Search results

The purpose of this paper is to examine the underlying mechanism of the spillover effect from a service brand alliance to its parent brand at the post-consumption stage.

Online surveys were used to collect both qualitative and quantitative data from participants of an actual event. Conceptual models were developed and tested on two cross-sectional samples using structural equation modeling.

Results demonstrate perceived brand contribution and consumer involvement mediate the relationship between the service brand alliance experience and the evaluation of its parent brand at the post-consumption stage. While perceived brand fit had an indirect effect on the parent brand, the spillover was mostly driven by service alliance experience and perceived brand contribution.

Findings indicate brand managers should focus on consumers’ brand experience of the service brand alliance to drive spillover evaluations to the parent brand, and organizations could extend brand alliances to services with low category fit to the parent brand if consumers are to have a good experience with the service brand alliance.

This research extends findings on brand alliance research that was based on hypothetical brands and indicated that the spillover effect from a brand alliance to the parent brand is influenced by perceived brand fit. The findings highlight the importance of consumer experiences in driving the spillover effect at the post-consumption stage, where consumers evaluate brand relationships from a value-added perspective that goes beyond the service category fit.

Drawing upon uses and gratifications (U&G) theory and customers' online brand-related activities framework, the present study aims to examine the influence of customers’ motivations to engage with brand-related social media content on different social media engagement behaviors (consumption, contribution and creation) and brand-related outcomes (brand trust and brand loyalty) in the quick service restaurant (QSR) context.

Based on a self-administered survey dataset of 500 social media users who are customers of QSR brands, partial least square structural equation modeling is used to verify the hypotheses.

Results showed that interactivity motivation and information motivation drive all the social media engagement behaviors (consumption, contribution and creation). The results also confirmed the mediating effect of brand trust on the relationship between two levels of social media engagement behaviors (consumption and contribution) and brand loyalty.

To entice customers to engage with QSR brands on social media, social media marketing managers should incorporate elements of interactivity, information, entertainment and incentive into QSR social media brand posts rather than relying solely on delivering social media content in a variety of ways such as photos, videos and status updates.

This study makes a novel contribution to hospitality and social media engagement literature, thus uncovering opportunities for managers to engage their customers on social media.

This paper aims to propose a dynamic and holistic framework that combines the brand portfolio audit with the brand architecture redesign.

Depicting from an extensive review on the frameworks of brand audit and brand architecture, a dynamic approach to brand portfolio audit and brand architecture strategy was developed, and later applied and tested in three B2B and B2C companies.

The paper suggests an eight-step framework to guide practitioners when auditing a specific brand portfolio and designing a revised brand architecture strategy. Additionally, a Brand Audit Scorecard was developed to enable and sustain brand portfolio audits, divided into three dimensions (brand equity, brand contribution and strategic options).

Further research should aim at testing the proposed framework in different types of companies and countries.

This paper contributes to the brand audit and brand architecture literature by proposing a holistic framework that is not static.

This study aims to assess how ethical sales behaviour affects switching costs typology, mediated by trust and moderated by brand affiliation, monthly contributions and the number of dependent beneficiaries in medical schemes in South Africa.

A quantitative study targeted a non-probability judgement sample of 250 main members of medical schemes, elicited near health-care facilities in South Africa’s Gauteng province. Data was collected in a face-to-face survey and analysed using structural equation modelling on AMOS version 29 and PROCESS procedure for Statistical Package of Social Science release 2.041.

The results show that ethical sales behaviour negatively affects trust and positively affects evaluation, monetary and personal relational loss costs. Trust positively affects personal relational loss costs, economic risk, evaluation, monetary and benefit loss costs. Moreover, trust mediates the effect of ethical sales behaviour on evaluation, monetary and personal relational loss costs. Finally, the number of dependent beneficiaries, monthly contributions and brand affiliation significantly moderate these interactions.

The paper validates the application of commitment-to-trust theory in mediating how the effects of the general theory of marketing ethics on switching costs typology differ according to the number of dependent beneficiaries, monthly contributions and brand affiliation with medical schemes.

This study aims to investigate whether stimulating a family business image can serve as a signal to enhance customer brand co-creation.

The authors tested the proposed moderated serial mediation model utilising a sample of 521 experienced online customers. Using a scenario-based approach with an experimental design, the authors investigated how the stimulation of a family business image influences customers’ co-creation activities on social media.

Stimulating a family business image plays a significant role in fostering interactions among customers who respond to this signal. Furthermore, when there is an alignment between customers’ self-concept and their perception of brand authenticity, a stronger brand contribution is established. Nonetheless, this alignment does not translate into heightened involvement in brand co-creation activities, as active participation in co-creation necessitates empowerment derived from the co-creation process.

By taking a co-creation viewpoint, this study empirically demonstrates how stimulating a family business image can impact different levels of brand-related involvement. It also highlights the moderating influence of self-congruence in transmitting the signal, shedding light on individual differences in brand engagement. From a practical standpoint, the distinctive nature of a family business image should be recognised as an asset that enables managers to enhance customer responses and strengthen their market position.

The integration of social media and e-commerce has resulted in a rising phenomenon among individual content providers (ICPs), who used to offer free content, to provide consumers with paid content, such as online courses, Q&As or consultations. Despite the prevalence of ICPs’ content monetization, empirical research has rarely studied its underlying mechanism. This paper examines how the characteristics of free content contributed by ICPs on social media platforms influence their paid content sales, focusing on the perspective of human brand.

The empirical setting is an online knowledge exchange platform, where users are allowed to provide free content (e.g. answers) on the social media platform and launch paid content (e.g. lectures) on the e-commerce platform. A machine learning technique is employed to construct measures for the characteristics of free content, and fixed-effects estimation is presented to confirm which factors have a significant influence on the sales of paid content.

The empirical results show that the quality, diversity and expertness of free content have a significant positive impact on the sales of the ICP-paid content, with the brand popularity of ICP playing a mediating role.

This study is the first attempt to demystify the relationship between content contribution and ICPs’ content monetization from the perspective of human brand. The findings validate the effectiveness of the “Selling by Contribution” strategy and provide valuable insights for ICPs and social media platforms.

Though employees are important stakeholders of a brand, their role in building brand equity has long been neglected. This study aims to deepen the understanding of employees’ brand co-creation efforts and their contribution to employee-based brand equity (EBBE).

The study analyses implicit and explicit communication activities by employees on the social media network LinkedIn and quantifies the contribution of their posts to EBBE. Data has been gathered from more than 1,300 posts and 130 private accounts, representing different employee groups of five corporate brands.

The investigation illustrates the high importance of brand co-creation in social networks by employees and helps practitioners to better understand the underlying processes.

Case-study research has limitations of generalisability. However, the authors unveil important limits to exploiting the autonomy of employees’ word-of-mouth communication.

Under a co-creative perspective, every social media activity of an employee can be a positive contribution to a brand’s equity. Therefore, companies should closely monitor EBBE.

The authors draw on basic conceptual insights and empirical work by other researchers but extend and interpret them in a new context. The study provides initial indications of key antecedents of and barriers to successful management of employees’ brand co-creation activities.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of brand’s social media marketing efforts and individual’s online social interaction propensity on various levels of consumers’ engagement with brand-related social media content. Additionally, the subsequent effects of consumers’ engagement with brand-related social media content on overall brand equity and purchase intention have also been examined.

Preliminary studies were conducted to identify brands for the main study. Data for the main study were collected using an online survey administered at the identified brands’ Facebook fan pages. Structural equation modeling was used to test the conceptual model.

The results found the uniform effect of the social media marketing efforts and individual’s online social interaction propensity on two levels of consumers’ social media engagement, but the effect on third level has been found only from the individual’s online social interaction propensity. Subsequent effects on brand equity and purchase intention were also found varying across the engagement levels.

This study extends previous research by examining the effect of brand’s social media marketing efforts and online social interaction propensity on all the three levels of consumers’ engagement with brand-related content on social media. Also, this study enriches the existing literature by investigating the impact of these three levels of consumers’ engagement on brand’s equity and purchase intention.

Previous research has no evidence of evaluating the effectiveness of social media marketing efforts on the consumers’ engagement with brand-related social media content. Although the effect of general online social interaction propensity on effort and social engagement has been examined in previous research but the effect on consumption, contribution and creation brand-related social media content had not been measured. Additionally, the effect of consumption, contribution and creation on brand equity and purchase intention had not been evaluated.

Sectoral brand management processes have presented planning, development and implementation challenges. With the aim of reducing these managerial problems, the purpose of this paper is to revise the structure and the processes of the sectoral brands management.

This is a qualitative exploratory study, with its unit of analysis being the process of managing the brand of the Brazilian fashion sector. Primary data collection was obtained through in-depth interviews with the seven industry associations and with the company responsible for the brand consulting. The secondary data used were reports about the branding process of the brand provided by respondents. Data analysis was provided by using the VSM to modeling sector structure and BPMN to processes modeling.

The results present a new sectoral brand structure and process to reduce existing barriers. Three sections were carried out: analysis and modeling of the current structure and processes of sectoral brand management; presentation of the current structure and processes problems; analysis and modeling of future structure and processes of sectoral brand management.

A theoretical contribution is provided in the literature of systems, processes and sectoral brands, since there are no previous studies that elaborated a system structure and process for sectoral brands. In addition, other theoretical contribution is the presentation of a future process model that relates brand management process with its system structure, that is, it relates BPM analysis with VSM.

It is also possible to indicate that VSM and BPM can contribute to the management of sectoral brands, through the structural and process problems identification and also by making possible to suggest future management improvements to reduce the barriers that were identified.

The present study originality is the approach of the first analysis of sector brand management with emphasis on its structure and processes that were experienced by the Brazilian fashion sector.

This study aims to explore brand meaning from a consumer perspective, identifying tangible attributes and intangible associations and their arrangement in brand meaning frameworks. Previous literature has focused on brand meaning flowing from intangible associations, and new insights are offered into the tangible attributes’ contribution to brand meaning.

A phenomenological approach was adopted, and meanings were gathered from lived experiences with consumers of local food brands. Quasi-ethnographic methods were used, including accompanied shopping trips to food fairs and local farm shops, kitchen visits and in-depth interviews in and around the county of Dorset in the south-west of England.

The findings demonstrate that tangible attributes have sensorial and functional brand meanings and are mentally processed. Both hierarchical and flatter patterned approaches are present when connecting attributes and associations. The hierarchical approach reflects both short and long laddering approaches; the flatter alternative offers an interwoven, patterned presentation.

This is a small in-depth study of local food brands, and the findings cannot be generalised across other brand categories.

Local food brand practitioners can promote relevant sensorial (e.g. taste) and functional (e.g. animal welfare) attributes. These can be woven into appropriate intangible associations, creating producer stories to be communicated through their websites and social media campaigns.

A revised brand meaning theoretical framework updates previous approaches and develops brand meaning theory. The study demonstrates that tangible attributes have meaning and hierarchical connections across tangible attributes, and intangible associations should not always be assumed. An additional patterned approach is present that weaves attributes and associations in a holistic, non-hierarchical way.