The Impact of Facebook Marketing on Customer-Based Brand Equity and Purchase Intention on Fashionwear Retail Industry in Sri Lanka

Purpose –This study focuses on examining the impact of Facebook marketing components on customer-based brand equity (CBBE) and purchase intention (PI).  Design/methodology/approach – A conceptual model was developed based on the literature and related hypotheses were tested based on the responses of 390 Facebook (FB) fans of four leading fashion-wear retailers in Sri Lanka who have been selected on a random basis. The data was collected using an online survey and analyzed using the structural equation modeling. Findings- The results indicate that Facebook marketing has a strong impact on customer-based brand equity. The items entertainment, reputation and relationship remain for Facebook marketing construct to test its impact on customer-based brand equity. This finding helps to recognize the role of Facebook marketing from the strategic point of view, confirming its significant contribution in taking a brand to the next level. Furthermore, the direct impact of Facebook marketing on purchase intention was not significant and customer-based brand equity fully mediates the relationship between Facebook marketing and purchase intention. Originality –This research applies the Honeycomb model which is a rarely used model to identify the components of Facebook marketing. Hence, this can be identified as one of first this kind of research in Sri Lanka. Further, this study address Fashion-wear retail industry which another important but understudied sector in Sri Lanka. Implications – This article connects the consumers’ opinion on Facebook marketing. The findings of Facebook marketing on taking brand equity into next level will be useful for decision making in business organizations. The effective use of social media will reduce the promotional expenses. Further, the application of Honeycomb model shows the appropriate criteria for Facebook marketing and fill the gap of the unavailability of criteria for social marketing evaluation

Exploring Department Store Offerings: A ZMET Study

Department stores in the UK have faced challenging retail conditions, which were affected by the everchanging external retail competition such as out-of-town and online retailers. As the boundaries between different retail institutions have blurred increasingly with an inclining similarity of their commodity offerings, the multi-department one-stop shopping experience is no longer unique to department stores. But the department stores are nevertheless still regarded as the anchor of the high street due to their strong brand associations linked to their heritage, physical presence, and emphasis on service quality. However, it is not clear if these associations are still relevant, particularly as customers are increasingly adopting a hybrid online/offline approach to shopping. This study, therefore, adopts a customer-based brand equity (CBBE) lens to explore the key constructs that are valued by customers in the current turbulent retail environment. This study was a mono-method qualitative study using Zaltman Metaphor Elimination Technique (ZMET). Data were collected from 24 UK high street department store shoppers in Derby using a cross-sectional time horizon. The use the of ZMET method elicited deep thoughts and feelings in the UK high street department stores by customers based on the participant’s choice of image. Thematic content analysis was used to analyse the data extracted from both the verbal interview, the participant’s choice of images and the montage created by the participants. A new onion model of customer-based brand equity (CBBE) in the current department store context was identified in this study, named customer-based department store brand equity (CBDSBE). This model showed that four out of Zaltman’s seven deep metaphors are more relevant to the current context, which are balance, resource, journey and connection. By identifying these deep metaphors, brand managers would gain in-depth understanding of their customers, and thus, establish enhanced marketing strategies accordingly. This study also identified that brand accessibility was a new construct that emerged from this study that contributed to the customer-based department store brand equity. It was identified that the department store provided access to the participants where they could access the individual brands, the physical products, and the experiences available at a department store. The outcomes of this study argued that the department store is not reaching the end of its lifecycle. It is suggested that a new definition of the department store is needed, which would ultimately distinguish the department store from its competitors who offered similar commodities and re-establish competitive advantage in the current turbulent retail environment by enhancing its customer-based department store brand equity

Sources and antecedents of brand equity for online companies

The area of Brand Equity has received considerable attention during the past twenty years. The importance of a brand emanates from the fact that brand recognition and positive associations with it create value for companies and consumers. This value is called Brand Equity and translates into monetary value. Until now, there is scant research on brand equity for online retailers to test whether theoretical frameworks developed for offline companies apply to online businesses. The study is an attempt to bridge this gap by developing and testing a comprehensive brand equity model with selected drivers (customer support and a mix of functionality and fulfilment marketing efforts) and sources (awareness, association of value and trust, and loyalty) of brand equity. Grounded in a traditional offline consumer-based brand equity framework, a research model (at the aggregate level) for assessing brand equity of online companies is developed and tested using structural equation modelling (SEM). Several key findings are reported: First, a measurement model based on dimensions of awareness, associations of value and trust, and attitudinal loyalty seem to fit the data well. Measures have adequate reliability, convergent and discriminant validity. Secondly, from the SEM application, only value association and loyalty are potent determinants of brand equity. Third, awareness, trust and value associations contribute indirectly to create brand equity. Fourth, the hierarchical hypothesized relationships between the sources of brand equity are confirmed. The final best-fitting (calibrating) model derived from the subjects that had bought from the online businesses under study was validated across a sample of subjects. Simultaneous model comparison using structural equation (by means of Chi square difference) confirms the tenability of the calibrating model. To test for the probability than an incorrect model will be rejected, power analysis was calculated. The results indicate that the likelihood of rejecting the hypothesis of exact and close fit equals 1.0. The second phase of the study involved brand analysis at the individual level. According to the calculations Amazon obtains slightly higher brand equity than eBay and puts it in first place, eBay is in second place, followed by Dell in third. CDNow is the worst performer and obtains consumer-based brand equity below average. The study offers contributions to both academia and business in several ways

Critical review of the e-loyalty literature: a purchase-centred framework

Over the last few years, the concept of online loyalty has been examined extensively in the literature, and it remains a topic of constant inquiry for both academics and marketing managers. The tremendous development of the Internet for both marketing and e-commerce settings, in conjunction with the growing desire of consumers to purchase online, has promoted two main outcomes: (a) increasing numbers of Business-to-Customer companies running businesses online and (b) the development of a variety of different e-loyalty research models. However, current research lacks a systematic review of the literature that provides a general conceptual framework on e-loyalty, which would help managers to understand their customers better, to take advantage of industry-related factors, and to improve their service quality. The present study is an attempt to critically synthesize results from multiple empirical studies on e-loyalty. Our findings illustrate that 62 instruments for measuring e-loyalty are currently in use, influenced predominantly by Zeithaml et al. (J Marketing. 1996;60(2):31-46) and Oliver (1997; Satisfaction: a behavioral perspective on the consumer. New York: McGraw Hill). Additionally, we propose a new general conceptual framework, which leads to antecedents dividing e-loyalty on the basis of the action of purchase into pre-purchase, during-purchase and after-purchase factors. To conclude, a number of managerial implementations are suggested in order to help marketing managers increase their customers’ e-loyalty by making crucial changes in each purchase stage

High-end fashion manufacturing in the UK - product, process and vision: Recommendations for a Designer and Fashion Manufacturer Alliance and a Designer Innovation and Sampling Centre

The Centre for Fashion Enterprise (CFE) was commissioned by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) to undertake a feasibility study to explore fully the market need for a new high-end production hub. This was in direct response to the need highlighted in the DCMS report, Creative Britain - New Talents For The New Economy, published in 2008. This study has confirmed that there is a need. However the need is for a sampling and innovation facility rather than a production hub. Designers reported a shortage of high quality sampling capacity in the UK, as well as difficulties in getting small quantities produced. Additionally, they do not know where or how to source appropriate manufacturing in the UK, Europe or globally, at the quality the market requires

Reviews of Brand Equity for Online Retailers

In this era, the study of brand equity for online retailers is essential for marketing strategy development. However, due to a lack of consensus about the definition and conceptualization of brand equity, studies on brand equity for online retailers remain ambiguous. This study aims to identify the general viewpoint of brand equity for use with online retailers, as well as exploring the various brand equity models which have been used for online retailers in previous studies published from 2002-2020. The findings conclude that there are various conceptualizations of brand equity for online retailers; however, they are based on the consumer perception of the online retailers’ brands. There are two concepts of brand equity for online retailers: utilizing traditional brand equity models and creating new models specifically for the online context. Aaker’s brand equity model, i.e., one of the traditional brand equity models, has been employed most frequently in previous studies as it is a well-established model and appropriate for the study context of online retailers. The current study provides a discussion and recommendations regarding the existing theoretical models for future online retail brand equity studies, while also enriching the body of knowledge on brand equity

Brand Tracking on Social Media: The Role of Country of Origin Perceptions

Marketers are now almost a decade into using social media as another outlet in developing brand relationships with consumers. Yet an understanding of how consumers interact with brands online is still in its infancy. This paper compares the social media and brand-tracking habits of consumers in three parts of the world: Asia, the Middle East and the USA. In addition, the study attempts to explain what motivates consumers to follow brands on social media, focusing on the role of products’ country of origin in explaining the relationship. The results show that US consumers spent the most time on social media and tracked the most brands, while Thai respondents did the least of both. Four dimensions of social media brand tracking were identified and ratings compared across groups. Significant differences among groups were found for one of the four factors, ‘brand experience’, with US consumers experiencing significantly more positive ‘brand experiences’ than Thai consumers, and Egyptian consumers falling somewhere in between. The results also indicate that the country of product origin can have some effects on brand tracking

The effects of loyalty programs on customer satisfaction, trust, and loyalty toward high- and low-end fashion retailers

This study examines the differential effects of the benefits customers receive from a loyalty program (LP) on satisfaction with the LP, trust in the LP, and store loyalty for high- and low-end fashion retailers. With survey data from U.S. LP subscribers, the study tests the relationships using multiple regressions and analysis of covariance. The results show that symbolic benefits are more important for high-end fashion store consumers' satisfaction with the LP; conversely, utilitarian benefits increase consumers' satisfaction with the LP more in low-end fashion retailing, whereas hedonic benefits increase consumers' satisfaction with the LP in both types of retailers. All benefits in both types of retailers affect trust in the LP. Finally, satisfaction with and trust in the LP are important drivers of loyalty to the retailer. The findings have important implications on how managers of high- and low-end fashion retailing can effectively design their LP rewards to maximize loyalty

THE ROLE OF THE BRAND: EXAMINATION OF THE EFFECT OF A BRAND CHANGE ON FINANCIAL PERFORMANCE OF ELEVEN SOUTH AFRICAN RETAILERS

Has the role of the brand eroded to the point where it no longer influences the customer’s choice or the retailer’s financial performance? Does the brand have little to no relevance to either the customer or the company, to the extent that even an abrupt change in a retailer’s brand will not have a detrimental effect on financial performance? The overarching hypothesis of this research is that in contemporary multi-category mass-market retailing, the retailer brand has little to no effect on a retailer’s financial performance but that the dimensions of the retail mix are all important. This thesis argues that whilst the brand may play a role in certain retail environments, in multi-category, mass market retailing, the brand plays little to no role! The study conducted quantitative analysis, using empirical, secondary, scanner based data. The data consists of 36775 sales data points and 6 further variables for each of 987 stores across eleven multi-category mass-market South African retailers, over thirty six months (all references to 987 stores relate to a specific point in time post acquisition of the group; the average number of stores p. a. over three years of the analysis was 1021). The research used a linear mixed model, and analysis of variance to examine the effect of key dimensions of the retail mix (price, merchandise assortment, location and credit offer) on sales performance, and to examine the effect of different levels of each dimension on sales performance. Secondly, the research used a linear mixed model supported where relevant by paired t-tests and relative difference analysis to examine the effect on financial performance of both an abrupt change in a retailer’s brand and of a change in the retailer’s credit offer. The proposed research will investigate what happens when eleven established dominant brands are abruptly consolidated into five. The research will further investigate the short and long term effect of a change in the credit offer which improves affordability

Sustainability as corporate culture of a brand for superior performance

This is the post-print version of the final paper published in the Journal of World Business. The published article is available from the link below. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. Copyright @ 2012 Elsevier B.V.Sustainability research highlights new challenges and opportunities for businesses. This paper reviews the literature to understand the ability of sustainable green initiatives when practiced as a corporate culture to individually create new opportunities for operations, management and marketing. According to current research, business opportunities exclusively available to different functions of a firm can drive its performance. The role of marketing in the achievement of superior performance by virtue of sustainability practices is also explained by the existing literature. Branding literature, however, fails to explain the influence of a brand on sustainability-driven opportunities available to a firm for superior performance. The objective of this study is to explore if a brand can strengthen the ability of sustainability-based green initiatives of managers to drive opportunities available to a firm for superior performance. A conceptual framework grounded in the triple bottom line theory is presented based on the assumption that brand as a stimulating factor can accelerate the conversion of opportunities available to a business into superior performance. Academic and managerial perspectives have been used to draw upon the implications of the model. Both practitioners and academic researchers will benefit from future research on this topic