Tourism and Hospitality

Rebecca Pera, Giampaolo Viglia, Roberto Furlan, 2016, Who Am I? How Compelling Self-storytelling Builds Digital Personal Reputation, Journal of Interactive Marketing, Volume 35, August 2016, Pages 44–55

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1094996815000614

Abstract

The work explores whether self-storytelling is a powerful predictor of personal reputation in a collaborative community of the sharing economy realm. By proposing that powerful self-storytelling allows an attractive positioning in respect to potential others, the paper extends the literature of brand storytelling and brand archetypes shifting the perspective to a personal level. This study adopts a qualitative–quantitative approach to investigate the meanings and stories contained in personal profile descriptions and their relation with reputation. Personal descriptions are interpreted as storytelling activities, labels/glosses that allow members to access the services of the community by facilitating personal reputation building. The findings show that powerful storytelling structures have defined phases and are crucial in reputation building when the story evolves in a metaphoric, symbolic lesson. The presence of archetypes, in particular the Sage and the Ruler, also confers reputational power to the stories. The results reveal opportunities for peer-to-peer communities, traditional companies, and social businesses. Marketers should design tools and platforms able to trigger consumers’ desire to express their individuality through personal descriptions and suggest the drivers that affect reputation.