Brand Management and Research Issues - Coursework Example

?Running Head: Brand Management and Research Brand Management and Research Submission Brand Management and Research Critical Evaluation of Brand Image Consumer culture is intricately related to branding. The mechanism acts twofold. First, consumer behaviour is to be understood and analysed before branding. Second, influential brands would affect the consumer culture itself. In the age of globalisation, the marketers have obtained cultural authority. By competition among the rivalling brands, the customer is finally supposed to attain personal sovereignty. However, brand image becomes important both in the context of the marketer and the consumer (Holt, 2002) In the case of the laptop brands like Apple, HP and Acer, the brands are influential and potentially capable of shaping up the market trends. An evaluative approach would analyse the laptop brands not only on the basis of product quality but also on the basis of the very brand image. Apple is perhaps a very strong brand in the world of laptop market. It is an innovative and capable market leader. The brand image of Apple is based on a lot of anticipation from the customers. The Apple brand actually raises expectations. Apple has been such a strong brand that the corporation ventured to make the year 2003 the year of laptops. This was stated by Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO, in his speech at the Macworld conference, San Francisco. Aptly, the brand image of Apple inspires “technolust” and creates a stir in the market with every new release in the array of its quality products (Albritton, 2003). From the perspective of critical reflection, evaluating the laptop brand from the customer’s point of view is worthy. Apple laptops would smoothly connect on the go. The Apple laptop is compact and elegantly designed. Using it in a meeting or conference is likely to create a good impression. It has a large Multi-Touch glass trackpad on its aluminium body. The built-in iSight video camera is a technological beauty (Reinhold, 2009). Moreover, customer experience tells that it has a large display and respectable battery life (Allbritton, 2003). Overall, the brand image of Apple is innovative and adventurous. HP, on the other hand, is a brand that has an influential image as an organisation. It has a worldwide presence and a strong customer relationship management system. HP offers great after-sales support as a strong and powerful organisation. The brand has top level support and formidable investment of resources. As a laptop brand, it is backed with a mechanism of design and redesign which is apt to adjust in the rapidly changing laptop markets. The group dynamics at HP are productive and help it to survive as an organisation in fierce competition (Zell, 1997). The brand image of HP is rather dependable and the company is always ready to assist its customers. It can be rightly called an international giant in the world of information technology. With a wide range of other electronic products, HP has a reliable brand image in the laptop markets too. The company has shown phenomenal growth throughout its history. It is relatively an older international brand that started its operations in the year 1938. The brand image of HP offers a blend of strong organisation, considerable business experience and competent customer support (Pham-Gia, 2009). Companies like BenQ and Acer are known for designing and making several ICT products for other companies. The brand image of Acer is thus not as impressive as that of Apple and HP. Still, Acer is a known name in the laptop markets. It has established a respectable brand image and it is one of the largest brands of monitors and laptops in Europe (Martin, 2006). Acer, however, depends on low cost manufacturing bases to maintain the economy of its production lines. The company has outsourced many of its manufacturing processes to Eastern Asia. As a brand, it has to depend largely on the cost-effectiveness of its products (Yu, 2007). By means of relevant literature review and in the light of reflective case studies, it can be concluded that a laptop brand cannot be fully described on the basis of the product quality only. In the terms of the criteria like research, design, development and innovation, Apple’s brand image is highly respectable. Apple is not a specialist only in laptops but also in most innovative products like iPods. On the other hand, brand image of HP is very impressive in terms of the criteria of organised customer support and worldwide network. Acer also has a good brand image but it is much constrained in Europe. An overall critical evaluation of the brand images of Apple, HP and Acer would place Apple at a very respectable position due to innovation and elegance along with global presence. The Report A good information base was needed for the critical evaluation of brand image. The topic was challenging no doubt, but it was interesting and thought provoking too. Sources of information for the assignment were diverse. I chose to consult business and academic literature. I avoided sources like Wikipedia and other similar web based resources for the purpose of referencing. I looked through the local library and examined the publications from Butterworth-Heinemann, Nova Publishers, Wiley Publishing Inc., etc. The online resources like SpringerLink, JSTOR and Google Scholar Beta were also useful. Logical connection of ideas involved explanation of the term “brand image”. A brand today is not merely a definition for an array of products in the market. It is in fact an important component of modern cultural engineering. Brand image, therefore, is not completely specific to the product category or quality. It involves customer relationship management, reputation, cost effectiveness, organisational sustainability, etc. (Holt, 2002) In critical evaluation of brand image, logical connection between several criteria has been framed. For example, on the criteria of global presence and after-sales services, HP was found to have a better image while on the criteria of innovation, Apple was found to have an impressive brand image. Thus, logically connecting the ideas around different criteria, a critical evaluating model could be developed. Identification, consideration and evaluation of arguments involved further examination of different criteria. The recommendations are based on discussion based on arguments set on different criteria like innovation, quality, customer relationship, global network, etc. If innovation and excellence of design was important, customer support service was also important. Brand image, argumentatively, influences market behaviour. During the course of surfing the Internet and consulting libraries, inconsistencies and errors were discovered. For example, at one place a resource contained the mention of HP laptops but it was in relation to Boolean algebra and not brand image. Actually, the resource was on Internet surfing techniques and explained the use of keywords. Due to wrong combination of keywords, I found a wrong resource for my purpose. Another point of inconsistency was the limitation of resources on brand reputation of the given brands. Academic resources were limited in the context of finding out company reputation in relation to brand image. Identification of the importance of various ideas involved interconnectivity between different points of consideration. For example, global outreach and after-sales services have been important ideas of consideration in the context of HP. After buying a laptop, maintenance and repair are important and HP has a good outreach in almost any part of the world. Another idea is that of innovative thinking, which is amply demonstrated by Apple. Writing the reflective of my beliefs and values, I must say that after-sales services are a very important issue. Since a laptop is a portable device, it may be taken to any part of the world. The vendor is therefore required to have a global presence so that customer support can be obtained in an hour of need. Moreover, reliability of the brand for a considerable period of time is also important. The critical evaluations that I made were largely based on the various factors related to brand image. For example, the survival and behaviour of the company in the context of the brand concerned is important. Organisational innovation at HP is to be considered as its special feature while discussing it as a laptop brand too (Zell, 1997). A multi-national company in today’s complex global environment can be categorised as a distinct modern culture as well. Application of cultural anthropology in the context of group dynamics thus becomes important. The multi-national nature of a group or organisation involves great many socio-psychological aspects which are important while exploring group dynamics in a given environment. Combination of cultural, economic and psychological processes derives the final results (Lewin, 1947). The organisational behaviour of HP thus becomes important as a specialty of this brand. Apple and Acer are also capable multinationals, but there networks and variation of products are not as diverse as that of HP. Customer experiences in regards of product design and utility have been marked in the case of Apple (Allbritton, 2003 and Reinhold, 2009). Inspiring “technolust” is a special part of the brand image of this company. The synchronisation of ideas in this context needed critical reflection. Critical reflection would involve considering and reconsidering experiences, examining a broad context of issues and observation of the topic from different angles. Critical reflection also involved a descriptive approach that would be mainly based on observations. Descriptive analysis has thus been important in the context of Apple’s brand image since innovation is its special feature. In critically evaluating the brand image of the given brands, addressing relevant academic principles has been important and useful. A criteria based evaluation model was perhaps best suited for the brands chosen. When the criterion was global presence, brand image of HP excelled. When the criterion was innovative thinking and elegance of design, brand image of Apple was influential. In terms of cost effectiveness and maintenance, brand image of Acer leaves a mark. The academic principles of criteria based critical evaluation can be based on hierarchical decision modelling. Finding out the relevant factors behind the final recommendations thus becomes imperative in examining the available academic literature. (Taha et al, 2007) Once again, the reflective of my own beliefs and values would enumerate different criteria that I chose to evaluate the given brands. I have considered after-sales services and customer support as important points. Brand image of both Acer and HP was impressive. I have also taken care of errors and inconsistencies during the research. This helped in applying the principles of decision modelling, criteria based evaluation and relevant business research. Also, logical connection of different ideas was necessary to derive a meaningful comparative analysis in the course of critical evaluation. Reference List Allbritton, C. 2003. New Apple Laptops are Droolworthy, Popular Mechanics 180 (6), pp 32-34 Holt, D.B. 2002. Why Do Brands Cause Trouble? A Dialectical Theory of Consumer Culture and Branding, The Journal of Consumer Research 29 (1), pp. 70-90 Lewin, K. 1947. Frontiers in Group Dynamics, Human Relations 1 (1), pp 5-41 Martin, G. 2006. Managing People and Organizations in Changing Contexts. Oxford: Butterworth-Heinemann Mezirow, J. 1998. On Critical Reflection Adult Education Quarterly 48 (3), pp 185-198 Pham-Gia, K. 2009. Case Study: Hewlett-Packard – Any Chance to Beat its Global Competitors? Munich: GRIN Verlag Reinhold, A. 2009. Switching to a Mac for Dummies. Hobokon: Wiley Publishing Inc. Taha, R.A., Choi, B.C., Chuengparsitporn, Cutar, A., Gu, Q, & Phan, K. IEEEXplore – Application of Hierarchical Decision Modelling for Selection of Laptop. Available: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?arnumber=4349440 Last accessed 27 February, 2011 Yu, F.T. 2007. Taiwan’s Economic Transformation in Evolutionary Perspective: Entrepreneurship, Innovation Systems and Government. New York: Nova Publishers Zell, D. 1997. Changing by Design: Organizational Innovation at Hewlett-Packard. New York: Cornell University Press Read More