Abstract

This study examines the role of gamification elements in engaging suppliers of sharing economy platforms in corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities. We expected that engaging business owners in CSR would improve the brand equity of these platforms by leveraging the business owners’ brand loyalty and brand association. The statistical population of the study is owners of Iranian accommodation who use sharing economy platforms. The size of the sample was 323 accommodation owners. The hypotheses of this study were tested using Smart PLS-3. The study confirmed all the research hypotheses and showed that engaging business owners in social responsibility activities using gamification elements on sharing economy platforms can lead to an increase in the brand equity of the sharing economy platforms. These results will reinforce the synergy between the platforms and their users by making both parties aware of it.

Introduction

The sharing economy (SE) is where customers and business owners (suppliers) are brought together by an online platform. It is a means by which individuals may leverage their assets, such as their cars, their property and, of course, their time so that these assets may be utilized more thoroughly. This increases the efficiency of society as a whole while either increasing the wealth of participating business owners, or increasing their work flexibility, or both (Kuhzady et al., 2021). Advocatesof the SE have often painted a picture of a utopia where business owners will be set free from the shackles of employment while their customers would be able to take advantage of the lower prices (Belk, 2007). Well known examples of SE platforms are Uber in the ride sharing (taxi substitute) field and Airbnb in the accommodation sharing (hotel substitute) field, though there are also imitators of these platforms which have different degrees of market presence in different parts of the world.

However, the vision presented by SE tends to place its emphasis on the freedom of individuals, whether customers or business owners, while ignoring the fact that one of the reasons for the lower costs and prices of the SE compared with traditional businesses is the lack of regulation designed to counteract some negative consequences. Criticisms of the SE approach (Kuhzady et al., 2021) have included negative social and environmental impacts (Ma et al., 2018), limited safety and security (Birinci et al., 2018) and lack of certainty caused by unknown parties (Hossain, 2020) that contradict the vision of SE platforms of being sustainable and socially responsible. Consumers demand social responsibility from SE platforms and therefore business owners must also adopt sustainability and corporate social responsibility (CSR) principles in their businesses (Mi and Coffman, 2019). Consequently, sustaining the SE requires the engagement of all stakeholders where platforms, consumers and business owners are stakeholders in making a sustainable and responsible SE.

Discussion and conclusion

The study examined the role of gamification elements in engaging accommodation owners in CSR activities and enhancing their experience on SE platforms and how it leads to enriching brand equity through mediating effects of accommodation owners’ satisfaction and trust that leads to brand loyalty and brand association.

ads to brand loyalty and brand association. The gamification elements have a significant effect on engaging accommodation owners in CSR activities on SE platforms based on selfdetermination theory. Analysis of the collected data showed that gamification can have a significant and strong effect on engaging accommodation owners in CSR activities on accommodation sharing platforms. This is consistent with previous research on the power of gamification. Researchers have shown that gamification can be used to transfer complex information and promote green behaviour among users (Souza et al., 2020). In this study, it was shown that gamification elements can be used, not only for customers, but also for the accommodation owners and can engage them in behaving sustainably and responsibly. Analysing the collected data indicates a significant effect of gamification elements on the experience of accommodation owners on SE platforms. This also is consistent with previous studies which indicate that gamification can activate hedonic emotions and ultimately enhance the user experience (Hsu and Chen, 2018). It was also concluded that this hedonic experience is not limited to customers but also includes the business owners.

Abstract

The aim of this research is to develop and test a measure of integrated retailer brand equity (IRBE) based on frontline fashion retail employees’ internal (i.e., as employee) and external (i.e., as consumer) perceptions of the retailer’s brand. Comparisons are made between two types of frontline employees, patronizing and non-patronizing. Using advanced PLS-SEM techniques, this research introduces a third order reflective-formative hierarchical component model (HCM) into the retailer brand equity domain. The research validates an IRBE model with four consumer dimensions and seven employee dimensions. Both types of employees value all four consumer dimensions; however, they value different employee dimensions. The IRBE model, when operationalized, can encourage closer integration of human resources and marketing functions, and enable practitioners to enhance their brand offerings and build a more cohesive retailer brand.

Introduction

Retailers have evolved from organizations that merely sell products, to multi-sensory brands (Ailawadi and Keller, 2004) that offer customers unique shopping experiences (Liu-Thompkins et al., 2022; Zhang et al., 2023). Indeed, retailers have their own multi-dimensional brand equity (Anselmsson et al., 2017) as evidenced by their larger than ever presence on brand ranking lists (Interbrand, 2022) that now includes 38 brands that rely on retail operations to deliver their brand promise (i.e., Amazon, IKEA, Toyota, Apple) of which 14 are fashion, apparel and/or beauty retailer brands (i.e., Zara, Louis Vuitton, Sephora, Nike). Retailing is a complex and highly competitive industry, and building a strong retail brand requires an understanding of a variety of stakeholders. However, retailers struggle to find new ways to competitively differentiate and understand what drives value for different stakeholders (Deloitte, 2019). Retailer brands are not only influenced by external (i.e., consumers) perspectives (Biedenbach and Manzhynski, 2016; Swoboda et al., 2016), but also internal (i.e., employees) stakeholders which together represent key drivers of a retailer’s business success (Veloutsou and Guzmán, 2017). Retailers build and invest in their external brand equity to persuade consumers (Gil-Saura et al., 2016), yet they must also invest in their internal brand equity to attract the best employees (Sivertzen et al., 2013).

Frontline workers are said to be the backbone of an organization (McKinsey and Company, 2023). Retailers, in particular, understand the importance of not only creating better customer experiences, but also employee experiences, in order to be relevant and successful. Frontline employees play a crucial role to a retailer’s competitive advantage (King and Grace, 2009). A recent study suggests a strong connection between employee satisfaction (via online reviews on Glassdoor) and customer satisfaction (via the American Customer Satisfaction Index), whereby a 1-star improvement in an employer’s rating (out of 5) was associated with a 1.3-point increase in customer satisfaction (out of 100) (Zhao and Chamberlain, 2019). However, the lines between customers and employees are becoming increasingly blurred. Gelb and Rangarajan (2014) describe frontline retail employees as integral elements of the retailer brand, as well as ambassadors of the brand. In today’s highly competitive environment, retailers are acknowledging the importance and growing empowerment of frontline employees (Gill-Simmen et al., 2018; Li, 2022). Indeed, a recent study found 43% of shoppers are more likely to make a purchase if they have interacted with a frontline employee, and these shoppers were 12% more likely to visit the store again if the interaction was a positive one (Petro, 2019). Frontline employees are no longer merely ‘cashiers’ or ‘sales associates’; they are ‘shopper concierges’ (Petro, 2019). This trend of employee empowerment is particularly relevant in the fashion industry, where employees perform not only traditional retail duties of selling product and delivering customer service, but they are also product experts, and responsible for educating and inspiring their customers and delivering personalized service. In other instances, employees also comfortable expressing their views on the retailer where they work. For example, while customers use social media platforms such as Instagram and TikTok to review products and services, employees also use online platforms such as glassdoor.com and indeed.com to review their experiences on the job. Furthermore, there is scholarly evidence of consumers who desire to be frontline employees of their preferred retailer (Wang et al., 2017; DeMotta and Sen, 2017). An employee review exemplar on indeed.com demonstrates the dual role of frontline employees as both workers and customers: “If you like fashion and clothing, it is a cool environment to be in and handle all the clothes, learn about them, how they’re made and be able to get first dibs on new products that come in” (Employee review of H&M, Indeed.com, 2023).

Conclusion

6.1. Discussion of the findings
The results confirm each of the eleven (four consumer-based and seven employee-based) dimensions examined in this model influence frontline employees’ perceptions of RBE. By integrating frontline employees dual brand perceptions as both consumers and employees, our study begins to address Boukis and Christodoulides (2020) call for future research to move beyond the unidimensional EBBE construct and develop integrated models that combine different stakeholder perspectives. Our study also suggests retailer trust partially mediates the relationship between IRBE and retailer loyalty, suggesting IRBE is a four-step process whereby CB-RBE and EB-RBE lead to IRBE, which leads to retailer trust and retailer loyalty. This aligns with Anselmsson et al.’s (2017) four-stage RBE model; however, their model starts with awareness, then leads to brand associations and consumer responses, and then leads to trust, and finally loyalty. A recent study found brand trust to be a mediator, however, it mediated the relationship between multichannel integration service quality and retailer brand equity (Qi et al., 2020). Earlier studies show RBE as simplified parallel structures (i.e., one stage process) (Aaker, 1991; Arnett et al., 2003; Pappu and Quester, 2006a) or two-stage models (Jinfeng and Zhilong, 2009). More recent studies illustrate RBE as a three-stage process (Troiville et al., 2019) whereby retailer specific dimensions lead to RBE, which lead to attitude, loyalty and word of mouth.

Abstract

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Abstract

Purpose: Unprecedented communication features of social media noticeably reinforce the active role of consumers in the value co-creation (VCC) of offline and online brands including social media. From the consumer perspective, this study examines a contribution of VCC behavior to consumer-based brand equity (CBBE) and consequent intention to use social media based on Instagram as the most popular platform in Kazakhstan. Methodology: A web-based survey provided data from 550 Instagram users in Almaty city. Empirical analysis includes testing statistical assumptions using SPSS 23, conducting confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and structural equation modeling (SEM) using Warp PLS 7.0. Findings: With the result of this study investigation, the paper develops the model that explains the effect of VCC on continuous usage intention to use social media through CBBE comprising brand associations, brand loyalty and brand perceived quality. Originality: Even though the importance of social media in the brand VCC process is widely recognized, a brand equity view of social media brands with users’ participation is under-investigated. However, brand equity’s importance for firm sustainability in terms of long-term business strategy is indisputable. This research enhances brand equity theory and VCC concept with the empirical data within the modern social media context. Practical implications: Owners and managers of social media brands can use the conceptual model to grow, maintain and assess their brands’ equities through their marketing efforts on the consumer motivation for brand VCC activities driving continuous usage of the brands.

1. Introduction

Social media proven to be one of the most active online platforms worldwide with more than 3.6 billion users in 2020 anticipated to hit about 4.4 billion people in five years [1]. One of the outstanding features of social media is the unprecedented facilitation of peerto-peer communications and seller–buyer relationships, which is a part of a marketing strategy to meet the long-term brand objectives, including a vital target of higher consumer purchase intention [2]. Another significant utility of social media is the unique way to promote sustainable customer behavior through a sustainable business strategy [3,4].

From the brand perspective, social media noticeably increase consumers’ voice and power to influence the creation, promotion, and consumption of current brands activating customer participation in brands’ value creation. Sales-Vivo et al. [5] demonstrate this role in the example of business-to-business activities, where value co-creation (VCC) is an essential antecedent of a manufacturer’s economic satisfaction. Social media have become the integrative resource contributor to VCC on par with customers and firms reviving VCC theory born in the offline business era [6]. This study explores the impact of consumers’ co-creation behavior on brand value building of social media as the modern digital media, which are widely used for achieving various business aims including sustainability as a growing prominent global trend.

Abstract

     Social media has been taken as an important marketing tool for business today and it has also become increasingly imperative for marketers of SMEs to strategically utilize to attain competitive advantage and excellent performance. However, scholarly research on the social media marketing strategy of SMEs is still scant. To fill this research gap, this study proposes a social media marketing strategy framework for SMEs using customer knowledge management. The research captures the knowledge about customer by text mining and knowledge from customer by the Kano model revealing the critical requirements that will be used for the development of the social media marketing strategy framework, referred to as knowledge for customer. The strategy framework consists of the five common components for SMEs to conduct social media marketing which are Context, Channel, Content, Communication and Continuity. The study offers valuable insight into social media marketing improvement and customer knowledge management in enterprises.

Introduction

     Social media provides opportunities for businesses to improve their competitive position through interactive and cocreative ways [1], and this has made social media widely adopted as a business tool [2]. Social media has been playing a significant role in marketing strategy nowadays [3]. Despite the high adoption rate of social media, the actual usage in enterprises often seems to be improvised and lacks a clear strategy [4]. And enterprises apply their social media marketing strategies guided by only intuition or trial and scant research has systematically integrated and expanded knowledge on social media marketing strategies [5] [6]. Especially in Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs), due to relatively insufficient human or financial resources compared to large companies [7], the social media workers with relatively lower competency lack the strategy to conduct work, leading to poor performance of social media marketing. SMEs’ usual lack of human capital restrains their internal drive of knowledge, Customer Knowledge Management (CKM) becomes a strategic approach in order to create customer value [8]. This study proposes a strategy framework that identifies and classifies the components of social media marketing to guide SMEs’ marketing activities by using customer knowledge management.

Findings

     The study develops a social media marketing strategy framework using customer knowledge management. The results would be organized into the three types of customer knowledge.

Knowledge about Customer

The knowledge about customer is the critical issues extracted by text mining from customer feedback of SMEs social media marketing, as shown in Table V

Abstract

     The aim of this study is to explore the evolving social media marketing strategies of football clubs involved in the English Premier League (EPL), in a constantly changing sporting and digital landscape. Interviews conducted with practitioners from a range of clubs revealed that social media marketing has been fully adopted as a key strategic marketing channel. Other insights include the importance of trust to clubs being able to harness the collective of passionate fans on social media platforms. Also, how clubs are using social media to grow their global reach and capitalize on worldwide EPL exposure. The paper also highlights some of the negatives of social media, as experienced by football club social media marketing practitioners. Finally, a social media marketing strategy framework applied to football is proposed, based on the social media marketing strategy of football clubs and their understanding of why and how their fans use social media.

Introduction

     Social media marketing (SMM) is a key strategic activity that can achieve organizational goals and create value for internal and external stakeholders.1 Focused on customer engagement and informed by analytics, SMM will be more effective and make a more significant contribution to marketing and commercial performance.2 Deeper levels of customer interaction and data insights enable trust and an increased chance of success through effective social media marketing strategy (SMMS).3 Despite increased scholarly attention on the role of SMMS in sport, there remains a paucity of insights across a variety of football leagues,4 resulting in a lack of theoretical depth.5

     The English Premier League (EPL) is the wealthiest and most popular football league in the world,6 its global success evident by the fact that all EPL clubs are again in the top 50 revenue generating clubs in the world.7 EPL clubs’ revenues totalled over £5bn for the first time in 2018/19,8 with broadcast rights being worth 59% of this total. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted EPL clubs significantly, primarily through matchday revenues plummeting thanks to matches having to be played behind closed doors.

Discussion and conclusions

     This study demonstrates how football clubs have increasingly embraced social media while continually adapting to the digital and sporting landscape. It confirms clubs now consider SMMS to be core to their communications with fans. The research is further evidence that brands use social media as a strategic tool to build relationships with local and global fans and stakeholders, in addition to informing fans to encourage interaction.74 Trust is at the centre of a successful SMMS, with the club as the unifying intermediary between fans and the business organization that is the actual club.

     Similar to research that focused on the fan perspective,75 this study finds that passion, based on an emotional connection with the club, is central to fans following clubs on social media. Moreover, a sense of community and social interaction are key to informing, entertaining and keeping fans engaged with the football club and its SMMS.76 Every club emphasized the insatiable appetite for information their fans have from the SMMS of their chosen club. Such findings link with research claiming fans are motivated to engage with football club SMMS for information, for their own social influence with their community, and for entertainment.77 It also concurs with research that fans are motivated to engage with EPL clubs on social media for information, empowerment via influencing other consumers, social interaction, and passionate, emotional attachment.

Abstract

Introduction

Charity Social Media Marketing

Awareness

Interaction

Timeliness

Informativeness

Customization

Advertising

Research Hypothesis

Methodology

Analysis and Results

Discussion and Conclusion

Managerial Implications

References

Abstract

     This study aims to identify the outline of charity social media marketing (SMM) and to determine to what extent it influences the charity brand image, brand trust, and donation intention. The data were gathered from followers of internationally operating Turk charities on social media. The theoretical model and hypotheses were tested by using structural equation modeling. Charity SMM is composed of awareness, interaction, timeliness, informativeness, customization, and advertisement dimensions. Awareness is the only dimension of SMM that has a significant direct influence on donation intention. Timeliness, informativeness, and advertisement significantly influence charity brand image, whereas brand trust is influenced by informativeness and customization. Besides, Charity SMM, as a whole, influences donation intention both directly and indirectly through brand image and brand trust. Therefore, charity brand image and brand trust are crucial for charities to promote donation intention through SMM. Therefore, charities are strongly recommended to focus primarily on developing their brand image and gaining trust in current and prospective donors.

Introduction

     Charities have been operating to improve needy people’s living standards through aids and cash assistance (Ilyas et al., 2020). The revenues of a charity consist of monetary donations, non-monetary but tangible gifts, and investments like other non-governmental organizations. Most charity activities are carried out by volunteers (Sargeant et al., 2006). Like charities, many nonprofit organizations such as hospitals, universities, cultural centers, art centers, and environment and animal protection societies depend on donations and volunteers. Therefore, charities have faced intense competition with these organizations (Bennett, 2005) and difficulties financing their activities (Quinton & Fennemore, 2013). In such a competitive environment, charities need to use marketing communication tools efficiently and effectively to retain current donors and volunteers and find new ones.

     Social media is one of the most convenient communication channels that charities can use to interact with donors and volunteers. Social media facilitates interactions between users, i.e., individuals and organizations. Thereby, social media offers unique opportunities for charities to strengthen relations between donors/volunteers and organizations by increasing interactions. Social media enables charities to post informative or attention-grabbing content quickly, affordably, and continuously (Seo & Park, 2018; Tsimonis & Dimitriadis, 2014). Therefore, social media is evaluated as an essential part of the marketing activities of charities that aim to develop communication with donors and volunteers (Simon & Tossan, 2018).

Discussion and Conclusion

     This paper identifies to what extent charity SMM, as a construct, and its dimensions influence charity brand image, brand trust, and donation intention. Charity SMM is categorized into six dimensions: awareness, interaction, timeliness, informativeness, customization, and advertisement. Charities can create awareness about needy people on their social media posts so that prospective donors can keep donating. They can also promote interactions among donors and between donors and the organization by motivating followers to share information, ideas, views, and opinions on charities’ social media profiles. Timeliness, i.e., keeping social media account updated and sharing real-time information and the latest information on activities, makes current and prospective donors believe that social media is an essential source of information. Informativeness, i.e., providing accurate, practical, and comprehensive information about the charities’ activities through social media, promotes credibility. Charities’ customization of their communication with individuals through social media helps them resolve their interests, curiosities, and concerns. Charities’ attentiongrabbing and motivating social media advertisements are essential dimensions of SMM.

Abstract

Keywords

1. Introduction

2. The multidimensionality of brand equity

3. Systematic risk asymmetry

4. The effect of brand attributes on risk

5. Model

6. Results

7. Discussion and conclusion

Acknowledgement

Appendix A.

Appendix B. Supplementary material

References

Abstract

The authors investigate the extent to which central customer-based brand equity dimensions (Differentiation, Relevance, Esteem, Knowledge, and Energy) influence a firm’s systematic risk (i.e., beta) during both market upturns and downturns. The results demonstrate that aggregating upside and downside beta or different dimensions of brand equity masks the true associations which can be seen only in the disaggregate analyses. The authors find that Relevance and Knowledge play roles as stabilizers, showing negative relationships with both upside gains and downside risk, while Esteem plays the role of protector, showing a negative relationship with only downside losses and not influencing upside gains; Energy acts as a booster, being positively associated with a firm’s potential gains in a period of market growth without increasing the firm’s expected losses during a bad market. The positive relationship of Energy with aggregate risk could be misleading as it hides the beneficial effect of Energy as a booster. The authors also find that Relevance is the most important consideration when people make choices in bad market situations, while Energy becomes the most crucial deciding factor in good market situations. Taking advantage of the multidimensional constructs of brand equity while allowing for the asymmetrical characteristics of risk enables managers to capture the differential role of each brand equity dimension in influencing firm risks, which leads to more sophisticated strategic decisions regarding risk management. In addition to general brand strategy, the authors provide tailored brand strategies to firms from different industries or with different financial characteristics.

1. Introduction

The value of a firm, as depicted by shareholder value, depends not only on cash flow, but also on the firm’s risk, and thereby, the cost of capital used to discount future results. According to the Capital Asset Pricing Model (CAPM), total risk can be decomposed into systematic (market-wide) and unsystematic (firm-specific) risk. Unsystematic risk can be eliminated through diversification. Thus, a risk premium is only attached to systematic risk, i.e., a firm’s “beta” or the extent to which a firm’s returns co-vary with market-wide returns. Therefore, marketing strategies that are associated with lower beta enhance a firm’s value, apart from their effect on cash flow.

Because of the centrality of risk in affecting firm valuation, some recent work (e.g., Singh, Faircloth, & Nejadmalayeri, 2005; McAlister, Srinivasan, & Kim, 2007; Tuli & Bharadwaj, 2009), has investigated the relationship between marketing variables and a firm’s beta. These studies are based on the perspective that market-based intangible assets (i.e., brand equity) created by strategic activities such as advertising or R&D programs will influence a firm’s performance and decrease the firm’s risk. That is, brand equity acts as a barrier to competition, increases customer loyalty, and as a result, decreases the covariance between the firm’s stock return and market return, thereby lowering the firm’s CAPM beta. There are several approaches to measuring brand equity, but customer-based brand equity has shown to significantly affect a firm’s risk (e.g., Rego, Billett, & Morgan, 2009; Johansson, Dimofte, & Mazvancheryl, 2012).

Abstract

Keywords

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

2.1. Employee-based brand equity

2.2. Customer relationship management dimensions

2.2.1. Customer orientation

2.2.2. Knowledge management

2.2.3. CRM organization

2.2.4. Technology based CRM

3. Methodology

4. Analysis of results

4.1. Common method Bias

4.2. Descriptive statistics

4.3. Measurement model

4.4. Structural model

5. Discussion and conclusion

6. Limitations and future research

Appendix A. Factor loadings of remaining items based on CFA results

References

Abstract

     The purpose of this study was to explore the effect of customer relationship management (CRM) dimensions on employee-based brand equity. By looking at the past literature, it can be noticed that the majority of earlier studies on brand equity examined it from customers’ perspective, while the employees’ perspective received less emphasis. Thus, the required data was obtained using a survey tool from 164 employees in the ride-hailing industry in Saudi Arabia. The obtained data was analyzed by the Covariance-Based Structural Equation Modeling (CB-SEM) method to test the hypothesis and reach at conclusions. The findings showed that CRM in general has a positive effect on employee-based brand equity. Specifically, it was found that CRM organization has a significant positive impact on employee-based brand equity. It was also verified that knowledge management and customer orientation have positive effects on overall employee-based brand equity. Finally, the results confirmed that technology-based CRM has a significant positive impact on employee-based brand equity. These results add to the body of literature on this topic and verify the significance of customer relationship management dimensions in affecting employee-based brand equity.

Introduction

     The topic of brand equity has received a noteworthy attention from several scholars since the last decades. The examination of brand equity has mainly been centered towards determining the factors that could improve brand value (Dinçer, Bozaykut-Buk, Emir, Yuksel, & Ashill, 2019). Although the concept has many definitions in the previous literature, there is a universal agreement that brand equity symbolizes the tangible and intangible value of a firm’s products or services that are devised from the unique name of the brand (Srivastava & Shocker, 1991). A strong brand equity provides noteworthy implications to firms, their clients, and to the investors as well. It enables the service providers to generates several benefits, such as: charging higher prices than the rivals for similar products, maintaining business customers on the long term even though competitors peruse price cutting strategies, and withstanding negative information about the failure of a certain product or service (Gelb & Rangarajan, 2014). High brand equity also permits firms to use the same brand name when they successfully introduce a new product. As the competition has increased recently among businesses and due to the imitation of a brand’s offerings, the acquisition of a reliable and trustworthy brand name has been regarded as the key distinguishing element. According to Augusto and Torres (2018); and Phung, Ly, and Nguyen (2019), a firm that acquires high brand equity tends to have greater trust from its consumers. Moreover, Poulis and Wisker (2016) tested the effect of employee-based brand equity on organizational performance and found that the attachment of employees to a brand represents the main factor that contributes to better financial outcomes.

Results and analyses

     As stated above, the collected data were analyzed using the CB-SEM approach. In order to check the likely existence of common-method variance bias among constructs, this paper relied on the CFA and single factor test of Harman (1960), and full collinearity test of Kock and Lynn’s (2012). When all of the measurement items of the constructs were constrained to be loaded on one single common factor, the overall variance explained by a general latent variable was lower than the Harmin’s threshold value of 50%, indicating that the final model is considered free from common method bias. Additionally, all of the Variance Inflation Factors (VIFs) in a full collinearity test were less than 5, suggesting that there is no indication of existing pathological collinearity (Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee, & Podsakoff, 2003).

Abstract

1 | INTRODUCTION

2 | HYPOTHESES DEVELOPMENT

3 | METHODS

4 | RESULTS

5 | GENERAL DISCUSSION

6 | IMPLICATIONS FOR THEORY

7 | IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE

8 | LIMITATIONS AND FUTURE RESEARCH

9 | CONCLUSION

REFERENCES

Abstract

Drawing on construal level theory, basic psychological need-candidate theory and gender schema theory, this study aims to develop a multilevel framework that explains how nostalgic brand positioning increases brand equity via nostalgic brand relationship dimensions (i.e., brand passion, brand local iconness and brand authenticity). Moreover, we posit that brand innovativeness and customer gender are important boundary conditions for these indirect effects of nostalgic brand positioning on brand equity through the nostalgic brand relationship dimensions. To this end, a convenience sample of N = 1,171 respondents was used to inspect the hypotheses in settings relating to the fast-moving consumer goods industry. Results show a positive indirect effect of nostalgic brand positioning on brand equity through brand passion, brand local iconness and brand authenticity. Moreover, moderation results reveal that the effect of nostalgic brand positioning on brand passion and brand authenticity was more salient when brand innovativeness was lower; however, for brand authenticity, the effect was more pronounced when brand innovativeness was higher. Similarly, findings relating to the moderation effect of customer gender indicate that nostalgic brand positioning has a greater effect on brand passion and brand authenticity for females than for their male counterparts. Conversely, for brand iconness, the effect was equally important for both males and females. The practical and theoretical implications of these findings are provided and limitations are acknowledged.

1 | INTRODUCTION

Brand equity is one of the most recognized marketing concepts and an essential component of brand success (Rana & Paul, 2020; Yoon & Oh, 2016). Each year firms allocate a huge budget for building, managing, measuring and defending their brand equity (Ahmad & Guzmán, 2020; Paul, 2019a). In academic literature, brand equity was established in the 1980s; since then, it has been widely investigated from both consumer and company perspectives (Paul, 2019b). Regardless of diverging perspectives, brand equity is defined as the total value created by the brand (Bailey & Ball, 2006). Similarly, the prominent scholar such as Aaker (1991) established and defined the well-recognized conceptualizations of brand equity as ‘a set of assets and liabilities linked to a brand, its name, and symbol that add to or subtract from the value provided by a product or service to a firm and/or that firm’s customers’ (p. 15).

Highlights

Abstract

Keywords

1. Introduction

2. Literature review

3. Methodology

4. Data analysis

5. Conclusions

6. Managerial implications

7. Limitations and potential future research directions

Declaration of Competing Interest

Funding

References

Abstract

This study examines how the degree of fit between the brand extension and the parent brand, in the case of heritage sites, affects the extension’s brand equity-formation, considering the mediating role of brand attitude and brand credibility and the moderating role of the tourist’s level of experience of the parent heritage brand. An experimental design is applied, in which two different levels of fit between the parent heritage brand and the brand extension are controlled between subjects. Suggestions are provided for effective ways of enhancing heritage brand equity and therefore contributing to destination promotion and competitiveness.

1. Introduction

Cultural heritage is considered a key factor in the socioeconomic development of territories in general (neighborhoods, cities, regions, and countries) (Bowitz & Ibenholt, 2008; Henche & Salvaj, 2017) and in that of tourist destinations, in particular (Carbone, 2016; Halpenny et al., 2018; Henche, 2018). When a heritage site is designated a World Heritage Site (WHS), this high-profile recognition constitutes a powerful heritage brand (Timothy, 2011) that enjoys significant status, perceived quality, and authenticity (Ryan & Silvanto, 2009). This heritage brand exerts a positive effect on demand patterns in the territories concerned (Halpenny et al., 2018; Poria et al., 2011), reducing tourist perceived risk associated with choosing a destination (Halpenny et al., 2018) and, ultimately, increasing tourist confidence in the destination in question (Hassan & Rahman, 2015). Therefore, heritage sites that carry the WHS hallmark are a focus of significant appeal for tourists and drivers of wealth-creation for the territories in which they are located. They also constitute an enormous source of potential for destinations’ on-going economic development through the creation of brand extensions—a topic of particular interest to marketing scholars (Aaker, 1990; Kim et al., 2019; Reast, 2005).

As bringing new brands to market is a costly endeavor, many firms opt instead for the brand extension strategy, which has been critical for business growth in recent decades (Aaker, 1990; Buil et al., 2009). While several factors are known to influence brand extension success, the perceived fit between the parent brand and the extension plays a particularly significant role (Aaker & Keller, 1990; Buil et al., 2009; Miniard et al., 2018; Reast, 2005). Perceived fit is derived from consumers’ perceptions of the extent to which the parent brand and its extension share a likeness or similarity.