The Role of Bloggers in Business Ecosystems - Investigation of Open and User Innovation Processes in the Fashion Industry

This paper analyses a phenomenon of blogging in the fashion industry and it related magnitudes for the firms to innovative, market and diffuse new products and designs and respond rapidly to fast-moving trends. More... [ view full abstract ]

This paper analyses a phenomenon of blogging in the fashion industry and it related magnitudes for the firms to innovative, market and diffuse new products and designs and respond rapidly to fast-moving trends. More specifically, it investigates open and user innovation practices and the role which bloggers play in the creation of nonfunctional innovation, such as brand image and collective sense making. The authors investigate a novel phenomenon which lies in the intersection between marketing and open and user innovation literature; and explores the role of bloggers in the fashion business ecosystems through the lens of the lead user and opinion leader theories.
To shed more light on the phenomenon of blogging, an empirical qualitative analysis is applied, which is based on 25 in-depth interviews with German fashion bloggers. It has been shown that bloggers can serve as both an effective marketing tool as well as valuable sources of innovation capable to contribute to the creation of new products, expansion of the design space, and re-positioning of brand perception. Therefore, this paper provides valuable insight for companies on how to manage their interaction with bloggers and how to leverage their creative capabilities. The findings can be applied not only in the fashion industry but also in other consumer goods industries which are strongly driven by user insights and collective sense making on the social media channels. Theoretical contribution can be seen in the area of open and user innovation within a specific industry such as fashion, development of lead user theory, and understanding of the functioning of online user communities and innovation diffusion in such communities.