March'20
The IUP Journal of Brand Management
Focus
An Empirical Analysis Based on Tourists' Insights" by Sabari Shankar R, brings out a very interesting observation. Traditionally, Coimbatore's position as a tourist destination has been mainly as a beachhead for the nearby hill station of Ooty, which is just 85 km away. However, this paper, through a survey of nearly 450 tourists, finds that Coimbatore has now begun to be perceived also as a spiritual destination in its own right. This is evidently so in the light of increasing popularity of Isha Yoga Center, apart from the well-known temples of yore. Typically, the persons who perceive Coimbatore as a spiritual destination are youngsters, well-educated, who have a salaried job and in the higher income groups.
The second paper, "Research Challenges for Brand Authenticity" by Henrik Uggla, draws attention to four dichotomous dimensions of brand authenticity, which could lead to clouding of the brand strategy, if not clearly understood and analyzed. The paper provides a brief and succinct coverage of (1) real versus perceived brand authenticity,
(2) brand owner's origin versus the brand's country of origin, (3) authenticity of craftsmanship versus front-end modern brands under which the products are marketed, and (4) premium versus luxury brands.
The next paper on employer branding, "Employer Branding: A Strategic Tool for Employee Retention in IT Industry" by Vibhuti Tripathi, Rajlaxmi, Anshita Srivastava and Aastha Tripathi, is based on a survey among employees working in the Indian IT companies in Delhi and Hyderabad. The paper explores the impact of employer branding on employee retention. It identifies seven factors of employer branding, which impact the intention to stay in an organization. These are growth opportunities, work culture, brand image, creativity and learning, belongingness, socio-ethical responsibility, and compensation and recognition. Among these, brand image and belongingness play a motivational role, whereas the others mainly act as hygiene factors.
The last paper, "Brand Architecture: A Review" by R Harish, compiles a literature review on the subject of brand architecture. Available literature on this subject is explored along five dimensions-(1) brand architecture and equivalent concepts, (2) brand architecture typologies, (3) factors influencing the brand architecture of a company,
(4) specific topics related to brand architecture, and (5) brand architecture strategy explorer.
Consulting Editor
Coimbatore as a Spiritual Destination: An Empirical Analysis Based on Tourists' Insights
According to the Indian Tourism Statistics Report 2018, 20 million tourists across the world are expected to tour India. Though at pinnacle, Indian tourism industry requires accelerated research on branding the destinations in the global context, which not only elevates the brand value of the destinations but also boost local economies and Foreign Direct Investments. This paper is a part of a major research and aims at understanding whether emerging spiritual attractions in the district of Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu, India, create a potential space for branding the destination as spiritual destination. Data was gathered from 448 tourists through a structured questionnaire and SPSS has been employed for analyzing and deriving the findings. An interpretation has been made based on the results derived from Cross-Tabulation and Analysis of Variance. One of the most notable findings is: Coimbatore is also perceived as a spiritual destination by different nationals. It is critical to note that the destination also possesses other image aspects. However, for specifying the objective as to whether the selected geographical location is also perceived as spiritual destination, this paper has portrayed the aspect of spirituality.
Research Challenges for Brand Authenticity
The paper outlines the four most important research challenges for brand authenticity. Brand authenticity has come of age and there is an urgent need to overcome a set of dichotomies that create a brand strategy fog, surrounding the whole brand authenticity discourse in theory and practice. The following dichotomies are discussed: real versus perceived brand authenticity, brand origin versus country of origin, craftsmanship versus industrial brand heritage and premium versus luxury brands.
Employer Branding: A Strategic Tool for Employee Retention in IT Industry
Employer branding is a strategic move for acquisition and retention of potential and existing employees in an intensely competitive market. The study is conducted on Indian IT industry described by intense competition; on its growth trajectory, the industry faces a challenge of high attrition. The human resource in IT firms is characterized by young employees who are willing to take risk and look for continual change in their jobs for better opportunities or quality of work life. The paper is empirical in nature and addresses the objective to find out the dimensions of employer branding and its influence on employees' intention to stay in an organization. A standardized scale of Berthon et al. (2005) is adapted with necessary changes in the Indian context to measure the attractiveness of employers. Convenience sampling method is used and sample size is 100 existing employees working in IT companies from Delhi and Hyderabad. Factor analysis and regression are used for data analysis. After data reduction, seven factors are extracted, namely, growth opportunities, work culture, brand image, creativity and learning, belongingness, socio-ethical responsibility, and compensation and recognition. Further, multiple regression is used to explore the relationship between dimensions of employer branding and intention to stay in an IT firm. The findings suggest that brand image and belongingness positively affect the intention of employees to stay in an organization. Suggestions based on the findings may help the employers to improve their employer branding strategies so that they can retain more talents.
Brand Architecture: A Review
Brand architecture has gained importance as a subject of academic study relatively recently. Several researchers have worked on specific aspects of this topic in different parts of the world and at different times. However, the number and types of brand architectures identified vary across authors, and so do the observations on their usage pattern and the factors that determine brand architecture. The paper presents literature review under five topics-(1) Brand Architecture and Equivalent Concepts, (2) Brand Architecture Typologies, (3) Factors Influencing the Brand Architecture of a Company, (4) Specific Topics Related to Brand Architecture and (5) Brand Architecture Strategy Explorer.
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