Starting from Scratch: Rethinking Brand Image Research and Identifying Cues and Context as Influential Factors

The paper proposes to start brand image research from scratch. It is argued that presently applied measurement methods hold an overly reliance on the presence and relevance of certain kinds of associations in consumer memory. First, the concept of brand representation is introduced, grounded on frame theory. Next, activation cues and evaluation context are elaborated upon in the paper, as these factors might bias research findings. The paper intends to make both advertisers and market researchers aware of bias in present brand image research: by relying on method assumption methods may create rather than establish brand images. INTRODUCTION Conceptualization of and research on brands has developed in recent years from the conception of brands being a necessary identification mark for products, into an awareness of the growing benefits of owning brands instead of products. This awareness led to attempts to establish the surplus value brands lever over mere products. The establishment of the so-called brand equity, the 'value of brands', has become a major focus of research on brands. Until so far there seems to be not much consensus on the definition of brand equity. However, based on a great number of conceptualizations of brand equity, Franzen (1998) concludes that brand equity includes four aspects: (1) the presence of a brand in the memory of consumers, (2) its influence on purchase behavior, (3) the effects of purchase behavior on the market position and financial results of a brand and (4) the financial value of a brand as an immaterial asset owned by a company, which can be placed on the balance sheet and is expressed when the selling of the company is at stake. According to these four brand equity aspects, the value of a brand stems from the content of consumer's memory, and research on this aspect is thus essential for brand equity research. The brand-related content of consumer memory is most often referred to as brand image. The term image is derived from psychological literature, and has been widely applied in marketing research for years but unfortunately has become more of a generic term. There seems to be no unified definition of brand image. Poiesz (1989) tried to make sense out of the quantity of definitions of brand image by distinguishing three main categories of definitions, differing in level of elaboration: (1) the high elaboration approach defines brand image as a network of meanings stored in memory. This …