Internalization, Objectivation and Externalization : Formation of Hyper-Loyal Brand Communities

Building blocks of brand loyalty have been appealing to marketers for decades. The search for the 'one-fits-all strategy' has unintentionally impaired the exploration of the deeper phenomenological processes consumers engage in. Consumer loyalty for brands includes various degrees (Aaker 1996; Rowley 2005). One form of intense brand loyalty is the communities (Muniz and O'Guinn 2001) created around and directed by par ticular brands. These brand communities have been known to yield to hyper-loyalty (McAlexander and Schouten 1998; Ebstein, Betou et al., 1999). Therefore, it is crucial to better understand the formation stages of brand communities, which can then shed the light to the dynamics of sustainable long-term competitive advantage they often inherit. This paper proposes that deeper understanding of consumer hyper-loyalty and its formation process needs to be integrated with the infamous advantageous resources (Hunt 2002)