Guest-based hotel equity: scale development and validation
| Pages | 615-633 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JPBM-09-2017-1570 |
| Date | 17 September 2018 |
| Published date | 17 September 2018 |
| Author | Mohammed Ismail El-Adly,Amjad Abu ELSamen |
| Subject Matter | Marketing,Product management,Brand management/equity |
Guest-based hotel equity: scale development
and validation
Mohammed Ismail El-Adly
Department of Marketing, Abu Dhabi University College of Business Administration, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, and
Amjad Abu ELSamen
Zayed University College of Business, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates
Abstract
Purpose –This paper aims to measure customer-based brand equity in the context of hotels, and to develop and empirically validate a new scale,
named guest-based hotel equity (GBHE), by incorporating the customer perceived value of hotels as a multidimensional con struct in addition to its
traditional dimensions (i.e. brand awareness and brand image).
Design/methodology/approach –A structured and self-administered survey was used, targeting 348 hotel guests who were surveyed about
their experience with the last hotel they had stayed in during the previous year. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were used to
assess the research constructs dimensions, unidimensionality, convergent and discriminant validity and composite reliability.
Findings –The empirical findings indicate that GBHE is a multidimensional construct with nine dimensions, namely, hotel awareness, hotel
overall image and seven dimensions of customer perceived value (i.e. the values of price, quality, self-gratification, aesthetics, prestige,
transaction and hedonism). The new scale is found to have excellent psychometric properties; it has demonstrated its predictive power on
behavioral intentions.
Research limitations/implications –Although the authors believe that the sample size was reasonable and adequate for conducting CFA analysis,
a bigger sample would be better and might increase the robustness of the proposed scale. In ad dition, to avoid the retrieval failure problem, hotel
guests should be surveyed just after their stay in the hotel or not long afterwards. Further, the hotel classification or hotel star rating was not
considered in developing and validating the GBHE scale.
Practical implications –The findings of this study provide hotel managers with a new tool to use in assessing the experiential value of the hotel
brand equity, other than conventional hotel awareness and brand image. Further, using the multidimensional construct of perceived value provides
hotel managers with more insights into what aspects of hotel brand equity they should focus on to influence the behavioral intentions of their
guests.
Originality/value –The originality of this research is highlighted in several points. First, it develops and empirically validates a new scale to
measure customer-based brand equity in the hotel context, that is, GBHE. Second, it incorporates the customer perceived value of hotels
not as a unidimensional construct that is concerned only with cost, but as a multi-dimensional construct which includes in the GBHE scale
dimensions that are both cognitive (i.e. of price and quality) and affective (i.e. of self-gratification, aesthetics, prestige, transaction and
hedonism) in addition to its traditional dimensions (i.e. brand awareness and brand image). Third, it assesses the predictive power and
relative importance of the GBHE dimensions for behavioral intentions (i.e. loyalty to hotels). Finally, no research has been done so far on
the brand equity of hotels in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), although it is considered a fertile soil for tourism in the Arabian region.
Keywords Hotels, Scale development, UAE, Customer perceived value, Customer-based brand equity, Guest-based hotel equity, Hospitality service
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Brand equity has been described, from the cognitive
psychology standpoint, as the incremental utility or the
added value conferred on a product by its brand name
(Chen and Chang, 2008;Buil et al., 2013). It can be
measured from either a financial perspective, which
emphasizes the value of a brand to a firm or from a consumer
perspective, which stresses the conceptualization and
measurement of brand equity at the consumer level (Myers,
2003;Buil et al.,2013). Indeed, this latter perspective,
which is known as customer-based brand equity (CBBE),
has been given much attention by both marketing academics
and practitioners because it represents the product’s
position in the consumers’minds that provides equity for
the brand and value for its firm (Yasin et al., 2007). In
addition, a brand with high equity from the consumers’
perspective generates a competitive advantage that enables
its firm to attain a price premium, larger margins, greater
loyalty, a more inelastic consumer response to price
increases and a more elastic consumer response to price
reductions, less vulnerability to competitive marketing
actions and increased effectiveness in its marketing
communication (Keller, 2008). A high level of brand equity
also increases consumer satisfaction, repurchase intention
and loyalty (Kim et al., 2008a).
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on
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Journal of Product & Brand Management
27/6 (2018) 615–633
© Emerald Publishing Limited [ISSN 1061-0421]
[DOI 10.1108/JPBM-09-2017-1570]
615
Since the introduction of CBBE by Aaker (1991,1996)and
Keller (1993), much effort has been made to theorize and/or to
measure it in different contexts, such as durable goods (Lassar
et al.,1995;Yoo and Donthu, 2001;Pappu et al.,2005,2006;
Tong and Hawley,2009), non-durable goods (Netemeyeret al.,
2004), the co-branding of non-durable products (Washburn
and Plank, 2002), health care (Kim et al., 2008a), financial
services (Mackay, 2001), retailing (Pappu and Quester, 2008;
El Hedhli and Chebat, 2009;Allaway et al.,2011;Gil-Saura
et al.,2016), restaurants (Kim and Kim, 2004), airlines (Chen
and Chang, 2008), destinations (Boo et al.,2009;Pike et al.,
2010) and hotels (Kim et al.,2003;Kim and Kim, 2005;
Kayaman and Arasli, 200 7;Kimpakorn and Tocquer, 2010;
Liu et al.,2017).
Although CBBE has long been considered an important
multi-dimensionalconcept in marketing, marketers are still not
agreed about its dimensions, how to measure them, or which
measures best capture this multi-faceted construct (Buil et al.,
2013;Veloutsou et al., 2013).Most of the research has focused
on four dimensions, specifically: brand awareness, brand
associations, perceived qualityand brand loyalty (Aaker, 1991;
Yoo and Donthu, 2001;Washburn and Plank, 2002;Pappu
et al.,2005;Pappu and Quester, 2008;Buil et al.,2008).
However, other researchers have replaced brand associations
with brand knowledge, which has two dimensions, namely,
brand awareness and brand image (Keller,1993, 2008;Kim
and Kim, 2004;Esch et al., 2006;ElHedhli and Chebat, 2009;
Jara and Cliquet, 2012). Researchers have also added to the
above dimensions new ones such as social value (Lassar et al.,
1995;Valette-Florence et al., 2011), brand differentiation,
brand relationships (Esch et al., 2006;Kimpakorn and
Tocquer, 2010), brandtrust (Esch et al., 2006;Kimpakorn and
Tocquer, 2010), brand personality (Aaker,1996;Pappu et al.,
2005;Kam Fung So and King, 2010;Jara and Cliquet, 2012),
brand distinctiveness (Yasin et al.,2007), brand
trustworthiness, brand attachmen t, brand pe rforman ce
(Lassar et al., 1995), management trust and brand reliability
(Hsu et al., 2012), brand affect and reputation (De
Chernatony et al., 2004;Han et al., 2015), tangible prestige
and motivation (Huang and Cai, 2015), sustainability and
social influence (Baalbaki and Guzmán, 2016).
Furthermore, Tolba and Hassan (2009) propose a model
that breaks down the CBBE into three main dimensions:
knowledge equity (i.e. awareness and familiarity);
attitudinal equity (i.e. affect, prestige, perceived quality);
relationship equity (i.e. perceived value for money,
satisfaction, attitudinal loyalty). Recently, Veloutsou and
Guzmán (2017) have made a thorough literature review of
the content of the Journal of Product and Brand Management
spanning the past 25 years and found that research has
highlighted the need to improve the CBBE measurement.
Despite the observed proliferation of CBBE models, an
important yet under-researched construct in brand equity
research is customer perceived value. Appreciating the
importance of experiential value in the CBBE model, Keller
(2008) demonstrates that the power of a brand lies in what
remains in a customer’smind as a resultof enduring experience
with the brand. Thus, the challenge for marketers in building
up a strong brand is to make sure that customers have had the
right combination of experiences with their products and
services. Bill Xu and Chan (2010) developed a conceptual
model highlighting the role of qualityof experience in the hotel
industry. The authors recommended examining ways to
enhance guests’perceptions of the quality of their experience
and the way in which a multidimensional quality of experience
can be created. Despite the importance of experientialvalue in
creating brand equity from the consumer’s perspective, only a
few researchers, lacking consensus, have incorporated
customer perceived value in their estimates of CBBE. It has
been incorporated as a unidimensional c onstruc t that i s
concerned only with the perceived value of money, price or
cost (Lassar et al., 1995;Aaker, 1996;Mackay, 2001;
Netemeyer et al., 2004;Buil et al., 2008;Kim et al., 2008b;
Boo et al., 2009;Jara and Cliquet, 2012;Abu ELSamen,
2015;Gil-Saura et al., 2016). Undoubtedly, having a
multidimensional construct of perceived value in measuring
brand equity that is wider than merely the perceived value of
the outlay and the quality would increase the usefulness of
the construct (Sweeney and Soutar, 2001;El-Adly and Eid,
2015) and give more insights into the consumer’scomplete
experience with the brand.
In the context of the hotel industry, the concept of perceived
value as one of the dimensions of CBBE has been examined
only in its narrowdefinition, as noted above (Kim et al.,2 008b),
but previous research in the hospitalitydomain calls for a better
understanding of the CBBE concept (Pappu et al.,2005;
Hsu et al.,2012;Huang and Cai, 2015). Thus, the present
study seeks to contributein several ways to the sparse literature
on the quantitative measurementof CBBE in the hotel context.
First, it develops and empirically validates a new scale to
measure CBBE in the hotel context. We name this
parsimonious scale guest-based hotel equity (GBHE). The
difference between this proposed scale and the conventional
CBBE can be summed up by saying that the knowledge of
CBBE has evolved from the cognitive psychology paradigm
(Christodoulides and De Chernatony, 2004), while the
realization of GBHE has emerged from the cognitive-affective
psychology. This cognitive-affective psychology integrates the
customers’cognitive evaluationswith their affective evaluations
of the designatedobject, which could be a product,a brand, or a
place (San Martín and Del Bosque, 2008). The cognitive-
affective psychology paradigm is crucial in the hotel context, as
hotel guests’emotional response is a vital constituent in the
complete hospitality experienceand not less important than the
cognitive component (del Bosque and San Martín, 2008). In
addition, the conventional CBBE is a general concept that has
been applied in several contexts, while the proposed GBHE is
context-specific. This is because the experiential value –which
we regard as a major component in measuring GBHE –is
contextual in nature (Holbrook, 2006). Therefore, measuring
the CBBE for a hotel may not be the same in another context
such as a mall or a bank. Second, GBHE incorporates the
customer perceived value of hotels not as a unidimensional
construct that is concerned only with cost, but as a multi-
dimensional construct which includes in the GBHE scale not
only cognitive dimensions (i.e. price and quality) but also
affective ones (i.e. self-gratification, aesthetics, prestige,
transaction and hedonism), in addition to its traditional
dimensions (i.e. brand awareness and brand image). We argue
that adding the multi-dimensional construct of the customer
Guest-based hotel equity
Amjad El-AdlyMohammed Ismail and Abu ELSamen
Journal of Product & Brand Management
Volume 27 · Number 6 · 2018 · 615–633
616
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