Masterclass: "Start-up tribe, building a community around a Start-Up"

Start-Up Tribe - Building a community around a start-up

The community is at the very heart of the business: This key point is the starting point of this masterclass, which will address the operation of start-up-type organisations based on a community. Avoiding excessive theorising, Professor Bernard Cova will demonstrate the fundamental importance of communities for the development of entrepreneurial projects through numerous enlightening examples drawn from various sectors and countries, and from highly revealing professional experiences.

To guide entrepreneurs and help them reap the rewards of brand and market development, the Professor will share in this masterclass, based on his latest book, a five-step approach to developing a community while launching a start-up.

About Bernard Cova

Bernard Cova is a professor of "marketing and sociology of consumption" at KEDGE Business School where he teaches in the MSc Marketing programme. His numerous academic publications make him one of the most renowned French-speaking researchers in his field. Among other books, he co-authored Project Marketing (John Wiley, 2002) with Pervez Ghauri and Robert Salle, Consumer Tribes (Butterworth-Heinemann, 2007) with Robert Kozinets and Avi Shankar and Consuming Experience (Routledge, 2007) with Antonella Carù. He is also the author of more than twenty books in French and Italian such as Il Marketing Tribale (Il Sole 24 Ore, Italy, 2010) and La Vie Sociale des Marques (EMS, France, 2017). Since the 1990s, he has been conducting innovative academic research on the management of brand communities and consumer tribes. Through his articles published in the main journals of the discipline (Journal of Consumer Research, Journal of Business Ethics, Marketing Theory...), he has introduced innovative concepts such as societariat and brand volunteering, and his work has inspired companies and brands such as Alfa Romeo and Ducati or Macif and Nikon. Since 2017, he has been working to develop an integrated community approach for startup projects.

Why join KEDGE Marketing MSc

KEDGE Business School's Marketing Master of Science was created jointly with key companies in the sector. Taught on the 3 campuses of Bordeaux, Paris and Marseille, it offers 4 different specialisations to give access to all professions in the sector. More than 40 prestigious partner companies are involved in the programme at various stages of the course, allowing for experiential learning and increased employability for graduates. The programme benefits from the expertise and research work of KEDGE's Marketing Centre of Excellence, one of the most renowned research centres in Europe.