can give how much they were and how comfortable they were, valuable massively reassuring answers to that question (Schwartz et al., 2013). information for me as a potential consumer that I may not have Our research provides an answer the question “Why?” From this retrieved as easily or quickly from any other source. answer, we derive an overarching metaphor that might re-frame how we see the value-in-use integrator who is at the center of this digitally empowered world. We see a person integrating resources, including For example, when using the site “Tripadvisor,” if I saw that the brands and brand meanings and brand communities, in order to achieve majority of users had rated a hotel poorly and criticized the food life goals. They are pursuing pleasure; passing the time; keeping abreast and hygiene, I immediately ruled it out. As a holiday is a high with affairs; keeping in touch with friends; sharing the latest trends, ad- involvement purchase, it is not something I would be happy to take vice, views, and reviews; averting boredom; problem solving; rational- a risk with. izing. Lasch (1979) and Brown (1997) see boredom and rationalizing (respectively) as elements of narcissism. They could be said to ready to emerge from this focus on their self to and find themselves “Leaving In regards sites such as TripAdvisor, the review carried more weight Pleasantville.” Rather than picturing watertight categories of activity, for me if I recognized the user's name from other reviews. I could see there are a complex range of possibilities presented by the accessibility how long they had been a user and whether they gave balanced re- of the web. Even within the buying process, at times these persons need views or if they were all generally negative for example. (Female 7) information to buy; sometimes they are randomly surfing; sometimes they are seeking advice or affirmation. UGC and word-of-mouth have merged into a way of living with Web 2.0 as digitally empowered young people. 4.4. Commentary on Stage 2 findings 5.2. A medieval labyrinth These narratives indicate an element of engagement with sites and the creation of UCG or commentary that created increased passion for Hence the idea of a journey, an inward, self-absorbed, self- the brand/product/service, this was a side issue. Mostly, these narratives referencing journey—the search for the self and supports for self- shed light on the use made of information as a resource. The theme that esteem. A fitting metaphor—finding something that the meaning therefore emerges is one of trust. Trust was placed in apparently made in this process of creating and consuming UCG is like—would unknown persons, in a non-hierarchical world of presumed goodwill have the person in charge, but not in a very forceful fashion. The project peer to peer. A matching distrust of PGC was also apparent. The focus is not a joint one; it is being virtually networked: this is an individual was on self-identity rather than group identity within brand engage- personal project. A suitable pictorial metaphor needs to have the idea ment: a finding that presents a challenge to firms developing brand of a journey within it—but not a trip. There is a fast way and a slow communities. Heightened levels of self-consciousness and the mention way of traveling. It was tempting to consider something more of averting boredom as a reason for this activity present the space for networked, but entering a medieval labyrinth seems to capture the seeking personal transformation—for being attracted to Leaving melding of meandering and purpose. In fact one can step straight into Pleasantville, as the movie proposes. Web surfing is a part of life of the center of the labyrinth or right outside at will in these two-  S.V. Halliday / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 137–144 143 dimensional labyrinths, such as the archetypal floor in Chartres limitation to current practices owing to a failure to grasp the need to Cathedral: see Fig. 3 for a contemporary version. It is a walk one repeats; understand this cultural context of UGC production and reproduction. it is not on a bucket list of things to do once in a lifetime. This paper makes a contribution to management knowledge by A labyrinth is unicursal: it consists of one path which twists and building on the SDL conceptualization to research young adults' turns but leads inevitably to the center, and then leads back out again practice. In the virtual environment, as elsewhere, consumers are co- (see Fig. 3). The four-quadrant format might fit the four most active creators of knowledge. What follows is important for marketers to areas of Internet activity for respondents: networking, shopping, and understand better the extent to which firms can reach, communicate, entering the audio-visual world of YouTube and Skype, and using the and influence consumers, via SNS and UGC. Prahalad and Hamel's university's VLE—task-based use of the Internet. But the power of this (1990) analysis of sustainable competitive advantage was framed with metaphor is that the underlying pattern is there, but it is also open to customers and markets external to the organization and operations variation and re-interpretation in terms of the activities undertaken. internal, but due primarily to communications and information technol- What is necessary for a brand to prosper is to understand this ogy, organizational boundaries have become much more fluid to the virtually connected person, who chooses to enter the labyrinth and extent that consumers now also create and sustain the firm's competi- who might keep to the rules and follow a structure, who will undertake tive advantage. Particular opportunities for exploration by firms are activities that overlap and blur boundaries, and who might step over the present in the desire to avert boredom that is driving social media use boundaries and take a shortcut inside, or leave at any point that suits —especially audio-visual site traffic. them. These findings and this metaphor suggest that, to prosper, brands A final contribution is in providing a metaphor for the answers to the will need to offer resources for the journey. New possibilities will question, “Why?” The study leaves space for consideration of the power emerge. But the ongoing resource integration for life projects and for shift represented in the desire to create and convey UGC. The person is identity construction will remain. at the center and their journey combines a walk with a purpose with The diaries and reflections indicate a connectedness to activity some repetition and the ability to participate or leave at any point— that was not planned on entry and that was not directed by forethought, one that is more flexible and dynamic than those supplied by but that happened. An intriguing area to follow up on is the Forrester (2010) and Lanson (2011). This metaphor is useful for sum- repeated motivation recorded for entertainment: boredom. For the re- marizing the findings of this study (see Fig. 3): it is the route for a series conceptualization from consumer to person in this paper, supporting of life projects and personal transformation. The study here provides SDL fits someone who is somewhat narcissistically focused on self- both insight and a metaphor to explain a key driver of UGC creation in transformation and who “depends on others to validate his [sic] self- 21st century postmodern life. esteem”—to cope with feeling “overwhelmed by an annihilating sense of boredom” (Lasch, 1979 p. 39). The labyrinth is something of an adventure, as is described in Plato's dialogue Euthydemus, where Socra- 6.1. Limitations and areas for further research tes describes the labyrinthine line of a logical argument: Clearly, limitations exist in this study. Kenney (2009) points out that Then it seemed like falling into a labyrinth: we thought we were at there are times when participants may forget to make an entry in their the finish, but our way bent round and we found ourselves as it were diaries, and rather than leave the entry blank, they may try to catch up back at the beginning, and just as far from that which we were seek- by filling in their missing entries: this is otherwise known as hoarding. ing at first … Thus the present-day notion of a labyrinth as a place When hoarding occurs, this can lower the validity of the study as partic- where one can lose [his] way must be set aside. It is a confusing path, ipants attempt to recall what they had been thinking, feeling, or doing. hard to follow without a thread, but, provided [the traverser] is not Weekly submission mitigated this risk. As discussed above, participa- devoured at the midpoint, it leads surely, despite twists and turns, tion in any study has a distorting effect on the events that take place back to the beginning. (Plato, 2014) as part of that study. Participation heightens, at the very least, aware- ness of everyday practices. Several respondents commented on this. A labyrinth is an ancient symbol of wholeness that combines the So even this open-ended research approach is somewhat intrusive; imagery of the circle and the spiral into a meandering but purposeful the respondent is a flawed instrument: the study addresses this limita- path (Labyrinth, 2014). A labyrinth seems to fit the young person creat- tion by splitting off the recording from the reflection, so that the reflec- ing and consuming UGC. For, as Putney writes of her choice of theme for tion was easily carried out to time. her novel The Spiral Path (2002), the title comes from a labyrinth that Diary-keeping as a research method can be a costly process as was part of the hero's healing journey, as well a metaphor for the Bryman and Bell (2007) note, due to the costs associated with recruiting complexity of the characters' lives and relationships. This complexity diarists to take part and checking to see that diaries are completed prop- is non-hierarchical in a way that a ladder (see Fig. 2) simply is not. It erly. We mitigated this by making weekly diary-keeping a requirement provides the space to open the way to personal transformation as the of the module. The population sampled is young adults, which is huge movie Leaving Pleasantville suggests. and only 215 were selected, so this is not a rigorous sample for quanti- tative purposes. Only 100 diaries were fully completed such that only 6. Conclusions, contributions, limitations, and areas for further half of the cohort of students' data have been examined. The study research includes 28 of the written reflections as they were judged to have created insight. This study conceptualizes the developing practices, issues, and prior To address both the limitations of this study and to further its find- literature and creates a metaphor to supplement current typologies ings, more work could usefully be done to explore young adults as for understanding UGC. We use CCT to conceptualize the consumer as members of communities, in the light of the finding that questions the a person digitally empowered to use brands as resource for life pro- heretofore assumed and researched centrality of communities as the jects—on a journey of formation and even personal transformation. context of individuals networking (see Kozinets, de Valck, Wojnicki, & UCG activities are part of ongoing identity creation by these students Wilner, 2010). The opportunity occurs to re-frame brand communities and the co-option of brands themselves to form part of the self- as resources for individual identity projects as Arnould et al. (2006) identity. Here the issue for firms is less control, their loss of authority, suggest and affirm and developed in the context of digital empower- and therefore loss of degree of influence. This is predicted by the advent ment in this study. The study here presents evidence as to why young of SDL and enabled by Web 2.0 technology. The understanding gained of adult consumers create and respond to UGC; two puzzles, such as the the motivations for creating and responding to UGC highlights a trust in the authenticity of blogs and reviews that might have been 144 S.V. Halliday / Journal of Business Research 69 (2016) 137–144 infiltrated by management and the role of boredom even while Kozinets, R. v., de Valck, K., Wojnicki, A. C., & Wilner, S. J. S. (2010). 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