Lead User Participation in Brand Community: The Case of Microsoft MVPs

This paper investigates the antecedents and the behavior of Lead Users in the Microsoft brand community (MBC). Lead users in the MBC are called Microsoft Most Valuable Professionals (MVP). The group of MVPs is highly regarded as a very valuable resource within the Microsoft brand community, and their opinion strongly influences innovations in the MBC. MVP activities are center within the Microsoft brand and intermingle with other social activities in the MBC. A model is proposed based on the theory of planned behavior, incorporating social intentions and three aspects of cognition (brand knowledge, normative community pressure, and community engagement) and beliefs (brand identification). This research attempts to look into behavior, instead of stopping at the level of behavioral intention. Data was collected from 48 Microsoft MVPs through a questionnaire survey administered during a Taiwan MVP Summit. Analysis reveals that the MVPs’ participation intention is influenced by brand knowledge, normative community pressure and community engagement, which are influenced by their sense of identification towards the brand. Furthermore, participation intention, in turn, affects MVPs’ behavior, moderated by their creativity relative level. This study confirms the importance of brand identity, brand knowledge, normative community pressure, and community engagement on their intention and behavior. The results can be a basis for companies to pay attention in building up a sound brand communities.