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Models of the components of brands are gaining more attention among practitioners and academics. We review why managers have a tendency to develop mental models and overview the key published models of the components of brands. Among 20 leading edge brand practitioners we found evidence of their using their own mental models to make sense of brand complexity. There were similarities between elements of their models and those of the “atomic brand model”. This particular model was favourably received by experts and from their evaluations we propose the more comprehensive “double vortex model” of the brand.

The commercial importance of services has been realised in recent times and the importance of research to understand service brands and their meaning for consumers is a growing priority. This study focuses on consumer based perceptions of brand associations of a service brand, attitudes toward and intention to use the branded service via qualitative and quantitative methods. The results indicate a number of key dimensions that are important for consumers of services such as core service, experience with brand, self‐image congruency, feelings, servicescape and interpersonal service, publicity, advertising, price and brand. However, in this study country of origin and word of mouth were not significant. Largely, the findings indicated that service brand associations influence brand attitude and attitude and associations influence intention to use a service brand.

There are few valuable services brands, which may be due to the lack of services branding knowledge and the inappropriate use of product‐based branding advice. To contribute to services branding knowledge the authors undertook a review of the services management and services branding literature and postulated a model of services branding. In‐depth interviews with 28 leading‐edge consultants showed the appropriateness of this model. The study found a need for ruthless clarity about positioning and the corporation's genuinely felt values. Success is more likely when everyone internally believes in their brand's values. When management behaviour is based on genuine conviction, shared values are more likely. Through shared values, there is a greater likelihood of commitment, internal loyalty, clearer brand understanding, and importantly, consistent brand delivery across all stakeholders. By viewing these factors within a systems perspective, greater services brand consistency can result.

It is recognised that an organization’s corporate reputation is affected by the actions of every business unit, department and employee that comes into contact with another stakeholder. However, the means by which employees can be directed or encouraged to “live the brand” is an area which has received relatively limited coverage. This article explores the management actions that are required if employees are to support and enhance the organization’s corporate reputation. The study illustrates the pivotal role of staff in the corporate reputation management process and presents ways through which organizations can encourage commitment, enthusiasm and consistent staff behaviour in delivering the brand values.

Much has been written about the strategic importance of added value as a means for achieving competitive advantage, but little attention has been paid to the meaning of the term “added value”. For the concept to realise its purported advantages, a better understanding of added value is crucial. To gain greater insight into the concept we undertook depth interviews with 20 leading‐edge brand experts to explore their views about the nature, roles and sustainability of added value. We conclude that added value is a multidimensional construct, playing diverse roles, and interpreted in different ways by different people. The more sustainable added values are the emotional values.

This paper aims to explore the impact of brand authenticity dimensions (i.e. aesthetic, symbolism, heritage, originality, quality commitment and virtue) on consumer engagement in the context of social media. This study answers to the need of scholars to understand consumer behaviour towards family and non-family firms’ brand authenticity constructs and for practitioners to find the correct levers to increase consumer engagement.

Top 10 European family firms with a retrievable Facebook (FB) page from the Global Family Business Index have been selected. Then, the study analysed family firms’ social media consumer engagement versus their non-family business direct competitors on a sample of 21.664 FB posts over a four-year period, leveraging multi-group analysis.

The results outline that three out of six brand authenticity dimensions posted on FB are statistically arousing more interactions respect to non-authenticity-related contents when posted by family firms. However, there are no statistically significant findings when brand authenticity content is posted by the non-family competitors.

This research is helpful for practitioners and entrepreneurs who might want to strengthen their social media brand strategies. With this regard, the study provides insights on which elements of brand authenticity are perceived by consumers as more engaging and which levers to use when communicating the familiness of the company.

To the best of authors’ knowledge, this is one of the earliest studies crosscutting the family business and brand authenticity literature streams to conduct an empirical analysis based on official FB data with a data set of over 20,000 observations. Moreover, this study assesses that not every dimension of the brand authenticity construct is relevant in the context of social media and that its effectiveness depends on the firms’ familiness.

This paper aims to investigate how brand identity is co-created, with a specific focus on how employees contributed to the process in a five-star hotel setting. The focus of this study is on understanding how two hotels planned and executed their brand identity strategy simultaneously, differentiating one from the other and how employees actively participated in this process.

A longitudinal case study approach was adopted, centred on building the identity of two luxury hotels owned by a single company in Seoul, Korea. Various organizational documents were collected and analyzed to understand the brand identity of the hotels and how brand co-creation has been implemented. In addition, semi-structured in-depth interviews were conducted with 42 employees to understand the brand co-creation process from their perspective.

The brand co-creation process of the hotels was conducted simultaneously and evolved over the following four phases, with employees’ roles varying in each phase, namely, establishing a clear brand identity strategy; designing and selecting sensory identity; aligning organizational identity; and delivering brand identity through external communication. Employees that participated in brand co-creation enhanced their brand knowledge, developed emotional bonds with the brand and were motivated to deliver the brand identity. Furthermore, those that immersed themselves in the new brand identities were able to enable positive guest perceptions towards the brand image, which consequently enhanced employees’ pride in their work.

This research advances the brand management literature in defining branding and brand identity elements, as well as emphasizing the importance of consistent branding. In addition, the current study expands the scope of internal branding, highlighting the process of brand co-creation and the role of employees as active participants. Moreover, it reveals that employees’ participation enhances not only their brand knowledge but also their emotional bonds with the brand. The proposed conceptual framework demonstrates the flow of branding elements, brand identity elements and the “infinite loop” of employee participation in brand co-creation.

The case study approach adopted here enables an in-depth investigation of employee participation in brand co-creation, including their different roles and activities in the process; a phenomenon that has not been adequately explored in previous research.

The motivations behind co-branding alliances, the differences in performance between the paired brands and the emergence of “spillover effects” have been pillars of the marketing research agenda for almost three decades. We observe an extensive number of studies on co-branding alliances, combined with multiple theoretical perspectives and empirical approaches informing extant literature. The purpose of this paper is to summarize of the state of the art of this research.

The authors offer a systematic literature review of 190 papers on co-branding alliances. The authors portray a picture of the theories informing co-branding research and build a conceptual framework that summarizes the concepts and variables used in this literature. Finally, 11 interviews with managers and consultants of European firms help to reveal potential problems in practice and needs that are not captured by previous studies.

The authors develop a map of theories used to investigate co-branding alliances and build a conceptual framework linking motivations, co-branding alliance implementation and outputs. Finally, the authors propose a structured research agenda.

The main implication relies on the structured research agenda.

Practical implications include the identification of the variables and dimensions involved in a brand alliance to exploit the strengths and moderate the weaknesses of a brand.

This paper highlights how co-branding is embedded in different contexts and dimensions regarding both firms and consumers. The two maps presented in this study underscore the interdependence among such dimensions. The authors interview marketing experts to validate the conceptual framework and to help us extract the managerial implications that stem from it.

Focuses on the relations that product managers, as industrial buyers, develop with industrial service providers (advertising, promotional and marketing research agencies, lawyers, other consultants and distribution channels) in different business sectors in Greece. Investigates how brand managers in the pharmaceutical and other fast‐moving consumer goods industries view their relationships with their various interfaces, by analysing the allocation of their working time, the level of contact, and the perceived significance and quality of relationships with their interfaces. The results indicate that there are differences in the development of relationships amongst the sectors analysed.

This special “Anbar Abstracts” issue of the Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing is split into seven sections covering abstracts under the following headings: Marketing strategy; Customer service; Sales management; Promotion; Product management; Marketing research/customer behavior; Sundry.