National Brands Research Articles

Valuing the contribution of ultra‐light buyers

AbstractUltra‐light buyers, those who, on average, buy a brand once a year or less, are important by number and their contribution to brand purchase occasions. The initial research, however, was limited in scope and did not measure the contribution of these buyers to sales volume or value. By examining over 850 brands in almost 60 categories, we identify that ultra‐lights make up 62% of a brand's buyer base over 5 years and contribute 32% of purchase occasions and 31% of sales volume and value. In line with previous findings that brands with higher loyalty exhibit more repeat purchases and thus fewer ultra‐light buyers and private label brands often exhibit higher than expected loyalty for their market share—we find the prevalence of ultra‐light buyers is higher for national brands than private labels, likely reflecting the higher loyalty often observed for private labels. We also find no difference in ultra‐light buyers' contribution between high and low‐price brands, indicating that price is not a significant factor affecting the contribution of ultra‐light buyers. Finally, we find that both growing and declining brands have fewer ultra‐lights than stable brands. As growth occurs via increasing penetration and loyalty, for growing brands, new buyers may be more ‘light’ than ‘ultra‐light’ in terms of their loyalty; while for declines, these findings imply that there are not enough ultra‐light buyers to maintain brand sales. A failure to recruit ultra‐light buyers may be very dangerous for brand health.

Slovenian folk-pop music as a place and nation making strategy between heritage and popular culture

ABSTRACT Cultural heritage tourism partly depends on authorized heritage definitions, and partly on complex bottom-up processes of heritage identification, interpretation, and communication. This paper addresses the ways in which music, when understood as intangible heritage, may be used for place making and nation branding purposes, and the dynamic between these two processes, as seen from the perspective of cultural and heritage tourism workers. To analyze this dynamic, we focus on the genre of Slovenian folk-pop music. Invented in the 1950s, it has since then become the prevalent (popular) musical element of the Slovenian cultural landscape, while its variants have also, and in parallel to ‘national’ characterization of the genre, been appropriated in various local contexts. We trace how Slovenian folk pop simultaneously partakes in the construction of the country’s national brand and in local place making strategies of heritage promotion, deployed by national, regional, and local stakeholders. We draw on an extensive literature review, document analysis, and interviews with folk-pop festival organizers. Based on this initial mapping of the major stakeholders, we propose a classification of folk-pop music festivals that accounts for the different ways in which folk pop is used as an instrument of heritage tourism, place making, nation branding, and entertainment industries.

Manufacturer's sales format selection and information sharing strategy of platform with a private brand

PurposeIn recent years, private brands for e-commerce platforms have experienced rapid growth. However, whether these platforms developing private brands should share their demand information with others and how such information sharing affects the sales format selection of national brand manufacturers have puzzled firm managers in practice. This paper aims to investigate the information-sharing strategy for the e-commerce platform and its influence on the sales format selection in the presence of the private brand.Design/methodology/approachThe authors use a game-theoretical model to examine the interaction between the information-sharing strategy and sales format selection in a supply chain consisting of a manufacturer and a platform that operates a private brand.FindingsThe equilibrium results show that when the commission rate is low, the manufacturer favors agency selling, and the platform shares demand information with the manufacturer; when the commission rate is high, the manufacturer prefers reselling, and the platform does not share the information. This preference is affected by information forecasting accuracy; as the information forecasting accuracy increases, the manufacturer prefers to adopt agency selling, and the platform tends to share the information. Interestingly, under agency selling, sharing information with the manufacturer can increase the platform’s profit from selling the private brand and achieve a win-win situation for them. Furthermore, we show that the manufacturer can inspire the platform to share the information with himself by adopting agency selling, whereas the platform sharing the information improves the probability that the manufacturer adopts agency selling. Moreover, the manufacturer may have a first-mover advantage. In particular, the manufacturer moving first increases the likelihood that the manufacturer chooses agency selling and the platform shares the information.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to sales format literature by exploring the effect of information sharing strategy on sales format selection in the presence of the private brand and can help manufacturers and platforms to make suitable decisions regarding information sharing and sales format selection.

Nation branding and feminist diplomacy after crisis: France’s response to SEA allegations in Central African Republic

Abstract This article makes the case that gender and racial analyses of the constitutive interplay between nation branding and diplomacy advance understandings of how liberal states use feminist agendas in response to political crises. Adopting a feminist post-colonial approach and drawing on a discourse analysis of French diplomatic speeches made in the UN Security Council between July 2011 and January 2020, the article examines how male and female diplomats address France’s accountability failures when French peacekeepers sexually abused children in Central African Republic in 2014–15, widely known as the Sexual Exploitation and Abuse, or SEA crisis. Operating as embodied brand ambassadors, diplomats use affective and performative strategies to progress through the political crisis life cycle quickly and re-establish France’s ontological security. It is contended that while feminist foreign policy and feminist diplomacy serve as short-term solutions to reputational damage, France’s longer-term nation-branding project, which follows a masculine, white-supremacist neoliberal logic, stabilises the grand narrative of the middle power and its projected image as a legitimate strategic leader in global governance. Yet in attempting to control the narrative on the SEA crisis, French diplomats downplay the global crisis of accountability surrounding sexual exploitation and abuse and silence the personal crises of SEA survivors.

The Legal Risks that Local Chinese Companies face when being Acquired by Foreign Multinational Companies and the Measure

With the comprehensive and in-depth development of reform and opening up in the last century, as well as since China's accession to the WTO in 2001, foreign multinational companies have aimed at China, accelerated the pace of entering our market. A large number of mergers and acquisitions of Chinese enterprises have penetrated into many industrial fields in China. International mergers and acquisitions have become one of the important ways for multinational companies to enter our market, and many enterprises in China have encountered or will encounter mergers and acquisitions by multinational companies. Due to the lack of specific and detailed laws and regulations in China, the lack of a systematic regulatory mechanism for foreign companies merging with Chinese companies, and the significant differences and gamesmanship between Chinese and foreign merger and acquisition laws, local Chinese companies are exposed to huge risks in the process of being merged by foreign companies. This paper uses legal analysis to explore the legal risks faced by Chinese enterprises in international M&A. It proposes ways to deal with the risks by improving M&A laws and anti-monopoly laws, creating a national brand protection system and actively implementing anti-malicious takeover measures.

Korean Wave in Indonesia: Are there any changes in perception and intention to visit Korea?

South Korea has a good image overseas due to the success of its national branding. With the Korean Wave as their national branding, Koreans introduce their country and culture through Korean entertainment. Indonesia is one of the Asian countries exposed to the Korean Wave, especially Korean dramas. This paper aims to analyze the determinants of changes in perceptions and the desire of Indonesians to visit South Korea as a tourist destination. International strategy theory, international marketing theory, and Korean Wave types are analyzed. The research sample consists of 237 randomly selected Korean Wave fans and non-fans. Data were collected using a questionnaire adapted and modified from previous studies. Respondents received questionnaires on-line via Google Forms. Multiple linear regression analysis was used in this study. The findings show that international strategy and marketing can adequately explain changes in the perception and desire of Indonesians to visit South Korea as a tourist destination. The Korean Wave has a positive and significant effect on changes in public perceptions toward Korea. The significant level of 0.000 <0.05 concludes that the four Korean Wave variables (Korean music, food, dramas, and products)simultaneously have a positive effect on changes in the perception of Indonesians people toward South Korea. However, K-pop and K-food were not found to determine the intention to visit South Korea as a tourist destination.

The strategic interaction between business mode and store brand introduction in a platform-based supply chain

The phenomenon of store brands introduced by large-scale platforms is becoming common, and manufacturers should carefully choose the business mode of selling national brand (NB) products via platforms. Considering big-data marketing, we examine the sales mode selection in a platform-based supply chain based on the strategic interaction between the business mode decision and store brand decision. By continuous dynamic game theory, the strategies and performance under different modes are solved. We find that given the store brand (SB) decision, the business mode adopted by the manufacturer depends only on the commission rate, which is high for reselling and low for agency selling. Given the business mode, under reselling, whether the platform introduces SB depends only on the brand preference, i.e., SB is introduced when the preference for NB is low. While under agency, he introduces SB in the general or relatively passive situation, depending both on the commission rate and the brand preference. In addition, four equilibrium sales modes are obtained based on the strategic interaction. In order to achieve a win-win-win situation in profitability among the manufacturer, the platform and the platform-based supply chain, the manufacturer should adopt agency selling and the platform forgoes introducing SB when both the commission rates and NB preference are low.

Investigation on the Current Situation of the National Fitness Activity Brand Project in Shanghai

Through the investigation of the current situation of the national fitness activity brand project in Shanghai, this paper finds the problems in the organization and management, project content, brand value, explores the reasons, and puts forward scientific feasible suggestions on how to inherit, innovate and develop the national fitness brand project with Shanghai characteristics. For the masses to develop and innovate more abundant, more scientific fitness programs, for the sustainable development of the existing brand projects to provide ideas. Moreover, the formation of brand projects to a certain extent also sets an example for the development of national fitness sports in areas with relatively backward economic development level.

Investigation and Study on the Influencing Factors of Intangible Cultural Heritage Paper-cutting Inheritance

With the rapid development of the economy, nowadays we no longer suffer and worry about "not covering the body and not having enough to eat", we begin to pursue spiritual resonance and aesthetic synchronization: more and more people are interested in traditional culture, more and more national fashion brands emerge, and more and more traditional skills are exposed, loved and inherited. However, under the background of "promoting excellent traditional culture and strengthening national cultural self-confidence", there are still many traditional arts that have encountered difficulties. This article takes intangible cultural heritage paper-cutting as an example to summarize the influencing factors in development and inheritance, innovatively seek to explore a new path, let it inject fresh blood, and keep innovation.

The effect of the national brand on high-tech exports in selected countries

High-tech exports play a crucial role in the growth and prosperity of the national economy due to higher added value and higher profitability. However, gaining a competitive advantage and increasing high-tech exports is arduous because of the highly competitive environment in global markets. In addition, increasing the value of the national brand through the improvement of foreign customers' mental image of products made in a specific country, can play an undeniable role in the improvement of customer’s loyalty and growth of high-tech exports. In this paper, we evaluate the impact of the national brand on high-tech exports in 12 countries with the most valuable nation-brand, using panel data and a generalized method of moments (GMM), during the period 2015–2021. The results showed the positive and significant impact of the national brand in this group. It means that although improvement of the national brand stimulates the demand for high-tech products from foreign customers, countries that have had more capacity to increase the production and supply of these products have been more successful in meeting the created surplus demand. Therefore, developing countries should take action to improve the national brand, by moving towards a knowledge-based economy, and at the same time, they have to increase their capacity of production and supply of high-tech products to be able to meet the demands of these products in global markets.

주 태국 한국 문화원의 케이팝 아카데미 운영에 대한 고찰과 제언

This study aims to find out what effects the K-POP Academy operated by the Korean Cultural Center in Thailand has on K-POP consumption and the Korean nation branding in the Thai market and to make suggestions for the operation of the K-POP Academy. At the results, in Thailand, K-POP was mainly consumed by females in their teens. It was found that K-POP draws great popularity in Thailand because its unique musical characteristics correspond to the essential excitement of the Thai people. In addition, it was analyzed that Thai people's ‘multi-cultural acceptance’ is not significantly related to K-POP consumption. On the other hand, ‘experience’ served as a fundamental reason for Thais to participate in the K-POP Academy. Lastly, it was found that the K-POP Academy has an effect on Thais’ intention to visit Korea and purchase Korean products, thus effectively enhancing Korea's nation branding.

K-pop이 한국 국가 브랜드와 관광업에 미치는 영향에 대한 연구

The purpose of this study is to examine the influence of BTS on Korean national brands and explore the influence of K-pop on Korean tourism industry. As for the research method, the study used the form of questionnaires to collect data. In order to understand the influence of BTS on Korean national brands from the perspective of foreigners, 473 Chinese university students and employees were selected as the subjects of this study. And the hierarchical regression analysis of the relevant data was carried out. In order to explore the impact of BTS on Korean brand, this research set Acculturation, PAD, Para-social interaction, and BTS attitudes as independent variables, while Korea attitudes and Korea visit intention were set as dependent variables. According to the independent variables and dependent variables, the research questions and hypotheses are designed. Results suggest that BTS positively affect the national image of Korea and travel intentions, demonstrating that the tourism values of K-pop are emerged. However, other cultural elements show less significant effects.

How the credibility of places affects the processing of advertising claims: A partial test of the B2B communication effects model

Using an economic development context, this study tests a portion of the revised B2B communication effects model, which added source credibility as an antecedent to message processing. This exploratory study examines how the perceived credibility of a nation brand influences message persuasiveness under varying levels of argument quality and issue involvement. Applying dimensions of source credibility to place advertising, the research uses an online, between-subjects experiment with a sample of site-selection managers to measure their responses to foreign direct investment seeking advertisements. In nearly all conditions, results suggest source credibility by itself has a stronger influence over message persuasiveness than either argument quality or involvement.

Importance of news media branding in a contemporary media environment

Digitalization fundamentally brought new ways in how media distribute and audiences consume media content, transforming the existing media environment and bringing new competitors to media organizations. On one side, new platforms and technology companies give media ample opportunities to reach their audiences; on the other, they develop a highly competitive information environment - oversaturated and fragmented where the point of differentiation between media brands could be higher. Furthermore, multi-platform and content on-demand consumption delude and endangers media brand associations, contributing to an environment where audiences care less about media brands and more about the moment of consumption independently from platform, time and media brand. The younger audience, Generation Z, is an even more platform, on-demand and experience-driven audience who prefers social media and global media and cares less about national media brands raising vital questions about whether national news media brands will have an audience in future. Therefore, young audience consumption trends have become significant media industry factors as the sector recognizes this audience as a significant portion of the market today and shortly signalling media consumption trends after coming generations. The research actuality is based on these aspects that challenge national news media brands to attract a younger audience, ensuring news media brand attribution and strong brand equity in a contemporary media environment. Numerous experts believe that competition among news media outlets has intensified dramatically due to the fragmentation of the news media market, compelling media managers to continually search out new methods to differentiate their media brands. In the meantime, realising that news media brand uniqueness is uncommon and developing a continual stream of items with distinctive characteristics is exceedingly challenging. This study focuses on national news media and analyzes how news media attributes and perceived uniqueness impact news media brand equity in a contemporary media environment transformed by digitalization. The study highlights the importance of media brands' distinctiveness and impact on news media brand equity. The authors utilised multiple linear regression analyses and the decision tree method to estimate the most influential news media attributes contributing to news media brand equity. The impact of the perceived uniqueness of news media brands was analyzed along with other news media brand attribute-based associations.

Impact of store brand competition on retailer's strategic inventory in decentralized supply chains

AbstractRetailers often sell their own store brands that compete with the national brands. Store brand competition induces the supplier to quote lower wholesale prices for national brands. In multi‐period selling environments, retailers may complement this wholesale price reduction by carrying strategic inventories. Hence, store brand carrying retailers face the following dilemma. On the one hand, strong store brand competition might be sufficient to lower the national brand's wholesale price substantially. In this case, the retailer need not carry any strategic inventory. On the other hand, the wholesale price reduction induced solely by store brand competition might not be substantial. In this case, the retailer might want to carry either national brand or store brand strategic inventory to complement the wholesale price reduction. We address the above dilemma by investigating the effect of store brand competition on the strategic inventory decision using a two‐period game‐theoretic framework. We enhance the current understanding of the retailer's strategic inventory by incorporating the impact of store brand competition. Our analysis reveals that it is never optimal for the retailer to carry store brand as strategic inventory even when the store brand and the national brand are close substitutes. We also find that a store brand selling retailer may become worse off when being endowed with the option of carrying strategic inventory. However, when the holding cost is sufficiently low, we show that the strategic inventory and store brand competition complement each other and benefit the retailer.

What claims best convey the quality of retailers' standard private label products?

PurposeConsumers consider retailers' standard private labels (PLs) as relevant choices, compared to national brands (NBs), and their demand for private label products has increased significantly over the past decade. At the same time, PLs have undergone a profound transformation as retailers have enhanced their quality. The goal of this research is to investigate the impact of claims used to highlight the enhanced quality of standard PL products on consumers' perceptions and behaviours.Design/methodology/approachA between-subjects experiment, set in a store laboratory, was used to study consumers' perceptions and behaviours. The impact of six non-nutrition claims – linked, according to the self-other trade-off, either to concern for consumers' health (internal to the self) or for the environment (external to the self) – on consumers' reactions has been studied. Then, the data collected were analysed with partial least squares structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM).FindingsThis research indicates that health claims retailers make to echo consumers' own concerns have positive impacts at three basic levels: the brand, the retail chain and the store. It also highlights the central role of trust in standard PLs, which, once activated by the non-nutrition claims made by retailers and the increase in the quality of standard PLs thus inferred by consumers, can improve consumers' attitude toward the food retailers' stores and reinforce their intentions to visit again and recommend them.Research limitations/implicationsFrom a theoretical perspective, this research supplements cue utilisation theory as it applies this framework to standard PLs and establishes that consumers use extrinsic cues (i.e. communications on non-nutrition claims) to infer the quality of standard PL brand products. It also complements scant studies on retailers' corporate social responsibility (CSR) with quality aspects of their own labels as it specifies the levers (i.e. the claims) to use to improve retailers' CSR image and consumers' behaviours.Practical implicationsFrom a managerial perspective, this research highlights the superiority of retailers' claims related to consumer health and, more specifically, of claims highlighting the natural origin of ingredients. For this specific assertion, trust in the standard PL and the CSR image of the brand have direct and indirect impacts, via attitude toward the stores, on consumers' intentions to return to and to recommend these stores.Originality/valueDespite the increasing importance of products as effective tools for communicating companies' CSR policies, scant research has been conducted on consumers' reactions to non-nutrition claims, which are increasingly prominent in the marketplace.

C2M strategies on an e-commerce platform under brand competition

With the growing diversity of consumer preferences, an emerging mode of supply chain innovation, the consumer-to-manufacturer (C2M) model, is being adopted by e-commerce platforms. The C2M model directly connects end consumers to upstream factories digitally, shortens the information pipeline, and helps factories better understand consumer needs. Given the presence in the market of a national brand produced by a manufacturer, whether to incur the costs of introducing C2M store brand products is a key issue for the platform. Specifically, we consider two C2M modes that depend on whether the e-commerce platform has pricing power: (1) TC2M, which involves the factory selling to consumers directly, and (2) JC2M, which involves the e-commerce platform reselling the C2M product. We show that a relatively high mismatch level of the national brand product and a low introduction cost might induce adoption of the C2M model, which is in the interest of both the e-commerce platform and the factory. Furthermore, when the national brand’s mismatch level is not too high, the e-commerce platform prefers the JC2M mode to alleviate intensified brand competition. Interestingly, under certain circumstances, the C2M model can also be beneficial for the national brand producer (i.e., manufacturer) due to more precise targeting of its market segment. Our study extends the literature by modeling the competition between the national brand and C2M store brand, discussing supply chain members’ preference for the C2M model and providing intriguing managerial insights for the platform on the adoption of different C2M modes.

Neo-Ottoman Turk-Scape: Analyzing the Role of Dizis as Türkiye’s Soft Power

Türkiye has grabbed the world’s attention in the last three decades for its strategic use of soft power as an instrument of cultural diplomacy. Buoyed by relative economic success in the post-Cold War period, the new ruling elites of Türkiye used Islamic practices and value-system, particularly its Ottoman past, as tools of the soft power in cultural diplomacy. Turkish dizis (television series), particularly those based on historical figures, have played a critical role in the nation branding exercise of Türkiye. These dizis have not only created a soft spot for the country, and boosted its tourism, but it also helped the government, particularly President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan project himself as a leader with potentials to lead the Muslim world or Ummah. This article assesses the role of Turkish dizis as a soft power instrument in cultural diplomacy and the nation branding of Türkiye. Interestingly, Turkish dizis were primarily produced for domestic consumption, and were not necessarily targeting foreign audience, at least in the beginning. Thus, they perform the dual function of molding public opinion within the country, while also helping create a positive image about Türkiye and its past among the foreign audience. But nostalgia of the past alone is not sufficient, if not complemented by reciprocal actions on the ground.

The moderating role of brand involvement between brand authenticity And brand relationship quality and its impact on behavioral outcome (In the Case of Selected National and International Brands)

The moderating role of brand involvement between brand authenticity And brand relationship quality and its impact on behavioral outcome (In the Case of Selected National and International Brands)

Can a nation brand be built with an online tourism brand?

PurposeNation branding efforts are carried out by means of communication. The element, which is the object of communication tools, must have an analogical connection with nation branding. The object of analogy should have attractive features that will strengthen the nation brand. Online tourism content, which has the quality to add value to nation branding, can produce a strong analogy. Online tourism content can easily be internalized in a positive way, as it creates attractive connotations such as memories, entertainment, holidays, etc. in the mind of the audience. In this direction, the research aims to reveal that the online tourism brand is a strategic transmission tool of nation branding.Design/methodology/approachThe research study was carried out with the semiotics method. Content analysis has been made for the videos of GoTürkiye, Turkey's tourism brand, on YouTube.FindingsResearch findings show that content covering a large part of Turkey has been created. Messages to be given in the content; it is that Turkey has authentic and attractive elements and hosts international events. The content on GoTürkiye's YouTube has reached a significant number of views.Practical implicationsThe research aims to reveal how to build an online nation brand through online tourism brands. In this respect, it is thought that the results can guide the politicians or marketers responsible for nation branding.Originality/valueThe idea of how to build an online nation branding through online tourism brands remains unclear. In this respect, the research demonstrates its original value in proposing a model that will contribute to online nation branding.