Sports Team Brand-Equity Index: A New Measurement—An (Extended) Abstract

Abstract

Increased commercialization of professional sport teams has led to increased competition, making it imperative for sport managers to develop and maintain fruitful relations with their fans and other stakeholders (Naik and Gupta 2013a; Bauer et al. 2005). The stakeholders might include participants, owners, team administration, governing bodies, financial stakeholders, and community at large. To ensure a team’s economic success, team owners and managers lay strong emphasis on “team branding” to build a loyal fan base (Naik and Gupta 2013b). It has been observed that higher loyalty of fans ensures their involvement in the team’s activities and leads to its economic success. In a recent survey by Gallup in 2009, it was observed that more than 56 % of the respondents were watching a sport because they were the fans of a particular participant team. It is therefore important for team management to identify critical factors that have an impact on the success of the teams. Researchers have argued that high team brand equity can result into increased fan loyalty, global presence, differentiation of team, positive fan attitude, and increased purchase intentions while ultimately leading to economic success (Naik and Gupta 2013a; Bauer et al. 2005). Measuring and evaluating brand equity of a team on a continuous basis should be considered a strategic marketing decision by the team manager. There are plenty of scales that have been developed to measure sport teams’ brand equity (Gladden et al. 1998; Gladden and Funk 2002; Bauer et al. 2008; Villarejo-Ramos and Martin-Velicia 2007; Ross 2006; Ross et al. 2008; Naik and Gupta 2012b). With these scales using reflective indicators, there is serious question on their coverage of the concept meaning as well as practical application.