How brand coolness influences customers’ willingness to co-create? The mediating effect of customer inspiration and the moderating effect of customer interaction

Building brand coolness is widely used as a means of brand innovation and differentiation strategy, but its potential benefits have not been explored yet. In this paper, a multilevel mediation model with moderating effects was hypothesized. Integrating social exchange and customer inspiration theories, we examine how brand coolness influences customers co-creation willingness via inspiration. We also investigate the role of different interaction types in this process. This lead to a questionnaire that was distributed to a total of 400 customers within 10 branded sports chain stores. Our findings show that brand coolness positively impacts customers willingness to co-create through customer inspiration. Moreover, interaction exhibits different effects at various stages: increased customer-to-customer interaction weakens the impact of brand coolness on inspiration, whereas heightened brand-customer interaction fortifies indirect brand coolness effects that are contingent upon customer interactions. These findings deepen the exploration of brand coolness strategic value, provide positive confirmation of the applicability of social exchange theory within brand management, and enrich the mechanisms involved in formation and functioning of customer inspiration. Moreover, it provides brand managers with a feasible way to enhance customers willingness to co-create and a new perspective on managing customer relationships.