Editorial

Citation

Guzman, F. and Veloutsou, C. (2014), "Editorial", Journal of Product & Brand Management, Vol. 23 No. 7. https://doi.org/10.1108/JPBM-09-2014-0711

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Journal of Product & Brand Management, Volume 23, Issue 7

The current issue of the Journal of Product and Brand Management (23 7) has in total 13 contributions; seven papers on product and brand management, one paper on pricing strategy and practice and five book reviews.

Urde and Koch contribute a conceptual paper that provides a deeper understanding on the concept of positioning. The paper suggests that there is the market-oriented and the brand-oriented positioning approach. It also suggests that there are five principal schools of positioning and that each one uses a different metaphor, has different objectives and bases the development of a positioning proposal on different techniques and concepts.

Ar and Kara explore how Turkish consumers perceive and trust well-known global brands made in China. After gathering data from a large consumer sample, they find that country of production has a significant negative effect on brand image, brand trust and perceived quality once a Turkish consumer becomes aware that China was the country of production. Their findings are specific to Turkey and suggest that cultural and lifestyle factors might lead to different results in different countries.

Ramanathan and Purani contribute a conceptual paper in which they explore brand extensions in a virtual world. They present 14 propositions that argue that the real world and virtual world contexts moderate brand extensions and highlight differences among within-the-world brand extensions and across-the-world brand extensions. The paper introduces to the marketing scholars an entirely new area of enquiry as it challenges the known brand-extension knowledge.

Balasubramanian, Patwardhan, Pillai and Coker explore the factors (attitudinal movie constructs – attitude toward the actor, the character and the movie) that influence attitude toward the brand in movie product placements. They showcase several theories to relate attitude and fit constructs to attitudes toward the product placement and attitude toward the brand. They find that only the fit between the actor and placed brand impacted attitude toward the product placement.

Rea, Wang and Stoner investigate the differences in consumer reactions to high- versus low-equity brands after a product-harm crisis. They conduct an experimental design that compares a high-equity PC brand and a low-equity PC brand. Their findings reveal that there are negative consumer perceptions regardless of brand equity level but that a high-equity brand has less negative perceptions and a smaller loss in consumer perceptions than a low-equity brand.

Gamoh, Mallin and Pullins study the role of personality congruence between salespeople’s own personality and the personality of the brand they represent, in driving salesperson identification with the brand and its subsequent effects on important sales force outcomes. With data collected from a cross-sectional sample of salespeople, they find that the congruency of the salesperson personality with their perceived brand personality of the brand they represent has a significant impact on the salesperson’s brand identification. They discuss all the sales force implications of their findings.

Faulkner, Truong and Romaniuk analyze brand competition in China using the Duplication of Purchase (DoP) law to understand Chinese buyer behavior in comparison to western buyers. They find that DoP law holds across six categories and over multiple years. Their findings can be applied across a wide range of categories in China to better understand the Chinese market structure and buyer behaviors.

O’Connor reviews the progression of the pharmaceutical industry through the lens of government legislation in the USA. She provides a comprehensive review of pharmaceutical marketing practices while providing direction for emerging pricing and promotional approaches. She identifies specific pricing and promotional tools that the pharmaceutical industry can use in response to changes in the legislation.

In the book review section, Schembri reviews Gladwell’s book titled David and Goliath: Underdogs, misfits, and the art of battling giants. Dingus reviews the book titled Merriam’s Guide to Naming. Bishop reviews Joseph’s book titled The ‘Made in Germany’ Champion Brands. DeLong reviews Dawar’s book titled Tilt: Shifting Your Strategy from Products to Customers. Agarwal reviews Kusume and Gridley’s book titled Brand Romance: Using the Power of High Design to Build a Lifelong Relationship with Your Audience.

We hope that you find reading this issue enjoyable. We would like to thank the reviewers that were involved in the assessment of the papers in this double issue, for providing guidance to the authors on how to further improve their submissions.

Francisco Guzman and Cleopatra Veloutsou