This chapter discusses cultures as analogues of actual environments, specifically socially constructed communities and the individuals who compose them. Analogues replace actual environments in human perception. Virtual communities provide context for this discussion. Virtual communities have evolved as analogues of actual communities to the degree that technology permits. Greater technological...

Bringing Business to Business Brands to Life ANN MEARA Although most business-to-business companies realize the importance of branding, when it comes to executiong they lag behind their consumer marketing counterparts. Meara discusses the challenges unique to B2B branding and strategies for sales success. 2 Staff 3 Sponsors 4 Advisory Board 5 Letter from the Publisher 6 Letter from the Editor 2...

As the use of the Internet continues to grow among consumers, firms need to assess the requirements of individual branding-strategies in the context of electronic commerce. Although branding has been an integral part of the marketing mix for a long time, the issue of brand orientation and consumer loyalty in the context of the Internet has not yet seen the same attention. This paper presents re...

Copycat brands mimic brand leaders to free ride on the latter's equity. However, little is known regarding if and how consumers confuse copycat as leading brand in purchasing. In this study, we applied a word-pair evaluation paradigm in which the first word was a brand name (copycat vs. normal brand both similar with a leading brand in category), followed by a product name (near vs. far from th...

INTRODUCTION Brand equity and consumer loyalty play a role in continued purchasing behaviour; however, this research has largely focused on non-addictive products without counter-marketing tactics. We examined the impact of brand equity (price premium, market share) and consumer loyalty (switching rates) on smoking cessation (discontinued cigarette purchases for 1 year) among smokers in a consu...

‘Branding’ is well known for consumer products. Power has shifted from manufacturers’ brands towards retailers’. Branding may become more important for shopping centres. The authors firstly investigated qualitatively. Shoppers described centres in ‘personality’ terms. One in-town centre was ‘dull, boring and old-fashioned ... not exciting, just OK’. A larger regional centre was ‘trendy, prestig...