Linking user experience and consumer-based brand equity: the moderating role of consumer expertise and lifestyle
| Pages | 333-348 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JPBM-12-2013-0459 |
| Published date | 18 August 2014 |
| Date | 18 August 2014 |
| Author | Abhishek Mishra,Satya Bhushan Dash,Dianne Cyr |
| Subject Matter | Marketing,Product management,Brand management/equity |
Linking user experience and consumer-based
brand equity: the moderating role of
consumer expertise and lifestyle
Abhishek Mishra and Satya Bhusan Dash
Department of Marketing Management, Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow, India, and
Dianne Cyr
Beedie School of Business, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada
Abstract
Purpose – The study aims to explore the buildup of consumer-based brand equity (CBBE) from positive derived experiences. Rewarding experiences
with products make a user feel good about their decision to buy and use them. Those feelings get accrued as strong consumer–brand relationship,
measured comprehensively by CBBE in marketing literature.
Design/methodology/approach – The study is conducted in two phases – exploratory and validation. The exploratory phase involved conceiving
a theoretical framework from in-depth literature review. The framework is then validated through a survey-based empirical phase. Smartphones form
the context of the work.
Findings – The three consumption values used in the study are usability, social value and pleasure in use. Brand equity has been conceptualized
and measured as brand association, perceived value, brand trust and brand loyalty. The moderating role of user expertise, as well as lifestyle, was
also tested on pleasure derived. Most of the hypothesized relationships between different constructs of experience and brand equity were found
significant. Significant evidence for hierarchical formation of brand equity was also established.
Research limitations/implications – Lack of evidence of moderation of lifestyle may be ascribed to the validity of the scale used to measure it
in the current context and needs to be updated. The study contributes by conceiving experience as a multidimensional framework based on
Holbrook’s typology, besides validating its relationship to CBBE. Hierarchical formation of brand equity is also a novel contribution.
Practical implications – This study provides an indicative guide to marketers with design cues that can provide relevant consumption values in
the quest for a positive brand impression. It also provides directions for segmenting the smartphone market based on user expertise for better
branding.
Originality/value – The study is innovative by relating experience, conceptualized with Holbrook’s framework and CBBE – something yet to be seen
in the literature.
Keywords Social value, Brand trust, Usability, Brand awareness, Brand loyalty, Social status, Consumer-based brand equity,
Experiential branding, Hedonic and utilitarian consumption, Perceived quality
Paper type Research paper
An executive summary for managers and executive
readers can be found at the end of this issue.
1. Introduction
Advent and evolution of interactive digital devices, like
smartphones, in consumer’s lives translates into variety of day
to day experiences, be it information transfusion,
communication or even lifestyle portrayal. As a gateway,
allowing the user to flux between the real and virtual worlds
seamlessly with more control and power, such devices score
high on engagement levels (Kim et al., 2013), yet few
studies (Chapman et al., 1999;O’Brien and Toms, 2008)
focus on consumers’ source of engagement and experiences
for this category. Recent work on user’s engagement with
technology products, proposes motivation, in form of
utilitarian, social and hedonic motives, as a conduit for
prolonged usage (Kim et al., 2013,2007). Although these
studies provide strong guidelines for measuring
consumption experience and its importance to long-term
usage, the effect of such positive experiences with the
product, on the brand and its relation with the consumer,
remains conspicuously unattended.
Extant literature suggests that products, tangible or
intangible, are rich sources to vivid experiences (Holbrook and
Hirschman, 1982), causing long-term association with
products belonging to the contextual brand (Cyr et al., 2006).
Such rich and productive experiences convert to favorable
brand dispositions, measured most effectively by
consumer-based brand equity (CBBE) (Kumar et al., 2013;
Biedenbach and Marell, 2010;Ferguson et al., 2010). As a
novel attempt, the current study aims to use the experiential
value framework as a measure for meaningful consumer
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/1061-0421.htm
Journal of Product & Brand Management
23/4/5 (2014) 333–348
© Emerald Group Publishing Limited [ISSN 1061-0421]
[DOI 10.1108/JPBM-12-2013-0459]
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experiences and explores its effect on CBBE operationalized
as a multi-dimensional framework.
2. Research objectives
Extant research suggests there are two distinct ways
experiences can shape consumer’s brand impressions. First, it
is quite possible that brand imageries are imprinted in human
memory as elements of conceptual nodes (McClelland, 2000).
Undergoing specific experiences with a product may activate
the brand element associated with this node. Alternatively,
brand associations, themselves, may be engraved in human
mind as a variety of other related associations, one of them
being a specific product category (Sen, 1999). Irrespective of
the mechanism, it seems evident that direct product
consumption experiences will influence brand association as
well as the consumer–brand relationship (Warlop et al.,
2005), something this study explores. The prominent building
blocks of the overall model are highlighted next along with the
associated research objectives.
2.1 Consumption value and CBBE
The exploration of the consumption experience builds a path
into the concept of consumption value (Holbrook, 1999).
Holbrook defined consumption value as an interactive
relativistic preference experience composed of three critical
values – utilitarian, social and hedonic. While utilitarian value
constitutes a mix of perceived usefulness (effectiveness) and
perceived ease of use (efficiency) of a device, as theorized by
Holbrook (1999), social value points to the experiential
component that enhances the consumer’s social status and
self-esteem (Vigneron and Johnson, 1999). Finally, hedonic
value refers to the multitude of emotions and affect
experienced by consumers in the form of fun, playfulness and
enjoyment (Cyr et al., 2006). These three values are parallel to
the three motives for user–smartphone engagement as
undertaken by Kim et al. (2013).
The concept of CBBE, as a measure of consumer – brand
relationship, has been operationalized as a multi-dimensional
construct primarily made up of brand association, perceived
value, brand trust and brand loyalty in most discussions
(Aaker, 1996;Yoo and Donthu, 2001;Netemeyer et al., 2004;
Delgado-Ballester and Munuera-Aleman, 2001). Specifically
from a product context, these dimensions are critical and have
been adopted for a richer and comprehensive understanding
of the CBBE formation process for this work. With extant
literature pointing toward a strong relation between product
consumption experience and consumer – brand association,
the first research objective of the study is to explore the
relationship between different constructs of experiential value
and those of CBBE.
2.2 Individual characteristics
Individual differences play a critical role in affecting the
process of consummation pleasurable experiences (Gard et al.,
2007;Meehl, 1975). More recently, in the context of digital
devices, user expertise and usage lifestyle have been theorized
as factors modulating emotions derived from product
experiences (Mitchell and Dacin, 1996;Wilska, 2003;
Langner and Krengel, 2011). Based on this discussion, the
second research objective of the study is to explore the
moderating effect of consumer expertise and lifestyle on
consumption value development process.
3. Literature review and hypotheses
3.1 User experience
Current literature points at two paradigms exploring user
experience – consumption experience and brand experience.
In their recent effort, Brakus et al. (2009) conceptualize brand
experience as one related to brand-related components like
brand design, identity, packaging, communications or
environment. The critical point of difference between brand
experience and consumption experience lies in the multitude
of outcomes in experiential context. Brand experience relates
to consumer inference about the quality of brand-related
stimuli in the product and resulting emotions and feelings,
leading to liking of the experience. On the other hand,
consumption experience theory takes a more holistic
consumer perception-based facets and utilities arising out of
product use, without accounting for brand judgments. More
so, the consumption value approach (Holbrook, 1996;
Mathwick et al., 2001) undertakes perceived experiential value
as the central point of consumer’s perceived experience.
Besides Holbrook’s axiology, the value framework has seen
two more associated treatments in literature – consumer’s
functional, symbolic and experiential needs (Park et al., 1986)
and consumer values of functional, social, emotional,
epistemic and conditional needs (Sheth et al., 1991a,1991b).
Functional, hedonic and social values form the three common
denominators in form of consumption values, derived from
these three leading frameworks. Owing to the richness and
relevance of Holbrook’s framework, it has been adopted as the
guideline to measure consumption experience in this study.
3.2 Dimensions of user experience
With hardly any research on consumption experience in the
smartphone context (Sheng and Teo, 2012), the three
experiential values needed transformation suitable to the specific
category. Literature outside the marketing domain was analyzed
for suitable measures of experiential values, leading us to propose
the following three components of consumption experience.
3.2.1 Usability (functional value)
As an integration of certain qualities inherent in a usable device
like efficiency, learnability, memorability, error-reduction and
satisfaction (Nielsen, 1993), usability aggregates functional value
(Holbrook, 1999), perceived ease of use and usefulness in
technology adoption model (TAM) (Davis, 1989;Venkatesh
and Brown, 2001) and the utilitarian motive of engaging with
smartphones (Kim et al., 2013) into one broad construct.
Usability of a device can range from ease of use and assimilation
of the device in day-to-day life to facilitating interactions with
others, as well as convenience of usage (Hallnäs and Redström,
2002;Church and Oliver, 2011). With utilitarian value well
established as an antecedent to continued usage of technology
products (Kim and Han, 2011), the importance of usability in
determining overall experience and its aftereffects on a brand
needs to be investigated.
3.2.2 Social value
Holbrook (1999) defines social value as one that occurs when
one’s own consumption behavior serves as a means to shaping
Linking user experience and consumer-based brand equity
Abhishek Mishra, Satya Bhusan Dash and Dianne Cyr
Journal of Product & Brand Management
Volume 23 · Number 4/5 · 2014 · 333–348
334
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