To survive in the severe market competition, company needs to have power brand with strong image and high brand loyalty from the customers. To have sustainable competitive advantage, brand has to build the favorable, strong and unique association in t...
To survive in the severe market competition, company needs to have power brand with strong image and high brand loyalty from the customers. To have sustainable competitive advantage, brand has to build the favorable, strong and unique association in the minds of internal and external customers. Power brand has differential effect of the marketing activity on the customer response and market response(i.e. high customer loyalty, market share and profit).
Recently, many studies have been accumulated for the relationship among brand personality, brand identification and customer loyalty. The most studies for relationship between brand personality and brand identification so far have focused mainly on the external customers. But brand identification process of internal customers may influence the way that marketing activities are executed and their satisfaction/dissatisfaction. To expand the past studies for the effects of brand personality-customer identification, this study investigates the effect of brand reputation on the brand identification. Brand with higher reputation may result in stronger brand-self identification compared to brand with lower reputation if there is no difference in quality consumers interpreted the brand reputation as being prestigious and reliable. The purpose of this study is to examine the relative effect of brand personality dimensions and brand reputation on the brand identification. Also this study investigates the moderating effect of market offering's tangibility(tangible product and intangible service) and customer type (external customer and internal customer) in the casual relationship between brand personality and brand reputation and customer-brand identification.
This study consists of 4 parts. First, casual relationship among the perceived brand personality, brand reputation, brand identification and brand loyalty for external customers is tested. Second, brand identification process for internal customers also is tested. Third, this study examines how offering's tangibility and type of customer moderate the brand identification process of internal/external customer. Lastly, the differences of perceived brand personality between internal and external customers are verified.
In the empirical analysis, it is found that some dimensions of brand personality affect the brand identification of the external customers and brand reputation strongly influences brand identification. Brand identification of external customers affects their satisfaction, and then it affects external customer's loyalty.
Second, some dimensions of brand personality affect the brand identification of the internal customers. And the effect of brand reputation as the antecedent of brand identification is confirmed as well. Brand identification of internal customers affects internal customer's satisfaction significantly.
Third, moderating effect for the offering tangibility is partially supported. The offering's tangibility affects significantly on the path between brand identification and customer satisfaction. But not significant on the path between brand reputation and brand identification. Also moderating effect for the type of customers is partially supported. The type of customers affects significantly on the path between brand identification and customer satisfaction. But not significant on the path between brand reputation and brand identification.
Lastly, the dimensions of brand personality based on the type of customers are compared. There are big differences for the perceived brand personality between internal and external customers for the brand. In case of internal customers, they perceive that all brand personality dimensions for K airlines is higher compared to C beer. The importance of the brand personality management for the service company is confirmed.
The contribution of this study is to examine internal and external customers' brand identification process. This study found that some brand personality dimensions and brand reputation strongly influenced the brand identification, especially for service brand.