Sustainable Community Marketing for Probabilistic Goods: The Paradox of Brand Love and Jealousy in a Dual Emotional Engagement Model

Abstract

This study investigates online community marketing as a strategy to cultivate brand–consumer-relationship sustainability. Blind boxes have recently gained worldwide popularity but are increasingly criticized for sustainability concerns. While previous research mainly assumes cooperation among members, we highlight cooperative and competitive emotional interactions in building a sustainable online community. Integrating the conditioned-expectancy theory of vicarious emotion with social comparison theory, we propose a dual emotional mechanism consisting of brand love and brand jealousy to reflect cooperative and competitive emotions. This study obtained 601 valid responses from online communities of blind boxes. The results show that online community marketing is positively related to purchase intention. Although they are paradoxical, brand love and brand jealousy coexist, and both mediate the abovementioned relationship. We also find a serial mediation through brand love and jealousy and then engagement. In post hoc analysis, we further find a curvilinear mediation via brand love, which accelerates the emotional engagement in community marketing, while brand jealousy maintains a linear position. This study provides new insights on sustainable community marketing and suggests practical implications for innovative marketing approaches.

1. Introduction

Online community marketing is an effective strategy for fostering sustainable brand–consumer relationships. The high interactions among community members are utilized to achieve various marketing goals [1,2,3]. With the expansion of interactive social media platforms, many brands have built online communities to leverage customer engagement and facilitate purchase [4,5,6]. This strategy is especially applicable to probabilistic goods (e.g., blind boxes). Despite gaining worldwide popularity, blind boxes are facing increasing scrutiny regarding sustainability. They are often criticized for promoting short-term consumption, as market interest quickly cools, ultimately leading to product waste [7]. It is essential for brands to cultivate sustainable-marketing effectiveness [8]. Hence, online community marketing has emerged as an important strategy for strengthening brand–consumer relationships for probabilistic goods.

Although there has been extensive research on online community marketing, the previous literature mainly emphasizes cooperative interactions in boosting sustainable brand–consumer relationships [9,10,11]. This is because brand communities are usually made up of consumers with common interests. They share information and interact with other members, demonstrating a strong sense of group cohesion and communal spirit [12]. However, there remains limited studies combining the competition perspective. In particular, new approaches such as probability selling may shape a different pattern of customer–customer interactions in communities, while the traditional cooperation-oriented explanations may neglect the competition aspect.

Focusing on community marketing of probabilistic goods, this study highlights a cooperation–competition sustainable relationship among members of such online communities. Probabilistic goods are usually sold in sealed packages, and consumers find out what they get only after payment [13]. From a set of multiple goods in a set, it is not ensured which one a consumer will obtain since it is decided by a probability. Examples include Japanese New Year lucky bags, Pokémon mystery boxes, Pop Mart blind boxes, mystery vacation packages, and virtual in-game loot boxes [14,15,16,17,18,19]. There are numerous online forums and social groups for fans to communicate on these products or brands that they are interested in. On the one hand, members show cooperation by sharing useful information, which helps others to pursue desired products [19,20]. This is consistent with the traditional view of cooperation in communities, as members share their experience and knowledge in multi-faceted interactions to support others in their community circle [21]. On the other hand, the probabilistic nature implies competition among community members. In a set of probabilistic goods, there are usually some goods with higher value, thus making them preferred, while others are not; and some consumers may get the preferred goods, while others do not [13,17]. Community members will compare themselves to others when the preferred goods are only obtained by a limited number of people. As a result, a competitive psychological climate will arise among members. Such community climates encourage a collecting consumption culture, endowing the products with enduring value. It transforms disposable purchases into sustainable and collectible ones [22]. Supported by the online community, blind box buying is transformed into a sustained, collection-driven form.

Therefore, the coexisting cooperation–competition context in communities for probabilistic goods is distinct from that of traditional communities for regular goods. It highlights the brand–consumer-relationship sustainability. Previous research mainly emphasizes the cooperation aspect in communities, discussing affective and behavioral reactions based on common interests and mutual support among members [8,23,24]. Clarifying the unique nature of probabilistic goods, we argue that the competition aspect should not be neglected for a full understanding of community marketing. Moreover, despite the increasing academic attention to probabilistic goods, there is a lack of research on consumer responses in brand communities of probabilistic goods [25,26,27]. The abovementioned research gaps urge a re-examination and update of the theoretical development regarding the association between community marketing and consumer responses in the context of probabilistic goods.

In light of the paradox involving cooperative–competitive relationships in online brand communities of probabilistic goods, this study attempts to unpack the emotional mechanisms behind consumer engagement and purchase intention. It is vital to emphasize emotional engagement for fostering sustainable brand relationships in digital marketing [28]. From a consumer’s perspective, the unsustainability of blind boxes may stem from psychological obsolescence. Once the uncertainty is opened, the perceived value of the blind box declines quickly, resulting in product underutilization and waste. By building stronger emotional relationships with brands as a strategy, the present research provides a new perspective on sustainable brand management. This perspective stresses the enduring emotional value toward the brand, turning consumption into a lasting brand relationship. Therefore, this study integrates social comparison theory [29,30] and the conditioned-expectancy theory of vicarious emotion [31] to build a conceptual model. Social comparison influences individuals’ self-assessment and feelings [29,30] when they compare what they obtain in the purchase of probabilistic goods with others’ acquisitions during interactions in online communities. Although the theory does not explain emotional responses in cooperation–competition relationships, some following research [30] adds cooperative–competitive orientation to the examination of social comparison effects. Therefore, we also adopt the conditioned-expectancy theory [31] to explain emotional instigation in a cooperative–competitive context. Drawing on the theory, we argue that expectations of cooperation can elicit congruent positive effects such as brand love shared among community members, while competition promotes incongruent emotional experience such as the negative feeling of brand jealousy when observing another’s joy of receiving desirable items. It provides a theoretical foundation for exploring the twofold brand emotions in community interactions where cooperation and competition coexist.

The previous literature mainly focuses on simplex brand emotions as affective mechanisms. Most research emphasizes positive emotions, such as brand love, brand passion, and brand attachment [32,33,34]. Cooperative and supportive interactions bond community members with the brand in affective relationships, resulting in positive emotions toward the brand [35,36]. However, consumers may experience blended emotions during their community interactions [37]. Besides giving consumers cozy and warm feelings with a sense of belonging, communities may also arouse competition feelings due to the desire of surpassing other people [38]. Community marketing may evoke both brand love and jealousy when a consumer observes peers’ delightful experience, especially when social media facilitates sharing and observing among individuals [39,40].

This study extends the literature by investigating the dual emotional mechanism in online brand communities of probabilistic goods. Purchasing probabilistic goods often involves emotions [19,41]. For instance, consumers buy Pokémon mystery boxes and Pop Mart blind boxes because they love the brands and their products. They pay for the hedonic benefits [18]. Probabilistic selling makes it a surprise when they open the boxes and thus creates a gameful experience [14,17]. Online brand communities provide a place for people of the same interest to share their emotional experience. When members share information and emotional experience on the products and brands they commonly love, they strengthen community ties, expand knowledge-sharing networks, and build brand belonging [42,43]. The cooperative interaction can nurture love bonds between consumers and products, thus increasing cherishing behavior [3,44]. However, the emotional interactions are twofold. Online community marketing can inspire brand love by creating a warm and cooperative interactive atmosphere. But it may also elicit brand jealousy in a competitive way. The uncertainty inherent in opening boxes of probabilistic goods leads to imbalanced allocation of high-value ones, sparking competition among community members [26,45]. Driven by upward comparison, consumers may generate the competitive emotion of jealousy toward those who luckily obtain high-value products [46,47]. It has been found that jealousy can make consumers emotionally invest more effort into pursuing their goals and thus intensify their purchase intention toward the brand [48]. Meanwhile, comparison increases the perceived social value of the product, which encourages both retention behaviors and secondary resource circulation [7]. Therefore, the cooperation–competition nature of probabilistic goods communities evokes twofold emotional reactions among members. We argue that brand love and brand jealousy are both related to positive consumer responses in online community marketing for probabilistic goods.

Furthermore, customer engagement is considered to be a positive outcome of brand emotions [49,50,51]. With the rise of online interactive platforms, opportunities to improve sale performances have increased through emotional arousal and engagement [52]. This study adopts an emotional engagement framework to examine brand–consumer relationships. When consumers form long-lasting emotional bonds and devote themselves to a brand, they demonstrate a higher purchase propensity [53]. However, current empirical research on emotional engagement has focused on singular emotional arousal [36,54], with limited attention paid to the mixed emotional states. It is a competitive advantage for marketers to understand blended emotional customer experience in paradoxical interactions [37,55]. Hence, this study emphasizes the roles of brand emotions and customer engagement in the relationship between online community marketing and purchase intention.

To test the model, we conducted a survey from online blind box communities. The empirical results from 601 valid responses showed that online community marketing was positively related to customer engagement and purchase intention. And both brand love and brand jealousy mediated the relationship between online community marketing and purchase intention. The mediation effect of brand love was stronger than brand jealousy. Additionally, the positive association between community marketing and purchase intention was serially mediated by brand emotions (brand love and brand jealousy) and customer engagement. To further investigate the two emotional mechanisms, we conducted post hoc analysis and found a curvilinear indirect effect through brand love, and just a linear effect via brand jealousy.

This paper makes several contributions. First, this study investigates online community marketing of probabilistic goods, highlighting brand–consumer-relationship sustainability. It offers a new perspective to enrich sustainable brand community research on innovative marketing approaches such as probabilistic selling. This study advances the understanding of consumer interactions in communities by incorporating a full picture, whereas prior work has primarily focused on the cooperation perspective [1,4,10]. Second, we propose dual emotions as mechanisms, namely brand love and brand jealousy, to reflect cooperative and competitive emotional interactions in probabilistic goods communities. Previous studies have mainly discussed single-valence brand emotions [53,56], with traditional views that positive emotions yield favorable outcomes, while negative emotions are linked to disadvantages [37]. Our findings reveal that the paradox of opposing brand feelings can coexist and generate positive outcomes, providing a strategic lens for sustainable brand–consumer relationships and contributing to a novel theoretical explanation to sustainable brand management research. Third, this study validates a serial mediating mechanism. It demonstrates that online community marketing for probabilistic goods induces dual emotions, then enhances customer engagement, and finally increases purchase intention. Finally, the post hoc analysis provides a new insight into differentiating the two emotional mechanisms during community engagement. The curvilinear effect of brand love, but not brand jealousy, suggests an accelerating association between brand love and engagement. This may explain why brand love dominates in the dual-mechanism model, appealing for modifications of theories used in the prior literature [57]. This study contributes to theoretical development and also provides practical implications for the marketing of probabilistic goods with emotional and engaging tactics.

2. Theoretical Framework and Hypotheses

2.1. Online Community Marketing for Probabilistic Goods

Brand community is defined as “a specialized, non-geographically bound community based on a structured set of social relationships among admirers of a brand” [2] (p. 412). It often functions as a social hub for like-minded individuals to share their passion and pursue common brand-related goals [44,58]. With the development of digital platforms, online communities are considered a strategic vehicle for achieving sustainable growth [59]. They provide an online presence for firms to strengthen brand–consumer relationships through interactions between brand enthusiasts and firms [34,60,61].

Prior research of community marketing emphasizes cultivating partnerships with targeted consumer segments [62]. Rather than relying solely on conventional advertising or celebrity endorsements [18,63,64], firms leverage the social capital embedded within communities to facilitate value co-creation, foster collective identification, and create a sustainable brand–consumer relationship [4,34,65]. In digital marketing, online communities have evolved into diversified interaction platforms to satisfy consumers’ growing desire for social connection and co-creation [49]. Although there has been increasing research on online communities and interactions, this study focuses on an emerging but neglected type of communities for probabilistic goods, where customers interact with brands and other community members around the products [66].

Probabilistic goods are different from regular ones, and their unique characteristics may show different dynamics in community interactions. When consumers buy probabilistic goods, they cannot anticipate which specific item they will receive from a set of distinct products. Popular examples include Pokémon’s mystery boxes and Pop Mart’s blind boxes. There is a gamble of probabilities among value-differentiated options [67,68]. That is, consumers may obtain higher-value items or receive lower-value alternatives at the same price. This inherent uncertainty fundamentally distinguishes probabilistic consumption from traditional purchasing [13], prompting consumers to seek supplemental brand information for reducing decision ambiguity. Therefore, online brand communities serve as critical platforms for these enthusiasts to interact, aiming to mitigate uncertainty in probabilistic purchasing.

In the process of communications and interactions in the community, however, consumers may form a cooperation–competition sustainable relationship. While the existing research primarily focuses on the cooperative aspect of community marketing [4,33,43,44], it may not adequately capture the full understanding of interactions in probabilistic goods communities. The coexistence of cooperative and competitive nature may imply a dual mechanism for community members’ emotional interactions. On the one hand, members demonstrate a cooperative relationship in various forms, such as expressing common interests, exchanging experiences, posting latest information about products or brands, answering questions, discussing strategies to draw desired items from some set of probabilistic goods, and sympathizing with someone’s feelings. These provide emotional bonds and social support, enabling consumers to develop a sense of group cohesion and integrate into a collaborative atmosphere [62,69]. On the other hand, the probabilistic nature determines that not everyone can acquire their desired items, resulting in unequal distributions of probabilistic goods [19]. This inherent scarcity fuels competition within the community. And flaunting behavior further amplifies the competition, which may arouse other members’ jealousy and engagement [70].

Thus, cooperation and competition may coexist through continuous community interactions [5,71,72,73,74]. When brands conduct community marketing for probabilistic goods, consumers may experience the paradox of positive and negative emotional responses. This study aims to uncover the dual emotional mechanisms behind consumer engagement and purchase intention. We integrate the conditioned-expectancy theory of vicarious emotion [31] with social comparison theory [29,30] to construct the theoretical foundation. Based on the conditioned-expectancy theory, expectation of cooperation promotes perceived emotional congruence between self and others, while competition connects to incongruent emotion responding [31]. In line with this, this study argues that the cooperative side of a community fosters mutual support and emotional similarity [30], fulfilling consumers’ natural longing for a shared and warm atmosphere in the community [38]. When members joyfully share brand-related content, the sense of inclusiveness and similarity can arouse positive community emotions among members, thereby nurturing brand love [33,44]. In contrast, a competitive climate highlights the perceptions of differentiation and uniqueness [30]. When individuals observe others’ delightful experience, the social comparison amplifies a sense of threat to their social status and generates incongruent emotions, thus triggering brand jealousy [39]. Therefore, community marketing for probabilistic goods may drive both brand love and brand jealousy due to the coexistence of cooperative and competitive sustainable relationships among members in the community.

Furthermore, this study adopts the emotional view to examine customer engagement and purchase intention. Some research suggests that engagement emerges from hedonic and authentic consumption motivation [28,75]. We agree that consumers will engage more after they develop brand love through hedonic gratification and shared interests. To provide a full picture, however, we also argue that brand jealousy triggered by competitive desires for product acquisition also drives consumers to increase engagement. Research on consumer behavior, advertising promotion, and brand management discovered that engagement is key to positive marketing outcomes, such as brand loyalty, advertising persuasion, and purchase [52,53,76]. As such, this study proposes that the cooperation–competition nature of probabilistic goods communities evokes the dual emotional mechanisms, which both enhance customer engagement, and finally promotes purchase intention.

2.2. Online Community Marketing and Purchase Intention

Online community marketing has been an effective tool for brands to conduct promotions with niche markets [43,77]. It can enhance sustainable brand–customer relationship when similar consumers gather in a certain community [59,63]. And strong relationships with customers can generate positive sustainable economic returns including increased purchase [78,79]. However, existing research on community effects has primarily focused on the cooperative aspect, while the competitive aspect has been limited by insufficient investigation. Some of the recent literature has recently realized the gap and indicated that an interactive environment integrated with both cooperation and competition is more conductive to market development and profit growth [5,74,80]. Although some pioneer research has examined consumers’ collaborative co-creation behavior in virtual travel communities [81], few studies have investigated the influence of the cooperation–competition-nature community induced by uncertainty of product acquisition. In this vein, this study focuses on probabilistic goods to investigate consumer responses in such online communities. The uncertainty of acquiring probabilistic goods and members’ common interests make the community marketing, to some extent, similar but different from that of general products.

Brand community is an aggregation of like-minded individuals who share enthusiasm for the brand [2,58]. When members develop a strong sense of community in the cooperative environment, they tend to exhibit a higher propensity for purchasing behavior toward the brand [82]. Common interests in certain brands or sets of probabilistic goods lay down a base for a cooperative relationship among members in the community. Cooperative interactions help to reduce decision uncertainty, especially against the difficulty of acquiring desired probabilistic goods. Customers can seek useful information and personal experience from the community, thus reducing uncertainty and ambiguity. By conducting community marketing, brands can organize various online activities to foster cooperative interactions among members, thus possibly increasing purchase intention [23]. In addition, the competitive aspect of probabilistic goods communities can also stimulate consumer purchase. Competition involves a struggle among individuals striving for something they value [74]. Upward social competition is an essential driver that motivates members to try their best to gain social status by acquiring desired brands or products. This is commonly seen in games, where competition constitutes a key part of gamification community, serving as a form of positive encouragement [83]. Similarly, community members compete with others through what they obtain, given that high-value or preferred ones are limited in a set of probabilistic goods. In such an atmosphere, these consumers tend to develop a stronger intention to buy probabilistic goods, especially when they see others owning their desired ones [47]. Therefore, we propose the following hypothesis.

Hypothesis 1.

Online community marketing is positively related to purchase intention.

2.3. The Dual Mechanisms of Brand Love and Brand Jealousy

Emotions play a pivotal role in consumption decisions [38,84]. These emotional responses are not purely intrapersonal but also influenced by social interactions. The influence of emotional mechanisms on consumer behavior has been seen in research of community marketing, where consumers receive social–emotional support within a community [85]. However, social interactions in probabilistic goods communities, where cooperative–competitive relationships coexist, may induce multiple forms of customer emotions simultaneously [37]. Some research has noticed that customers may experience both joy and jealousy when observing others’ delight [39]. Consumers may exhibit blended emotional responses in social interactions, particularly when confronted with ambivalent environments [86]. In this paper, we highlight that the paradox of brand emotions as community marketing for probabilistic goods creates cooperative–competitive relationships among consumers. Specifically, we examine the dual mechanisms of brand love and brand jealousy between community marketing and purchase intention.

Brand love is the degree of passionate emotional attachment that a satisfied consumer has for a brand [87]. It reflects customers’ positive affect and a strong emotional relationship between a brand and its customers [21,36,88,89]. Existing research has provided empirical evidence on the positive effects of brand love on brand loyalty [54,90], word-of-mouth [91], customer engagement, and purchase intention [53,90,92]. Some research on behavioral finance stresses that emotional attachment has a critical role in decision-making [93]. The logic provides a foundation for purchase decision-making when consumers experience emotions. Brand love is a crucial link between marketing activities and outcomes of brand management [56,88,94,95].

Community marketing is often designed to stimulate individuals’ community emotions and nurture their love for the brand, with the purpose of achieving marketing goals [35,62]. When consumers are passionate about a brand, they make purchases to support it [53]. Online brand communities provide a warm and supportive environment for members by cultivating internal cooperative interactions [18,75,96,97]. For instance, consumers can obtain useful product information and personal experience from community members (e.g., tips for drawing desired Pop Mart blind boxes). According to the conditioned-expectancy theory of vicarious emotion [31], expectations of cooperation can generate congruent positive emotions. Receiving sharing and support from people of the same hobby can foster love for the brand [90,98]. Delightful emotions arising from cooperative interaction can generate positive emotional contagion and will increase brand love, which enhances purchase intention.

Moreover, an inclusive and cooperative environment benefits brand enthusiasts to express themselves freely, satisfies contemporary consumers’ self-expression needs, and contributes to mental well-being [99,100]. For example, consumers can display their secondary creations publicly and show their brand stories in blind box communities. Such a community atmosphere can further cultivate a sense of passion and yearning in the community, and passion and yearning are important factors associated with purchase intention [82,101].

Therefore, online community marketing induces consumers to generate positive community emotions, deepening their love toward the brand in a cooperative community environment [38]. It fosters a sense of companionship among like-minded customers and enhances emotional attachment [65]. Individuals develop a preference and love for the brand, and their peer members collectively nurture the love [35]. This ultimately promotes higher purchase intention.

Hypothesis 2a.

Brand love mediates the relationship between online community marketing and purchase intention.

Jealousy was firstly described in the interpersonal relationship literature [102,103,104,105,106]. According to Hupka [107] (p. 425), interpersonal jealousy arises from a perceived threat of relationship between one’s partner and an interloper. In marketing, brand jealousy occurs when customers observe others possessing desired brands or products they lack, resulting in a sense of threat or crisis [46,70,108]. Sarkar and Sreejesh [109] (p. 25) defined brand jealousy as ‘‘complex of thoughts and feelings that follow threats to self-esteem generated by a romantically loved and esteemed brand in the mind of a romantic brand lover who does not possess the brand currently due to some constraint, after seeing another person (rival) using the same brand.” It highlights that brand jealousy is triggered by a perceived threat to self-esteem in brands that customers perceive as preferred. The literature has distinguished jealousy from envy. While jealousy implies a feeling of loss when self-esteem is threatened, envy focuses on a feeling of lack when seeing the rival is better off [110,111]. Envy is considered a more negative emotion, as it contains a destructive motivation [111]. In particular, malicious envy typically implies a revenging intention, while benign envy is usually associated with frustration and a motivation to improve the situation (e.g., by paying a premium price to obtain the desired product) [111,112]. Based on the above research, we connect jealousy with the context of interactions in online community marketing. While consumer envy concerned with oneself and their compared person, brand jealousy mainly occurs across the consumer, their rival, and their jointly loved brand [113]. In this sense, brand jealousy involves a threat to the customer’s established bond with the brand, while envy is based on the desire for material possessions [114]. For instance, a loyal brand consumer may feel jealousy rather than envy when the brand offers other consumers benefit, since the focal consumer interprets this action as a relational threat to their status in the brand, even without desiring the benefit [112]. Therefore, this study concerns the role of brand jealousy, as probabilistic goods communities imply not only a cooperative but also a competitive relationship over the brand among members.

Although jealousy is traditionally regarded a negative factor in interpersonal relationships [105,112], companies have noticed its positive effects on marketing outcomes in competitive environments, including willingness to pay a premium price [46], active engagement [109], and action loyalty [70]. In this study, we argue that brand jealousy is derived from the competitive relationship in probabilistic goods communities. Research on competitive arousal indicates that the emotional desire to beat the competition drives consumers to engage in competitive consumption [115]. We extend this logic to the association between jealousy and purchase of probabilistic goods when consumers feel competitive. It is supported by previous research indicating the impact of jealousy on competing collection (e.g., blind box collection) [116].

As mentioned above, brand jealousy is characterized as a competitive feeling among consumers, stemming from the desire for preferred products. Hence, a jealous customer, motivated by upward social comparison, may increase their purchases in an attempt to close the gap with those superiors [48]. In online brand communities of probabilistic goods, many customers habitually share their successful possessions of desirable and scarce items from a target set of probabilistic goods. This kind of sharing often carries a purpose of showing off because consumers post information on their acquisitions to signal their status and self-expression. This makes observers perceive a threat to their social status in the community. Jealousy may arise when individuals perceive their social standing to be challenged, which in turn enhances their purchase intention. Ludwig et al. [39] indicated that consumers may experience social anxiety and jealousy when they observe others delightfully displaying desired products. The social comparison can evoke competitive emotions [38,117].

As a competitive emotion, brand jealousy may promote positive marketing outcomes in upward comparison. An empirical study on luxury fashion brands indicated that brand jealousy can positively affect consumer addiction to the brand [118]. Some other research found that individual who viewed a friend’s positive post of purchase experience reported higher purchase intention [119]. Wu et al. [120] supplemented this view in the retail sector, showing that scarcity promotions could stimulate impulse purchase by intensifying perceived jealousy. In the competitive climate of probabilistic goods communities, brand jealousy could be an effective mechanism to boost purchase intention under community marketing, which facilitates members’ sharing and comparison. For collectors, witnessing others display an entire wall filled with blind boxes can spark feelings of jealousy. Jealousy can amplify their desire for the products and foster a sense of urgency to acquire them [47]. Thus, we hypothesize as follows.

Hypothesis 2b.

Brand jealousy mediates the relationship between online community marketing and purchase intention.

2.4. Brand Emotions and Customer Engagement

Customer engagement constitutes consumers’ cognitive, emotional, and behavioral investment in brand interactions [121]. It is considered an important way to establish and maintain consumer–brand relationships. Not only positive emotions but also negative emotions can drive customer engagement [37,55]. While the traditional literature focuses on the effect of positive emotional mechanisms, some recent research suggests that that consumers may experience mixed emotions, which motivate them to participate in more activities during social interaction [37]. Building on this, we argue that both brand love and brand jealousy can enhance customer engagement in probabilistic goods communities.

Fournier [122] indicated that love is the core of all strong brand relationships, and love objects require a great deal of time and investment. With brand love, consumers are more willing to integrate the brand into their lives [98] and actively engage with it [35,54,123]. From a cooperation perspective, a warm and supportive community environment can develop emotional attachment among members, thereby enhancing their community engagement [53]. It has been found that brand interactions driven by passion and pleasure can promote positive behaviors, such as customer engagement, brand evangelism, and purchase intention [18,36,92].

The literature on brand love provides the foundation to consider it as an important manifestation of emotional connection between a brand and its customers [89,95]. When consumers love a brand, they are motivated to stay close to it. Song and Kim [94] noted that customers who experience temporal separation from their beloved brand may exhibit frantic reengagement to compensate for the perceived loss. This supports Babić-Hodović et al. [90], who suggested that putting lots of energy and resources into brand community is a means of maintaining brand love. And it has been found that customer engagement increases purchase intention [124]. Therefore, we argue that, in communities of probabilistic goods such as Pokémon’s mystery boxes and Pop Mart’s blind boxes, community marketing may enhance brand love through consumers’ hedonic gratification and their sharing of such experience. Consumers may respond with higher engagement by investing more, cognitively, emotionally, and behaviorally. The abovementioned emotional engagement can facilitate purchase intention.

Hypothesis 3a.

The indirect relationship between online community marketing and purchase intention is serially mediated by brand love and customer engagement.

As noted earlier, brand jealousy is related to a threat to social status and the motivation of surpassing others due to social comparison. Research has shown that competition is regarded as a motivational mechanism, driving individuals to improve and perform at their best [71,125]. Jealousy can strength one’s engagement in competitive environments [126]. It can also enhance purchase intention [46] and brand addiction [118]. Jealousy can be utilized as a tool for sustainable marketing because it urges consumers to obtain the same possession as others and avoid an inferior status [114]. Competitive dynamics can stimulate community members’ jealousy and thus increase their engagement [83]. In the social media context, some research has recognized the role of jealousy in driving engagement due to the need for popularity, which in turn increases the intensity of online use [40,127]. The abovementioned research provides evidence to support our highlighting of brand jealousy in online communities of probabilistic goods.

Jealousy is an uncomfortable feeling that may urge a consumer to make more effort to gain a superior social status. When consumers observe others sharing desired items during community interactions, they may experience jealousy, as they feel threatened through social comparison. It may drive them to engage more frequently in community activities to obtain the desired products more quickly [109,128]. Research on social media interactions has shown that jealousy has a positive mediating effect on material consumption [119]. Similarly, motivated by jealousy, members will actively seek strategies through community engagement, demonstrating a willingness to pay more for desired probabilistic goods consequently. Accordingly, we propose the following hypothesis.

Hypothesis 3b.

The indirect relationship between online community marketing and purchase intention is serially mediated by brand jealousy and customer engagement.

Our research model is shown in Figure 1.

3. Methods

3.1. Sample and Data Collection

Data for our study were collected through Wenjuanxing, one of the most commonly used online survey platforms in China [129]. The participants were recruited from members of various online brand communities of blind boxes (e.g., Pop Mart) in China. To ensure that the participants had authentic community experience, several screening questions were set. The first question was, “Do you own a blind box toy” (“yes” or “no”). Only respondents who selected “yes” proceeded to the second question, “Which blind box communities have you registered with?” thereby verifying their self-identified members in relevant communities. Those who indicated their community affiliation were finally asked, “Did you participate in any community activities last week” and “Have you shared information or experience of blind box toys in this online community?” These questions verified whether participants could understand the following survey questions based on their experience in such communities. Respondents who answered “no” to any question were excluded, while those who answered all “yes” proceeded to the questionnaire. A total of 625 responses were collected during the period from 1 November to 20 December 2024. Finally, we obtained 601 valid responses after eliminating responses that were incomplete or with the same values for all questions. The sample consisted of 78% female, 74% aged 18–25, and 94% with a college degree, consistent with the population of the customer segment. Moreover, 35% reported a monthly disposable income ranging from CNY 1500 (USD 208) to CNY 3000 (USD 417).

3.2. Measures

Online community marketing was measured by a five-item scale (e.g., “The blind box brand community encourages me to upload fan posts”) developed by Gutiérrez-Cillán et al. [130]. Brand love was adopted from Carroll and Ahuvia [87], with an example item, “Blind boxes make me feel good”, with a four-item scale. Brand jealousy was measured with a three-item scale from Sarkar and Sreejesh [109], with statements such as “I feel really hurt when I see others owning a style that I don’t have”. Customer engagement was adopted from Algesheimer et al. [131], with four items, such as “I benefit from following blind box community rules”. Two items from Sarkar and Sreejesh [109] were used to measure purchase intention (e.g., “I would like to buy this brand”). All items were on a Likert scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). Furthermore, demographic information was collected, including gender, age, education, and monthly disposable income.

4. Results

4.1. Measurement Model

We conducted confirmatory factor analyses (CFA) to confirm our model has an adequate construct validity. The five-factor measurement model fit indices reveal the acceptable model fit to the data: χ²/df < 3, RMSEA < 0.08, CFI > 0.80, TLI > 0.80, SRMR < 0.08, and p < 0.001. All the items loaded significantly (p < 0.001) on the respective constructs, and their Cronbach’s alpha values were above 0.80.

4.2. Hypotheses Testing

Table 1. Means, standard deviations, and intercorrelations among variables.

	Mean	SD	1	2	3	4	5
1. Online community marketing	3.79	0.74	(0.85)
2. Brand love	3.75	0.74	0.63 **	(0.87)
3. Brand jealousy	3.45	0.97	0.45 **	0.54 **	(0.84)
4. Customer engagement	3.36	0.80	0.58 **	0.65 **	0.51 **	(0.86)
5. Purchase intention	3.85	0.81	0.56 **	0.64 **	0.44 **	0.64 **	(0.84)

Notes: N = 601; ** p < 0.01 (two-tailed).

shows descriptive statistics and correlations. Cronbach’s alpha values are presented in parentheses along the diagonal.

To test our hypotheses, regression was first used. The results showed that online community marketing was positively related to purchase intention (β = 0.54; p < 0.001), supporting H1. To test the mediating effects of brand love and brand jealousy between online community marketing and purchase intention (H2a and H2b), we first conducted hierarchical regression following Baron and Kenny (1986) [132]. The results showed that brand love (β = 0.43; p < 0.001) and brand jealousy (β = 0.10; p < 0.001) mediated the relationship between online community marketing and purchase intention (

Table 2. Results of regression analysis.

	Brand Love		Brand Jealousy		Customer Engagement			Purchase Intention
	M1	M2	M3	M4	M5	M6	M7	M8	M9	M10	M11
Control variables
Gender	0.07	0.03	0.07	0.02	0.14 **	0.11 **	0.09 **	0.08	0.05	0.03	0.00
Age	0.05	0.03	0.05	0.03	0.08	0.06	0.04	0.02	−0.01	−0.02	−0.04
Education	−0.02	0.01	−0.02	−0.05	−0.05	−0.03	−0.02	−0.04	−0.01	−0.01	−0.01
Income	0.15 **	0.08	0.15 **	0.07	0.05	−0.01	−0.06	0.14 *	0.08	0.04	0.06
Independent variable
Community marketing		0.61 ***		0.43 ***		0.56 ***	0.24 ***		0.54 ***	0.24 ***	0.16 ***
Mediating variables
Brand love							0.40 ***			0.43 ***	0.30 ***
Brand jealousy							0.19 ***			0.10 **	0.04
Customer engagement											0.33 ***
∆R2	0.05	0.36	0.03	0.18	0.04	0.31	0.16	0.04	0.29	0.14	0.05
∆F	7.53 ***	355.95 ***	4.61 **	137.80 ***	6.94 ***	281.71 ***	93.91 ***	5.63 ***	253.14 ***	76.56 ***	66.39 ***

Notes: N = 601; * p < 0.05, ** p < 0.01, *** p < 0.001.

).

Then we employed Preacher and Hayes’s PROCESS macro (v4.3) for the indirect effects [133]. As shown in

Table 3. Total, direct, and indirect effects.

	Effect	Boot SE	Boot LLCI	Boot ULCI
Total effect	0.60	0.04	0.522	0.669
Direct effect	0.26	0.04	0.179	0.348
Total indirect effect	0.33	0.04	0.247	0.420
OCM → BL → PI	0.29	0.05	0.200	0.381
OCM → BJ → PI	0.05	0.02	0.005	0.088
Difference (BL-BJ)	0.24	0.06	0.133	0.354

Notes: N = 601; 95% confidence intervals based on 5000 bootstrap samples. OCM = online community marketing, BL = brand love, BJ = brand jealousy, PI = purchase intention.

, the bootstrapped total indirect effect was 0.33, with 95% CI [0.247, 0.420]. The indirect effect through brand love was 0.29 (95% CI [0.200, 0.381]), which did not straddle zero. So, H2a was supported. And the indirect effect through brand jealousy was 0.05 (95% CI [0.005, 0.088]), which did not straddle zero. Hence, H2b was supported. It is worth noting that the Sobel test revealed a significant difference between the two indirect effects: difference = 0.24, 95% CI [0.133, 0.354]. It indicates that the effect of brand love was stronger than that of brand jealousy.

Moreover, considering that brand jealousy is theorized to be a complex emotion [109], it is necessary to examine whether different levels of jealousy might be positively or negatively associated with consumer responses. We conducted a distribution analysis to test the effects. Participants were categorized into three groups based on their brand jealousy score: low (N = 135), medium (N = 239), and high (N = 227). An analysis of variance confirmed that purchase intention differed significantly across groups, F (2, 598) = 59.39, p < 0.001, with the high jealousy group (M = 4.26) reported highest purchase, followed by the medium (M = 3.66) and low groups (M = 3.48). We further analyzed the distribution of purchase intention within the high-jealousy group. The results revealed that the majority (90.3%, N = 205) of customers reported purchase intention above the scale midpoint (3.0 on the 5-point scale). Only a small minority (9.7%, N = 22) reported purchase intentions at or below the midpoint. The results confirm that brand jealousy was positively related to purchase intention.

Table 4. Serial mediation through brand emotions and engagement.

	Effect	Boot SE	Boot LLCI	Boot ULCI
OCM → BL → CE → PI	0.11	0.02	0.061	0.151
OCM → BJ → CE → PI	0.06	0.01	0.039	0.094

Notes: N = 601; 95% confidence intervals based on 5000 bootstrap samples. OCM = online community marketing, BL = brand love, BJ = brand jealousy, CE = customer engagement, PI = purchase intention.

shows the results for the serial mediation effect of online community marketing on purchase intention through brand emotions (including brand love and brand jealousy) and customer engagement. Brand love and customer engagement serially mediated the relationship between community marketing and purchase intention (effect = 0.11; 95% CI [0.061, 0.151]), supporting H3a. Similarly, the serial indirect effect through brand jealousy and customer engagement was also significant (effect = 0.06; 95% CI [0.039, 0.094]). Hence, H3b was also supported.

4.3. Post Hoc Analysis

Alternative model tests: To verify the robustness of the hypothesized mediation model, we tested an alternative model regarding whether the association between emotions and engagement is reversed. The results of serial mediation tests showed that customer engagement and brand jealousy did not significantly mediate the relationship between online community marketing and purchase intention (coefficient = 0.00; 95% CI [−0.012, 0.029]). The results reject the alternative model of a reversed relationship between brand jealousy and customer relationship. Although the serial indirect association of customer engagement and brand love was significant (coefficient = 0.08; 95% CI [0.041, 0.130]), it was weaker than the hypothesized direction (coefficient = 0.11; 95% CI [0.061, 0.151]). Therefore, the hypothesized emotion–engagement relationship (rather than a reversed engagement–emotion model) is a superior explanatory mechanism for online community marketing (

Table 5. Serial mediation through customer engagement brand emotions.

	Effect	Boot SE	Boot LLCI	Boot ULCI
OCM → CE → BL → PI	0.08	0.02	0.041	0.130
OCM → CE → BJ → PI	0.00	0.01	−0.012	0.029

Notes: N = 601; 95% confidence intervals based on 5000 bootstrap samples. OCM = online community marketing, CE = customer engagement, BL = brand love, BJ = brand jealousy, PI = purchase intention.

).

Curvilinear model tests: We further investigated potential curvilinear mediation effects through brand love and brand jealousy. In particular, this study attempted to examine how online community marketing would stir customer engagement in different emotional ways. Data were centered to minimize potential problems of multicollinearity [134]. The results of regression showed that the quadratic term of brand love was significant (β = 0.13; p < 0.01), while the linear term was also significant (β = 0.54; p < 0.001). It suggests that the mediation effect was curvilinear and convex. Figure 2a plots the curve. The inflection point was calculated at 1.63 (−2.12 as centered) [134]. Higher values of customer engagement were observed at the two sides of the inflection point. And most of the data were located on the right side. The results of simple slop analysis reveal that the slope was significantly positive at the maximal value (simple slope = 0.86, p < 0.001) but nonsignificant at the minimal value, although it was negative (simple slope = −0.16, p = 0.561). More points on the right side, including −1SD, mean, and +1SD, confirmed that the coefficients of the simple slope became larger. It suggests that brand love amplified customer engagement, while its diminishing effect on the left side of the U-shape was nonsignificant. Hence, it was not a full U-shape.

Following Hayes and Preacher’s approach [135], we further tested the curvilinear mechanism of brand love by examining the instantaneous indirect effect at different levels of brand love. The results are shown in

Table 6. Instantaneous indirect effect of brand love on customer engagement.

Brand Love	Estimate	SE	Boot LLCI	Boot ULCI
Min	−0.10	0.17	−0.422	0.231
−1SD	0.21	0.06	0.105	0.329
Mean	0.33	0.05	0.247	0.422
+1SD	0.44	0.07	0.317	0.590
Max	0.52	0.10	0.343	0.718

Notes: N = 601; 95% confidence intervals based on 5000 bootstrap samples.

. Overall, at the mean level, the curvilinear indirect effect of brand love between online community marketing and customer engagement was significant (θ = 0.33, 95% CI [0.247, 0.422]). At the minimal level of brand love, the effect was negative but nonsignificant (θ = −0.10, 95% CI [0.105, 0.329]). At the other levels higher than the turning point, all effects were positive and significant. The instantaneous indirect effect was the strongest at the maximal level of brand love (θ = 0.52, 95% CI [0.343, 0.718]).

However, the results of brand jealousy demonstrate a different pattern of its effect. Its quadratic term in regression was nonsignificant (β = 0.06; p = 0.09), while the linear term was significant (β = 0.34; p < 0.001), indicating a linear mediation effect. Using the PROCESS macro (v4.1), we found that the indirect effect through brand jealousy was positive and significant (coefficient = 0.16; 95% CI [0.106, 0.206]).

In summary, although brand love and brand jealousy are emotional mechanisms that coexist in online community marketing, they exert different patterns of the mediating effects. Brand love accelerates customer engagement, which finally increases purchase intention, in a curvilinear form. And the curvature is upward. However, brand jealousy only has a linear effect. The curvilinear accelerating effect of brand love may explain why its effect was much higher than that of brand jealousy in the previous Sobel test, and it may provide evidence to support sustainable community relationships. Theoretical contribution and practical implications are discussed in the next section accordingly.

5. Discussion

With the development of online social media platforms, community marketing has become a popular tool for brands to build sustainable brand–consumer relationships. While previous studies have provided extensive evidence of interaction support within online brand communities [43,44,58,81], this study highlights the paradox of brand emotions derived from a cooperation–competition nature in communities of probabilistic goods. This study demonstrated that these opposing forces jointly foster and balance relationship sustainability. Integrating the conditioned-expectancy theory of vicarious emotion [31] with social comparison theory [29,30,31], this study proposes a dual emotional-mechanism model to unpack consumers engagement and purchase intention for sustainable community marketing. The findings indicate that online community marketing is positively related to purchase intention, supporting earlier research [19,51]. However, we provide a different view to explain the mechanisms based on the unique characteristics of probabilistic goods communities.

This study develops a blended brand emotional mechanism that supports relationship sustainability through community interactions. Specifically, from the cooperation perspective, brand love is evoked when consumers perceive cohesion and senses of belonging within the community [21,54]. Consumers are inseparable from a product when they truly develop love for it [136], as they tend to exhibit collecting and cherishing behaviors. It increases the product’s lifespan and endows it with higher collection value from a sustainability perspective. From the competition perspective, brand jealousy is triggered by upward comparisons and the presence of desired objects [46]. As jealousy implies perceived scarcity and desirability, it is expected that consumers would show higher engagement and purchase. These interactions serve to achieve the ultimate sustainable marketing goal of brands. Beyond economic sustainability, however, this study also extends the implication to ethical sustainability of marketing that employs emotional tactics. Jealousy is a negative emotion. Although encouraging competition and arousing jealousy in communities can bring positive marketing returns, it potentially harms consumers’ psychological welfare. Ethical concerns and suggestions are discussed in the section on practical implications.

Notably, this study reveals that the mediating effect via brand love is stronger than that of brand jealousy. A possible explanation is that customers may feel a sense of competitive emotion (brand jealousy) but hold a stronger pleasure-driven community emotion (brand love) during their community interactions. For example, Pop Mart’s blind boxes, as hedonic products, captivate consumers with their unique features and bring them joy in the community [137]. Consumers can experience a higher level of pleasure and arousal through uncertain hedonic consumption [17,138]. The uncertainty and hedonic benefit can generate spiritual satisfaction and delight [17,18]. This amplifies brand love [66] and makes it a dominating mechanism, even with the coexistence of a competitive tension that induces brand jealousy.

Furthermore, this study verifies dual serial mediation effects through brand emotions and customer engagement. That is, online community marketing for probabilistic goods firstly arouses brand love and brand jealousy parallelly, which then both enhance customer engagement and finally increase purchase intention. These findings extend those of Hollebeek and Macky [75], and Hsu [53]. We suggest that incorporating a lens of blended emotions, even though they exist in a paradox, provides additional evidence to support the path from emotion to engagement in the context of sustainable marketing effectiveness. Finally, the post hoc analysis demonstrates a critical distinction between these two emotional engagement mechanisms. Specifically, this study identifies a curvilinear effect through brand love between online community marketing and customer engagement. Although lower-level brand love still exhibits an indirect impact on engagement, higher-level brand love amplifies the indirect effect to a greater extent. It indicates that brand love, at higher levels, accelerates customer engagement. When consumers have stronger brand love, the emotion drives them more sharply to engage in community activities. For brands, increasing consumer brand love can bring them accelerated business return in community marketing. This suggests that while both paradox emotions drive customer engagement, brand love serves as an accelerating force, amplifying engagement at higher levels of emotional intensity. However, the effect of brand jealousy remains linear. This study identifies deep affection as a prerequisite for building lasting and sustainable brand–consumer relationships.

5.1. Theoretical Contributions

This research is the first to explore online community marketing for probabilistic goods by addressing the coexisting cooperation–competition characteristics as the context for emotional interactions and responses. While previous studies have mainly identified the importance of mutual cooperation [8,44,49,62], fewer have investigated the effectiveness of online community marketing from the perspective of competition. With the emergence of innovative marketing strategies such as probabilistic selling, consumer interactions have become diverse [99,139]. Considering the criticism of unsustainability surrounding probabilistic goods, this study examines the sustainable brand–consumer relationships in online community. This research contributes to the community marketing literature by framing online communities as a cooperation–competition sustainable environment, which stirs brand emotions to promote engagement and purchase intention in such communities.

Second, this study reveals the paradox of brand love and brand jealousy in online community interactions. While prior research has mainly focused on single-valence emotions [53,56,90], this study highlights that consumers may experience a mixture of opposite emotions during brand interactions, particularly within the coexistence of cooperation–competition relationships among members. Integrating social comparison theory [29,30] and the conditioned-expectancy theory of vicarious emotion [31], we build a dual-mechanism model to demonstrate how the paradoxical cooperative and competitive emotions work together. Notably, we challenge the traditional assumption that positive brand emotions are associated with favorable consumer behaviors and negative emotions result in adverse outcomes [25,94,112]. Instead, we prove that they collectively foster positive outcomes by integrating affective durability (brand love) and social vitality (brand jealousy), thereby shaping brand–consumer-relationship sustainability.

Third, the findings on brand jealousy not only address the ambiguity in the literature but also contribute to the theorization of ethical sustainability in marketing. Some research has cast jealousy in a negative light within relationships [105]. Jealousy may carry potential risks, such as brand hate and perceived unfairness [39,140]. But some other research highlights its beneficial impacts on business [46,118]. Attridge [141] suggests that jealousy can foster positive commitment behavior when it stems from protective motives. Given the conflicting findings in the literature, we clarify the association between jealousy and positive outcomes, including engagement and purchase intention. The post hoc analysis also confirms that the pattern persists at high, medium, or low levels of jealousy. To the theoretical development of sustainable marketing, however, the jealousy mechanism would harm ethical sustainability. In sustainable marketing research, brand jealousy might be theorized as a backfire of community marketing when outcomes are examined from an ethical perspective. We suggest a comprehensive view when research connects business sustainability with emotional mechanisms in online community marketing. The emotional engagement mechanism (driven by jealousy via competition and love via cooperation) provides economic sustainability to brands that leverage the community power. Meanwhile, ethical issues are also involved in terms of social sustainability.

Fourth, this study reveals a serial mediation mechanism through the paradox of emotions and engagement. This enriches prior research highlighting a single-path mechanism in reinforcing positive emotional engagement [73,142]. Although some recent research has found that negative emotions can influence engagement [55], there is still insufficient discussion on dual mechanisms with opposing emotions. This study adds new insights to the understanding of emotions, engagement, and purchase in community marketing for probabilistic goods.

Finally, the post hoc analysis on the nonlinear mediation effect extends prior research by providing new findings and new insights. This study reveals a positively accelerating effect of brand love between online community marketing and customer engagement. This finding challenges the conventional assumption of a linear effect of brand love toward customer responses [53,54]. We suggest modifications of existing theories that explain the role of brand love in online community marketing, especially when they concern how customers engage in an emotional way. Moreover, this study deepens insights into business sustainability by revealing that sustainable consumer responses are grounded in deep emotional intensity, where stronger emotions are associated with higher engagement. In addition, this study differentiates the effect of brand love and brand jealousy. Although opposing emotions coexist as dual mechanisms, they present different patterns of relationships. The upward curvilinear pattern of brand love might explain the dominance of brand love over brand jealousy (which is just in a linear pattern). This finding may add a new interpretation to explain why there has been an emphasis on brand love over brand jealousy in prior research [57].

5.2. Practical Implications

Our findings offer valuable practical implications. For the marketing of probabilistic goods, brand managers should recognize the importance of building a sustainable and relationship-based brand community, in addition to traditional marketing activities. While mainstream community marketing has predominantly emphasized fostering a cooperative atmosphere to attract participation [43], this study suggests that both cooperation and competition play a crucial role in maintaining the brand–consumer-relationship sustainability. To drive purchasing in communities, managers can leverage a set of competitive triggers to deepen consumers’ engagement. For instance, implementing scarcity strategies can act as catalyst for competitive arousal, evoke brand jealousy, and, in turn, stimulate engagement and purchase behavior [120,143]. Therefore, integrating cooperation–competition mechanism into online community marketing presents an effective and sustainable strategy for brand managers.

Brand managers should understand that consumers might simultaneously experience opposite brand emotions during interactions. In specific scenarios, while positive emotions often promote favorable outcomes, negative emotions may not necessarily result in negative consequences [37,144]. In probabilistic goods communities, the inherent uncertainty derived from the probabilistic nature can evoke ambivalent brand emotions. In particular, these arousals increase consumers’ retention behaviors and foster a collection consumption culture, which encourages sustainable product utilization. Moreover, managers should identify whether positive or negative emotions produce a stronger impact on consumer responses. Then they may elicit different valences of emotions accordingly.

Marketers should place greater emphasis on emotional arousal and engagement within online communities. In the literature, emotional appeals have been used as a powerful sustainable marketing strategy [90,128]. In this study, we find that collaboration and encouragement in brand communities can foster engagement through brand love, while inducing comparison and competition can also increase engagement through brand jealousy. Once brand love is activated and exceeds a certain point, increased community investment yields disproportionately higher returns in customer engagement. Brand managers should make sustained and substantial investments in online community development to cultivate intensified brand love among customers [35]. Stronger emotional bonds with a brand can bring greater customer engagement, which is an important determinant of sustainable marketing returns. It is worth noting that brand love can exert a stronger driving force than brand jealousy because the former has an upward curvilinear accelerating effect. And there is no reason to worry about the diminishing part because the left side of the U-shape is not significant.

However, marketers should not overlook the potential risk of brand jealousy in ethical sustainability. Compared with brand love, jealousy is more contextual and social comparison-driven. It can be activated by competitive cues and make behavioral influence. Hence, manipulating brand jealousy may entangle marketers in an ethical dilemma. On the one hand, for instance, incorporating competing gamification into social interactions may effectively induce jealousy, promoting engagement and purchase in favor of the business [3,52,143]. On the other hand, however, encouraging jealousy may trap consumers in unhealthy affect status, harming their psychological welfare. Taking the jealousy strategy hence violates the social dimension of sustainability. For ethical community marketing conducts, there should be clear ethical boundaries for brands when they utilize the jealousy mechanism [114]. First, marketers are advised to set clear, public community rules. For example, inclusive language should be required to prevent overly provocative posts or excessive conspicuous displays, thereby mitigating malicious jealousy [111]. Second, during community operations, marketers could reward constructive sharing of consumers’ experience and feelings. Helpful behavior among community members should be encouraged, such as answering others’ questions or providing information about obtaining probabilistic goods. Finally, marketers need to intervene to curb toxic emotional contagion once jealousy becomes harmful to communal relationships, especially when jealousy evokes revengeful interactions [112]. Even jealousy-induced revengeful consumption should be gently reminded. Brands are obligated to prevent consumers from indulging in addictive purchases, due to the nature of probabilistic selling. These practices not merely reflect a firm’s ethical practices but contribute to sustainable business relationships.

It is worth noting that the blind box strategy is still regarded as a potentially risky proposition despite its utilitarian and hedonistic value [137], particularly for customers susceptible to addiction consumption [118]. Although our study supports the effectiveness of community marketing, it also needs to highlight ethical practices. As Cordes et al. [145] recently warned, the design features of loot boxes may encourage overspending, prompting calls for stricter regulation. Accordingly, self-regulatory business ethics are essential in future practice, especially given their resemblance to gambling features. It is a necessary way to prevent the amplification of problematic purchasing behaviors.

5.3. Limitations and Future Directions

Although this study provides new insights, there are still several limitations. Our data were collected through a cross-sectional survey and may raise concerns about common method bias. Harman’s single-factor test [146] yielded three factors with an eigenvalue greater than 1, with the largest factor accounting for 47.47% of the variance (below the 50% threshold value). The result suggests that the common method is acceptable in our study. Moreover, the cross-sectional data limit the evidence to support causal relationships. Future research may use longitudinal or experimental data to strengthen the findings. For example, researchers can manipulate online community marketing exposure or social comparison scenarios to examine emotional and behavioral responses.

Most of the sample consisted of young customers, which may not cover the broader population. Although young customers are the primary market target in blind box industry [19], probabilistic goods encompass a variety of categories, and it would be interesting to investigate with various demographics [13,67]. Further research could include different types of probabilistic goods across diverse consumer segments. In addition, the sample was drawn from Chinese platforms. Although the Chinese market provides a good context for online community marketing of blind boxes, it limits the generalizability of the present study. Blind boxes have recently gained global popularity, suggesting the possibility of cross-cultural research. It will be interesting to examine whether emotional responses vary across different cultures and online environments.

The results of our study showed that the mediation effect of brand jealousy was significant but weaker than brand love. Some research has demonstrated that consumers experience more intense and enduring pleasure-driven emotions through uncertain hedonic consumption [138,147,148]. It nevertheless requires further empirical evidence to verify the influence of jealousy. Some research argues that brand jealousy partly stems from brand love. A deeper love for a brand entails a sense of possessiveness. Emotional shift from love to jealousy may happen when individuals become aware of a loss [100,118]. Although this study provides a dual-mechanism model, future research may extend the discussion with more evidence. Moreover, self-report was used to measure brand jealousy. Since negative emotions are often perceived as threatening and undesirable, individuals might conceal or underreport them. Future research could adopt other methods to capture jealousy.

Finally, some individual traits might serve as potential confounders or moderators. For example, narcissism and materialism have been found to be related to heightened jealousy, especially in a competitive climate [46,97]. Narcissists may be more likely to experience jealousy in social interactions, amplifying the effect of emotional responses of social comparison. Similarly, fandom trait could foster autonomous emotional engagement within brand communities [149]. Future research may include these factors.