1、标题： Determination of brand loyalty factors age group-18-24 原文： The topic of Brand Loyalty holds great interest for market researchers, marketing managers and marketing academics. Brand Loyalty is a key issue for many marketing managers, and companies spend millions each year tracking brand loyalty l
2、evels through market research organizations. This interest in brand loyalty is also reflected in the academic literature, where loyalty has also been referred to a commitment and retention. Loyalty is an important concept in strategic marketing. A base of loyal customers allows marketers to charge a
3、 premium price and to reduce the cost of doing business through decreasing acquisition and promotion costs, thus increasing shareholders value and hence profitability . It has been suggested that it takes a lot less money to increase the retention if current customers than to find new ones . Fred Re
4、ichheld, formerly with Bain Consulting, defined loyalty in the Harvard Business review, as the willingness of someone-a customer, an employee, a friend-to make an investment or a personal sacrifice in order to strengthen relationship. Loyalty, therefore, is a big deal-taking lots of thought, plannin
5、g and consideration on the part of the marketers. From a firms perspective, a successful brand enables it to maintain a high level of consumer acceptance, often in the face of considerable competition. In addition, brand loyalty can: * Provide a solid foundation for new product launch and for licens
6、ing * Offset a decline in market share during price and promotional wars * Help provide resistance to competitive attacks Aaker wrote, The brand loyalty of the customer base is often the core of a brands equity. If customers are indifferent to the brand and, in fact, buy with respect to features, pr
7、ice, there is likely little equity. From the customers perspective, a brand provides a visible representation of difference between products. Brands allow consumers to shop with confidence in an increasingly complex world. A brand can signify product quality as well as aid consumers in differentiati
8、ng the product from competitive offerings. A brand that consumers trust will also serve to reduce perceived risk and post-purchase cognitive dissonance. Modeling of price elasticity effects also demonstrate the importance of loyalty. More loyal consumers, as measured by probability of purchase or sh
9、are of requirements from past purchase panel data, are less likely to switch due to a given price inducement； as a corollary a loyal buyer usually needs a bigger discount to switch than would a less loyal buyer . Marketers must understand what brand loyalty is, bearing in mind that brand loyalty wil
10、l be different for each brand managed. Research suggests that customers can demonstrate loyalty by purchasing, by being willing to recommend, and by providing advice to the company, and finally, customers could demonstrate brand loyalty through an intention to repurchase. Thus, brand loyalty is a co
11、mplex construct and it should not be assumed that behavioral loyalty involves feelings or positive cognitive processes as antecedents, brand attitude may be one possible determinant of loyal behavior, but there are others such as distribution, market concentration and promotional activity supporting
12、 a brand. A loyal buyer usually needs a bigger discount to switch than would a less loyal buyer . Clearly, it is important for brand owners to understand the variables that underpin the construct of loyalty and, in particular, loyalty behavior for their brands. Customer loyalty presents a paradox. M
13、any see it as primarily an attitude-based phenomenon that can be influenced significantly by customer relationship management initiatives such as the increasingly popular loyalty and affinity programmes. However, studies show that loyalty in competitive repeat-purchase markets is shaped more by the
14、passive acceptance of brands than by strongly held attitudes about them. From this perspective, the demand-enhancing potential on loyalty is more limited than might be hoped. Generally, we say a person is brand loyal when he or she buys the same brand over and over, in spite of there being reasonabl
15、y substitutable choices. But some argue this isnt necessarily brand loyalty. Although it is tempting to define loyalty as simply repurchase, marketers often have little power over the variables and constraints directly controlling how customers pass through the purchase environment . It may be that
16、the product brand is the only one available to the consumer, such as in a monopoly market place situation or, it may be simply consumer inertia: repetitive consumer behavior and the path of least resistance or, it may be that brand loyalty is more the result of indifference than choice if all brand
17、have the same basic ingredients, cost about the same, and perform at the same level, it really doesnt matter which brand the consumer buy-they get the same benefits. Today most critical issue faced by the marketing managers is of declining brand loyalty. Research has shown that, today, solely loyal
18、customers rarely make up more than 20% of the total customers buying. More importantly, research has shown that solely loyal customers buy less when compared to customers who are multi-brand loyal, and the number to solely loyal customers diminishes over time. Today, most customers include several b
19、rands in their preferred brand set. Research has cited that Brand loyalty doesnt exist for many products and services, and is declining for those who have a modicum of it, because the marketing organization and the brands are not loyal to the customers.Marketers want customers to be brand loyal-but
20、marketers commonly fail to be loyal to their customers . Brand Loyalty has declined for three main reasons: 1. Increasingly, people seek variety and like to try new brands and products； boredom thresholds have fallen and consumer like to break out of same old routines-and this has had a negative imp
21、act on loyalty. 2. Quality levels of products have risen to a standard where they no longer clearly differentiate the competing brands within the category. Consumer risk in switching brands is considerably lower today as the quality of substitute brands is no longer a concern. 3. Many brands still p
22、osition themselves on the basis of quality and risk reduction, which does not resonate with modern consumers. Brands have different meanings for modern consumers compared with consumers of bygone eras. Each of the studies in the following section seeks to identify consumer characteristics, purchasin
23、g attitudes and/or behavior that go some way to explaining brand loyalty. The study that is the focus of this paper seeks to identify the factors that determine brand loyalty across three-product category . It explores brand loyalty and brand purchasing behavior in the 18-24 age groups. The rationale for this and the specific research
