Contemporary thinking, topics and trends in international branding - Part 1

Citation

Melewar, P.T.C. and Small, J. (2007), "Contemporary thinking, topics and trends in international branding - Part 1", International Marketing Review, Vol. 24 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/imr.2007.03624caa.001

Contemporary thinking, topics and trends in international branding - Part 1

About the Guest EditorsProfessor T.C. Melewar (BSc, MBA, PhD) is Professor of Marketing and Strategy at Brunel Business School, UK. He has previous experience at Warwick Business School, UK, MARA Institute of Technology, Malaysia, Loughborough University, UK and De Montfort University, UK. TC's research interests include corporate branding/identity, marketing communications and international marketing strategy. He has published in the Journal of International Business Studies, International Marketing Review, European Journal of Market Research and International Journal of Advertising among others. TC is the Joint Editor-in-Chief for the Journal of Brand Management and in the Editorial Advisory Board for: Journal of Marketing Communications, Corporate Reputation Review, Marketing Intelligence & Planning, Corporate Communications: An international Journal and Journal of Euro-Marketing.

Joseann Small is a Temporary Lecturer in Marketing at the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill, Barbados. Having begun her career as a management consultant, she entered academia in 1995. She has published in international journals in the areas of international marketing and international branding. This is her first editorial experience.

Contemporary thinking, topics and trends in international branding – Part 1

International branding, as an area of research in international marketing, needs a domain and an impetus of its own. This special issue seeks to lift international branding out of out the shadow of international marketing and out of a pattern of largely replication studies centred on the standardisation/localisation debate. The work contained herein seeks a more comprehensive understanding of the dimensions of international branding and of its related paradigms.

The paper written by Whitelock and Fastoso is the premier literature review of research into international branding. Not only do the authors identify gaps and platforms for future research endeavour, but they also develop a comprehensive and working definition, which captures the domain of international branding.

Much of research into international marketing, and by extension, international branding has centred around the measurement and impact of the country of origin (COO) effects. Despite 50 years of intense research into COO effects, this area of study continues to be fruitful and to display increasing complexity.

The study by Pecotich and Ward is a noteworthy addition to the COO literature. This experimental study considers the choice of computers by novices and experts and suggests that the extrinsic cue of country-of-origin is used differently according to product and technical knowledge. Whereas novices used COO as a halo, experts placed greater importance on the brand name, with COO as a summary construct in making the purchase decision. It is therefore more useful to emphasize COO when targeting novices in a particular product or technology. This study serves as a platform for fine-tuning research into COO as a segmentation variable. Emphasis must now be placed on not only identifying the demographics of segments, which display a domestic preference, but also on segmenting markets based on how COO is used in the purchase decision.

Cova, Pace and Park boldly dovetail the postmodernist approach to consumption into the realm of international branding. They examine how brand communities built around Warhammer (a strategic battle game) interpret the brand and conclude that players in France differ to those in USA with respect to the symbolic interpretative process. Developing a global brand community may therefore be a complex task, given the endurance of cultural difference. Despite the advent of several paradigms such as “the global brand” and “global consumer culture” the need to appreciate and incorporate cultural and geographical differences into marketing and branding strategies persists. Cova et al. suggest a “communal glocalisation” as a means of grappling with cultural heterogeneity. Future work must consider how this new perspective could be incorporated into the branding of products and services with highly symbolic meanings and consumer followings.

The lone e-branding contribution comes from Murphy and Scharl. They focus on the moderating effects of Hofstede's cultural values on the branding of internet sites. Research findings indicate that multinational corporations are better served by using country rather than.com domains where collectivism and an orientation towards masculinity are prevalent in host countries. This finding is expected, given the cultural peculiarities of collectivist societies. Nevertheless, the often unanticipated challenges experienced in the online environment demand greater research efforts into internet marketing and branding.

Lee, Garbarino and Lerman, through a comprehensive study of Western, Asian and Latin markets, demonstrate that countries with low uncertainty avoidance (Hofstede, 2001) are less harsh on products with high product uncertainty, that is products originating from countries with a low-quality image. This study's contribution is two-fold. Firstly, it considers the Latin American marketplace, which continues to be extremely under researched in international marketing, despite its size and importance (Maheswaran and Shavitt, 2000). Secondly, the paper considers uncertainty avoidance, an important but understudied dimension of the Hofstede paradigm. Once again, this study reinforces the need to consider the influence of culture on brand attitude formation.

Finally, the research undertaken by Andrews and Kim is of immediate practical significance to international marketers in its indication that measures used to revitalise a brand in its country of origin can often be used in international markets as well. The potential for greater standardization in brand revitalisation strategy augers well for the cost effectiveness and streamlining of international marketing efforts.

It has been a highly interesting and thought provoking experience to edit this Special Issue. We have gathered an array of perspectives on international branding from different parts of the world. The international focus and affiliations of the academics contributing to this compendium add to the interesting diversity inherent in the papers. Special thanks to Professor Jeryl Whitelock, the Editor of International Marketing Review, whose support and encouragement has served to enhance the quality of the publication. We expect that this Special Issue has made a contribution to closing the gaps, which still exist within international marketing research. Moreover, we hope these materials have pushed the extant knowledge and understanding of international branding, and that they will guide future research endeavours.

Further readingLee, C. and Green, R.T. (1991), “Cross-cultural examination of the fishbein behaviour intentions model”, Journal of International Business Studies, Second Quarter, pp. 289-304.