No / Employer branding has been advocated as an effective strategy for motivating employees to "live the brand" however, previous research has tended to focus on recruitment. As a result, little is known about what makes an organisation's employer brand attractive to its current employees. The objective of our study is to address this question through the lens of Social Identity Theory (SIT) which we do by conducting a comparative case study across four organisations. We found that the specific attributes considered most attractive by employees were different in each organisation. However the categories of attribute were almost identical; these were employment, organisational successes, construed external image, and product or service characteristics. We also argue that managers need to identify the attributes of their own organisation that employees find most attractive within these categories in order to link the employer brand with the identity of the organisation, and the interests of employees.

Yes / Brand champions are responsible for encouraging employee commitment to the corporate brand strategy. They strongly believe in and identify with the brand concept—the company’s selected brand meaning, which underpins corporate brand strategy implementation. We conducted research to explore why and how brand champion behaviour operates within companies implementing a new corporate brand strategy. Against a backdrop of growing interest in brand champion behaviour in corporate branding research, we grounded our study in social identity theory and rhetorical theory from change management literature. Our findings show that articulating a compelling brand vision, taking responsibility, and getting the right people involved are the most widely used strategies by brand champions. We uncover how rhetorical strategies within brand champion behaviour generate employee commitment to a new corporate brand strategy. The dimension of brand champion behaviour that is effective depends on the type of brand evolution, involving shifts in the brand concept. We make suggestions for further studies underpinned by social identity theory and rhetorical theory to investigate brand champion behaviour processes within companies introducing a new corporate brand strategy.

Yes / In the field of business-to-business marketing, corporate ethical identity and corporate brand identity are crucial subjects for discussion. Business organizations function under social norms, and to establish an ethical identity, they must show corporate ethical responsibility, embrace ethical standards, and maintain open communication with suppliers. While an organization's reputation is impacted by the absence of an ethical identity, its financial success is unaffected. Extant literature has not thrown a spotlight on social and environmental performance which indicates that less focus has been given by academics than by practitioners. To fill the lacuna in the existing literature, this study examines the relationships between corporate ethical identity, corporate brand identity, social and environmental performance. The study uses a deductive research approach and develops hypotheses which are further tested using variance based structural equation modeling. The study offers a distinctive contribution to ethics theory and stakeholder theory by showing that developing an ethical identity requires more than just adhering to moral guidelines and upholding open communication. Companies must show that they are ethically responsible towards society. The study provides evidence of the influence corporate brand identity has on environmental and social performance. The findings can be useful in developing business-to-business marketing strategies.

This study explores how service firms incorporate CSR activities within the internal brand building process. It was found that CSR does influence and is implemented in every stage of our theoretical framework of the internal brand building process. The study was based on interviews conducted on managers and employees of service firms in the Netherlands and in Sweden.  CSR is an evolving concept, increasingly becoming important in affecting the consumption decisions of service firm’s customers. Service firms are now resorting to incorporating CSR in their internal brand building to appeal to consumers. Consumers who are trying to minimize the inherent risk in buying an intangible product typical of a service product are now shifting their focus from the firm’s product to the firm itself.  The purpose of this study was to explore if and how CSR influences the internal brand building processes of service firms. We did not seek to generalize the findings. We carried out eight interviews where the respondents were able to broadly shared their thoughts and opinions. The research questions we sought to answer were: In what way does CSR influence the internal brand building process in service firms? And, how do service firms implement CSR in their internal brand building process?  It was found that the service firms do define CSR as a responsibility for their Employees, Community, Environment, Clients/Customers as well as Ethical Responsibility. We also found out that CSR influences the internal brand building in service firms through their employees, brand audit, brand identity, brand positioning and brand communication, which we then included in our empirical developed model of the internal brand building processes in service firms. CSR is implemented in service firm’s employees’ management through employee education, training, recruitment and motivation. CSR is implemented in a service firm’s brand audit through a flat/hierarchical organizational structure, multicultural organization, ethics, sustainability, transparency and honesty. CSR is implemented in a service firm’s brand identity through quality assurance, creativity/innovation and compliance. CSR is implemented in a service firm’s brand positioning through partnership, accessibility, quality, trust. CSR is implemented in a service firm's brand communication through intranet, meetings, publications and teams.  Future researchers are recommended to study service firms that are equally divided based on their size, age and wealth to get a deeper understanding. More employees could also be studied since employees might have different viewpoints and since it is found that employees are the most important asset for service firms.

Diploma thesis deals with the creation of environmental corporate image and with designing a communications strategy in order to address environmental program. In the world of globalization and increased competition, companies strive to differentiate their business in unconventional way. Differentiation is being done by open communication and also by socially responsible behavior. The goal of the thesis was to point out that each and every company can run its business ecologically, even the consulting company operating on B2B market. Building the environmental image, however, requests new values being integrated into common internal processes and creating new corporate identity visible to public. The content of the thesis is divided into theoretical and practical part. The theoretical part deals with the corporate identity, corporate image and brand. Other chapters are devoted to the theory of communication, corporate social responsibility and environmental aspects of business. The practical part includes description of the company and proposal of comprehensive environmental program. The final chapter of practical part describes the plan of external and internal communication strategy which is inevitable for building environmental corporate image.

Background: The brand embodied a set of values and attributes which were appropriate, which stimulated consumer interest, which distinguished brand from others and created a unique piece of property for its owners. From marketing point of view, brands are the means that consumers use to distinguish products and services based on essential and non-essential attributes and they are a source of business’s differential advantage. Furthermore, brands communicate tangible and intangible advantages and are attractive to a range of feeling. In order to make decisions for brand strategy, branding plays an important role. Kotler and Keller (2006) state that a brand is needed because it identifies the product, and the responsibility of the product hence lies in the hands of the makers or producers of the product. Brands are important in both consumer and business-to-business situations, where a decision of purchase is needed. A strong brand can create sufficient higher total returns to shareholders than a weak brand. Brands are at the heart of marketing and business strategy ( Doyle,1998, p.165) and building brand equity or strong brands, is considered to be one of the key drivers of a business success ( Prasad & Dev, 2000; p.22). Problem Statement: What are the promotional strategies company’s uses to create International brand in order to pursue the potential customer in B2C marketing environment?? Purpose:The purpose of the thesis is to investigate how firm employ effective promotional tools and techniques to create and sustain international brand in the customers mind. Research design: Both Qualitative and Quantitative method is applied in this thesis. Primary data is collected from interview (E-mail and telephone) and internet survey, while secondary data is gathered from books, journals, and internet source. Conclusion: The promotional tools capabilities can help businesses to spread the messages to the mass market. It is very powerful technique to be used to increase brand awareness of the organization. We found out those promotional tools such as sales promotion, direct marketing, personal selling, publicity, advertisement, and internet marketing play vital role to create international brand.

Syfte: Huvudsyftet med denna studie är att få en förståelse för vilken roll ett företags identitet och image har för valet av profilreklam. Metod: Studien är baserad på en kvalitativ undersökning där en fallstudie har gjorts av två stycken företag/organisationer som är köpare av profilreklam samt deras profilföretag. En tvärsnittsstudie har sedan gjorts av mottagaren av profilreklam. Resultat: Ett företags identitet och image har stor betydelse för valet av profilreklam, framförallt företagets strategi, kultur, design och marknadskommunikation. Begränsningar: Studien har endast undersökt två svenska företag/organisationer och deras profilföretag om hur de arbetar med att ta fram profilreklam. Praktiska implikationer: Resultatet i studien kan användas för att ta fram profilreklam som syftar till att stärka ett företags image som varumärke. Originalitet: Många forskare har undersökt företags identitet och image samtidigt som många har undersökt profilreklam i olika aspekter men få studier har kombinerat dessa två och sett vilken betydelse ett företags identitet och image har för valet av profilreklam. Nyckelord: Företagsvarumärke, företagsidentitet, företagsimage, presentreklam, profilreklam, give-aways. / Objective: The main purpose of this study is to get an understanding of what purpose a corporate identity and image has for the choice of promotional products. Method: The study is based on a qualitative research and a case study has been made of two companies/organizations as buyers of promotional products and their profile companies. A cross-sectional study has been made of the receivers of promotional products. Results: A corporate identity and image have a big impact on the choice of promotional products, especially the company’s strategy, culture, design and market communication. Limitations: The study have only researched two Swedish companies/organizations and their profile companies on how they choice promotional products. Practical implications: The result in this study can be used to choose promotional products for the purpose to strengthen a company’s brand. Originality: Many researchers have studied corporate identity and image and many have studied promotional products in different aspects, but few have studied the combination of the two and looked at the meaning corporate identity and image has for the choice of promotional products. Keywords: Corporate brand, corporate identity, corporate image, promotional products, give-aways.

Background: In previous years, Swedish company Na-kd has been promoted in the media due to allegations of poor working conditions. While this has potentially taken a hit on the company’s reputation, studying the relationship between corporate actions and perceptions of the public has been neglected. People engage in political consumerism to express their opinions regarding political, social, or ethical concerns, which could for example include boycotting (refusing to shop at) a specific company. Previous literature within the political consumerism and corporate brand reputation stream pays little attention to understanding the relationship between the two, which includes the impact of corporate brand reputation on political consumerism. Purpose: The purpose of this research is to investigate the relationship between political consumerism and corporate reputation, where corporate reputation is impacted by CSR, employer branding, corporate image, and crisis exposure. Method: This research has adopted a deductive structure and a quantitative approach where the Na-kd case was used as a stimulus/prompt. A non-probability sampling approach was used, and primary data was collected through an online questionnaire where results were exported and analyzed in SPSS software. The methods of analysis were correlations and the sample consisted of 114 female respondents in the ages of 18-35. Findings: To test the hypotheses Pearson’s Chi-Square test and Spearman’s rho was conducted and calculated to test the relationship and its strength between the chosen variables. The results proved to be significant, and all five hypotheses were supported, which concludes that corporate reputation is influenced by poor CSR activities, poor employer branding, negative corporate image, and crisis exposure which in terms affects consumer purchase decisions to boycott, buycott or doing nothing. Originality/Value: This research proves that there is a positive correlation between negative corporate reputation and political consumerism, which contributes to the political consumerism stream within the consumer research domain as well as literature about corporate brand reputation within the field of brand marketing.

Studien undersöker communityskapande verksamhet inom kreativa näringar. Genom att applicera en modell som behandlar varumärkesidentitet, the Corporate Brand Identity Matrix, på en exempelorganisation kunde dennas nyckelfunktioner för communityskapande identifieras. Modellens idéer kring identitetsskapande kunde även prövas på en organisation som verkar på ideella grunder där community och kollektivt värde står i fokus framför vinstdrivande intressen. Resultaten baseras på material insamlade från en kvalitativ fallstudie utförd på den Malmöbaserade organisationen Media Evolution, där verksamhetens uppbyggnad kring element valda från modellen stod i fokus. Organisationens arbetssätt kopplat till elementen kunderbjudande, relationer, kultur och uttryck undersöktes genom observationer och intervjuer med representanter från olika delar av communityt. Resultaten visade hur verksamheten i praktiken arbetar på ett mer organiskt sätt än vad modellens design indikerar, varpå det blir problematiskt att tydligt kategorisera Media Evolutions funktioner under CBIMs element. Media Evolutions främsta nyckelfaktorer visade sig ha stor grund i att man har översatt digitala idéer till en fysisk gestaltning kring vilket communityt byggs upp i alla led. Således kunde en utvecklad modell skapas där organisationens communityskapande verksamhet bättre kan förstås. Resultatet visade hur organisationens nyckelfaktorer är lokal anpassning för verksamheten, praktiserat tillika kommunicerat fokus på engagemang och medskapande kultur, hierarkisk utplattning samt relationsbaserade arbetssätt. / This study looks at the phenomenon of community building in creative industries. By looking at an example organization through a brand identity perspective, using elements from the Corporate Brand Identity Matrix model, key functions could be identified. The ideas borrowed from a corporate business perspective regarding identity could also be tested on a community built on non-profit interests. The results rely on data gathered from a qualitative case study of Media Evolution in Malmö. Through observations and interviews with representatives from different parts of the community, Media Evolution’s way of working regarding value, proposition, culture, expression and relationship was studied. Findings showed that a conflict appears between the CBIM and the way this kind of community is built up. Since Media Evolution’s organization is managed more organic and relationship based than the model implies, it tended to be difficult to categorize their functions under the specific elements used in the study. Therefor a new model could be designed to better explain the organizations community building. Findings also showed that Media Evolution’s key functions all are born out of digital ideas translated into physical formation. Key functions of the organization showed to be local adaption, community diversity, practical and rhetorical focus on engagement, hierarchal flattening and a relationship based approach.

This study focuses on the extent to which the various elements of corporate brand identity as identified in the literature are perceived to contribute to corporate brand image formation. In doing so, a theoretical perspective is adopted for this study that borrows from both marketing communication and corporate communication theories. Three data collection techniques – Q methodology, an online questionnaire and computer-assisted telephone interviews (CATI) – were used to determine to what extent these elements are perceived significant in corporate brand image formation among participants from 106 South African organisations across various business sectors. Four categories were identified to be perceived as significant for corporate brand image formation, namely transformational leadership and management, positioning and differentiation strategy, brand equity and employee orientation and mentorship. To date, a comprehensive measuring instrument that theoretically includes all the corporate brand identity elements perceived to be significant in corporate brand image formation has not been developed. Based on the research findings, the study aims to propose a theoretical framework for establishing a measuring instrument that includes all the corporate brand identity elements deemed significant in corporate brand image formation as perceived by South African organisations. The objective of providing a theoretical framework for establishing a measuring instrument is to enable organisations to assess the role of their corporate brand identity in corporate brand image formation among their stakeholder groups. The theoretical framework includes the four identified categories perceived as significant in corporate brand image formation. It indicates which of the corporate brand identity elements included in the four categories are perceived to be more significant in corporate brand image formation by South African organisations. In addition, it provides assumptions on how these corporate brand identity elements are perceived to work in synergy to enhance corporate brand image formation based on the research results. / Communication Science / D. Litt. et Phil. (Communication)