The power of diversity in online communities

Abstract An increasing focus on diversity and inclusion initiatives can be observed in the marketplace with varying success in terms of consumer response. Online communities create a virtual space where consumers can interact independent of their self in the offline world. This creates a marketing opportunity to embrace diversity and the plethora of personas in the digital space. Our research focuses on the role of communicating membership diversity in attracting and importantly engaging new members in an online community. We conducted an online survey experiment with 3000 consumers across six European countries. We find that communicating membership diversity of an online community increases interest in joining this community. The increased interest in joining further increased engagement behavior. Diversity orientation is the main driver for this effect. We contribute to the literature by providing evidence of the positive effect of communicating membership diversity in online communities.