Exploring consumer experiences with a service brand
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/10610420410546961 |
| Pages | 257-268 |
| Date | 01 June 2004 |
| Published date | 01 June 2004 |
| Author | Aron O'Cass,Debra Grace |
| Subject Matter | Marketing |
Exploring consumer
experiences with a
service brand
Aron O’Cass and
Debra Grace
The authors
Aron O’Cass is Chair of Marketing at Newcastle Business
School, University of Newcastle, Callaghan, Australia.
Debra Grace is a Lecturer at the School of Marketing and
Management, Griffith University-Gold Coast, Gold Coast,
Australia.
Keywords
Brands, Services
Abstract
The commercial importance of services has been realised in
recent times and the importance of research to understand
service brands and their meaning for consumers is a growing
priority. This study focuses on consumer based perceptions of
brand associations of a service brand, attitudes toward and
intention to use the branded service via qualitative and
quantitative methods. The results indicate a number of key
dimensions that are important for consumers of services such as
core service, experience with brand, self-image congruency,
feelings, servicescape and interpersonal service, publicity,
advertising, price and brand. However, in this study country of
origin and word of mouth were not significant. Largely, the
findings indicated that service brand associations influence
brand attitude and attitude and associations influence intention
to use a service brand.
Electronic access
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An executive summary for managers and
executive readers can be found at the end of
this article
Introduction
Brands are increasingly seen as valuable assets and
sources of differentiation playing an integral part in
marketing strategy (Lim and O’Cass, 2001).
However, to date services marketing research has
focussed on issues ranging from consumer
evaluations of services (Fulmer, 1997), measuring
service quality (Parasuraman et al., 1985), to service
failures (Blodgett et al., 1995), service switching
(Grace and O’Cass, 2001), whilst inquiry into the
branding of services has been minimal. In the area of
branded goods considerable effort and
understanding has developed over the past decade.
Twoprominent developments in this area have been
proposed by Keller (1993, 1998) and Aaker (1996)
focussing on brand image. However, despite the
importance of service brands, researchers have not
given them sufficient attention to date. The focus of
this study is to start the process of exploring brand
dimensions that may be attributed to branded
services and their relationships to service brand
attitude and usage intention.
Branding literature
To date, a number of theoretical frameworks have
been suggested in an attempt to assist marketers to
understand how consumers think about, and
respond to, brands, therefore enabling them to
implement effective consumer-centred marketing
activities and gain sustainable differentiation (de
Chernatony, 1993; Keller, 1993). However, these
models have a distinct tendency to conceptualise
the brand in terms of physical goods, with minimal
regard, or reference to the branding of services
(Turleyand Moore, 1995). However, some models
are argued by their developers to be applicable to
both goods and services branding (Keller, 1993; de
Chernatony and Dall’Olmo Riley, 1997; Keller,
1998). Such models possess dimensions that are
argued to have commonality across the two
domains, but the potential application of these
models could well be questioned on the grounds
that marketing principles, for both goods and
services, are inconsistent due to the inherent
differences between the two (Berry, 1980, 2000).
For example, the core offering for goods is quite
different to that for services, in that the core service
offering is more complex and largely comprises
processes, people and physical facilities (Tax and
Stuart, 1997). This may well suggest that the
evaluation of service brands by consumers may be
Journal of Product & Brand Management
Volume 13 · Number 4 · 2004 · pp.257-268
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited · ISSN 1061-0421
DOI 10.1108/10610420410546961
257
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