The increased competitive intensity in several global markets has encouraged firms which traditionally compete, to also collaborate with each other, that is coopetitive branding alliances. Coopetitive branding has, to the best of our knowledge, not been researched from a consumer perspective.Does this mean that consumers remain unaffected when two competitors all of a sudden also collaborate?The purpose of this thesis is to explore how consumers’ brand images can be affected by firms’coopetitive branding strategies. With support from existing alliance literature and an empirical studycomprised of four focus groups, an abductive research approach is adopted.The findings indicate four distinct parameters, which can influence an alliance’s outcome, from theperspective of a consumer’s positive or negative brand image - which is a vital component in consumer-based brand equity. The contradictory nature of simultaneous competition and collaborationmakes coopetitive branding more or less desirable, from a consumer perspective, under differentcircumstances, which need to be acknowledged and managed by the partnering firms. A suggestionfor future research is to examine a wider consumer segment and not only students, to validate thetransferability of our findings.The results contribute to the strategic alliances theory, since existing research has not examinedthe consumer perspective and brand image in relation to coopetitive branding alliances. The resultscan also provide managerial guidelines for firms that wish to understand what elements of a coopetitive branding alliance creates value with consumers.

Modern technology has provided for greater company transparency and media coverage, which among other has led to customers being able to increasingly demand corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives from companies. Companies should however not consider CSR as a constraint, but rather as a way to create competitive advantage, generating positive outcomes. One of which could be consumer-based brand equity (CBBE), however, the implementation of efficient CSR strategies is a difficult task, where research has somewhat disregarded the customer aspect of CSR, which can drive CBBE. Hence, this research has focused on the customer attitudes towards CSR and how this impacts CBBE, as well as brand trust. The data for the survey was gathered through a convenience sample, which after data cleanup consisted of 106 respondents. The results of the data analysis suggested the impact which customer attitudes towards CSR can have on both CBBE and brand trust, within the context of the insurance industry, used for this paper, due its linkage to CSR, as described later on. Keywords Customer Attitudes, Brand Affection, Brand Trust, Brand Equity, Consumer-Based Brand Equity (CBBE), Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), Insurance Industry.

Fotbollssupportrar återkommer till en klubbs matcher även om de senaste resultaten har varit dåliga. Referensgrupper har visat sig kunnat påverka supporterlojaliteten som vidare påverkar ett varumärkes supporterbaserade kapital. Tidigare studier har visat att stjärnspelare, arena, coach med mera påverkar en fotbollsklubbs varumärkskapital, detta i kontexten av proffsklubbar. Utifrån bristen av denna kunskap gällande mindre fotbollsklubbar i Sverige uppkom frågan hur varumärkeskapital byggs för dem. För landsbygdsklubbar blir denna varumärkesbyggande kunskap extra betydande med hänvisning till dess problematik med exempelvis knappa resurser. Studien syftar därmed till att undersöka vilka faktorer som spelar in i den supporterbaserade varumärkesvärderingen av mindre fotbollsklubbar. Detta i perspektivet av stads – och landsbygdsklubbar i de lägre divisionerna i den svenska fotbollen. Som teoretisk utgångspunkt användes Aakers ofta citerade modell om varumärkeskapital.  För att besvara detta syfte användes en kvantitativ metod där supportrar till tre klubbar svarade på en enkät. Datan möjliggjorde korrelationsanalyser mellan de teoretiskt identifierade faktorerna och supportrarnas direkta värdering, för att kunna analysera huruvida faktorn var betydande eller ej. Resultatet visar på att varumärkesassociationerna hade starkast samband med värderingen, både för stads – och landsbygdsklubb. Med kunskapen om att faktorerna påverkade varandra skapades modeller för respektive klubbgrupp för att urskilja vilka faktorer som hade störst förklaring av värderingen. Slutsatsen blev att för landsbygdsklubbar inkluderades det i fallande ordning varumärkesassociationer, första klubb, klubbhistoria och identitet. För stadsklubbsmodellen inkluderades det i fallande ordning varumärkesassociationer, identitet och bevittnad klubbhistoria. Sammanfattat betyder det att det skiljer sig något mellan vilka grunder supportern värderar klubben utifrån, beroende på om det är en stads – eller landsbygdsklubb. / Soccer supporters will continue to watch a club’s games even if they have lost their recently played matches. It has been stated that reference groups are able to affect the loyalty of supporters and thereby affect the supporter-based brand equity. Studies has shown that for example star players, the arena and the head coach affect the brand equity of professional soccer brands. There is a lack of equivalent knowledge in the context of smaller city and countryside clubs. For the countryside clubs this knowledge could be stated as more important since their problematics with example lacking resources. Thereby, this study aims to investigate which factors the supporter-based brand equity is based on, depending on if it is a city or countryside club. The perspective of this study constitute of clubs thar are active in the lower divisions in Sweden. As theoretical base, the often-used brand equity model by Aaker is used.  To fulfill the aim, a quantitative research was done where the supporters of three soccer clubs answered a survey. The data made it possible to carry out correlations analyses between the theoretically found factors and the supporters’ direct valuations. This enabled to state if the factors were of importance or not. The results indicates that brand associations are the most important factor for both club categories. The knowledge of correlations between the factors made it necessary to develop a model that explains which factor that affect the equity the most. The conclusion for countryside clubs is, in descending order, that brand associations, first club, club history and identity affect the supporter-based band equity. For city clubs the descending order of affecting factors is brand associations, identity and witnessed club history. By this, it could be concluded that there is a small difference in which factors affecting the supporter-based brand equity between the club categories.