Branding Principles Research Articles

Footwear with feeling: a cultural approach to product development

ABSTRACTHolt (2004) pioneered a change in marketing discourse by outlining how brands can become icons through tapping into cultural mythologies of the time. Yet, the theory has remained purely focused on branded consumption. This film extends the approach to the realm of product development and focuses on the transformation of a fashion trend into a consistent product category by examining the flatform shoe, a new shoe style that blends the height of a heel with the comfort of a flat. Through qualitative interviews and ethnographic analysis, this film argues that consumers are able to attach a strong postfeminist sensibility to the style. This helps to elevate the style to a mainstream category of its own through an adherence to cultural branding principles.

A Proposed Conceptual Framework to the impact of Talent Management on Employer Branding: An Empirical Study in Egyptian Food Processing Companies

Abstract Human capital brings value to the firm and organizationalperformance can be enhanced through skillful investment in human capital (Backhaus and Tikoo, 2004). Within this context, escalated competition for attracting best employees to the firm is named “the war for talent” (Michaels, Handfiels-Jones and Axelrod, 2001). In today’s globalized business world, companies in all scales do their utmost to win the war for talent. An important tool in this war is employer branding. In order to attract better employees, firms recently started using branding principles and practices in the area of human resources management. The application of branding principles to human resources management has been termed as “employer branding” (Backhaus and Tikoo, 2004). The concept of employer branding has recently become a prominent topic in the HRM field. So this research not only investigate the impact of talent management dimensions on the employer branding factors in pharmaceutical organizations, but also build a conceptual framework to the impact of talent management on employer branding. Using survey approach, the data collected from 200 employers from various managerial levels from food processing companies in Egypt that have the biggest sales rate, the researcher selected managers as a the sample units from these food processing companies because manager has the chance to mobility between different companies and promotion to high administrative levels according to their capabilities to generate a distinctive sale rate and market share. That is to define the validity degree of both talent management dimensions and employers branding factors - between employers in different managerial levels in the Egyptian food processing companies, and also determine the impact of talent management dimensions on employers branding factors, and finally constructing a conceptual framework explore the impact of talent management dimensions on employer branding. This study found that talent management dimensions play a critical role to form the factors of employer branding. Talent management dimensions(communication, employee development , rewards and recognition, managing performance, open climate) have a positive impact on employer branding factors, and the five components of talent management lead to create employer branding factors (social value, interest value, Application value, Development value , Economic value , Management value , work/life balance ).in the organizations between employers. The employer branding factors build three dimensions which form employer branding (identity, image, and reputation) and according to these three factors talent manager could form a blue-print to employer branding in the organization. This study not only contributes to talent management concept but also identify its basic dimensions or components that have their impact on formulating employer branding in an important production sector in Egypt “food processing companies” concentrating on companies with big sales rates according to the Egypt Business Directory (Retrieved on 27th Aug.,2017), and also proposed a cyclic model to displaythe impact of Talent Management on Employer Branding.

Reinventing Personal Branding Building a Personal Brand through Content on YouTube

The study explores the phenomenon of personal branding on social media and in particular, examines how YouTubers create their personal brands online. The explorative and inductive approach has involved qualitative content analysis of a total of 72 videos produced by four successful YouTubers during several years of their social media presence. The findings reveal three major stages of the personal branding process, which are not sequential, but rather, were found to run in parallel over time: loyalty to personal brand profile, promotion of multiple social media accounts and addressing the audience and encouraging co-creation. The personal brand content is found to comprise such elements as the personality of the YouTuber, typical topics, the tone of voice, environment (setting) as well as product brands. Among its key features are clarity, consistency, and authenticity, resembling those of a product/service brand. The study proves the applicability of classical principles of product branding and typology of consumer-brand relationships as well as brand meaning co-creation to the personal branding phenomenon, while at the same time highlighting the complex nature of this phenomenon as being “born global”, purposeful and highly interactive. Thus, personal branding might be seen as a re-invention of the traditional branding but on a completely different level of interaction and visibility. Among managerial recommendations is the need for managers to closely monitor and analyze what is being said about their brands by the famous personalities on-line as these individuals are capable to influence the consumers’ perceptions about brands and companies.

Relationship between Reputation Perception and Job Pursuit Intention in Private Sector

These days’ companies use the concept of branding in the area of Human Resource Management and the application of branding principles to HRM has been termed as Employer Branding. This ideology is applied to attract potential recruits and to reassure that the existing employees are involved in the company’s culture and strategy. Therefore, the aim this research study is to analyze how organizations’ reputation together with job attributes influence potential job seekers’ intention to apply for a job. This study is quantitative in nature and its scope is to find out the impact of organizational identity on potential recruits. To achieve this objective, a survey of a sample size of 100 students enrolled in the Masters and Graduate program of four business school Karachi was conducted with the help of questionnaire. Correlation test will be run to find out the relationship between reputation perception and job-pursuit intentions. Through the in-depth analysis of the conducted survey, it was seen that employer branding is positively associated with job seeker intention to apply and to attract more than more talented and qualified candidates therefore organization need to be attractive employer by focusing on different strategies of employer branding and through this approach their can increase applicant intention to apply. It can be concluded that reputation information of an organization creates brand equity that generate the perception of organization's prestige in the market and students get influenced by the reputation of a firm because due to that they want to associate with a branded organization to start their career.

Allure of the Abroad: Tiffany & Co., Its Cultural Influence, and Consumers

Allure of the Abroad: Tiffany & Co., Its Cultural Influence, and Consumers

Sub-branding as an effective way to leverage the strengths of higher education institutions to create master brand ambassadors

This paper compares brand-marketing execution across three different types of organisations: marketing-driven (or market-driven) organisations, franchise organisations and higher education institutions, to demonstrate how the principles of branding are applied in each industry. Higher education institutions are markedly different from other organisations, and this paper explores the concept of sub-branding as an effective way to leverage the strengths of higher education institutions to employ brand-marketing principles. Specifically, higher education is examined as an environment of independent critical thinkers. The concept of sub-branding is introduced as a way to embrace this critical thinking and discussion-based culture to advance the branding principles typically found in other organisations. The reader will gain an understanding of master brand and sub-brand concepts and will be guided through a step-by-step process for performing a successful sub-branding exercise. The paper outlines the multiple benefits of sub-branding in a higher education organisation and also details fundamentals for successful implementation.

Self-branding, ‘micro-celebrity’ and the rise of Social Media Influencers

ABSTRACTThe notion of self-branding has drawn myriad academic responses over the last decade. First popularised in a provocative piece published in Fast Company, self-branding has been criticised by some on theoretical, practical and ethical grounds, while others have endorsed and propelled the idea. This article considers how and why the concept of self-branding has become so prevalent. We contend that it parallels the growth of digital technology (particularly social media) embedded in the current political climate: neoliberal individualism. Another objective here is to imbue the concept of self-branding with a marketing perspective and show how the ‘celebrities’ of self-branding manifest at a marketing media nexus distinct to the opening decades of the twenty-first century. Building on literature from mostly media and cultural studies, this critique sees self-branding as a distortion of key branding principles that has obvious implications for its practitioners and advocates. The article shows that, despite inherent tensions and problematic ironies, self-branding persists through the rise of Social Media Influencers; we consider three of these whose fame and following was achieved via the practices and phenomena under consideration.

University Branding: A Conceptualizing Model

Appropriate branding needs to attract the right people and invest time, money, experience, knowledge, and commitment of international organizations to create powerful and influential university brand. Acceptance the branding principles makes strategic approach focused the introducing of a university. Branding should be strategy-centered framework for coordination and integration messages and experiences of the university brand. Among the factors which is influencing the strategy formulation process, the amount of funding available, stage of development, market complexity, the complexity of the economic infrastructure and the perception in key markets. On the other hand, each place has its own dynamics in which products, politics, history, attitudes, and practices of the location will appear.

The Elimination of Child “Custody” Litigation: Using Business Branding Techniques to Transform Social Behavior

This article discusses how rebranding principles, already being used to alter social behavior in other non-consumer contexts, could be utilized to accomplish the legislative goal to reduce litigation as well as diminish animosity in custody cases. Part II of this article discusses the impetus for a transformation in the way parents view custody disputes. Part III discusses basic branding principles and how companies establish a brand and can successfully change their branding. Part IV explores the evolution of the current custody brand, identifies eight states that have eliminated “custody” and, in some cases, “visitation” from their vernacular, and discusses, in detail, changes to Florida’s custody statutes as part of the rebranding of custody litigation. Part V examines Florida’s experience with statutory revisions by considering appellate cases and practitioner commentary since the amendments to the state’s custody statutes went into effect to identify areas that demonstrate a failure at successful rebranding. Lastly, Part VI analyzes the implications for a successful attempt to rebrand “custody” and suggests that capitalizing on the psychological and emotional responses to rebranding could aid in achieving the universal goal to reduce the animosity associated with custody litigation.

What are the benefits of creating an omnichannel brand experience?

Is it really worth the time, trouble and investment that it takes to create a truly great omnichannel brand experience? This paper helps to explain what omnichannel really means and how a company can benefit from aligning all its channels into one consistent brand experience. It also looks at what customers are expecting from brands as they move from smartphone to tablet and finally complete their shopping mission in-store. Both the rational and the emotional factors that affect experiences are explored to establish how to optimise the performance of each individual channel and achieve the maximum return on investment. These findings are used to highlight the danger of overinvesting in one channel at the expense of others. This phenomenon is brought to life through real-life examples of brands that have experienced the pain of unhappy customers using multiple channels to vent their anger. The paper also highlights the major trends in omnichannel and includes a ‘how to’ user guide to creating a world-class omnichannel experience. And, finally, the proof of the pudding — the author gives real-life examples of global businesses that have embraced the principles of omnichannel branding and reaped the rewards.

Brand identification in higher education: A conditional process analysis

The dimensions and dynamics of higher education brands remain excessively informed by general principles of branding, with inadequate empirical testing in the specific context. This paper advances understanding of brand identification in higher education by empirically assessing its antecedents and relating brand identification to brand loyalty and brand support as outcome variables, moderated by time since direct experience of the university. Results of a conditional process analysis with a sample of 791 alumni indicate that recalled academic and social experiences significantly influence brand identification, and that brand identification is a good predictor of alumni brand loyalty and brand support. While the direct effects of recalled academic and social experience on brand loyalty decrease over time, the indirect effect of academic experience on loyalty via brand identification increases, indicating that the mediation effect of brand identification becomes stronger with the passage of time. The study makes important theoretical contributions to the branding literature by emphasizing the mediating role of brand identification and by examining the moderating effects of time on these variables. The results also inform marketing of higher education, suggesting that universities which focus on offering great academic experiences to their students will be more effective in developing strong brand identification over time which in turn leads to greater brand loyalty and brand support.

Turning the Corner

This article reports on formative research to develop the Adelante brand, an innovative program for Latino immigrant adolescents and their families. The brand applies social marketing principles used in previous health brands in areas such as tobacco control, substance use, and HIV prevention. Specific objectives were to apply branding principles as an approach to increasing adolescent engagement with, and participation in, a community-based youth development program called Adelante, which is based on positive youth development theory. We collected data in a primarily low-income Latino immigrant community, Langley Park, MD, located near Washington, DC. A total of 39 adolescents, ages 13–19, participated in six focus groups. We designed and tested a brand positioning statement, associations, a logo and graphics, and youth archetypes. We used thematic content analysis to code focus group data into broad topic areas and then analyzed the data using substantive coding to identify themes. The concepts of strength, resilience, and “turning the corner” by overcoming life obstacles and succeeding were the main themes. Latino youth face a challenging environment in which they grow up, finish school, and succeed. Adelante represents a source of support and help to turn the corner. A graphic depicting a city street corner with a darker side (past) and a brighter side (future) was identified as the Adelante logo. Youth characters named Victor and Erika, and an educational entertainment strategy, were conceived as a way to create a brand persona. Adelante is now actively building its brand to increase youth engagement in the program.

Employer Branding and Reputation From A Strategic Human Resource Management Perspective

Although reputation management literature has been dominated by marketing and communications-led perspectives, there is anagreementthat corporate reputation and good governance are often built from the internal towards external stakeholders. Lately, balancing the usage of social media as opposed to conventional media has demanded both human resources managementand public relations to become more strategic in addressing the role of brand communication via social media to gain competitiveness and business value. The purpose of the present study is to investigate the role of brand management for engaging employees, while building the reputation of the company. Most research on reputation management and branding focus either on social expectations and trust of external stakeholders and emphasis on internal stakeholders, particularly employees, is quite recent. “Employer branding” has been the application of branding principles for competitive advantage in strategic human resource management. Internal marketing of employer brands need to support external marketing so that organizational reputation is persistent. Employee commitment here refers to the degree to which an employee has positive associations and perceptions towards the organization, its brand values, brand personality and reputation. The researcherhas drawn upon prior research to develop anintegrated model that aims at linking strategic human resources management (SHRM), branding and corporate reputation. By using structured interviews of managers from various companies in different sectors, comparing and contrasting challenges and implications may pave the way for an integrated understanding of employees as the ultimate brand ambassadors/ advocates.

The Unbearable Lightness of University Branding

This study investigates how universities brand themselves and in what ways visual self-representation varies cross-nationally. We trace differences in the icons (emblems and logos) used in the Internet self-representation of 821 universities and higher education institutions in 20 countries in 5 continents. Emerging from content analyses of the icons were three main visual types (guilded, national, and organizational), arranged in five subtypes (classic, science/technology, local, abstract, and just-text). Generally, the visual expression of abstract or text-based organizational type is the least visually loaded, such lightness matching modern principles of corporate branding; the other types are rich in references to the national or guilded professional field of universities. We find that while the abstract organizational type of visual expression has become dominant in Western countries, including France, Germany, and the United States, heterogeneity prevails in other nations such as Australia, Italy, or South Africa. We develop possible explanations of the observed distribution of types across countries and discuss the implication of our findings for world society institutionalism and the institutional logics approach.

DESTINATION BRANDING AIMED AT INTERNATIONAL AFFIRMATION OF TOURISTIC POTENTIALS OF BiH

The aim of the paper is to explain howapplication of marketing and branding principlescontributes to effective management of destinationsunder conditions of globalization. The paperemphasizes the importance of understanding oftourists’ behavior model, with special focus onimportance of destination image in process of decisionmaking on destination choice. Case of the city ofRovinj was presented as good practice example indevelopment of destination brand. In order to get theanswer to the question where BiH is located incomparison to other countries of the Western Balkansin regard to the most important tourism indicators,findings of relevant research of the World TourismOrganization and the World Economic Forum werepresented. In the last part of the paper, some of theshortcomings that usually arise in the process ofdestination management in BiH were presented, withrecommendations how they can be overcome inaccordance with the principles of destinationmarketing and branding, in order to better utilizetourism potentials in BiH.

Turning the corner

This article reports on formative research to develop the Adelante brand, an innovative program for Latino immigrant adolescents and their families. The brand applies social marketing principles used in previous health brands in areas such as tobacco control, substance use, and HIV prevention. Specific objectives were to apply branding principles as an approach to increasing adolescent engagement with, and participation in, a community-based youth development program called Adelante, which is based on positive youth development theory. We collected data in a primarily low-income Latino immigrant community, Langley Park, MD, located near Washington, DC. A total of 39 adolescents, ages 13–19, participated in six focus groups. We designed and tested a brand positioning statement, associations, a logo and graphics, and youth archetypes. We used thematic content analysis to code focus group data into broad topic areas and then analyzed the data using substantive coding to identify themes. The concepts of stren...

Food and Beverage Brand Development: Global Trends and Directions for Ukraine

ABSTRACT. The article presents the results of research on the development of international and Ukrainian brands, and also analyzes food and beverages brands position in the Interbrand rankings and UkrBrand. Moreover, the research studies the dynamics of their value and the representation of world's leading brands on the Ukrainian market in order to identify global trends and characteristics of development in Ukraine.Keywords: brand, valuation, rating, Interbrand, UkrBrand.(ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.)IntroductionFood industry is the most important part of production. It is designed to ensure national food sovereignty and food security. Understanding the specific role of brands in business management helps to transform the knowledge into an effective tool that facilitates maintaining competitive position on the market and relationship with the consumer.The research contributed greatly to the theory of management, studies of definitions the terms: and brand name, and also helped addressing questions regarding their development in the scientific heritage of the founders of marketing D. Aaker, T. Gad, F. Kotler (2003, 2001, 2008). Theoretical and practical principles of branding are set forth in the works of Russian scientists including: V. Domnin (Domnin, 2004). Among the scientific works which studied the problem of management there are works of Ukrainian authors, like: O. Shafalyuk, O. Zozuliov (2009, 2010).Brand development is influenced by global imperatives, but has characteristic features of the Ukrainian economy. The main objective of this paper is to determine these features.In contrast to international practice in Ukrainian science the term appeared in the late twentieth century. The emergence and development of brands in Ukraine were possible thanks to gaining independence of the country. This changed the economic model of development, the use of enterprise management and marketing tools, and developed new consumer behaviour. The present Ukrainian food market is characterized by fierce competition between different manufacturers and their brands, which we think is a marketing tool - the source of competitive advantage that determines the strategic direction, forms and maintains relationships with customers.Brands - world leadersAmong the brands represented in Ukraine by manufacturing facilities or subsidiaries, one should mention: the global Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Nestle, Nescafe, DANONE. They are the leaders of the most prestigious annual ranking formed by experts of Interbrand, which has operated on the market 1974, and according to the information from the company's website since the time when the world began to realize that the is not just a word or a logo. The branches of the company operate in 29 countries under the following slogan: We create value and manage it. Interbrand calculates the share of the profits, which the company gains by brand, its role in intangible assets, and the brand's power. Interbrand annual published the results of their research. The research identified the presence of the leading food industry representatives from among a 100 of the world's leading brands (Table 1).An analysis of the Interbrand's survey results, conducted in 2011 among 100 world leaders, proves the presence of 15 brands of food, including 4 softdrinks brands, 7 alcohol and 4 facilitate food choices. In terms of the country of origins of the aforementioned brands, traditionally, the leader's position is occupied by the United States: 49 positions among top 100, 10 positions in the top ten, seven of the 15 best brands of food and beverages. Second place - Germany: 10 representatives among a hundred of the world's leading producers, but no food brands. The fight for third place in the ranking takes place between France and Japan, both of which was rated to have 7 participants, but 2 of the 15 food brands are French. …

Place and Role of Employer Brand in The Structure of Corporate Brand

ABSTRACT. This article discusses the concept as a component of the structure. The role and place of the in the structure were analyzed, the comparison of the main characteristics of the and was made. The definition of the was proposed, the scheme that reflects the relationship between the components of was worked out. The article states that the product has the biggest impact on the brand; the strength of the product reinforces the strength of the brand. A schematic representation of the is suggested, one of the components of which is the brand. The provides employees with the realization of the values so that the employees, in turn, effectively provide the promises of the product to consumers and customers.Keywords: brand, brand, brand.(ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.)IntroductionThe world tendencies in human resource management in organizations are global by nature and reflect the search of innovative companies in creating a highly efficient implementation of creative and productive human potential to improve the efficiency of the company. A clear understanding and practical application of branding principles, based on establishing, maintaining and positioning of the unique attractive image of the company as an in the labor market enables the company to operate successfully in terms of the so-called war for talents.There are three approaches to the appearance of concept - within the framework of marketing, branding and personnel management. They are the following:* The and branding in the job market - the least developed and processed part of marketing conception.* The based on the theory of the internal branding, as a component of the branding conception.* The is connected with the evolution of the psychological contact theory and how the psychological contact influences organizational relationships (Kucherov, 2009).The object of the study is the conception.The subject of study is the comparison of brand, and product brand.The purpose of the article is to define and justify the role and place of the in the structure, to determine the connection between the product and brand.To achieve this goal the following objectives are set:1. To investigate a theoretical background for the emergence of the conception of the as the component of the structure; to clarify the terms employer brand and corporate brand;2. To characterize features versus features;3. To show the relationship between corporate, product and brand.During the research we used the general research methods of analysis (to analyze the conception and the nature of the brand) and synthesis (to display the author's vision of the structure, Fig. 1), abstraction (separating essential information from nonessential), specification, argumentation, comparison (comparing and brand, comparing the characteristics of components) and generalization method by which the link between corporate, product and was characterized.Main results of the article:* the role and place of the in the structure were analyzed,* the comparison of the main characteristics of the and was made,* the definition of the was proposed,* the scheme that reflects the relationship between the components of was worked out,* the schematic representation of the was suggested, one of the components of which is the brand. …

Branding Principles - Application to Business-to-Business Branding

This essay consists of a review of three books on Brand Management. The books are reviewed with the purpose of arriving at an approach for b2b branding. The three authors Travis, Davis and Aaker show different approaches to branding. Travis is anecdotal, Aaker is conceptual and Davis adopts a mixture of the two approaches. Consequently, Travis targets the practitioner, Aaker targets the academic and Davis targets both. The three authors give useful principles for branding in general. But none of them directly addresses the issue of b2b branding. This paper provides an approach to b2b branding integrating Aaker5 s brand identity framework and the principles of b2b marketing. High value b2b purchases are typically made by a buying center, a formal committee constituted for that purpose. The committee members in the buying center are known to play different buying roles like initiator, influences specifier, approver, user, buyer, gatekeeper and decider (Webster and Wind, 1972). The expectations from the brand are different for different roles and these expectations are specifically taken into account by the b2b branding approach suggested in this paper. Aaker's (1996) brand identity framework has four components namely brand as product, brand as organization, brand as person and brand as symbol (Aaker's four). The approach recommended here elaborates on what should be done under Aaker's four to satisfy the brand expectations of the members in the buying center.

Identifying Dimensions of Attractiveness in Employer Branding: Effects of Age, Gender, and Current Employment Status

Attracting and retaining talented human capital become one of the very sources of competitive advantage. In order to attract better employees, firms recently started using branding principles and practices in the area of human resources management. The application of branding principles to HRM has been termed as employer branding. Firms appear to be expending considerable resources on employer branding campaigns, indicating that they find value in the practice. Consequently, the concept of employer branding has become a prominent topic in the HRM field. This study attempts to identify the dimensions of attractiveness in employer branding, to examine their perceived importance levels and to contrast perceptual differences (if any) regarding the age, gender and current employment status of the respondents. In order to respond to these questions, a field study is conducted and data is collected from a convenience sample of 600 adults (half of them were employed and the other half were un-employed college students at the time of data collection). Analyses results indicated significant differences between the perceived levels of importance of employer attractiveness dimensions concerning the gender of the respondents, but neither the age nor the current employment status of them. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.