La confiance est définie dans ce papier comme la croyance fondée sur la démonstration d’un comportement non-intéressé, intègre et sensé de la part des entreprises envers leurs consommateurs. Rationnellement, la confiance abaisse les barrières d’auto-protection et favorise la prise de risque (Jarvenpaa et al., 1998, Mayer et al., 1995). Le principe de communauté online/virtuelle comprend plusieurs acceptions. Dans cet article, on se restreint à celles qui sont organisées et gérées par une entreprise commerciale. Elles peuvent être hébergées en interne, sur le site web de l’entreprise, mais aussi en externe, sur un site tiers.

Les auteurs s’attachent à évaluer l’impact de trois critères sur la création de confiance sur les communautés virtuelles. Ces trois critères ont fait l’objet de travaux préalable :
–       la qualité du contenu : peut mener au succès de la communauté (Brown et al., 2007)
–       l’intégration des membres : les consommateurs se sentent comme des membres de l’organisation/entreprise (Bhattacharaya et Sen, 2003).
–       l’interaction entre entreprise et consommateur : moteur de la participation (Dholakia et al, 2004).

L’enquête a été menée en ligne, par le moyen d’un questionnaire. 1000 réponses collectées.
Principaux résultats de l’enquête :
–       Les efforts des entreprises pour maximiser l’intégration des membres des communautés et pour fournir un contenu qualitatif ont un effet positif sur la construction de la confiance avec les consommateurs.
–       Les efforts pour encourager les interactions n’ont, quant eux, pas d’impact significatif sur la création de confiance ; cela ne suffit pas.
–       La création d’un contenu de qualité a un impact moins important que l’intégration du consommateur à la communauté.
–       Cette intégration du consommateur a un double effet :

• Elle facilite la croyance en un partage de valeurs entre le consommateur et l’entreprise (dimension altruiste).
• Elle renforce la croyance sur le côté « opportuniste » de telles communautés en ligne. Cela n’a cependant pas d’effet sur la confiance, ce qui va dans le même sens que les travaux de Brashear et al. (2003).
  => les consommateurs semblent tolérer un peu d’opportunisme de la part de l’entreprise sans que cela affecte le degré de confiance accordé. Ils connaissent le but commercial de ces communautés online.

–       La confiance a un impact positif sur trois comportements potentiels de la part des consommateurs :

• La propension à partager des informations personnelles : même pour les communautés en ligne, où les consommateurs s’inscrivent d’eux-mêmes, il faut que les entreprises cultivent la confiance pour y récolter des informations fiables.
• La volonté de coopérer, notamment dans le cas du lancement d’un nouveau produit.
• La fidélité envers la marque.

Notes d’intérêt pour la recherche en cours :

Comment créer de la confiance au sein de communautés en ligne (à but commercial), et quelles sont les retombées marketing de cette confiance pour les entreprises ?

Ce qui n’a pas été abordé :

Traite uniquement  les communautés créées et gérées par les entreprises en interne ou en externe de leur propre site internet. N’inclue aucunement la sphère des réseaux sociaux qui constitue pourtant le meilleur exemple de communauté virtuelle.

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