An assessment of brand experience knowledge literature: using bibliometric data to identify future research direction

Zha, Dongmei, Melewar, T. C., Foroudi, Pantea ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4000-7023 and Jin, Zhongqi ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2881-2188 (2020) An assessment of brand experience knowledge literature: using bibliometric data to identify future research direction. International Journal of Management Reviews, 20 (3) . pp. 287-317. ISSN 1460-8545 [Article] (doi:10.1111/ijmr.12226)

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Abstract

There is wide consensus that the brand experience literature (BEL) suffers from a deficit in conceptual works. This study argues that, for brand experience research to overcome its conceptual insipidity, it must reexamine the core of its intellectual structure to rediscover what ‘an experience provided by brands’ truly implies. The purpose of this paper is to reconceptualize and present a future research framework for research into the concept of brand experience, by identifying both the core and peripheral sources of knowledge of the concept and its association with brand meaning. Through a bibliometric process covering 136 articles published between 2002 and 2018, resulting in a database of 2,698 citations, this brand experience conceptual paper fills a critical research gap by providing the first full-scale bibliometric study to date of the BEL, using a combination of high citation and co-citation metrics. Based on this conceptual reorientation, a matrix for future development is presented, enabling the reader to visualize the scope and breadth of potential brand experience research horizons in areas relating to customer experience, consumer-brand relationship, online brand experience and sensory brand experience. The four approaches listed in the matrix – firm-based, social constructionist, virtuality and embodiment – provide a roadmap for future brand experience research undertakings to explore the rich potential of experience evoked by brands.

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