How does the fast-fashion companies normally communicate with their stakeholders on Facebook, and what constitutes a successful Facebook-page?

As is evident from the results chapter, the three brands examined in this paper have different ways of communicating with their followers on Facebook. H&M is main focus is

communicating with their followers, and they do not publish posts as often as the other brands. H&M often asks their followers questions to get their input on new clothes,

collections or current trends, or more general questions regarding weekend plans or favourite activities during summer for example. Quinton’s (2013) research highlighted co-creation as very important for brand communities, and the significance of incorporating the consumers in the value-creation of the brand H&M also have the highest response rate of all three firms, again underlining their dedication to co-creation, but also their efforts to promote

participation and getting their followers engaged in the community, as deemed important by several researchers (Porter et al, 2011; Habibi et al, 2014b). H&M posts a variety of topics and is also the brand with the largest variety in terms of values their posts entails.  

Mango has a different approach than H&M with a high frequency of post, but a lower response rate. However, they avail of the like-button regularly, and in 2013 they liked 912 comments from followers, an average of 2-3 likes a day. Mango is less diverse in the topics that they post, and they rarely ask their followers’ questions or try to engage them in the community. Yet, what is noteworthy about Mango is their efforts to reach more followers by using different languages in their posts. Some posts are translated to as much as four

languages; English, Spanish, French and German. They also frequently include links to where the items in the pictures can be bought, and as such the communication is more sales-oriented than H&M’s communication with followers.

Benetton is the brand with the least amount of activity on their Facebook-page of the three brands. The brand is similar to Mango in the respect that they focus on publishing a high amount of posts, twice as many posts as H&M in 2011, 2012 and 2013. The brand has a low response rate, and low variety in post topics. They are also not very engaging in their posts, however, here there is an improvement throughout 2012 where their posts becomes

increasingly social in value. In 2013 however, the brand goes back to publishing purely functional posts, and as such does not attempt to engage their followers.

The findings show that the brands have different levels of activity and focus in their

communication with followers. However, what does the findings say about what constitutes a successful Facebook-page? As evident from the theory chapters, it can be argued that a successful Facebook-page is the page that manages to create a brand community (Quinton, 2013; Habi et al, 2014a; Habibi et al, 2014b), and previous research has highlighted

engagement as paramount to the survival of a brand community (Schau et al, 2009; Porter et al, 2011; Quinton, 2013; Habibi et al, 2014b). While most researchers seem to agree that engagement is the most important factor in a brand community, studies have highlighted different aspects of how one creates engagement. On Facebook the options for engagement is posting, commenting, liking or sharing content. Both Mango and H&M have high levels of likes and comments from followers, but they have different approaches to posting and engaging with followers in their brand communities.

Sicilia and Palazón (2008) state that to create a successful community, brands have to provide options that tap into the functional, social and entertainment values of the followers. H&M publish posts with a mix of functional and social values. They provides their members with both information regarding the brand and their products, and they also often ask their member questions and involve them in the value-creation of the brand. Mango almost purely publishes posts with functional values, and Benetton publishes posts with a mix social and functional values, though with a focus on functional values. However, none of the brands have a high focus on providing entertainment for their followers. One argument may be that for some viewing pictures and videos of clothes is in itself “entertainment”, however this do not aid in explaining why Mango has managed to gain the biggest engagement of all three brands by publishing posts with almost exclusively a functional value. This is noteworthy, as studies

show that incorporating members of a community in the value-creation of the brand (Quinton, 2013), as well as the brands responding to questions and actively becoming a part of the conversation (Berthon et al, 2012) is very important, yet Mango has very little focus on this.

Culnan et al (2010) argue that content is the most important factor in creating engagement in a brand community: “The first and most important element is content. Without a continual supply of compelling content, there is no reason for people to visit an organization’s social media site. An organization typically bears primary responsibility for initiating content on Twitter and Facebook and in blogs that will motivate its customers to respond” (p. 249). With this in mind, the reason why Mango is so successful in creating engagement may be their continuous update of interesting content on their Facebook-page. In 2013 the brand posted an average of three posts per day, while Benetton and H&M posted only one posts per day.

However, if continuously updating interesting content is the most important, Benetton should have experienced higher engagement from followers in 2012. The numbers from 2012 shows that Mango posted an average of 2,5 posts per day, H&M one per day and Benetton two posts per day, twice as many as H&M and almost as often as Mango. Furthermore, if the emphasis is on what the content of the posts are, and the most important factor for success is engaging content, H&M has the highest variety in topics, and as such should experience higher engagement from followers than Mango.

The answer may be found in the research of Porter et al (2011) stating that ultimately, getting members engaged in a community depends on what the followers wish to get out of the community. “Engagement is a situated consumption phenomenon that is best understood and achieved when viewed through the dual lens of consumer needs fulfillment and motivation.”

(Porter, et al, 2011, p. 84). Sicilia and Palazon (2008) similarly argue that brands must determine what contents and values appeals most to its followers, and plan the content accordingly. Consequently, while H&M’s recipe for success is focusing on communication with their followers, this may not be what engages the followers on Mango’s Facebook-page.

Therefore, while findings from research as the importance of involving followers in the co-creation of the brand (Quinton, 2013), relating to the functional, social and entertainment values of the followers (Sicilia and Palazon, 2008), and strengthen the relationship with followers to increase trust towards the brand (Habibi et al, 2014b) is important, creating

engagement in a social media brand community primarily rely on brands understanding of what followers want out of a brand community, and what motivates them to engage. Of course, one may ask if Mango may engage even more members were they to spur

engagement, or if H&M would have a higher number of engaged members were they to post interesting content at a higher frequency. To answer this would require further more extensive research.

RQ 2: What CSR-efforts is the focus of the fast-fashion companies, and how are they