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Blizzard

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Online Brand Communities Used As Part of Relationship Marketing: A Case Study of Blizzard
BA-Thesis - Morten Hedegaard Nielsen

2010

Abstract
Purpose
During the last few decades competition in consumer markets has increase dramatically and fragmented the markets. Consequently, the discipline of marketing has changed radically from transactional marketing into relational marketing. Today, the entertainment industry is one of the most rapidly growing industries, where competition intensifies year by year and hence the focus on building relationships with customers has become a central element for survival. The thesis has its focus on one of the most successful companies in this industry, Blizzard Entertainment®. More specifically it will explore how they utilise their online brand community „Battle.net®‟ in order to build relationships with its customers.
Based on a theoretical discussion of relationship marketing and online brand communities, together with an investigation of Blizzard Entertainment‟s online brand community „Battle.net‟, this thesis will explore:
How and to what degree does Blizzard Entertainment’s online brand community ‘Battle.net’ contribute to build successful relationships with its customers in a fragmented market?

In order to answer the problem statement the thesis is divided into three parts; a contextual description, a theoretical discussion, and a case study of Blizzard‟s online brand community
Battle.net. The contextual description and the theoretical discussion create a fundament for the case study. Method
The thesis takes a hermeneutical/humanistic view point to approach the research area. The thesis therefore does not seek to explain, as with the positivistic approach, but instead to understand and interpret. In order to explore the research area, this thesis employs a qualitative research method in the form

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