The factors effect to brand building effort in small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in viet nam

THE FACTORS EFFECT TO BRAND BUILDING EFFORT IN SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES SMEs IN VIET NAM In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements of the Degree of MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMISNITRATION

THE FACTORS EFFECT TO BRAND BUILDING EFFORT IN SMALL AND MEDIUM ENTERPRISES (SMEs) IN VIET NAM

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements of the Degree of

MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMISNITRATION

THE FACTORS EFFECT TO BRAND BUILDING EFFORT IN SMALL AND

MEDIUM ENTERPRISES (SMEs) IN VIET NAM

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements of the Degree of

MASTER OF BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

Under the guidance and approval of the committee, and approved by all its members,

this thesis has been accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree

Acknowledge

I would like to express my heartfelt gratitude to my Supervisor, Dr Le Nguyen Hau

for his patient and support to suggest guidelines, development orientation and

encouragement, reading and commenting on this thesis

Secondly, I would like to send my grateful to Dr Phan Trieu Anh, Dr Ho Thi Bich

Van and Dr Pham Hong Hoa – members of the proposal examination for their

valuable comments and suggestions

Thirdly, I would like to thanks to Association of Small and Medium Enterprises in

Ho Chi Minh City for their help about contacting and connecting to SMEs in data

collection

Lastly, I am thankful to my family, my friends and those who supported during my

working on the thesis

Plagiarism Statements

I would like to declare that, apart from the acknowledged references, this

thesis either does not use language, ideas, or other original material from anyone; or

has not been previously submitted to any other educational and research programs or

institutions I fully understand that any writings in this thesis contradicted to the

above statement will automatically lead to the rejection from the MBA program at

the International University – Vietnam National University Hochiminh City

Copyright Statement

This copy of the thesis has been supplied on condition that anyone who

consults it is understood to recognize that its copyright rests with its author and that

no quotation from the thesis and no information derived from it may be published

without the author’s prior consent

© Nguyen Thi Thu Sang/ MBA06028/ 2014

Table of Contents

Acknowledgement i

Plagiarism Statements ii

Copyright Statement iii

List of Table viii

List of Figures x

Abstract xi

Chapter 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Background 1

1.2 Problem Statement 2

1.3 Research Question 3

1.4 Research Hypothesis 3

1.5 Research Objectives 4

1.6 Implication of the Research 4

1.7 Research Scope 5

1.8 Structure of the thesis 5

Chapter 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 7

2.1 Definitions of Concepts 7

2.1.1 Small and Medium Enterprises 7

2.1.2 Brand 8

2.1.3 Corporate Brand 8

2.1.4 Brand Management 9

2.2.5 The importance of Brand 11

2.2 Brand building in SMEs 11

2.2.1 Role of building strong brand in SMEs 11

2.2.2 Factors effect to brand building effort 12

2.2.2.1 Commitment of Owners 12

2.2.2.2 Available of Resources 12

2.2.2.3 Culture of Organization 12

2.2.2.4 Strategic Vision 13

2.2.2.5 Perceived Image 13

2.3 Conceptual Model Framework 13

2.4 Brand Management Issues faced in SMEs 15

2.4.2 Narrow Interpretation on Brand Management 15

2.4.3 Lack up Resource and Time 16

2.4.4 Less attention on Brand building in SMEs 16

Chapter 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 18

3.1 Research Design 18

3.2 Sampling 18

3.3 Data Collection 19

3.4 Data Analysis 20

3.4.1 Descriptive Statistic 20

3.4.2 Reliability Statistic 20

3.4.3 Exploratory Factor Analysis 20

Chapter 4: DATA ANALYSIS AND RESULTS 22

4.1 Sample Demographics 22

4.2 Descriptive Statistics 24

4.2.1 Attitude 24

4.2.2 Brand Building Effort 25

4.3 Reliability Test 27

4.3.1 Commitment of Owners 27

4.3.1 Availability of Resources 28

4.3.2 Culture of Organization 29

4.3.3 Strategic Vision 29

4.3.4 Perceived Image 30

4.3.6 Brand Building Effort 31

4.4 Results of Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) 32

4.4.1 Result of Factor Analysis each Independent Variables 32

4.4.2 Result of Factor Analysis Dependent Variable – Brand Building Effort 36

4.5 Correlation Testing 38

4.6 Regression Analysis 40

Chapter 5: DISCUSSION AND RECOMMENDATION 43

5.1 Explore the attitude of SMEs owners 43

5.2 Brand Building Effort 44

5.3 Recommendation for SMEs 44

Chapter 6: CONCLUSION AND LIMITATION 46

6.1 Conclusion 46

6.2 Limitation of the Study 47

REFERENCES 48

APPENDIX 54

List of Tables

Table 3.1: SME Definitions Used by Multilateral Institutions 18

Table 3.2: SME Definitions of Decree 56/2009/NĐ-CP 19

Table 3.3: Sample size 19

Table 4.1: Demographic information 22

Table 4.2: Attitude scores 24

Table 4.3: Action scores 25

Table 4.4: Cronbach’s Alpha of Commitment 28

Table 4.5: Cronbach’s Alpha of Resources 28

Table 4.6: Cronbach’s Alpha of Culture of Organization 29

Table 4.7: Cronbach’s Alpha of Vision 29

Table 4.8: Cronbach’s Alpha of Perceived Image 30

Table 4.9: Cronbach’s Alpha of Brand Building Effort 31

Table 4.10: KMO and Bartlett's Test of Independent Variables 33

Table 4.11: Total Variance Explained 34

Table 4.12: Rotated Component Matrix of Independent Variables 36

Table 4.13: KMO and Bartlett's Test of Dependent Variable 36

Table 4.14: Total Variance Explained 37

Table 4.15: Component Matrix 37

Table 4.16: Correlations 39

Table 4.17: Model Summary 40

Table 4.18: Coefficients 41

Table 4.19: Test of Homogeneity of Variances 42

List of Figures

Figure 2.1: The conceptual research model 15

Abstract

Brand concept has been discussed a lot in many big companies and

multinationals However, in many SME companies, brand management receives little

or no attention in the daily run of affairs Although the owners or director are the

ones to take the lead in this area, they either seldom have the time for it or are not

even aware of brand management as a concept And because this concept is not

ingrained within such an SME, there are no other employees available to give it

sufficient attention

The study attempt to explore the attitude of SMEs owners towards brand

building and aim to identify internal and external factor effect to brand building

effort then draw managerial implications for SMEs

Based on the quantitative survey, the respondents were SMEs owners with

samples size of 162 SPSS software 20.0 was used to analyze the collected data The

date was analyzed in five steps: the first step was Descriptive Statistic, the second

step was Reliability Statistic, the third step was Exploratory Factor Analysis and the

fourth step was Correlation Testing, the last step was Regression Analysis to show

the positive influence of all independent variables on dependent variables

The result show that the most important dimension in effecting brand

building effort was Vision concerning to company business strategy, business

decision and leader’s impact The other dimension was Commitment, Resources, Culture and Perceived Image also affected important to brand building

Keywords: Brand building, corporate brand, SMEs

CHAPTER 1 - INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background

Nowadays, brand management plays an important role in marketing (Keller,

2003) A brand contains several elements, and can essentially be described as “an

identifiable product, service, person or place, which the buyer or user perceives as

relevant, unique, or sustainable added values which match their needs most closely

and provide more satisfaction” (De Chernatony, 2001) And famous brands have played an important role in business customer decisions (Bendixen, Bukasa and

Abratt, 2004; Michell, King and Reas, 2001) For those reason, building strong

brands has become an important point for many companies since it produces a

number of marketing advantages and increases companies’s competitive strength (Hoeffler and Keller, 2002) Thus, building strong brands not only increases their

visibility and credibility, but also distinguishes them from competitors, and acquires

more market share The principal focus of branding is to build a successful brand that

can be distinguished from the competitor, be held in high esteem, and establish a

relationship with target customers (Aaker, 1996; Keller, 2003)

Brand management has been discussed a lot in many big companies and

multinationals, and branding also creates tremendous value for them However, the

small and medium-sized enterprise group constitutes 95% percent of all businesses

which cannot be ignored (Thurik, R., Risseeuw, P and Uhlaner, L M., 2003)

Furthermore, too few researchers are focused on brand management issues in SMEs

It is apparent that small and medium enterprises (SMEs) play a significant

role in the economic development of a country (Muhammad et al 2010) In Viet

Nam recent year, SMEs have contributed important to growth and structure of the

economic, decrease unemployment, increase export turnover Particular, SMEs

create a haft of millions labors yearly and devoted 40% of Gross Domestic Product

(GDP) The difference between large firms and SMEs can be described as the

physical dimensions (Hutchinson, K., Quinn, B and Alexander, N., 2006) Although

the scope of SMEs is smaller than large enterprises, SMEs have their own features to

gain market share Carson and Cromie (1989) also mentioned that SMEs have their

own particular characteristics and abilities which can largely determine their

marketing preoccupations and concerns, so it is universally and widely accepted that

small and medium businesses are not scaled-down big businesses

In Vietnam, a trend of ignored brand management was plainly discernible in

recent time Most of SMEs do not awareness of important in brand building in brand

management; it is evident that less company has brand management department In

terms of brand managers, they are not only inexperienced, but also have no

knowledge of brand management; in terms of company management, there are two

missing from brand building and brand protection while brand protection must do in

first period of company established together with launching campaigns On the other

hand, SMEs in Vietnam have general understandability about brand management

For instance, company supplies the best product and quality to customer and they

expect to become loyalty with their clients, the question asked – is it enough to get

client’s loyalty when their competitors do also the same? Particularly with SMEs, each company need to awareness their strength by bring “added value” to customers

and overcome other competitors

1.2 Problem Statement

In the competitive environment, SMEs have to face the challenges not only

from the similar but also much stronger large firms So, the brand strategy in SMEs

should be built upon and apply for internal and external challenges (Abimbola,

2001) Small business but SMEs know how to manage their brand it can become

well-known as large company

By measurement effected of factors of commitment, resources, culture,

strategic vision and perceived image to brand building effort, SMEs can explore what

they will manage their brand? What role of brand management? What problem they

are facing with? And how to increasing brand awareness?

1.3 Research question

From the statement problem, the research raises the following research question:

What are the factors of commitment of owners, availability of resources, culture of

organization, strategic vision and perceived image effect to brand building effort in

H4: Factor of strategic vision direct effect and positive associated to brand building

effort

H5: Factor of perceived image direct effect and positive associated to brand building

effort

1.5 Research Objectives

Brand building is really necessary for those companies especially SMEs

However, in Viet Nam many owners of SMEs usually ignore the importance of

brand and the benefits which derive from branding, or even worse they do not have a

brand Given this situation, this research aims to:

- To identify factors (internal and external) effect brand building effort in

SMEs

- To draw managerial implications based on those results of the two above

objectives

1.6 Implication of the Research

This research describes the attitude of SMEs owners towards brand

management as well as the effort to build a strong brand In fact, the study can

increase awareness of managers in SMEs who make business decision in company

On the other hand, SMEs will recognize their visibility, credibility and competitive

strength

The study explore that brand building do not only limited into advertising,

brand name and the logo in common but also identify internal and external factors

which effect to brand building effort in SMEs From the research, the managerial

level can understand company’s demand to carry on brand strategy suitable in each

period In economic situation now, SMEs can face with counterfeit problem, to

protection; company will create orientation for brand building

1.7 Research Scope

Branding often considered as a large companies’ issue (Merrilees, 2007) The

concept of brand includes product branding and corporate branding Most of large

companies have separate orientation development for two of them However, in

SMEs which often less attention to branding will have same orientation between

product and corporate branding In this study, the brand word will consider as

corporate branding or company branding

Due to there is limited little research before Thus, one limitation of this

research is that the study lacks theoretical rigour Similarly, secondary data related to

SMEs is also limited As the study is doing research 250 SMEs, the findings cannot

be considered representative of all SMEs

Moreover, researchers’ understanding has limited in all of concept, so the objective result may happen That is also limitation of the research

1.8 Structure of the thesis

Chapter 1: Introduction

This chapter makes a general introduction about research background, research

problem, research objectives, implication and scope of the research

Chapter 2: Literature review

The literature review chapter focuses on related background concepts and theories of

brand building

Chapter 3: Research Methodology

This chapter depicts research design, sampling methods, data collection, data

analysis methods

Chapter 4: Data analysis and results

Data analysis chapter provides the progress of processing data after carrying out the

survey Demographic information would be introduced in order to provide the

overview about population participant in the survey Then descriptive statistic is

depicted through attitude and action to brand building effort The next stage will be

analyzing Exploratory Factor Analysis and the last is correlation testing and

regression analysis

Chapter 5: Discussion and findings

This chapter mainly focuses on discussion about the result through the survey

Basing on the data results, the researcher solve research objective includes: explore

attitude of SMEs owners towards brand building and identify factors effect to brand

building effort Then recommendation was given

Chapter 6: Conclusions and Limitation

The last chapter depicts the conclusions and limitation for the SMEs towards brand

building concept

CHAPTER 2 - LITERATURE REVIEW

2.1 Definitions of Concepts

2.1.1 Small and Medium Enterprises

SMEs include family businesses, startups, spin-offs and a variety of others

(Sadi and Henderson, 2010) SMEs can be classified by the number of employees,

annual turnover, and a combination of employee and turnover metrics (Hutchinson et

al., 2006)

The European definition of SME follows: "The category of micro, small and

medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is made up of enterprises which employ fewer

than 250 persons and which have an annual turnover not exceeding 50 million euro,

and/or an annual balance sheet total not exceeding 43 million euro” (European

Commission, 2012) According the Word Bank defined SME has at least 300

employees and has maximum turnover 15 million dollar, and the assets exceeding 15

million dollar Moreover, definition of SMEs has not been easy as different countries

have different criteria for defining SMEs Stokes and Wilson (2006), stated that the

“SME is defined as a small to medium enterprise managed by its owner(s) in a personalized way with a relatively small share of the market in economic terms, and

having 10-49 employees” Medium-sized have bigger than both micro and small

businesses in terms of operations, manpower capacity or number of employees,

structure, capital investment and size According to Darren et al (2009), they are the

businesses that employ up to 249 employees in UK, in European Union, they employ

up to 250 employees, in Australia, they employ up to 200 employees while in U.S.A,

they accommodate up to 500 employees In Viet Nam, decree 56/2009/NĐ-CP of

government defines at most 300 employees

One of the most popular definitions of SMEs is given by the American Small

Business Administration (SBA) as that business or firm which is independently

owned and operated; it is not dominant in its field and meets the criteria for the SME

business administration sponsored loans program (Arowomole, 2000)

2.1.2 Brand

Kotler and Keller (2006) acknowledge the American Marketing Association’s

definition of a brand as a “name, term, design, symbol, or any other feature that

identifies one seller's good or service as distinct from those of other sellers The legal

term for brand is trademark A brand may identify one item, a family of items, or all

items of that seller If used for the firm as a whole, the preferred term is trade name”

A brand is thus a product or service that adds dimensions which differentiate it in

some way from other products or services designed to satisfy the same need These

differences may be functional, rational, or tangible – intangible – related to what the

brand represents

Supporting Kotler and Keller’s view of a brand linking it to the tangibles of the brand, Rosetti (2005) suggested in a presentation that a brand is a name, term,

sign, symbol, design or a combination of them, intended to identify the goods and

services of one seller or group of sellers and to differentiate them from those of the

competition

Van den Heever (2000) is of the opinion that a brand is not a name, logo,

sign, symbol, advertisement or spokesperson A brand is everything that

organizations want people, especially its target markets, to feel and believe about its

product and services

2.1.3 Corporate Brand

Branding, especially corporate branding is often a radically new concept for

SMEs (Inskip, 2004) Corporate branding is defined as “a systematically planned and implemented process of creating and maintaining a favorable image and

consequently a favorable reputation for the company as a whole by sending signals to

all stakeholders and by managing behavior, communication, and symbolism” (Einwiller and Will, 2002) Corporate branding implies deserting product branding

with its narrow marketing-driven focus on tactical, functional processes Corporate

branding is an attempt to accommodate these weaknesses Product branding is based

on short-term advertising ideas, while corporate branding is based on a long-term

brand idea Corporate branding also expands the parameters of differentiation by

enabling companies to use their rich heritage actively to create strong brands

Corporate branding involves the whole organization and emphasizes the pivotal role

employees play if they are to succeed in the creation of a strong corporate brand

Value and beliefs held by employees are key elements in the differentiation strategy

According Schultz et al (2005) define corporate branding is a “move towards conceiving more integrated relationship between internal and external stakeholders

linking top management, employees, customers and other stakeholders”

2.1.4 Brand Management

In practice of brand management, the main differences between large firms

and SMEs appear in building and managing brand equity According David Aaker

(1996) brand management starts with developing a brand identity-the unique set of

brand associations that represent what the brand stands for and promises to

customers, an aspiration brand image Aaker maintains that the identity should be

differentiating on some dimensions, suggest parity on others, resonate with

business, and be credible Credibility can be based on proof points, current assets or

programs or strategic initiatives, or investment in new or revitalized assets or

programs Keller (2008) said strategic brand management process is all about

“building, measuring, and managing brand equity”; and he also points out that the purpose of branding is to endue products and services with the strength of brand

equity

A company’s brand management is integrated into the daily operation of the company Furthermore, a brand strategy and brand management implementation is

not a one-time effort, but a regular marketing strategy, and it should follow the

development of the enterprise (Keller, 1998)

2.1.5 The importance of Brand

Brands identify the source or marker of a product and allow consumers –

either individuals or organizations – to assign responsibility for its performance to a

particular manufacturer or distributor Customers may evaluate the identical product

differently depending on how it is branded They learn about brands through past

experiences with the product and its marketing program, finding out which brands

satisfy their needs and which do not As consumer’s lives become more complicated,

rushed, and time starved, the ability of a brand to simplify decision making and

reduce risk is invaluable (Rajneesh Suri and Kent B Monroe, 2003)

Brands also perform valuable functions for firms (Rita Clifton and John

Simmons, 2004; Rik Riezebos, 2003 and Paul Temporal, 2002) First, they simplify

product handling or tracing Brands help to organize inventory and accounting

records A brand also offers the firm legal protection for unique features or aspect of

the product (Constance E Bagley, 2005; Judith Zaichkowsky, 2006; Maureen Morrin

and Jacob Jacoby, 2000) The brand name can be protected through registered

trademarks; manufacturing processes can be protected through patents; and packing

can be protected through copyrights and proprietary designs These intellectual

property rights ensure that the firms can safely invest in the brand and reap the

benefits of a valuable asset

Brand signal a certain level of quality so that satisfied buyers can easily

choose the product again (Tulin Erdem, 1998) Brand loyalty provides predictability

and security of demand for the firm, and it creates barriers to entry that make it

difficult for other firms to enter the market Loyalty also can translate into customer

willingness to pay a higher price – often 20% to 25% more than competing brands

(Scott David, 2000; Mary W Sullivan, 1998; D C Bello and M B Holbrook, 1996;

Adrian J Slywotzky and Benson P Shapiro, 1993) Although competitors may

duplicate manufacturing processes and product designs, they cannot easily match

lasting impressions left in the minds of individuals and organizations by years of

product experience and marketing activity In this sense, branding can be a powerful

means to secure a competitive advantage (Naomi Klein, 2000)

2.2 Brand building in SMEs

2.2.1 Role of building strong brand in SMEs

Through comparing the brand management activities undertaken by high

versus low-performing SMEs, Berthon et al (2008) find that high-performing SMEs

emphasize following 7 of 10 brand management practice (BMPs) than less successful

counterparts:

- Brand delivers benefits customers truly desire

- Brand stays relevant

- Brand is consistent

- Brand portfolio and hierarchy make sense

- Brand uses full repertoire of marketing activities to build equity

- Brand managers understand what the brand means to consumers

- Brand is given proper support and it is sustained over the long run

2.2.2 Factors effect to brand building effort

2.2.2.1 Commitment of Owners

In SMEs, most of owners who can determine company structure, such as

what kind of marketing personnel, what the objectives of the company are and how

much attention it can give to brand management (Krake, 2005) Thus, Krake (2005)

emphasizes that entrepreneurs should be consistent in their policy and activities; link

the brand to the character of the entrepreneur; develop a passion for the brand within

the company

2.2.2.2 Availability of Resources

SMEs lack financial resources and brand management is not given the

priority it needs for a strong brand image (Opoku et al., 2007) An SME has a much

more limited of factors compared with a large company such as physical, knowledge

and human which will certainly restrict the building brand effort

2.2.2.3 Culture of Organization

Organizational culture – the internal values, beliefs and basic assumptions

that embody the heritage of the company and communicate its meaning to its

members; culture manifests itself in the ways employees all through the ranks feel

about the company they are working for (Hatch and Schultz, 2001)

2.2.2.4 Strategic Vision

Collins and Porras (1998) define strategic visions within organizations as a

description of a future objective The function of a defined strategic vision is to

provide organizations with inspiration and decision making criteria that can be

applied in the entire organization Defining strategic visions is a vital element of

strategic management as it is the basis for all decisions within organizations and

applies to all units, departments and sectors equally (Collins & Porras, 1998)

2.2.2.5 Perceived Image

Corporate image is views of the organization developed by its stakeholders;

the outside world’s overall impression of the company including the views of

customers, shareholders, media, general public, etc (Hatch and Schultz, 2001)

Customers who sense information from interaction with employees that

differs from their perception of the company’s reputation will experience a negative

effect (Davies et al., 2010) Vice versa, their research shows that companies with a

clear positive image and averaged gap grow 16% points higher in sales than

companies with a clear negative gap

2.3 Conceptual Model Framework

The study objective brings three perspective and it will describe clarify in

questionnaire The research perspective starts with cognition of company owner and

end of management behavior or in the other word is entrepreneur’s action

The conceptual framework is final step of all stages, after SMEs recognize

that they must action for their brand building effort

The article of Krake (2005) have found three branding guidelines which are

about brand development, specifically he emphasizes on the entrepreneurs’ functions

during managing brand According to Hatch and Schultz (2001) successful corporate

branding is typically based on the alignment between (1) the strategic goals of the

top management level (strategic vision ), (2) the knowledge and attitude of the

employees (corporate culture) and (3) the perceptions of external stakeholders

(image) In other words, Hatch and Schultz claim that the strategic goals need to be

supported by and fit with the corporate culture and must fit with the perceptions of

key stakeholders to build and maintain a strong corporate brand

Base on above research, the conceptual research model will conduct like

below:

Figure 2.1: The conceptual research model

Source: Krake (2005), Hatch and Schultz’s (2001)

2.4 Brand Management Issues faced in SMEs

2.4.1 Narrow Interpretation on Brand Management

Most of SMEs do not aware of role of brand management for company

activities That is general situation for SMEs community According to Frank (2005)

the owner or directors are the ones who should take the lead of brand management

The owners or directors do not pay attention to brand management, so how they can

ask the other employees to pay attention to it (Frank, 2005) Some researchers

indicate that SMEs are immature in the market (Boyle, 2003; Krake, 2005) This is

businesses, such as local corner shops and grocery stores, may even fail to recognize

that they are a brand (Merrilees, 2007) Furthermore, Frank (2005) pointed out the

fact that the names of the SMEs are often not the same as the brand name, and it is

hard to gain people’s attention, therefore they will lose many chances in their business

2.4.2 Lack of Resource and Time

The limitation of time, resources is barrier to carry our branding activities in

SMEs According to Wong and Merrilees (2005), limitations on financial and human

resources and time are the main obstructions These limitations can force owners and

managers to focus on short-term business strategy, like what and how they can do

best in their daily tasks and get more profits in the short term However, the short

term focus on daily tasks can become an obstacle for the companies in developing a

long-term branding strategy, and it is hard to keep focused on the long-term business

(Wong and Merrilees, 2005)

2.4.3 Less attention on Branding in SMEs

Many SMEs pay little or no attention on brand management in their daily

tasks and their business strategy (Frank, 2005) Bresciani and Eppler (2010) state that

a common problem is that SME entrepreneurs usually pay more attention to financial

and production issues and less on brand management issues The reason is that

entrepreneurs believe a good branding and communication strategy is not necessary

to start a business Merriless (2007) suggested that many small firms believe

branding is a big business issue, such as banks, well known international brands,

motor corporations and the famous and popular companies with strong brand

recognition However, many companies later recognize that a clear brand vision is a

sound investment for them, because the cost of subsequent changes to their corporate

identity can be very high (Bresciani and Eppler, 2010)

CHAPTER 3 - RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

3.1 Research Design

This study applies quantitative research methodology to conduct our research

in SMEs And the objectives in this study are to explore attitude of entrepreneur to

corporate branding After their mind is awareness, the research will continuous with

analyze factors effect to brand building effort and how to implicate in SMEs The

primary data was collected from SMEs by face-to-face interview with the owner On

the other hand, researcher will send questionnaire through email to collect

information

3.2 Sampling

The company should be a SME among all companies in Ho Chi Minh City

with difference industrial, difference size and difference brand education There are

over 120 thousand SMEs companies in Viet Nam now so the sampling will base on

criteria and quantity like below:

Table 3.1: SME Definitions Used by Multilateral Institutions

Institution

Maximum # of Employees

Max Revenue or Turnover ($)

UNDP 200 (none) (none)

Table 3.2: SME Definitions of Decree 56/2009/NĐ-CP

Sector

Maximum Assets (thousand VND)

# of Employees

Maximum Assets (thousand VND)

# of Employees

From the definitions above, the research will design sample size with 250

SMEs in different industrial sector

Table 3.3: Sample size

3.3 Data Collection

Primary data for this research will be collected from the questionnaire

Researcher plans to deliver the questionnaire to 250 SMEs in Ho Chi Minh City

follow two ways Firstly, a face-to-face interview was met directly in company;

researcher will contact to set-up a meeting before Secondly, the questionnaire will

be sent through email

3.4 Data Analysis

Data analysis was driven by the need to answer the research question

(Carvalho, 2007), which is to investigate the problems SMEs faced when managing

their brands and what efforts do SMEs make to solve their brand management

problems The quantitative analysis on this research was conducted using SPSS

program version 20.0 with important statistical techniques applied factors for the

analysis on the findings of the research

3.4.1 Descriptive Statistic

According to William M.K Trochim (2006), Descriptive Statistics were used

to describe the features of the data in a study They provided simple summaries about

the sample and the measures Together with simple graphics analysis, they formed

the basis of virtually every quantitative analysis of data Descriptive Statistics in this

research described the Minimum value, Maximum value, Std Deviation, and Mean

of all variables

3.4.2 Reliability Statistic

A reliability analysis (Cronbach’s alpha) was performed to test the reliability

and internal consistency of independent and dependent variables

3.4.3 Exploratory Factor Analysis

Firstly, descriptive statistic was initially conducted to provide an overview of

the samples Secondly, Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) is set up to check the

factorial structure suitableness of the models Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) and

Barlett’s test of Sphericity indicators would be checked to see whether data fulfills necessary conditions to be grouped into smaller set of underlying factors If KMO’s

value was equal or greater than 0.5, it would be valid Besides that, Bartlett’s test of

Sphericity was valid if the correlation matrix is not identity matrix Items which had

factor loading value below 0.5 will be excluded for further processing