school

UM E-Theses Collection (澳門大學電子學位論文庫)

check Full Text
Title

How brand equity elements influence consumers' attitude and purchase intentions : a study in hotel industry in Macau

English Abstract

Understanding how brand equity elements influence consumers’ attitude towards the brand and how brand equity affects their purchase intentions of selecting a brand have been broadly investigated by researchers over the years. However, this aspect is not limited to the product view but also could be extended to the hospitality service view due to limited of research studies covered in the hospitality area and in particular, in the Macau hotel industry. The main purposes of this paper are to investigate how each of the brand equity elements from the customer-based brand equity model (CBBE) influences the consumers’ attitude towards the brand and their purchase intentions to choose to stay at the hotel brand, and to examine the underlying relationships among all the variables. Furthermore, by using the sampling data, the same model was applied to both luxury and non-luxury hotels (please refer to the footnote in page 2 for the classification) to examine whether there is any difference between the two categories. This study was based on questionnaire survey method conducted in Macau where sufficient sample size of 343 visitors was utilized. The findings revealed that relationships between all the four customer-based brand equity (CBBE) elements (brand loyalty, brand awareness, perceived quality and brand image 1* ), attitude towards the brand and purchase intention were all significantly positive respectively while attitude towards the brand was proved to have mediation effect between the four brand equity elements and consumers’ purchase intentions. Moreover, by applying the same research model for both luxury hotels (five star or above) or non-luxury hotels (four stars or below), the result indicated that there is no difference for the two hotel categories. As such, this paper implies that hotels in Macau should significantly consider these four dimensions of brand equity when attempting to establish definite brand equity from the customers’ viewpoint and what is more, increasing customers’ positive attitude towards the hotel brand through various promotional strategies such as cooperating with travel agents and social medias, for enhancing the probability of customers to choose the hotel brand among other competitors should be adopted. This study aims to enhance the current literatures on customer-based brand equity and consumers’ intentions to stay at a hotel in different ways in the hotel industry in Macau. In addition, it also contributes to the existing knowledge by examining the effect of attitude towards a hotel brand in predicting the consumers’ intentions to stay at the hotel. Although some other earlier research suggests that direct relationships exist between brand equity and consumers’ purchase intentions, this study is the first to examine the influence of the brand attitude on the relationship between customer-based brand equity and consumers’ purchase intentions in the hotel industry in Macau. Last but not least, this study contributes to prove that the proposed research model could be applied to both hotel categories in the hotel market in Macau which indicated that brand equity is not only influencing the high-end hotel market but also the budget hotel market iii simultaneously and this is one of the significant contribution or new understanding towards the general thinking of individuals that the drivers and brand equity element relationships with attitudes towards the brand or purchase intentions should be significantly different. 1* The four CBBE elements are not considered as a cycle but individual dimensions that constructed brand equity according to Aaker (1991, 1996).

Issue date

2015.

Author

Kok, Hei Lam

Faculty

Faculty of Business Administration

Department

Hospitality and Gaming Management Programme

Degree

M. Sc.

Subject

Hospitality industry -- Macau

Consumers -- Macau -- Attitudes

Supervisor

Liu, Ting Chi

Files In This Item

Full-text (Intranet only)

Location
1/F Zone C
Library URL
991008720589706306