Purpose – Luxury brands tend to be hesitant in adopting social media. This matter has created an imminent need to understand the different types of online luxury followers so as to help luxury brands communicate effectively with their consumers, while maintaining the “luxe” image and experience. Accordingly, the purpose of this paper is to provide luxury brands with a deeper understanding of their online audience and the strategies needed to engage with them through the different social media platforms. Design/methodology/approach – A qualitative approach was utilized in which 24 in-depth interviews were conducted with Lebanese followers of an online luxury brand’s social media pages. Findings – The study identifies the presence of six main categories of online luxury followers: pragmatists, bystanders, trend hunters, image seekers, passionate owners, and prime consumers. Each group has a specific engagement and propensity to buy levels. Research limitations/implications – Understanding the different segments of luxury brand followers provides a framework for marketing managers that allows them to correctly target their marketing and communication strategies in order to maximize consumer engagement and purchasing behaviors. Originality/value – A significant gap exists in the extant literature which offers no understanding of the different luxury brand followers and their different characteristics. This study is the first to offer an exploratory typology of the various luxury brand followers on social media platforms.

Introduction

A digital revolution has been shaping the marketing world, making it highly entrenched in the social media platforms and dependent on the online social relationship between consumers and a given brand (Hughes et al., 2016; Ramadan, 2017). The latter can be attributed to the fact that social media has become an inseparable element from the daily lives of consumers. As a result, today’s social media plays a major role in the branding and communication strategies of companies, ranging from fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) to luxury brands. Nevertheless, luxury brands tend to show a degree of hesitance with regard to their adoption of social media (Hughes et al., 2016; Jin, 2012) due to the fact that luxury brands have been built around the image of exclusivity and individuality whereas social media is readily available to the masses and can, in turn, generate a sense of brand overexposure (Okonkwo, 2009). Moreover, social media has facilitated the formation of online communities and social platforms that can simultaneously serve as virtual brand and anti-brand communities, thereby possibly leading to the creation of either positive or negative consumer sentiments (Ramadan and Farah, 2017). This issue has created an imminent need to understand the different types of online luxury consumers and their respective intentions and behaviors as this would allow luxury brands to successfully communicate with their consumers while maintaining the “luxe” image and experience. Nonetheless, a thorough review of the literature indicates the existence of a significant research gap regarding the social media marketing and consumer behavior of high-end luxury brands (Hughes et al., 2016). Indeed, the majority of studies on the subject focus mainly on luxury brand websites, features, and users, with little attention being dedicated to these brands’ social media pages (Hughes et al., 2016). In addition, although a few recent studies have examined the marketing potential of social media for luxury brand management (Hennigs et al., 2012; Jin, 2012), the literature still lacks a categorization of the latter brands’ followers and the methods to communicate with each of these segments. Indeed, the extant literature depicts a dearth in studies analyzing the different typologies and social characteristics that define luxury brand consumers and their behaviors (Tak et al., 2017; Zhang and Kim, 2013). Accordingly, this study aims to address this gap and offer an exploratory topology of the various consumer categories that are active on these brands’ social media pages in order to provide luxury brands with a better understanding of their online audience and the strategies needed to engage with them through the different luxury social media platforms.