明星代言的价值共创新机制——基于多个粉丝社群的网络民族志研究

《外国经济与管理》 2021年43卷第1期 页码：3 - 22  online：2021年1月9日

明星代言的价值共创新机制——基于多个粉丝社群的网络民族志研究

The Value Co-creation Mechanism of Celebrity Endorsement: Netnography of Multiple Fan Communities

作者（中）：周懿瑾1 *, 白玫佳黛2

作者（英）：Zhou Yijin1 *, Bai Meijiadai2

作者单位：1.中山大学 传播与设计学院，广东 广州 510006 2.辽宁大学 新闻与传播学院，辽宁 沈阳 110136

摘要：不同于传统明星代言中被动的消费者，粉丝社群在新兴明星的品牌代言中扮演着价值共创的重要角色，推动品牌资产与名人资本的价值双向流动和扩张，但这一明星代言的新机制和作用过程还未得到理论探索。本文通过对多个粉丝社群为期18个月的网络民族志研究发现：在社交媒体环境下，新兴明星的代言不再是明星背书品牌的线性传递过程，而是粉丝社群—品牌—明星三方行动者价值共创的动态循环。粉丝社群在社交媒体平台规则和对偶像强烈情感的双重牵引下逐渐转变为生产组织，并将自身的消费劳动与传播劳动作为一种生产资源投入到明星代言绩效的提升上，以此来推动和加速品牌与明星之间的价值双向构建，并反向扩大再生产品牌资产和名人资本。与此同时，粉丝社群也生产了一个能够吸引资本的投资机会，使得其他拥有更高资产的品牌愿意选择相应明星为代言人，从而推动名人资本进入价值共创的动态上升循环。本研究揭示的明星代言新机制对传统代言理论形成了重要补充，也丰富了粉丝研究的相关理论；实践中为品牌在新媒体环境下采用明星代言策略提供了重要建议。

关键词：明星代言; 价值共创; 粉丝社群; 消费劳动; 名人资本; 网络民族志

Summary: Unlike the passive consumers depicted by the traditional theories of celebrity endorsement, nowadays it is the fan community that plays a crucial role especially in the process of new celebrity brand endorsement: Incented by the affection to their idol, fans voluntarily gather together to form blurry boundary organizations to collectively promote the market performance of the brands their idol endorses, which in turn impacts the operation and decision-making of the brands. Such active participation of the fan community produces a new mechanism of celebrity endorsement, of which the current literature has not yet responded with convincing explanations. Based on an 18-month online ethnography study of multiple fan communities, this paper discovers that the new celebrity endorsement is no longer a linear value delivery process; instead, it is a dynamic circle of value co-creation consists of a rising star, his/her fan community, and the endorsed brands. In social media, a fan community is driven by both the platform rules and the strong affection to its idol to transform from a tribe bounded purely by affection into an organization of production; the core organization goal consequently changes from affective interaction into expanded reproduction of the celebrity capital, in the process of which celebrity endorsement becomes one of the means to achieve the organization goal. Generally speaking, fans of a rising star with relatively low celebrity capital would expect high value brands to pick up their idol as endorser so that the idol could benefit from the brands. Yet to the brands such cooperation may benefit more to the rising star rather than vise versa. In order to attract brands to the seemingly unappealing deal, the fan community will proactively offer its free labor brand communication as well as consumption to compensate the potential brand equity outflow – they not only act as heavy consumers of their idol-endorsing brands, but also actively help these brands to grab more market share. As a result, brands are paid off by better communication effects and market performances which lead to increasing brand equity; meanwhile, the rising star’s celebrity capital is nurtured and enhanced. In this triangular loop, the fan community not only supports and accelerates the value exchange between celebrity and brand, but also proactively constructs the brand equity as well as the celebrity capital. In this way, the fan community actually generates new capital investment opportunity by attracting other higher value brands to consider their idol as endorser, hence pushes the celebrity capital to the next higher level of value co-creation circle. As such, the idol’s celebrity capital spirals up through multiple brand endorsement co-creation circles, and the subsequent endorsed brands acquire higher equity in return. Meanwhile, as the bound between the fan community and its idol being continuously reinforced, fans are rewarded by emotional satisfaction and strong confidence grown out of their collective achievement. This study innovatively complements the existing endorsement theories by emphasizing on the influence of fans’ voluntary labor; it also enriches the theories of fandom studies and provides important suggestions for brands to make strategic decisions on celebrity endorsement in the social media environment.

Key words: celebrity endorsement; value co-creation; fan community; consumptive labor; celebrity capital; Netnography

DOI：10.16538/j.cnki.fem.20200723.301

收稿日期：2020-3-23

基金项目：国家自然科学基金青年项目（71602193）

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