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The Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science: Bridging Asia and the World (JGSMS) invites authors to submit manuscripts for a Special Issue on “Brand Engagement and Experiences in and Beyond Virtual and Actual Brand Communities“.

Scope of the Special Issue:

Since the early 2000s customer engagement in business relationships has attracted substantial interest of researchers (Brodie & Juric, 2018). Brodie et al. (2013, p.107) conceive engagement as “a context-dependent, psychological state characterized by fluctuating intensity levels that occur within dynamic, iterative engagement processes.“ This view of engagement as a psychological state and a dynamic process echoes the conceptualization of brands as complex, interactive, and co-creative contexts characterized by a state of meaning, manifestations and stakeholders as the current outcomes of an ongoing dynamic process at a point in time in which stakeholders continuously co-create brand meaning, co-generate brand manifestations, and co-determine legitimated stakeholders (Mühlbacher & Hemetsberger, 2013). Customers and other stakeholders more or less engage with the meaning of the brand, the physical or virtual manifestations of brand meaning, and other stakeholders of the brand (Raïes, Mühlbacher, & Gavard-Perret, 2015) in actual or virtual interactions (Wider et al., 2018). Brand stakeholders act as meaning makers, co-creators, negotiators, advocates, fans, market mavens, and adversaries (Stieler & Germelmann, 2018). In a brand ecosystem (Kornum & Gyrd-Jones, 2017), managers, consumers, staff, sales people, celebrities, journalists, media agents, suppliers, legislators, public administrators engage in the generation of brand manifestations and the determination of relevant stakeholders of the brand (Carvalho & Fernandes, 2018) depending on their specific interest (Ashley & Tuten, 2015). Interactions reach from familiarizing, documenting, negotiating, advocating, persuading, publishing, advertising, evangelizing and antagonizing over initiating, customizing, co-developing, product change, and peer collaboration, to self-presentation, personalization, emplacement, welcoming, socializing, knowledge sharing, educating, empathizing, governing, regulating and financing.

Stakeholders who engage in brand processes make experiences on a multitude of touch points (Voorhees et al., 2017) with personal, physical, and virtual manifestations of a brand. Experiences, are subjective, multi-sensory episodes in the lives of individuals, with emphasis on the emotions lived during the immersion (Caru & Cova, 2003), which result in a mental mark or memory. Object, kind and intensity of stakeholder engagement in brand processes determine sensations, feelings, cognitions, and behavioral responses (Brakus, Schmitt, & Zarantonello, 2009). Despite the fast growing interest of marketing researchers in experiences the focus has been on customers (McColl-Kennedy et al., 2015); and most research has been cross-sectional. It seems worthwhile to take a broader view encompassing the experiences of different stakeholders engaged in ongoing brand processes over time.

This special issue aims to enrich and update the existing body of knowledge on brand engagement and related experiences. The guest editors encourage contributors to forward both conceptual and empirical papers reflecting current research on experiences resulting from stakeholder engagement in real or virtual brand processes. The submissions should explore the evolving scopes but are not limited to the following themes:

• Relationship between kind of brand engagement and resulting experience
• The effect of stakeholder engagement experience on brand meaning
• Brand engagement with positive vs. negative valence
• Influence of experience on further brand engagement
• Impact of brand engagement practices on experiences
• Brand Engagement as an ecosystem
• Artificial intelligence, augmented reality: The impact of technology on stakeholder brand engagement

Guest Editors:

Karine Raïes, Department of Marketing, emlyon Business School, Lyon, France. (kraies@em-lyon.com); Hans Mühlbacher, Department of Marketing and Communication, International University of Monaco, INSEEC Research Center, Monaco. (hmuhlbacher@monaco.edu).

Submission Procedure: The authors willing to contribute may contact one of the guest editors regarding topics of interest or any questions / suggestions regarding the special issue. The abstract in about 400 words should be e-mailed as MS word attachment file by September 15, 2019 at kraies@em-lyon.com (Karine Raïes) or hmuhlbacher@monaco.edu (Hans Mühlbacher). The guest editors will provide feedback to the contributor on each submitted abstract by October 15, 2019. Author guidelines for JGSMS can be found at

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Submitted full papers will be peer-reviewed by international scholars. The co-editors and special issue blind reviewers are solely responsible for accept/reject decisions for submitted manuscripts.

Important Dates:

• Abstract Submission: September 15, 2019
• Feedback on the abstract by the editor: October 15, 2019
• Full Paper Submission: December 31, 2019
• Initial Review Report: April 15, 2020
• Revisions and Decision: September 15, 2020
• Publication Date: November, 2020

JGSMS Homepage:

References

Ashley, C. & Tuten, T. (2015), Creative Strategies in Social Media Marketing: An Exploratory Study of Branded Social Content and Consumer Engagement. Psychology and Marketing, 32, 15-27.

Brakus, J. J., Schmitt, B. H., & Zarantonello, L. (2009). Brand experience: What is it? How is it measured? Does it affect loyalty? Journal of Marketing, 73(3), 52–68.

Brodie, R. J., Ilic, A., Juric, B., & Hollebeek, L. (2013). Consumer engagement in a virtual brand community: An exploratory analysis. Journal of Business Research, 66(1), 105–114.

Brodie, R. J. & Juric, B. (2018). Customer engagement: Developing an innovative research that has scholarly impact. Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science, 28(3), 291-303.

Carù, A., & Cova, B. (2003). Revisiting consumption experience: A more humble but complete view of the concept. Marketing Theory, 3(2), 267–286.

Carvalho, A., & Fernandes, T. (2018). Understanding Customer Brand Engagement with Virtual Social Communities: A Comprehensive Model of Drivers, Outcomes and Moderators. Journal of Marketing Theory & Practice, 26(1/2), 23–37.

Kornum, N. & Gyrd-Jones, R. (2017). Interplay between intended brand identity and identities in a Nike-related brand community: Co-existing ynergies and tensions in a nested system. Journal of BusinessRresearch, 70, 432-440.

McColl-Kennedy, J.R.,Gustafsson, A., Jaakkola, E., Klaus, P., Radnor, Z.J., Perks, H., Friman, M. (2015). Fresh perspectives on customer experience, Journal of Services Marketing, 29 (6/7), 430-435.

Mu?hlbacher, H., Hemetsberger, A. (2013), Brands as processes, A social representations perspective, in: Scholderer, J. and K. Brunso (eds.): Marketing, Food and the Consumer, Festschrift in Honour of Klaus G. Grunert, Pearson, 31-46.

Raïes, K., Mühlbacher, H., & Gavard-Perret, M.-L. (2015). Consumption community commitment: Newbies’ and longstanding members’ brand engagement and loyalty. Journal of Business Research, 68 (12), 2634-2644.

Stieler, M. & Germelmann, C.Ch. (2018). Actor Engagement Practices and Triadic Value Co-creation in the Team Sports Ecosystem. MARKETING ZFP – Journal of Research and Management, 40(4), 30-43.

Voorhees, C. M., Fombelle, P. W., Gregoire, Y., Bone, St., Gustafsson, A., Sousa, R., & Walkowiak, T. (2017). Service encounters, experiences and the customer journey: Defining the field and a call to expand our lens. Journal of Business Research, 79, 269–280.

Wider, S., von Wallpach, S., & Mühlbacher, H. (2018). Brand management: Unveiling the delusion of control. European Management Journal, 36, 301-305.

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