Weak Brand Research Articles

Strategi Peningkatan Daya Saing Produk Melalui Pelatihan Kemasan Produk pada Pelaku Usaha Perempuan di Desa Api-Api Wonokerto

The partner in this PkM activity is the Api-Api village government, Wonokerto, Pekalongan district, this village is one of the villages that has several MSME groups or women entrepreneurs. The MSME aims to be a forum for innovation for women entrepreneurs to develop themselves as strong entrepreneurs. Based on a situation analysis of the main problems currently faced by partners in the marketing aspect and business management aspect. Marketing aspects include low competitiveness and business performance due to lack of innovation, weak branding, weak positioning and not optimal use of the internet in marketing. Meanwhile, aspects of business management include business management that is not yet professional, not having a business permit/PIRT and halal certification, conventional financial reporting. Based on these problems, through this activity, several solutions will be provided, especially product packaging problems so that they can attract consumers, namely strategies for preparing content, images, sentences and things that may or may not be included in the packaging regarding their impact on marketing. The method of implementing activities uses a participatory approach through training activities, with measurable achievement targets. Through this training activity, participants understand the material and are expected to implement the training results. As a monitoring aspect, the PkM team visits partners to see the implementation of the training provided.

Factors affecting brand attachment in the social media channels: Case of university in Vietnam

Originated from the reason that Hanoi University of Industry (HaUI)’s current social media network is still limited, specifically HaUI's Fanpage has not yet been green-checked, thereby leading to weak brand attachment have little impact on university admissions. From collecting data from information sources such as newspapers, social networking sites, the author has inherited previous studies to propose a research model and conduct quantitative research analysis. Through designing a survey questionnaire and randomly sending it to individuals who are studying and working at HaUI, specifically lecturers, staff and especially the university students. The study obtained 338 valid responses that were coded and cleaned using SPSS and AMOS software. After the cleaning and coding step, reliability testing, exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modelling were conducted. The research has made a significant theoretical contribution in terms of the important mediation role of brand awareness, perceived quality and university reputation in the relationship between social media communication and brand attachment. From there, it also provided the practical contribution to improve the association of the brand with students, to perfectionate the social networking sites,to share positive things, interesting, attractive and relevant lessons.

The impact of self-construal on consumers’ intention to write reviews: A trait activation perspective

Identifying which consumers are more likely to write reviews and when they are more likely to do so is of paramount importance for marketing management. Applying trait activation theory, this research explores how brand strength and consumption experience affect the intention of consumers with varying self-construals to write reviews. The findings suggest that, in general, consumers with an independent self-construal are less inclined to write reviews compared to those with an interdependent self-construal generally. However, for weak brands, consumers with an interdependent self-construal are less inclined to write reviews compared to those with an independent self-construal, irrespective of whether they have a positive or negative experience. When dealing with strong brands, consumers with an independent self-construal are more likely to generate reviews following a negative experience rather than a positive one. These findings improve our understanding of consumers’ review-writing behavior and offer insights for practitioners to enhance consumer review management.

PB adoption across ideological divides: Lessons from Brazil

ABSTRACT Participatory budgeting (PB), a democratic innovation incorporating citizens in the local budgetary decision-making process, has grown from a handful of left-wing municipalities in Brazil to around the globe. While the role of the Workers’ Party in driving PB diffusion in Brazil is well-recognized, less attention is given to how PB traverses across ideological divide and finds audience in some of Brazil’s center-right and conservative parties. This paper proposes a meso-level theory by incorporating party organization in the study of PB diffusion. I argue that parties with a weak brand, low level of internal cohesion, and a decentralized and disconnected structure provide a favorable scope condition for learning about dissimilar policies – an essential step for policy adoption. Combining quantitative analyses of PB in Brazil from 1997 to 2016 and a qualitative study of three major center-right and conservative parties, this paper illustrates the dynamic that explains PB adoption under seemingly unpromising environments.

Outsourcing or not? OEM's entry decision considering brand spillover effect

PurposeIn this paper, the authors study the entry and outsourcing strategies of manufacturer while considering the brand spillover effect resulting from outsourcing. The supply chain comprises two manufacturers: one being the entrant with a strong brand, and the other as the incumbent with a weak brand. The entrant decides whether and how to enter the market.Design/methodology/approachStackelberg game is applied to study the optimal strategies for the manufacturers. This paper conducts a comparative analysis on four situations, yielding conclusions and managerial insights.FindingsThe results show that, for the entrant, there is no need to worry about the brand spillover effect in the outsourcing process, which is very interesting and counterintuitive. To get further, the authors find the reason: The spillover effect causes the entrant’s equilibrium retail price to grow faster than the wholesale price. They also prove that a stronger brand effect empowers the entrant to challenge industry barriers, while the impact of the brand spillover effect is the opposite. For the incumbent who acts as the weak party in this issue, it is demonstrated that the optimal choice is to continue selling when facing the encroachment and outsourcing call from the entrant.Originality/valueDiffering from previous studies, the authors notice the brand spillover effect caused by outsourcing when studying company’s entry strategy. They further divide the brand effect into two parts, one of which does not exhibit a spillover.

Neural correlates of fanhood: the role of fan identity and team brand strength.

We analyzed the importance of fan identity and brand strength on fans' neural reactions to different team-related stimuli. A total of 53 fMRI scans with fans of two professional sport teams were conducted. Following up on a previous study we focused on the differences between fandom levels as well as the contrast between two team "brand" strength. Neural responses were compared among individuals based on their levels of fan identity. In sum, group comparisons between relatively high and lower identity and between weak and strong teams were made based on the notion that the latter reflects team brand strength (strong brand and weak brand). Findings indicate that brain activity in emotion regulation, memory, and cognitive control circuits is influenced by the relative level of fan identity. Higher-level identified fans showed increased reactivity to positive stimuli and the under-recruitment of their cognitive appraisal circuits, suggesting more vulnerability to marketers' messages. The strength of the team brand activates different neural mechanisms. Interestingly, the posterior cingulate showed larger recruitment both for weaker brands and lower fan identification, suggesting that visual memory processes are more active in these cases. Neurally processed content depends on the relative brand's strength, highlighting the importance of brand-focused communications.

Research on the Optimization Paths of the High-Quality Development of the TCM Industry

Abstract Numerous challenges persist within the industrial chain of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), including issues related to unstable quality, limited capacities for scientific and technological innovation, weak brand competitiveness, and a low level of integrative development. Consequently, it is imperative to harness the relevance, growth potential, and catalytic effects of the TCM industry on economic and social progress. This necessitates exploring and implementing high-quality development strategies for the TCM sector. Utilizing a combination of interviews, theoretical modeling, and Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA), this study identifies critical drivers influencing the TCM industry and delineates pathways for optimizing its development. The research highlights multiple factors propelling the industry, such as environmental sustainability, technological advancements, branding, integration, and specialization. Based on these findings, three strategic pathways for optimization are proposed: leveraging technology and branding, enhancing green cultivation practices alongside technological proficiency, and fostering leadership through green and branded initiatives. These drivers collectively contribute to the robust development of the TCM industry. The study further suggests that different regions may adopt tailored high-quality development strategies and models based on local TCM resource endowments core and peripheral conditions. By aligning the existing developmental trajectories of the TCM industry with these regional variations, the selected optimization pathways can significantly promote its high-quality growth.

Modeling Multi-Generation Product Diffusion in the Context of Dual-Brand Competition and Sustainable Improvement

The diffusion of competition under the coexistence of multi-generation products has become one of the important challenges faced by enterprises in their daily and sustainable operations. At the same time, the competition between different brands has intensified the difficulty and complexity of decision making in the process of multi-generation product operations. Therefore, based on the Norton–Bass model diffusion process, this paper introduces two marketing variables: dynamic price and quality level. Then, this paper builds a multi-generation product diffusion model under dual-brand competition and analyzes the impact of the company’s revenue on launch time to market, pricing, quality, and technical levels. By using the system dynamics (SD) method (from the perspective of strong brand and weak brand enterprises), the competition diffusion model is built and simulated. The simulation indicates the following: (i) When enterprises have the same brand competitiveness, reducing the pricing level cannot obtain more revenue and instead diminishes the overall revenue of the industry. Raising the pricing level can obtain more revenue and also improve the revenue of competitors. (ii) When the competitive strengths of enterprises are different, strong brands tend to maintain stable pricing on the basis of improving the quality level (or slightly raising the price). Weak brands tend to raise the pricing of new products significantly on the basis of improving the quality level. (iii) The launch-time-to-market decision of new products is influenced by the degree of the product quality upgrade. Therefore, the frequency of releasing new products should trade off against the degree of technological upgrading of the product quality. This research provides a theoretical basis and new insights for new product launches and operation decisions of enterprises.

Remanufacturer’s downstream encroachment and incumbent brand’s order shifting in Pareto improvement of economic and environmental sustainability

In the recent years, supported by Industry 4.0 techniques and government’s strict quality supervision, remanufactured components can be of high quality “as good as new”. This encourages the supplier of remanufactured components to develop self-branded business and encroach on downstream market to compete with the incumbent brand. In this paper, we build a three-player game-theoretical model to investigate the pros and cons of the remanufactured component supplier’s (Supplier R’s) downstream encroachment, under the incumbent brand’s single sourcing and order shifting strategies, respectively. We formulate Supplier R’s nonlinear remanufacturing cost depending on the random quality of the collected components, based on which we find the incumbent brand’s weak brand advantage will induce Supplier R’s downstream encroachment. We also find that the incumbent brand’s order shifting helps save Supplier R’s remanufacturing cost and hence, limits Supplier R’s downstream encroachment. Regarding the environmental sustainability, we use two indexes to measure it and show that there exist opportunities of Pareto improvement of economic and environmental sustainability for the supply chain system.

Research on the Development of Tea Industry in Yibin City under Rural Revitalization

Implementing the rural revitalization strategy is an inevitable choice to increase farmers' income and establish a moderately prosperous society. Yibin is one of the main tea producing areas in Sichuan Province, and promoting the healthy development of the tea industry is an effective way to achieve rural revitalization and farmers' prosperity. However, for a long time, the tea industry in Yibin has faced problems such as extensive management, low production level, weak brand effect, and small scale, which have seriously affected the three-industry linkage with tea as the main body. By analyzing the current development status of the tea industry in Yibin City, analyzing the constraints and proposing feasible solutions, we aim to explore a unique development path suitable for the tea industry in Yibin City.

Research on the Problems and Countermeasures of China's Wooden Furniture Product Exports

After the reform and opening up, China's wooden furniture industry has made great progress. The production of wooden furniture has continued to grow, and the total amount of exports is also steadily increasing. Wooden furniture is also an integral part of our daily life. As China's economy continues to develop, the demand for wooden furniture is increasing and the proportion of its exports is rising year on year. Since China's accession to the WTO, China's exports of wooden furniture have gradually expanded and China's influence and competitiveness in the international market has increased. However, there are still many problems in China's wooden furniture export trade, including the export market being too congregated and facing trade barriers; facing competitive pressure from the markets of emerging countries, led by Vietnam; increasing export costs and low added value of products; and a single product structure and weak brand awareness. The main reason for these problems is that the export value of Chinese wooden furniture products is small, the export scale is not large, and the export scale fluctuates; the export product structure is simple, of which bedroom wooden furniture occupies a large proportion; the export market structure is too aggregated, mainly in the United States. Therefore, China's wooden furniture industry should continue to optimize the market structure of products, and actively respond to trade barriers; actively respond to the challenges from the international market, to strengthen international competitiveness; constantly adjust the product structure, establish and strengthen brand awareness, to create high-quality, high value-added wooden furniture products, in order to promote the development of wooden furniture export trade.

ANALISIS MEDIA SOSIAL DAN KONSUMEN PADA UMKM CROFFLE EAT BENGKONG

Croffle Eat SME is a snack type business, namely croffle, which is located in Bengkong Laut. This business has been established since 2021, but it seems that there are still many people who don't know the Croffle Eat brand. Therefore, this research was conducted to help partners develop their business through the use of digital marketing such as building brand profiles on social media and advertising to increase consumer interest. As for the things that are done to increase sales turnover at Croffle Eat, namely by implementing the promotion mix strategy. Based on the results of an analysis of the obstacles experienced by partners, it was found that there were obstacles, namely the lack of promotion on social media which caused weak brand awareness in these MSMEs. Therefore, this research was conducted to integrate the implementation of the promotion mix marketing strategy by creating interesting content along with the right consumer targeting and in accordance with the results of a consumer survey to increase partner sales.

The Digital Protection of the Jingdezhen Ceramic

The Jingdezhen ceramic is an important symbol of the historical and cultural achievements of the Chinese nation, and an important part of excellent traditional culture. This paper summary the development history and cultural characteristics of Jingdezhen ceramic, and proposes the use of digital technology to empower the development of the Jingdezhen ceramic industry and the protection of intangible cultural heritage, so as to solve the problems faced in the development and protection of Jingdezhen’s intangible cultural heritage, such as the aging of inheritors, the loss of traditional porcelain-making techniques, the lack of innovative products and weak brand influence, and to promote the development of Jingdezhen’s cultural and creative industry by creating Jingdezhen cultural IP and carrying out cross-border cooperation.

Service failures in times of crisis: An analysis of eWOM emotionality

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to disrupt consumer experiences as well as service operations. Despite the magnitude of this exogenous shock, little is known about the pandemic’s impact on consumers. Building on engagement theory, this study examines consumers’ emotional responses to service failures on social media. Contributing to the brand equity literature, we test whether electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) emotionality is contingent on brand strength. To do so, we analyzed 327,205 tweets directed at airline brands over the first 12 months of the pandemic in addition to data from a nonaffected period. The models show that consumers’ overall emotionality in tweets was lower during the pandemic than before it. Over the course of the pandemic, levels of joy were lower while levels of sadness and anger were more prominent in tweets directed at weaker brands. Thus, brand strength still acts as a “buffer” if service failures are caused by exogenous shocks.

The neural correlates and the underlying processes of weak brand choices

Despite the advantages of strong brands over weak brands, consumers often choose weak brands. The authors test two competing explanations that can explain weak brand choices, by exploring the underlying strong/weak brand choice processes. We test these explanations in a simultaneous evaluation and choice-based scenario, using brands from several product categories. Through an fMRI study (and related behavioural studies), we found significant activation in Rostral Anterior Cingulate Cortex (ACC), Dorsal ACC and Right Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex (DLPFC) for weak brand choices. Our results suggest that weak brand choice involves an assessment of value/worth, including cognitive control over feelings of conflict, error-commission, and regret. Brain-behaviour correlation analyses, response times in a lexical-decision task, and choice responses in behavioural studies support these inferences. We contribute to the understanding of consumer-based brand equity, brand-affect associations, and joint/separate product evaluations, and also suggest actionable insights for firms/managers to leverage weak brands’ position.

Design of emotional branding communication model based on system dynamics in social media environment and its influence on new product sales.

In the current social media environment, emotional branding communication has become a common marketing tool for brand owners, and therefore it has become particularly important and urgent to study it. Based on the perspective of brand equity theory, combined with the new characteristics of marketing communication in the social media environment, this paper constructed an emotional branding communication model in the social media environment. The system dynamics (SD) method was used to simulate and analyze the new product marketing system to assess whether it could stir the emotional needs of the consumers and resonate within their hearts. This paper discusses the asymmetric communication of different brands regarding the same commodity to determine the impact of this exchange mechanism, that is, only the weak brands in the market initially adopt marketing methods, while the strong brands do not participate in social marketing activities. It was found that the influence of marketing frequency and marketing intensity on symmetric and asymmetric communications was different. In the face of different types of competitors, the marketing strategy of weak brands needs emphasis. Through unit consistency test, structure verification test, effectiveness, and rationality test, it was proven that the emotional branding communication model and new product sales interaction simulation model established in this paper were reasonable and effective.

Combating copycatting from emerging market suppliers in global supply chains

We examine how different strategies can be used to protect global manufacturers from the prevalent issue of supplier copycatting in emerging markets. In particular, using a game‐theoretical model, we consider a manufacturer that sells a product to an emerging market, which requires the completion of multiple tasks. The manufacturer can perform any of these tasks in‐house or outsource any of them to an emerging market supplier. The former approach carries a higher cost, while the latter puts the manufacturer's intellectual property (IP) at risk of supplier copycatting. Either the manufacturer or the emerging market government can exert enforcement effort to protect the IP rights within the supply chain. Our results show that, surprisingly, there are cases where the manufacturer should outsource fewer tasks when in‐house production is more costly. Further, even though the supplier is the target of the enforcement, we show that the manufacturer's enforcement effort can help the supplier but hurt customers and the emerging market. Concerning whether the government or the manufacturer should take responsibility for IP protection, we recommend that the government enforce IP protection when the manufacturer has a weak brand quality and that the manufacturer enforce IP protection when it has a strong brand. This managerial insight provides a theoretical framework for the recent practitioners’ debate about who should be responsible for protecting IP rights within the supply chain.

Contingent channel strategies for combating brand spillover in a co-opetitive supply chain

Brand spillover, which arises frequently and increasingly, becomes a serious concern for well-known (strong) brand manufacturers, as some giant retailers may develop and sell their private (weak) brand products by sourcing from the same contract manufacturers as the strong brand manufacturers and disclosing such a relationship. To cope with such brand spillover, strong brand manufacturers may adopt contingent channel selling strategies. In this study, we investigate a co-opetitive supply chain wherein a weak brand retailer (she) ex-ante decides whether to implement the brand spillover strategy, whereas a strong brand manufacturer (he) determines channel selling strategies for his own-branded products. We specifically consider three channel formats for the strong brand manufacturer, namely, Scenarios R (i.e., the manufacturer sells his own-branded products only via the reselling channel), D (i.e., the manufacturer opts to establish the direct-selling channel and sells his own-branded products via dual channels), and S (i.e., the manufacturer sells his own-branded products only via the direct-selling channel), to explore the strategic interactions between the two firms. We find that regardless of whether the retailer implements the brand spillover strategy or not, any channel format (Scenario R, D, or S) could be dominant for the manufacturer, hinging on certain conditions. Moreover, we uncover that, compared with non-brand spillover, brand spillover can enhance the manufacturer’s incentive to construct the direct-selling channel. Counterintuitively, we demonstrate that employing brand spillover strategy does not necessarily benefit the retailer when the direct-selling cost is moderate and the brand spillover level is weak; otherwise, the retailer will opt to do so.

Hotel brand equity and online reviews on social commerce intention: A cross-level identification process

Customer reviews and brand equity are both key assets that offer hospitality providers competitive advantages over rivalries. However, how they can complement each other is a question that scholars and practitioners continue to seek. This research draws on social identity and social presence theories to synthesize a multilevel model with social identification as a mediator of the relationship between persuasive message compliance and social commerce intention. We take a resource-based view to conceptualize brand equity as a strategic asset and to model it as a moderator. This inquiry contributes to extant literature by illuminating a multilevel paradigm to better understand the strategic imperative of brand equity in fortifying a strong brand, while casting means for weak brands to capitalize on e-WOM to impel favorable guest behaviors. It adds to the literature by acknowledging a dual-identification process in which both customer reviews and branding exercise different roles in customers’ brand identification.

Value creation, appropriation and destruction in coopetitive relationships among micro-firms

Although coopetition literature developed a lot for years, several dimensions remain under-studied. This paper addresses three of these gaps. First, the dilemma between value creation and value appropriation for coopetitors; second, the lack of empirical studies regarding the mechanisms of coopetition among micro-firms in traditional activities; third, the recent interest for geographic levels in coopetition, with a focus on the local level. Our research question is therefore: What are the mechanisms of value creation and value appropriation in local-level coopetition among micro-firms in traditional industries?We use an in-depth case study about a small French wine appellation, which is characterised by a modestly sized cultivated area occupied by small micro-firms, the existence of a cooperative cellar, but also a weak brand image.Our research contributes to the ongoing coopetition discussion in three ways: we enrich the literature on coopetition by documenting value creation and appropriation mechanisms, identifying nine different mechanisms that are collective or individual; we provide some empirical insights to coopetition literature regarding micro-firms and local-level coopetition; we produce some managerial recommendations.