I hate what you love: brand polarization and negativity towards brands as an opportunity for brand management

Abstract

Purpose Negativity towards a brand is typically conceived as a significant problem for brand managers. This paper aims to show that negativity towards a brand can represent an opportunity for companies when brand polarization occurs. To this end, the paper offers a new conception of the brand polarization phenomenon and reports exploratory findings on the benefits of consumers’ negativity towards brands in the context of brand polarization. Design/methodology/approach To develop a conception of brand polarization, the paper builds on research on polarizing brands and extends it by integrating insights from systematic literature reviews in three bodies of literature: scholarship on brand rivalry and, separately, polarization in political science and social psychology. Using qualitative data from 22 semi-structured interviews, the paper explores possible advantages of brand polarization. Findings This paper defines the brand polarization phenomenon and identifies multiple perspectives on brand polarization. Specifically, the findings highlight three distinct parties that can benefit from brand polarization: the polarizing brand as an independent entity; the brand team behind the polarizing brand; and the passionate consumers involved with the polarizing brand. The data reveal specific advantages of brand polarization associated with the three parties involved. Practical implications Managers of brands with a polarizing nature could benefit from having identified a group of lovers and a group of haters, as this could allow them to improve their focus when developing and implementing the brands’ strategies. Originality/value This exploratory study is the first explicitly focusing on the brand polarization phenomenon and approaches negativity towards brands as a potential opportunity.

Direct and indirect negatively valenced engagement behavior

“…Specifically, negative CEBs might have detrimental financial and relational consequences on firms (Kumar et al , 2010; Kunz et al , 2017; Van Doorn et al , 2010). However, despite its potential impacts and relationship to key outcomes for customer-brand relationship such as loyalty and lifetime and shareholder value (Verleye et al , 2014), the majority of studies address positively valenced CEB, thus, largely overlooking the negative side and its ensuing implications (Hollebeek et al , 2016; Osuna Ramírez et al , 2019). Specifically, within online contexts, negative CEBs are contagious and viral in nature, with ensuing implications that may involve potential short and long-term financial and reputational detrimental outcomes for firms, brands and service providers (Bowden et al , 2017; Wu et al , 2016).…”

“…This has caused a major limitation in e-WOM research stream with inconclusive findings regarding the impact of negative valence compared to ratings and volume of juxtaposed positive reviews (Cheung and Thadani, 2012, Hennig-Thurau et al, 2010, King et al, 2014. Accordingly, despite NVIB's potentially detrimental effects, an understanding of it remains scant in literature (Osuna Ramírez et al, 2019, Veloutsou andMafe, 2020) especially empirically, and specifically regarding the impact of its direct and indirect facets (Azer andAlexander, 2018, Hollebeek et al, 2016). Practically, this is important to service providers as the specific performances required to foster a firm's value or avoid value destruction can differ based on the relative strength of the impact of direct and indirect NVIB (Azer andAlexander, 2020, Dolan et al, 2019).…”

Fan Identification, Brand Community Identification, and Oppositional Brand Loyalty towards Sponsors of a Rival Sports Team: The Mediating Role of Schadenfreude

“…Fan identification has the power to influence an individual to be loyal to the extent of being fanatics to his/her favorite or preferred team, raise purchase intention of sponsor brands, and to minimize intention to switch to fans of sponsored team (Thorne and Bruner, 2006;Ramírez et al, 2019). Fan identification is situation in which a person feels that he/she is emotionally attached to, or being part of his/her favorite sports team.…”

“…It is necessary to note that, highly identified fans consider their favorite team victories as something which augment their own self-prestige and self-esteem through Basking in the Reflective Glory (BIRGing) of the favorite team (Dalakas et al, 2004). Experience shows that many sports fans know and acknowledge that some of these behaviors are improper or socially unacceptable, however they consider them as what a real fan should do to support or to help his/her favorite team be victorious (Ramírez et al, 2019).…”

Models for brand relationships

“…Although the focus of brand-centric research is still mostly on positive relationships and outcomes (Albert and Thomson, 2018;Veloutsou and Ruiz-Mafé, 2020), recent research also explores concepts related to negative brand relationships or feelings such as complaining (Huefner et al, 2002), brand avoidance (Lee et al, 2009;Knittel et al, 2016), brand retaliation (Thomson et al, 2012) or brand hate (Kucuk, 2010;Zarantonello et al, 2016Zarantonello et al, , 2018Hegner et al, 2017;Fetscherin, 2019). Recent research also explores the drivers and outcomes of participating in anti-brand communities (Popp et al, 2016;Dessart et al, 2020;Rodrigues et al, 2020), how the nature of brand-centric relationships may change over time (Jain and Sharma, 2019;Sakulsinlapakorn and Zhang, 2019;Kennedy and Guzm an, 2020) and how different consumers develop relationships of different strength and valence with a same brand (Osuna-Ramírez et al, 2019). Studying both negative and positive brand-centric relationships is crucial to understand the wide range of relationships consumers have with and around brands and the dynamics of these relationships.…”