Social media users are increasingly harming destination brands through their posts. This article examines how to counter brand co-destruction in social media through the application of storytelling practices. Based on a netnography of TripAdvisor and Facebook, combined with a case study of the Danish destination management organization (DMO) VisitDenmark, the article investigates the prospective ways in which social media users co-destroy the DMO’s brand. We demonstrate how value creation is a fluid process generated along a “brand value continuum,” as complex interplays between co-creation and co-destruction manifest through user-generated content. The article provides recommendations on how DMOs can counter co-destruction by using storytelling to influence perceptions and set agendas for user conversations that stimulate brand co-creation.

, , , , ,
doi.org/10.1177/0047287519887234, hdl.handle.net/1765/135303
Journal of Travel Research
Department of Media and Communication

Lund, N.F., Scarles, C., & Cohen, S.A. (2019). The Brand Value Continuum: Countering Co-destruction of Destination Branding in Social Media through Storytelling. Journal of Travel Research, 59(8). doi:10.1177/0047287519887234