Titel:                                       Leverera mera – En fallstudie på Volvo Trucks   Författare:                                              Erik Bylund & Johan Kristensson   Handledare:                                             Ulf Aagerup   Nivå:                                       Kandidatuppsats, Internationell Marknadsföring (15hp), VT 2014.   Nyckelord:                                               Sponsring, Leveraging och Ambush Marketing   Problemformuleringar:        - Hur använder Volvo Trucks leveraging i samband med deras sponsorskap? - Hur motverkar Volvo Trucks Ambush Marketing i samband med deras sponsorskap?                                             Syfte:                                      Syftet med uppsatsen är att undersöka och beskriva hur ett aktivt sponsrande multinationellt företag på B2B-marknaden använder sig av leveraging i samband med deras sponsorskap för att öka nyttan av deras investering. Vi vill även undersöka undersöka och beskriva hur de motverkar Ambush Marketing i samband med deras sponsorskap för att skydda deras investering.                       Teoretisk referensram:         Kapitlet inleds med grundläggande teorier kring sponsorskap för att sedan gå vidare till beskrivning av termerna leveraging och Ambush Marketing.   Metod:                                    Fallstudien har genomförts med en kvalitativ undersökningsmetod och en induktiv ansatts. Personliga intervjuer med högt uppsatt och kompetent personal inom Volvo Trucks legat till grund för insamlingen av våra data.   Empiri:                                   Empirin presenterar de kvalitativa intervjuer som gjorts med respondenter inom Volvo Trucks.   Analys:                                   Analysen jämför den insamlade empirin gentemot den teoretiska referensramen.   Slutsats:                                  Volvo Trucks använder sig av en omfattande leveragingstrategi där de genom sin 360-approach försöker vara närvarande på samtliga plan och kanaler. Det finns ett klart fokus på aktiverande leveraging med avsikt att bygga och stärka kundrelationer. Deras övergripande, långsiktiga sponsringsstrategi att äga event och vara titelsponsor ger dem stort inflytande och gör att de kan vara dominanta i sin exponering. Även om Volvo Trucks själva hävdar att deras primära strategi mot Ambush Marketing är att skriva noggranna kontrakt menar vi att deras övergripande strategier (omfattande leveraging och långvariga titelsponsorskap) också utgör ett viktigt skydd. / Title:                                                                               Leverera mera – En fallstudie på Volvo Trucks   Authors:                                                  Erik Bylund & Johan Kristensson   Advisor:                                                   Ulf Aagerup   Level:                                      Bachelor thesis, International Marketing (15 ECTS), Spring 2014   Keywords:                                               Sponsoring, Leveraging, Ambush Marketing   Problem:                                - How do Volvo Trucks make use of leveraging in conjunction with their sponsorships? - How do Volvo Trucks counteract Ambush Marketing in conjunction with their sponsorships?   Purpose:                                 The purpose of this paper is to explore and describe how an active multinational sponsor in the B2B market make use of leveraging in conjunction with their sponsorship to increase the benefits of their investment. We also want to investigate and describe how they combat Ambush Marketing in conjunction with their sponsorship to protect their investment.   Method:                                  The study has a qualitative research method with an inductively approach. Interviews with senior and knowledgeable employees within Volvo Trucks have been conducted to provide answers to the problem.   Frame of reference:              The chapter begins with basic theories about sponsorship and then proceed to the description of the terms and leveraging Ambush Marketing.   Empiric:                                 The empirical data presents the qualitative interviews conducted with respondents at Volvo Trucks.   Analysis:                                 The analysis compares the collected empirical data in relation to the theories studied in sponsorship, leveraging and ambush marketing.   Conclusion:                            Volvo Trucks uses a comprehensive leveraging strategy which through their 360 approach tries to be present at all levels and channels. There is a clear focus on activational leveraging with the intent to build and strengthen customer relationships. Their overall long-term sponsorship strategy to own events and titles sponsorship gives them great influence and enables them to be dominant in their exposure. Although Volvo Trucks themselves claim that their primary strategy against Ambush Marketing is to write detailed contracts, we propose that their overall strategies (including leveraging and longstanding title sponsorship) also provides an important protection.

Background: The authors tentatively believe they have identified a new trend within branding, where an established brand launches a new and innovative product that is somehow related to the brand’s core values, interactively through a complementary marketing communication video. Support for the relevance to further investigate the identified trend can be found in academic literature. Due to today’s competitive marketplace, several researchers emphasize the importance to further explore and evaluate creative customer-based brand equity-building strategies. Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to explore the identified trend and whether this identified trend can assist in building customer- based brand equity. The authors of this thesis use the Volvo LifePaint campaign as a case for the study. The research questions concerns what associations consumers make to the launched product when being exposed to its complementary marketing communication video, and whether these associations are transferable to the brand. Method: The method of this research was qualitative and the primary data collection was collected through 10 semi-structured interviews, as well as observations through netnography. Conclusion: Based on the findings from the case study, the authors conclude that the identified trend may serve as a creative branding strategy for an established brand, to assist in building customer-based brand equity. However, the authors noticed that unfavorable associations also may be created and transferred, which potentially can harm the brand.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the brand management of a motor manufacturing company. The study set out to establish what the most important elements are that contribute towards a successful brand and to identify a potential model that can be used to measure the brand elements that are evident in the Toyota brand. By using this model, the Toyota brand was evaluated, bringing to the fore the key success factors that have made Toyota the number one motor manufacturing brand in South Africa. The qualitative research was conducted to evaluate Toyota's understanding of its brand and then questioning the usage of the brand through an individual interview with the custodian of the Toyota Brand in South Africa. The results of this qualitative research were used to identify the key values that the manufacturer sees as brand-building elements and to then evaluate how they are using these values to build and enhance the brand. These core brand values were then evaluated in the quantitative research that followed. The quantitative research was conducted through questionnaires where the retail network (General Managers, Sales Managers in the Toyota retail network) evaluated Toyota SA's implementation of its brand's core values through the dealer network. The sample size consisted of twenty nine (N=29) randomly selected Unitrans Toyota dealers in the country. An extension of the study compared these key success factors with the values that are delivered through the retail network to the customers. The brand expectations that the customer has in mind to the realisation of the brand promise at retail level were compared. This study gives insight into the workings of the Toyota brand and tests the communication of the brand blueprint through to the retail network. This study allows Toyota to review the way they communicates their brand to the direct customer, the retail network. The study also found that Toyota should use the opportunity to communicate the brand name to its direct customers, namely the retailers, and that, if needed, Toyota should revise the communication strategy. Other recommendations are that both Toyota and its retailers should take note of the fast-changing business environment, acknowledge the importance of managing the length of the product line, and that Toyota should embrace the retailers as partners rather than mere franchisees. The retail network, in turn, can get a better understanding of the role it has to play to ensure the sustainability of the Toyota brand. The study also allows the retail network to realize the importance of customer service in the whole Toyota brand set-up. / Thesis (M.B.A.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2010.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the brand management of a motor manufacturing company. The study set out to establish what the most important elements are that contribute towards a successful brand and to identify a potential model that can be used to measure the brand elements that are evident in the Toyota brand. By using this model, the Toyota brand was evaluated, bringing to the fore the key success factors that have made Toyota the number one motor manufacturing brand in South Africa. The qualitative research was conducted to evaluate Toyota's understanding of its brand and then questioning the usage of the brand through an individual interview with the custodian of the Toyota Brand in South Africa. The results of this qualitative research were used to identify the key values that the manufacturer sees as brand-building elements and to then evaluate how they are using these values to build and enhance the brand. These core brand values were then evaluated in the quantitative research that followed. The quantitative research was conducted through questionnaires where the retail network (General Managers, Sales Managers in the Toyota retail network) evaluated Toyota SA's implementation of its brand's core values through the dealer network. The sample size consisted of twenty nine (N=29) randomly selected Unitrans Toyota dealers in the country. An extension of the study compared these key success factors with the values that are delivered through the retail network to the customers. The brand expectations that the customer has in mind to the realisation of the brand promise at retail level were compared. This study gives insight into the workings of the Toyota brand and tests the communication of the brand blueprint through to the retail network. This study allows Toyota to review the way they communicates their brand to the direct customer, the retail network. The study also found that Toyota should use the opportunity to communicate the brand name to its direct customers, namely the retailers, and that, if needed, Toyota should revise the communication strategy. Other recommendations are that both Toyota and its retailers should take note of the fast-changing business environment, acknowledge the importance of managing the length of the product line, and that Toyota should embrace the retailers as partners rather than mere franchisees. The retail network, in turn, can get a better understanding of the role it has to play to ensure the sustainability of the Toyota brand. The study also allows the retail network to realize the importance of customer service in the whole Toyota brand set-up. / Thesis (M.B.A.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2010.

The international and commercialised recognition of the Olympic Games can bring upon prestigious benefits to a country's Olympic Games legacy. Due to this, candidate cities have capitalised on this opportunity to leverage their bids to successfully secure hosting rights. Consequently, this has commodified the bidding process, which has intensified the competition and the declining number of bids over recent years. Thus, jeopardising the legitimacy of the Olympic Games bids to its true values of Olympism. Hence, utilising a semi-systematic literature review, this thesis aims to investigate the extent and in what ways the Olympic Games bids have embodied the values of Olympism. Specifically exploring within three case-study examples; the Beijing 2008; the London 2012; and the Rio De Janeiro 2016 Summer Olympic Games. Adopting a thematic analysis and theoretical framework, findings have noted four overarching themes that influence the leveraging of bids; Economical, Political, Globalisation and the Public (Social). Further, and to a vague extent, the selected Olympic Games bids embodied the values of Olympism as secondary and appear to be a by-product of a prominent agenda that reflects the ebb and flow of politics and economics of the respective host-city. Interestingly, by examining the Olympism philosophy and legacy this may not be an issue due to its abstract construction and lack of precision, which has enabled great flexibility. As a resolution, this thesis calls for the values to be measurable and the implementation of evaluative committees that span beyond the Olympic Games to ensure Olympism values and its legacy is embodied successfully.

This research focuses on the cyber-attack of the smart grid and its retrieval to a normal state by estimating the smart grid's resilience. This study developed a theoretical model to estimate the resilience of the smart grid using choice modeling. A utility function is formulated based on various factors and sub-factors of resilience to estimate the resilience of the smart grid. Choice modeling is applied to estimate the model parameters in various fields such as marketing, energy, transportation, and health and to predict the outcome.

Multiple customer needs and rapid technological change are what MNCs are confronted with, thus, they rely on subsidiaries responding to local market needs. The ability of subsidiaries to integrate resources to respond to market opportunities determines its competitiveness, and contributes to whole corporate. The purpose of this dissertation is to construct an integrative framework toward generating subsidiary initiatives and competitiveness. Structural equation modeling was employed to verify the conceptual framework. Based on the results of SEM, entrepreneurial leadership of top management teams enhances the talent on the process of human-capital leveraging to facilitate them to be creative and agile; further, promote collective learning among members. Additionally, with the support of top management teams, learning culture of subsidiaries can be strengthened. Support of top management team, human-capital leveraging and learning culture, improve the absorptive capacity, further, they promote subsidiary initiatives and competitiveness.

Background: In recent years, sponsorship has become an important and heavily implemented marketing communications tool, and the significance of sponsorship is especially seen within the context of sports. Despite the heavy implementation of sponsorship, both in a team context and on an individual level, existing sponsorship literature has been strongly focused on sponsorship in a team context, thus neglecting the individual aspect of sponsorship. Furthermore, previous literature has highlighted the importance of implementing clear objectives into the overall strategic marketing plan to respond to difficulties in tracing and evaluating sponsorship. The lack of existing literature on individual sponsorship and the need for clear objectives raises questions about managerial motivations behind the implementation of sponsorship. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate the underlying managerial motivations behind the implementation of individual sponsorship in outdoor recreation businesses in Sweden. In doing so, this study aims to reduce existing literature gaps within sponsorship. Method: A qualitative collective case study with an abductive approach was conducted utilizing semi- structured interviews with 5 relevant participants who are working in outdoor recreation brands within the Swedish market. Conclusion: Findings of this study revealed that building credibility through the use of individual sponsorship was found to be a highly desired outcome, and strong motivation behind implementation. By transferring meaning, such as credibility, from well known and2  trusted athletes to the brand through associations, the brand in question wished to achieve increased strength of communicated brand messages. The development and strengthening of the brand community was identified as another key motivation behind individual sponsorship. Through the use of individual athletes' mix of properties such as performance, social ability, and own network was believed to strengthen brand community. Another finding was the motivation to achieve brand awareness-through high media exposure using leveraging as a tool. Lastly, the research found that except for implementing sponsored athletes in the marketing activities, utilizing the athletes in the product development process was the motivation behind implementation of individual sponsorship.

Considerable research has focused on understanding the journey of knowledge from inception to application. However, this body of work often needs more exploration of how knowledge is effectively utilized for strategic advancement within an organization once it reaches its destination. Moreover, existing research has primarily concentrated on large corporations, neglecting small to medium-sized businesses, particularly those in the nonprofit sector. My dissertation addressed this gap by developing a model that comprehensively examined how employees within nonprofit membership-based organizations leverage knowledge. I defined knowledge leveraging as the proactive use of accumulated knowledge to enhance an organization’s strategic performance through mission-critical activities. I proposed six hypotheses within this model to deepen our understanding of knowledge utilization and its subsequent impact. The findings supported the knowledge leveraging (KL) model, with two distinct scales identified: individual (KL-I) and team (KL-T). The model was only partially substantiated because many hypotheses were not supported. However, the results still suggest promising opportunities for future studies on this emerging topic. / Business Administration/Strategic Management

<p><strong>Purpose</strong></p><p>The purpose of the thesis is to analyze the current challenges facedby Husqvarna Motorcycles in their brand building process, and todescribe ways in which applying the brand equity principles will enablean increase of the value of their brand.</p><p><strong>Background</strong></p><p>In the complex world of organizations and companies where thecompetitive position plays an important role in successful achievementsof the company, managers seek after building a sustainablecompetitive advantage. Building brand equity is an important focusfor a large company' improvement, since it raises interest of existingand new customers. The process of building brand equity takestime but through this process a company will have a stronger marketposition which creates brand value.</p><p><strong>Method</strong></p><p>In order to answer the purpose, the qualitative method with implementation of semi-structured interviews for collecting data wasused. The data was interpreted and then structured and analyzedusing theoretical framework.</p><p><strong>Conclusions</strong></p><p>During the research performed it was found out that the managersare facing several challenges in respect to building brand equity.Therefore, five components of building brand equity were implementedto draw the conclusions of how the managers could strengthentheir brand.</p>