Collaborative Branding

In the online domain, consumers become pivotal authors of brand stories: they produce brand-related content and widely share it through web 2.0 applications, exchanging opinions, thoughts, reviews, that contribute to (re)define the perceived identity of products. In this context, brand management appears to be as a complex activity, that must be “guided”, rather than “controlled”, co-created, rather than simply imposed. This paper aims to develop a deeper understanding of collaborative branding: How can a company mobilize consumers’ resources, engaging them in creative and innovative processes related to its brand? Under what conditions the co-creation unfolds its potential positively? What are the main managerial challenges that companies must address to start and sustain this process? Through a detailed case-study analysis (the Italian company Moleskine), we identify some relevant implications: brand co-creation is a challenging journey that requires time, effort and resources and a great capacity of adapting and realising fine-tuning processes; it is based on different pre-conditions (the existence of mutual benefits, the transparent and fair definition of reciprocal roles, etc.) and the seemingly paradoxical coexistence of stability and change, control and freedom.