The effect of perceived brand globalness on brand value and purchase intention

It was showed that Purchase intention be affected by customer’s perceived brand globalness toward perceive of its higher quality and brand prestige through word of mouth or observation..

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Dinh Thi Mai Trang

THE EFFECT OF PERCEIVED BRAND GLOBALNESS ON BRAND VALUE AND PURCHASE INTENTION

MASTER OF BUSINESS (Honours)

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Dinh Thi Mai Trang

THE EFFECT OF PERCEIVED BRAND GLOBALNESS ON BRAND VALUE AND PURCHASE INTENTION

ID: 22120077

MASTER OF BUSINESS (Honours) SUPERVISOR: Dr LE NHAT HANH

Hanh for her professional guidance from the very first day of research till the finishing Her helpful advices and encouragement during my research preparation are grateful Without her help, it would have been impossible for me to complete this research

I would like to send my appreciation to ISB- UEH professors for their expertise and encouragement during the master course Also thanks for their

valuable time for the proposal examination committee Their comments and

suggestions are significant for my research's complement

I am also grateful to my MBUS classmates for their knowledge sharing, expertise and spending great moments together Besides, I want to say thanks for the participants who filled my questionnaires out The participants donated their precious time to finish the questionnaires and helped me to acquire the data soon

Last but not least, I would like to express my gratitude to my parents, family members, colleagues and friends for their support and understanding throughout

my post graduate study Their unconditional love, sympathy and encouragement have made this research and my MBA course possible

important to understand the competition between local and global brands, and whether customers prefer global brands This study aims to investigate the effects

of perceived brand globalness on brand value, which in turns affect customer purchase intention Brand value is manifested via brand credibility, brand prestige, and brand quality The conceptual model is tested by using structural equation modeling 309 consumers who live in from Ho Chi Minh City were recruited as respondents for this research From statistical analysis, we find that Perceived brand globalness is positive related to both perceived brand quality and perceived brand prestige, which then significantly increase consumer purchase intention It also shows the critical role of brand credibility in leading to perceived of the quality of any brand This research provides important implications for developing global brand in Vietnam market and also for local brand

Key words: Purchase intention, brand globalness, consumer behaviors, brand

quality, brand prestige

ABSTRACT

TABLE OF CONTENTS

LIST OF FIGURES

LIST OF TABLES

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1

1.1 Research background 1

1.2 Research gap 3

1.3 Research objective 4

1.4 Research scope 4

1.5 Research contribution 5

1.6 Research structure 5

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW 7

2.1 Theory of Plan Behavior (TPB) 7

2.2 Purchase intention (PI) 9

2.3 Perceived brand globalness (PBG) 9

2.4 Brand credibility (BrC) 11

2.5 Perceive brand prestige (PBP) 12

2.6 Perceived brand quality (PBQ) 13

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY 17

3.1 Research procedure 17

3.2 Sample 18

3.3 Data collection and procedure 19

3.4 Scale and measurement: 20

4.2 Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) 26

4.3 Structural equation modeling (SEM) 31

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION, IMPLICATIONS AND LIMITATIONS 38

5.1 Conclusion 38

5.2 Managerial implication 39

5.3 Limitations and future research 41

REFERENCES 42

APPENDICES 52

Appendix A: Questionaire (English) 52

Appendix B: Questionaire (Vietnamese) 54

Figure 2.1 Conceptual model 16

Figure 4.3 Mediator analysis 35

Table 3.1 Source of measurement scale & Questionnaire 22

Table 4.3 Fit statistics of Confirmatory Factor Analysis 27

Table 4.6 Correlation matrix of research constructs 31

Table 4.9 Summary of hypotheses testing result 37

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

1.1 Research background

In a globalizing world, many international firms have moved from a multilocal to

a global branding strategy (Ozsomer & Altaras, 2008; Steenkamp et al., 2003) Due to Ozsomer et al (2012), global branding is understood as firms market their products on a global basis with only limited adaptation to local markets It standardizes aspects of its brand communication program like name, logo, image, packaging, positioning and consumers in multiple countries consider to be global (Akaka and Alden, 2010) In contrast, local brand is defined as brand that exists only in one country or in a limited geography area (Wolfe, 1991) Many multinational corporations today are altering their brand portfolios in favor of global brands (Steenkamp, Batra and Alden, 2003) which are brands that consumers can find under the same name in multiple countries with generally similar and centrally coordinated marketing strategies (Yip, 1995; Branch, 2001)

Globalness is perceived in mind of consumers and is called perceived brand globalness (Steenkamp, Batra and Alden, 2003) Perceived brand globalness has been researched mostly in the fast-moving consumer goods sections in highly developed countries, whereas the effect on retailer brand equity in emerging countries remains unclear

In Vietnamese context, many global brands are very successful compare to other local brands It began from late 1980s when Vietnam opened its market and welcomed foreign investment and trading Until now, besides agricultural products, food

processing products, textile… which are our domestic strengths products, almost other global productions have greater market share compare to the same local brand

productions The research of International Business Publication (2013, p.130) showed

consumers also remarkably familiar with foreign products even though they are not available in Vietnam due to internet access and contact to their foreign relative living abroad Vietnamese consumers, especially young people seem to prefer global brand

An assessment of a big fast- food brand in the world McDonald’s stated that “Vietnam has been at the top of McDonald's list of the next market to open for a very long time” (Maresca, 2014) Another example is the recent event of Starbucks store in Ho Chi Minh City On the opening day, it attracted a lot of young customers who were willing

to stand in long queues and wait for a long time for their chance to sample the ‘new’ coffee (The Saigon Times, 2013) This also is a value example for the readiness of Vietnamese customer toward foreign product

Actually, there is the challenge for local brands to get their market share and compete with other global brand within local market But building our local brand value has just been taken care recently And it seems that Perceived brand globalness is really

a new concept that very few Vietnamese brands have been successful in building an image as a global brand It is the fact that few Vietnamese corporate reaches the level of multinational company Moreover, to expand their business to an emerging market, retailers need to build the differentiation to distinguish themselves from local

competitors in target market Some reasons for moving toward global brands are yield economies of scale and scope in Research and Development, manufacturing and

marketing (Yip, 1995); increases meaningful segments of consumers around the world develop similar needs and tastes (Hassan and Katsanis, 1994); speed up time to market

by reducing time-consuming local modifications (Neff, 1999) Almost Vietnamese businessman should find the way to develop their products and increase sales by

exporting

This research will investigate the ways that global brand and perceived brand globalness affects purchase intention, whether the globalness of a brand play a vital role

in determining consumer purchase intention This is significant for foreign brand when penetrating to Vietnamese market And also for local brands, which are not recognized

by foreign market, consider if they want to bring their products abroad

1.2 Research gap

The concept of Perceived brand globalness and the effects of Perceived brand globalness to Purchase intention were investigated by some researchers with different accesses Most of the empirical study of Steenkamp (2003), Holt (2004), focused on the pathway through Perceived brand quality and perceived brand prestige Consumer prefers import products due to their superior quality It was showed that Purchase

intention be affected by customer’s perceived brand globalness toward perceive of its higher quality and brand prestige through word of mouth or observation This pathway

is also moderated by Consumer Ethnocentrism, a well-established bias among many consumers in favor of home-grown productions (Shimp & Sharma, 1987) The next trend of accessing this effect is proving the important of customer- based reputation which implies high quality productions and services offered by company, as well as the certainly that it would treat its customers well (Carmeli & Tishler, 2005; Greenwood,

Li, Prakash & Deephouse, 2005) Another point of view, perceived brand globalness affects purchase intention by Brand credibility as a mediating variable If a brand is view as globally available and, thus, there is global acceptance for the product,

consumer may perceive the brand is more credibility than local brands (Ozsomer & Altaras, 2008) But there is no other study concentrated on this mediating effect of Brand credibility on the relationship of perceived brand globalness and purchase

likelihood It is just as an integrated conceptual framework as Ozsomer and Altaras (2008) did suppose

Moreover, the majority of researches have been conducted in developed

countries Actually perceived brand globalness is not meaningful in advanced economic

because consumer tends to perceive local product with higher quality than import one (Dickerson, 1982; Herche, 1994) In contrast, with an emerging market, just few

researches worked on this concept, and most of them stated that production quality is the most meaningful attribute to consumers due to experiencing the low-quality of local production However to evaluate the quality of a production is not an easy task

(Nguyen, Nguyen & Barrett, 2008) Moreover, Batra and his colleagues (2000) find a direct relationship between the perceived nonlocalness of the brand and attitude toward the brand, where nonlocalness was measured by perceptions of multimarket reach And other studies focused on direct relation of different factors while in this study,

researcher examine the role of Brand credibility as a mediating variable affect customer purchase intention in transitional market like Vietnam

Therefore the conceptual model of this study is showed the effect of perceived brand globalness to brand values which includes brand credibility, perceived brand quality, perceived brand prestige, and then to customers purchase intention

international product and get their intentions of choosing to consume any of production The three target groups in Ho Chi Minh City, with the first two groups are students from high schools and universities and the other group is office staffs categorized by their age ranging to represent teenagers and adult workers which will mix gender The time frame

is 1 month after pilot test was agreed

Qualitative research was conducted firstly to confirm the reality of the

questionnaire, and also the reliability of Vietnamese questionnaire The interviewees were classmates and colleagues of researcher After that, the final questionnaire was fitted and the quantitative research was conducted to collect data for confirm the

deciding to penetrate to the new market in order to maximize opportunities and

minimize obstacle This study is useful for foreign investors understand what

Vietnamese customer need, and then have the straight strategy to attract and maintain customers’ loyalty Moreover, it also works for local brand managers who want to make their brands survive and compete in an emerging market like Vietnam

1.6 Research structure

The research is divided into five chapters The introduction chapter demonstrates background of the research Furthermore, this chapter briefs some previous research that

is relevant and helpful for the author to look for the research gap Deriving from

research gap, the research questions and research objectives are also generated The

study scope is also mentioned in this chapter Chapter two reviews and synthesizes the theories of six concepts, including Perceived brand globalness, Brand credibility, Perceived brand quality, Perceived brand prestige, Brand purchase intention This chapter also shows previous research, hypotheses, and the conceptual model The third chapter covers research methodology used to empirically test the research model Next, the analysis and result chapter shows the steps of data processing The last chapter discusses summarily the study findings, suggests some recommendations for any new business strategy on branding and building a brand image Moreover, this chapter covers the limitation of the research and suggestion for further study

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW

This chapter mainly introduces the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB, Ajzen, 1991) and its application to purchase intention of imported product, and constructs which are proposed by many scholars in academic field, related to each factors in the research model of the study After that, Perceived brand globalness concept is

introduced to clarify specially about perceived global brand definition Continuously, the related theories of each construct, including Brand credibility, Perceived brand quality, Perceived brand prestige, Brand purchase intention are discussed respectively Finally, research model is proposed, and also its constructs and relationship

hypothesized among these constructs

2.1 Theory of Plan Behavior (TPB)

Theory of Planned Behavior (Ajzen, 1991) is an extension of Theory of

Reasoned Action (TRA) which was introduced by Fishbein and Ajzen in 1975, due to the original model’s limitation in dealing with behavior According to TRA, individual intention to perform a given behavior correlates with actual behavior and determined by two basic components which are attitude toward behavior and subjective norm

Attitudes represent an individual’s overall evaluations of the behaviour as positive or negative Subjective norms assess the perceived social pressures to perform or not perform a particular behavior TRA could adequately predict behaviors that were

relatively straightforward (i.e under volitional control), under circumstances where there were constraints on action, the mere formation of an intention was insufficient to predict behavior (Armitage & Conner, 2001) Moreover, as Ajzen (1991) stated that behavioral achievement depends jointly on motivation (intention) and ability

(behavioral control) is by no means new It constitutes the basis for theorizing on such diverse issues as animal learning (Hull, 1943), level of aspiration (Lewin, Dembo,

Festinger, & Sears, 1944), performance on psychomotor and cognitive tasks (Locke, 1965; Vroom, 1964), and person perception and attribution (Anderson, 1974)

Therefore, TPB was introduced to extend TRA by a measure of perceived

behavioral control It suggested that behavior is best predicted by intention to perform the behavior (Ajzen, 1991) Intention is influenced by attitude towards the behavior, subjective norm and perceived behavioral control Perceived behavioral control is

defined as the individual’s perception of the extent to which performance of the

behavior is easy or difficult for that individual Perceived behavioral control is also held

to influence behavior directly when perceptions of control match actual control

(Armitage & Conner, 2001) Due to Ajzen (1991) the relative importance of attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control in the prediction of intention is

expected to vary across behaviors and situations And consistent with an emphasis on factors that are directly linked to a particular behavior, perceived behavioral control refers to people’s perception of the ease or difficulty of performing the behavior of interest Perceived behavioral control also refers to a specific behavioral context and not

to a generalized predisposition According to TPB, perceived behavioral control and behavioral intention can be combined to predict behavioral achievement

In summary, to predict whether or not a person intends to carry out any action, it should be come from thinking of whether people is favor on doing it (attitude), how much people feels social pressure to do it (subjective norm), and whether or not people feels control of their action (perceived behavioral control) By changing of these three factors, it will increase the change of people carry out the action and also increase the change of people actually doing it This study focus on identify the factors influencing the purchase intention of people towards global brands with the application of TPB model Moreover, additional independent variables are also being tested in this study

2.2 Purchase intention (PI)

In marketing area, attitude of customer is one of the most important indicators for marketers to achieve consumer insight Consumers’ attitude is the consumers’ feeling include good or bad, endorsement or preference towards product attribute, which is considered as the criteria that consumers refer to make purchasing decisions (Hanzaee

& Jalalian, 2012)

Intentions are defined as plans or goals It can be conceived as goal states in the expectancy value tradition that are the result of a conscious take- time process, requires some deliberation, and focuses on consequences (Loewenstein, Weber, Hsee, & Welch, 2001) Fishbein and Ajzen (1975) defined intention as a subjective probability

dimension involving a relation between himself and some actions

Then Purchase intention means a consumer plans to purchase a particular product

or service in the future or even attitude towards a product and perception of product (BusinessDictionary, 2013) In other words, purchase intention means consumers will buy a product once again after they evaluate a product and find out that the product is worth buying Whereas consumers choose one particular product, the final decision on accepting a product to buy or reject it depends on consumers’ intention Purchase

intention can affect the buying decision of customers in the future (Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975) Attitude towards complementing a behavior is considered as an assessment of the level that a person likes or dislikes to perform the behavior (Finlay et al, 2002)

2.3 Perceived brand globalness (PBG)

According to Yip (1995) and Steenkamp et al (2003), Perceived brand globalness

is defined as a perception that can be formed only if consumers believe the brand is marketed in multiple countries and is generally recognized as global in these countries Manufacturers have products that are internally considered to be global because they

share similar technical specifications (Branch, 2001) Perceived brand globalness is primarily achieved through the use of global symbols such as brand name, symbols, themes, brand logo, spokesperson… in marketing communications These brands are built on powerful narratives with universal appeal, example for Levi’s, the myth of independence; for Nokia, of connection (Cayla and Eckhardt, 2007)

Due to Ozsomer and Altaras (2008), the term “global brand” has been defined in

a variety of way in the literature There are two distinct definitions this construct One

of them, global brands are those that use similar brand name positioning strategy, and marketing mixed in most of their target markets It is based on marketing

standardization as global brand is building for benefit from strong economic scale and scope It means standardized brand can create significant cost saving in marketing, research and development, sourcing and manufacturing (Buzzeell, 1968; Craig and Douglas, 2000; Levitt, 1983; Porter, 1986; Yip, 1995) By this way, the global brand will benefit from unique perceived image in all its markets, especially when targeting global consumer segment (Hassan, Craft & Kortam, 2003; Hassan & Katsanis, 1991)

The second standard of identifying global brand is defined from the consumer perceptions perspective (Alden, Steenkamp, & Batra, 2006) It extends the definition to which the brand is perceived as global and marketed not only locally but also in some foreign market If a brand increases perceived as multimarket reach, the perceived brand globalness increase as well (Steenkamp, Batra, & Alden, 2003)

Consumer perception of a “global” brand can be formed in one of two ways Firstly, consumers may found the same brand in other countries, through media

exposure, word of mouth (heard from friends or relatives who returned from oversea),

or their own travel abroad Secondly, a brand can be observe by marketing

communication that used brand names, endorsers, advertising themes, packaging and other symbols widely associated with a “modern”, urban lifestyle, even if it not

available worldwide (Alden et al., 1999) Despite of how consumer perceive brand as global, the questions of interest here are whether consumer perceptions of brand

globalness affect purchase intention, especially in developing country like Vietnam

2.4 Brand credibility (BrC)

Brand credibility is defined as a signal to be the believability of the product position information contained in a brand, which depends on a brand’s willingness and ability to offer what it promises to customers (Erdem & Swait, 2004) In other words,

“brand credibility is an extent to which the product position information contained in a brand is perceived as believable” (Ozsomer & Altaras, 2008)

Brand credibility consists of two main components: trustworthiness and expertise (Erdem & Swait, 1998) Trustworthy refers to the willingness of a firm to deliver what they have promised Expertise refers to the ability of a firm to actually deliver what they have promised And these trustworthy and expertise of a brand are based on the

cumulative impacts of all previous marketing and action taken by a brand (Kim, Beak &

Yu, 2010) If brand as signals begin to lose their credibility by not delivering what they promised, their brand equity will be erode (Ozsomer & Altaras, 2008) Therefore

keeping brand credibility is very important

According to Erdem and Swait (1998) brands with greater marketing- mix

consistency and greater brand investments, such as advertising, have been proved to convey higher levels of credibility Marketing-mix consistency means the degree of harmony and convergence among marketing action and the stability of marketing

strategy over time (Erdem, Swait, & Valenzuela, 2006) It also showed the consistency

in product quality as leads to a low level of inherent product variability (Roberts & Urban, 1988) Brand investments represent resource spent on brand to ensure that brand promises will be kept and demonstrate long-term commitment to the brand (Klein &

Leffler, 1981) This reinforces the credibility of brand by compelling the firms to be honest in their product claims and to deliver the promised production

We proposed that global brands with greater brand investment and greater

marketing-mix consistency across major market and time are greater credibility

(Ozsomer & Altaras, 2008) Based on the preceding discussion, the following

hypothesis is advanced

H1 The perceived brand globalness has positive impact on Brand credibility

2.5 Perceive brand prestige (PBP)

Brand prestige is defined as the relatively high status of product positioning associated with a brand (Steenkamp, Batra & Alden, 2003) Prestige is a significant association related to global brands (Holt, Quelch, and Taylor, 2004; Steenkamp, Batra and Alden, 2003) Certain consumers are said to buy global brands to enhance their self-image as being cosmopolitan, sophisticated and modern (Friedman, 1990) Due to Alden, Steenkamp, and Batra (1999) consumers tend to perceive the consumption of prestige brands as a signal of social status, wealth, or power since prestige brands are infrequently purchased and are strongly linked to an individual’s self-concept and social image In general, the higher prestige of the global brands may be due to the scarcity and higher price compare to the local brands (Batra et al, 2000) It seems that higher price and greater scarcity create greater inspirational, prestige appeal (Bearden and Etzel, 1982) Moreover, research on developing countries of Bhat and Reddy (1998) showed that the consumption of products from Western countries acts as a symbol of status and prestige American products also were associated as high prestige

Consumers believe that brand globalness is linked to prestige and may enhance their self-image by adding a touch of modernity to their personalities (Schuiling & Kapferer, 2004) We supposed the hypothesis here is

H2 Perceived brand globalness positively affects consumers perceived brand prestige

Actually, brand prestige does not all individuals at the same degree

Consumption of prestige brand is varied according to susceptibility to other (Vigneron

& Johnson, 1999) According to O’Cass and Frost (2002), prestige brands differ from non-prestige brands in some ways that may affect consumer’s purchasing motives to improve their social standing and self-expression Perceived brand prestige has a

greater effect on purchase intention when the product category is of high social display value (Wong and Zhou, 2005) We replicate this relationship as follow

H3 Perceived brand prestige positively affects consumers purchase intention

2.6 Perceived brand quality (PBQ)

Perceived brand quality is defined as consumers’ subjective evaluation of the overall excellence of the product (Zeithaml, 1988) and the credibility of global brands makes consumers associate high quality with these brands (Akram, Merunka, Akram, 2011) Perceived quality is an attitude that results from the comparison of consumer expectations with the actual performance (Parasuraman et al., 1985) According to Baldauf, Cravens and Binder (2003), perceived quality is evaluated about the product for varied individual consumers according to their satisfaction The perceived quality is

a key factor that many firms can create their competitive advantage in their relative industry

If a brand is viewed as globally available, consumers may attribute higher quality

to the brand because such quality is likely to be thought of as critical to global

acceptance (Kapferer, 1997; Steenkamp, Batra and Alden, 2003) Due to Dimofte et al (2008), global brands are developed for a global market with their main characteristics being world wide availability and recognition as well as standardization across

countries Therefore, global availability and acceptance is taken as evidence that brand has to be as high quality (Steenkamp, 2014) As the finding of Akram, Merunka and Akram (2011), global brands charge a premium price which also signals higher quality, and advertising messages are often promoting higher quality It is unlikely that bad product can be successful around the globe (Steenkamp, Batra and Alden, 2003) It also likely that in emerging and developing countries, consumers perceive global brands to

be of a higher quality than local ones (Batra etal.,2000; Bhardwaj etal.,2010) Therefore

we supposed a hypothesis

H4 Perceived brand globalness positively affects consumers perceived brand quality

There is some empirical evidences approach to brand effects on consumer

consideration and choice that perceived quality is one of the main direct routes through which credibility effects materialize (Erdem & Swait, 1998) Wernerfelt (1988) stated that higher signal brand credibility may increase consumer perceptions of quality

Consumers may infer that more credible brands are higher in quality than less credible brands Credible brand may increase consumers’ quality perceptions (Aaker, 1999)

Moreover, there are some streams which are discussed in the research of Erdem and Swait (1998) showed that production quality can be evaluated by brand credibility The first stream focused on brand invested and its reputation for high quality (Shapiro, 1985) can ensure its commitment to high quality But they may lose their brand image if the firm cheating and not give what they promised Another stream believed marketing- mix elements are signal of good quality Packaging, advertising, and warranties are not only providing direct production information, but also show indirect information on product attribute (Spence, 1974) Warranties also were proposed by many other

researches of Boulding & Kirmani (1993), Grossman (1981), Lutz (1989) as a signal that manufactures’ confidence in the quality of their product There are also empirical

approaches showed that perceived quality is of the direct routes through which

credibility effects materialize (Erdem & Swait, 2004) Finally, as research of Wernerfelt (1988) showed multinational firms can take advantage of their reputation for quality by using the brand name of an established product for a new experience good Therefore

we proposed the hypothesis as below

H5 Brand credibility mediates the relationships among perceived brand

globalness and global brand quality

Perceived quality of strong brands adds value to consumers’ purchase

evaluations (Low & Lamb, 2000) The research of Supphellen and Rittenburg (2001) also showed in developing country, the customers are fully aware that the quality of local brands absolutely tends to be lower than foreign brand The common observation and recent empirical studies have shown that brands perceived as global induced better quality ratings, which in turn increased desire to buy (Kapferer, 2001) In a recent article, Bartikowski et al (2010) commented that in the short run, higher quality

perceptions lead to increase profit due to premium prices And in the long run, to

effective business growth, involving both market expansion and market share gains Above of all, Aaker (1991) did show in the research that the purchase decision is also influenced by the perceived quality which is also an aspect of brand value that makes consumers pay for certain products or services So our hypothesis is

H6 Perceived brand quality positively affects consumers purchase intention The literature shows the most compelling force that drives the consumers to the purchase intention of any global brand is the quality According to Jacoby and Olson (1985), perceived quality is the primary driver of purchase intention, regardless of product category, consumer section and time frame The quality perception plays a vital role in determining consumer preferences for these brands because global is

be linked directly with perceived prestige For example, Steenkamp, Batra, and Alden (2003) found that consumer value of a global brand is positively associated with both brand prestige and perceived brand quality But brand prestige just affects limited target customers As example of Steenkamp et al (2003) it is the concerned of each market or segment (e.g., young urban consumers), product categories (socially visible

productions…), certain stages of market revolution (e.g., where global brand are a novelty , extremely expensive, or scare (Ger et al, as cited in Steenkamp, 2003))

Therefore we hypothesize:

H7 Compared to Perceived brand prestige, Perceived brand quality has a

stronger effect on purchase intention

The conceptual model representing all hypothesized relationships between the construct is as below

Figure 2.1 Conceptual model

Perceived Brand quality

Brand purchase intention

Perceived

Brand

Globalness

Brand Credibility

Brand prestige

CHAPTER 3: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

This chapter presents the research method was used for this study to test the research model and hypotheses specified in chapter 2 Firstly, it starts with describing the process to do the research Next, the sampling method was outlined After that the data collection method and procedure was described Then, measurement scales are presented to develop questionnaire An in-depth interview also was conducted to help measurement scales clearer and understandable Beside, this chapter aims at explicating the research approach choice and presenting the purposes of using that method

Figure 3.1 Research procedure

3.2 Sample

The study was focus on Vietnamese market to test the theoretical model

Therefore the aim respondent is Vietnamese consumer, especially for more convenient, the survey was conducted in Ho Chi Minh City The sample was selected using a non-probability sampling technique - convenience sample Target respondents of this survey were people who lived in Ho Chi Minh City, one of big modern cities and present of most foreign brands in the world The sample size was necessarily big enough to

guarantee statistical significance Hair et al (2009) stated that the minimum sample for appropriate use for statistical analysis is equal to or greater than five times of number of variables, but not less than 100

n>=100 and n>=5k (k: number of variables)

This research covers 5 variables with 17 scales Therefore total questionnaire should be more than 100 to meet the requirement

Moreover, to obtain reliable estimates, structural equation modeling (SEM) requires a considerable sample size (Joreskog & Sorbom, 1996) So the researcher collected about 300 responses to have more credible data

3.3 Data collection and procedure

Data collection was conducted in Ho Chi Minh City The current study consisted mainly of two stages, a qualitative phase followed by a quantitative phase

The hypothesis was tested across two product categories to increase the

generalizability of the results Product categories and brands were selected from a large set developed through focus groups The brands were also important to choose

categories vary on globalness while being reasonably familiar Two brands in each category were chosen to present the global and local ends in order to increase the

probability of variance on perceived brand globalness The chosen brands were

supposed by in-depth interview with research’s supervisor and some other colleagues to take the most familiar brands to respondents Then product categories selected were coffee shop brands (Starbucks, Trung Nguyen) and fast food restaurants (Mc Donald’s, Lotteria) which are the most concerned choices to every people every day All of these four brands are popular in Vietnam so it would be easier to get the responding

The survey questionnaire was originally designed in English and then translated into Vietnamese by the researcher with the support of some English language experts The Vietnamese version questionnaire was also pre-test using in-depth interviews to check whether they understood clearly about the scale or not During the interview, the author also wanted to find out if the chosen measurement scale was suitable for

conducting the research in Viet Nam All the comments from the interviewees were gathered with the aim to modify the measurement scale

Based on the feedback of respondents, the survey questionnaire was modified to make it clearer and more understandable

To avoid respondent fatigue, product category was rotated across questionnaires,

in set of two brands in different category Hence each respondent answered question for two brands randomly in one of two pair of production: McDonald’s and Trung Nguyen; Starbucks and Lotteria So each questionnaire can get two observations for two different brands

As mentioned above, researcher intends to collect about 300 responds Therefore, for the survey, 200 questionnaires were distributed directly by paper and indirectly via Google survey to respondents Specifically, 150 paper questionnaires were delivered directly to researcher and friends’ colleagues The remained 50 questionnaires were sent via email to other researcher’s friend

After data collection, total 185 questionnaires were collected, represented for 370 responses The response rate was approximately 92 percent

However, there only 309 responses were qualified for data analysis process Total 63 responses were deleted with 39 responses indicated that they do not familiar with sample brands, the others 24 responses was invalid because they just chosen one option for all the questions or their answers were implausible Finally, 309 responses were used for this research It was satisfactory in comparison with minimum sample size for all the tests

3.4 Scale and measurement:

Perceived brand globalness, Brand credibility, perceived brand quality, perceived brand prestige, Purchase intention were measured by 7-point Likert scales, anchor

points including “strongly disagree” (=1), “disagree” (=2), “slightly disagree” (=3),

“neutral” (=4),”slightly agree” (=5), “agree” (=6) and “strongly agree” (=7) The

questionnaire mainly delivered to respondents by paper in convenient cases However,

to have enough respondent in time, the online version via the internet using Google Survey still was used

All the variables in the model were measured with multiple items, which

developed by other researchers, to adequately capture the domain of the constructs Specifically, perceived brand globalness was measured by three items of Steenkamp, Batra & Alden (2003); Brand credibility was measured by four items of Erdem & Swait (1998), Kim, Beak & Yu (2010); perceived brand quality measured by three items of Keller & Aaker (1992); perceived brand prestige measured by three items of Han & Terpstra (1988), Kim, Beak & Yu (2010); brand purchase intention measured by four items of Dodds et al (1991), Kim, Beak & Yu (2010) Then totally we had five variables with seventeen difference items to measure

3.5 Questionnaire design

The questionnaire was divided into three sections The first section explores respondents’ knowledge about the survey brands through Brand familiar questionnaire which developed by Steenkamp, Batra & Alden in 2003 with four questions (1) “This brand is very familiar to me”, (2) “Everybody here has heard of this brand”, (3) “I am very knowledgeable about this brand”, (4) “I have seen many advertisement for it in magazines, radio or TV” If the answer of these questions is lower than 4, so the

respondent could stop their job and might move to another couple brands instead

The second section was mainly focused on consumers’ attitude toward perceived brand globalness To avoid response bias, all concepts’ name will be eliminated from the questionnaire; total questions present continuously in one table

The last section includes demographics information such as gender, age, and monthly total income of the respondents This information will be used to classify and compare groups of respondent

Table 3.1 Source of measurement scale & Questionnaire

Variable & source of measurement

Perceived brand globalness

(Steenkamp, Batra & Alden, 2003)

- To me, this is a global brand

- I do think consumers overseas buy this brand

- This brand is sold all over the world

Brand credibility (Erdem & Swait,

1998; Kim, Beak & Yu, 2010)

- This brand delivers what it promises

- You can believe what the ads said about this brand

- Overtime, my experiences with this brand let

me to expect it to keep it promises

- This brand has a name you can trust

Perceived brand quality (Keller &

Aaker, 1992)

- This brand is very high on overall quality

- This is a brand of superior quality

- This is a very well made brand

Perceived brand prestige (Han &

Terpstra, 1988; Kim, Beak & Yu,

2010)

- This is a very prestigious brand

- This brand has high status

- This brand is very upscale

Brand purchase intention (Dodds et

al, 1991; Kim, Beak & Yu, 2010)

- I would buy this brand

- I would seriously consider purchasing this brand

- How likely would you be to purchase this brand?

- I will definitely recommend that friend buy this brand

Alden, 2003) - Everybody here has heard of this brand

- I am very knowledgeable about this brand

- I have seen many advertisement for it in magazines, radio or TV

3.6 Data analysis method

The collected data was processed by SPSS and AMOS software Firstly, the researcher used the confirmatory factor analyses to evaluate internal consistency and validity of the underlying constructs A confirmatory factor analysis, using AMOS with maximum likelihood estimation method, was conducted to ensure the validity and

unidimensionality of the underlying constructs After achieving the satisfactory fit in the measurement model, the structure model was estimated Due to Close et al (2006), this method accepts for rigorous testing of measurement reliability and validity before

subjecting the structural model the test it fit Lateral, structural equation modeling was used to test the theoretical models of study

CHAPTER 4: DATA ANALYSIS

In this chapter, the data collected was analyzed by SPSS and AMOS software package Then the result of research hypotheses testing is shown

Main survey was conducted by directly delivered paper questionnaire 309

responses were qualified for data analysis process, as about 83% of delivered

questionnaire The characteristic of sample was analyzed below

school Income per month was divided into four groups The highest rate was ranged from 7 million VND to 12 million VND with 51.1% There was 27.8% of respondent earned lower than 7 million VND per month The number of respondent earned from 12 million VND to 20 million VND was 16.5% The last proportion with the lowest

percentages was the respondents with 4.5% of people who earned more than 20 million VND a month