Online communities have been recognized as an important means of enhancing customer loyalty to a company's website; however, among the studies on online communities to date, research approaching the topic from a marketing perspective remains very limited. In this study, to empirically analyze the influence of online communities, we examined how a sense of virtual community formed in online communities affects loyalty to the website, and also explored how this sense of virtual community affects website loyalty through the mediating variable of identification with the website. We investigated the integrative relationships among these variables, established a research model and hypotheses, and empirically tested the hypotheses through a survey. The results showed that the sense of community formed in online communities has a significant effect on loyalty to the corresponding website and also significantly influences identification with the website. Furthermore, the greater the degree to which individuals identify with the website, the higher their loyalty to that website and the higher their purchase intention on that website. Additionally, the higher the website loyalty, the greater the purchase intention on that website.