THE EFFECT OF BRAND EXPERIENCE
ON CUSTOMER SATISFACTION
FOR UTILITARIAN BRANDS
Master Thesis – Msc. Business Studies
Felix van der Heijden 6120016 Supervisor Mw. Dr. K.A. Venetis University of Amsterdam
Table of contents
1 Introduction 3 2 Theory 8 2.1 Brand experience 8 2.2 Customer satisfaction 10 2.3 Quality 11 2.4 Utilitarian 12 2.5 Sensory dimension 13 2.5.1 Scent 14 2.5.2 Sight 15 2.5.3 Hearing 15 2.5.4 Taste 16 2.5.5 Touch 16 2.6 Effective dimension 16 2.6.1 Emotions 16 2.6.2 Mood 17 2.7 Behavioural dimension 18 2.8 Intellectual dimension 18 3 Hypotheses 20 4 Research method 244.1 Research design and data collection 24
5 Results 26 5.1 Response data 26 5.2 Scale analysis 27 5.3 Correlation 29 5.4 Descriptive 30 5.5 Mulitcollinearity 31 5.6 Moderation 33 5.7 Hypotheses testing 34 6 Conclusion – discussion 38 7 Managerial implications 40 8 Limitations 41 9 Further research 43 10 Reference list 44 11 Appendix – Questionnaire 47 2
1 Introduction
Many useful constructs and measurements have been developed recently in de branding literature of modern marketing. Brands try to create a better world, and with their brand they strive to deliver one (van Ham, 2002). Branding consists of different dimensions, and many useful academic literature is written about better understanding the world of branding. However, only brand marketing is not enough for commercial success on the long term (Sevier, 2007).
Levy (1959) describes that during the 1950s consumers not just buy products for what they can do, but also for what they mean. This awareness became of interest for marketing and became an important discussing in marketing literature and practice. This new shift in marketing continued on and on, and in the 1960s the incorporation and notion of symbolic meaning and lifestyle was start getting more interest (Levy, 1963). From the 1970s there was a gap in research and a discussion started towards product symbolism and lifestyle. The reason for this was an overload of the motivation research era (Hirschman & Holbrook, 1982). All though, this hiatus in research of symbolism, Holbrooke & Hirschman (1982) shed light into a new phenomenon named “hedonic” consumption. They describe this consumption as followed: “Hedonic consumption designates those facets of consumer behaviour that relate to the multisensory, fantasy and emotive aspects of one's experience with products”. The introduction of hedonic consumption changed the point of view of traditional consumer research. The hedonic view became quickly a topic of behavioural science as it included emotions and imaginable aspects. To capture these aspects of hedonic consumptions moreover marketeers where starting to get interested in the experience of a brand.
Sevier (2007) wrote an article that describes marketing communication by a three-legged stool. Brand marketing is the first stool, followed by the direct response of consumers via direct marketing. The third stool is the one that Sevier (2007) thinks is the one that is most underestimated in nowadays commercial marketing success; customer experience, also related to brand experience. The problem with the two described stools is that the promise of the brand does not reach the audience at any time. The value of direct marketing reaches their audience but the message often is misunderstood, less appreciated and does not promise what they communicate. Sevier (2007) third tool, customer experience, does or can deliver the flaws in the first two stools.
The focus of this brand experience view is more and more gaining interest in academic literature. Schembri (2008) state that this view is necessary for building and understanding brand-consumer relationships. Moreover, Schembri (2008) is explaining the increasing number of consumers that identified the effective branding in the socio-cultural experience surrounding brand consumption.
The reason why brand experience is important is because it encompasses every aspect of a company’s offering. The quality of customer care, but also advertising, packaging, product and service features, ease of use, and reliability (Meyer and Schwager, 2007). An example of a company that surrounds their products with brand experiences is Abercrombie & Fitch. Their core product, apparel, is all about the Abercrombie & Fitch experience. Every detail is focused on stimulating the sensory, affective, behavioural and emotional sense of consumers. Consumers just want to be a part of this community and want to experience a trip through their stores. By doing so they create a very valuable marketing point: customer satisfaction and loyalty.
With the awareness of brand experience Brakus et al. (2009) studied the topic brand experience and created a measurement scale in measuring a brand experience with four dimensions (sensory, affective, behaviour and intellectual). The measurement scale they developed showed validity, reliability, and is distinct from other brand measurements, that include brand personality, brand involvement, brand evaluation, brand attachment, and customer delight. As far as found was this the only measurement scale that shows an effect of brand experience on customer satisfaction and customer loyalty. All though the topic of brand experience shad light for many brands mainly research is done on the context in which specific product and service experience occurs (Arnould, Price, and Zinkhan 2002).
Brakus et al. (2009) describe their context of brand experience and how it affects customer satisfaction through brand personality. Brakus et al. (2009) concluded from their empirical results that a brand experience comes in a variety of settings when consumers are involved with searching, shopping and consuming a brand. Their main conclusion is that brand experience has a behavioural impact as it effects customer satisfaction and loyalty direct and indirect through brand personality. Babin et al. (1994) developed a scale assessing consumers ‘evaluations of shopping experience’ along two important dimensions: utilitarian and hedonic values. Given a growing interest and recognition that shopping involves experiential as well as instrumental outcomes Babin et al. (1994) showed that their scale, that measures consumers values, is indicated both hedonic and in utilitarian terms. They acknowledged that not all consumers’ behaviour is directed toward satisfying some functional, physical, or economic need.
To come back on the hedonic and utilitarian part Jones et al. (2006) investigated the differential effects on retail outcomes. They centrally focused the
complex interrelationship between shopping value and retail variables. The purpose of their research was to investigate how hedonic and utilitarian shopping values differ in their relationship with several important retail outcomes variables. They concluded that utilitarian shopping value may very well be a necessary, but not sufficient conditions for building store loyalty. And that hedonic values drive customer satisfaction.
To describe hedonic products Holbrook and Hirschman (1982) used the words fantasies, feelings and fun. Due to an increased arousal, heightened involvement, fantasy fulfilment, and escapism, hedonic valuable shopping experience are becoming very important to create a brand (Bloch and Richins 1983b; Hirschman 1983). An example of a brand that plays in on hedonic values is Starbucks. With their strategy they create communities where they seek to fulfil the need of fantasies, feelings and fun. Their experiential branding strategy contributes on creating an ambience based on human spirit and the need of people coming together.
The relationship between customer satisfaction and quality has received also a lot of attention in marketing literature (Balton and Drew, 1994). Many researchers have studied this field of marketing and all agreed that one of the antecedents of customer satisfaction is quality (Anderson and Fornel, 1994). Within the research of Brakus et al. (2009) this antecedent is missing both in literature and in their research. As we know the importance of quality what is the importance of a brand experience for quality?
Tremendous research is done about brand experience, utilitarian versus hedonic values, and quality. However, none of these studies in brand experience have considered focusing on the importance of a brand experience for customer satisfaction and the difference for utilitarian brands versus hedonic brands. Besides, the relative
importance of a brand experience for quality is also missing. This is in a way strange as both topics, separate, receive lot of attention in academic literature.
The purpose of this research presented is to investigate how important a brand experience is for customer satisfaction with utilitarian values, by the hand of Brakus et al. (2009) brand experience scale, and the importance of a brand experience for quality. It could be that for utilitarian brands a brand experience is not or less of important in compare with their counterpart hedonic brands. The outcome of this research could also state that the four items used in the brand experience scale of Brakus et al. (2009) are not or less important for utilitarian brands that foresees in utilitarian values, and that quality plays a key role in a brand experience for utilitarian brands. By examine this and to find differences for utilitarian brands it could contribute to the existing literature in brand experience and able utilitarian brands to create their specific brand experience. For utilitarian brands it could give new insight for marketing purpose, to decide whether or not to focus on a brand experience, which strategies to implement, and which dimensions are of importance for that brand experience. With this all stated the research question of this study is: How important is a brand experience for customer satisfaction, and is it different for utilitarian brands?
The remainder of this research is constructed as follows. First, relevant literature is discussed that reviews brand experience, customer satisfaction, quality, utilitarian, and the four dimensions by Brakus et al. (2009). From here the hypotheses are created that underbuilt the research question. Next, will the method be discussed that collects the most sufficient results. Than the results are analysed and discussed. Finally, this study ends with a general discussion of the findings, limitations, and a part for future research.
2 Theory – Literature review
The following chapter will focus on the foundation of this study. First an introduction will be made for brand experience. After this is done the importance of customer satisfaction will be discussed. The third part will describe quality followed by an explanation of utilitarian. Finally, an in-depth overview is given of the four dimensions of the brand experience scale from Brakus et al. (2009).
2.1 Brand experience
Many studies have been conducted on brand experience but the pioneers of experience literature have been done by Holbrook and Hirschman (1982). They recognized the changes in branding and noticed the demand of experimental dimensions of customer behaviour. They came up with a so called “experiental view”. They identified three “experiental” aspects of their view: fantasies, feelings and fun. Where the goal for the consumers lies to gain these three aspects beyond only being a rational consumer searching for brands. They are mainly driven by their emotions. Holbrook and Hirschman (1982) describe these human beings as ‘human beings who daydream about pleasurable adventures, respond emotionally to consumption situations, and use products in various playful leisure activities’.
Pine and Gilmore (1998) wrote the book: The experience economy. They state that it is of great importance to deliver a memorable experience with consumers because services become more and more commoditized. They explain that consumers think of brand experience across two bi-polar constructs, customer participation and connection. Pine and Gilmore (1998) used their framework on customer involvement in intensity, to find four so called ‘experience zones’. These zones are: entertainment, education, escapist and aesthetic.
Another interesting study is done by Schmitt (1999). He clearly describes the shift from traditional marketing, that came from the industrial age, towards “experiental” marketing. Due to all the changes in technology and interest from consumers the traditional way of marketing did not reached the demand of the consumers. Companies experienced the difficulties of reaching the expectations of their consumers as they were no longer based on functional needs. Schmitt (1999) came up with the strategic “experiental” modules that where: sense, feel, think, and act. All related and relevant for a customer experience according to Schmitt (1999). His overall conclusion is to become a superior brand, an experience includes all these factors.
Brakus et al. (2009) researched the effect of a brand experience towards customer satisfaction and loyalty by the hand of their brand experience scale that includes four dimensions: sensory, affective, behavioural and intellectual. The dimension social was deleted after conducting a factor analyses on the data. Social did not present significant results towards brand experience and was loading to heavy on affective. The other four dimensions did show a strong effect on customer satisfaction and loyalty that occurred from a brand experience. The four experience dimensions of Pine and Gillmore (1998) present an overlap with the measurement dimensions from the literature review of Brakus et al. (2009). Sensory is relates to aesthetics, education overlaps intellectual and emotional is partnered with the entertainment dimension, at last affective can be merged with behavioural.
According to Zanna (1978, 1981) brand experience can be seen in two levels. The indirect- and direct experience. Direct experience is the experience that occurs during physical consuming a product. Indirect experience is related towards brand attitudes that occur with experiencing an advertising campaign or corporate brand
image. Fazio and Zanna (1978, 1981) presented empirical evidence that the effect of direct experience on behavioural intentions is stronger than the indirect experience. It seems that direct experience is a possible evaluation basis for customer satisfaction. If their research holds true, customer satisfaction should influence brand loyalty stronger than brand attitudes. The indirect experience is also of importance including a total brand experience. Phau & Prendergast (2000) state that higher brand awareness yields higher levels of brand preferences which generates stronger purchase intentions.
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2.2 Customer Satisfaction
days) and lower in intensity than an emotion. Yet, exceptions
For many decades customer satisfaction has been seen as a very important topic for discussion in the field of marketing. Conferences, publications in Journals, all got the attention since the mid-1970s. In these decades customer satisfaction was for marketing one of the most important topics, and more than 1200 articles have been published in the field of customer satisfaction research (Perkins, 1991).
As customer satisfaction became a wide spread marketing notion, it was an important point of attention of any commercial firm. Boulding et al. (1993) describe two conceptualizations of customer satisfaction: transaction-specific and cumulative. Whereas transaction specific customer satisfaction is viewed as a post-choice evaluative judgment of a specific purchase occasion that does not explain the past, previous and future satisfaction. The cumulative satisfaction exists over time and is an overall evaluation based on the total purchase and consumption experience with a good or service. (Fornell 1992; Johnson and Forell 1991). Both conceptualizations are of importance and differ in the time period of the satisfaction.
Fornell et al. (1996) describe the three main antecedents of customer satisfaction. These determinants are: customer expectations, perceived quality, and perceived value. Where perceived value is created by the notion of customer
expectations and perceived quality. Perceived quality and expectations have here a direct and positive effect on customer satisfaction.
All though customer satisfaction got the intention for many years in the field of marketing due to changing customer behaviour and time, customers where not only taking satisfaction as their main driver. With the change to the hedonic lifestyle customers wanted to experience a brand not only buying it (Holbrook and Hirschman, 1982).
The same as one of the antecedent of satisfaction: quality. Due to the changing shift in experience the question is what the influence of quality is for these experiences. As consumers are looking for unique and memorable experiences the involvement of quality is discussable for the effect on customer satisfaction. That quality is an important antecedent for satisfaction is widely acknowledge . Only the question is, what the relative importance is for a brand experience. And, if the relevance importance is present does this differ in the type of products (e.g. hedonic versus functional).
2.3 Quality
The theoretical basis of quality is been defined in a wide context. From the theory that concerns quality all the authors emphasize that that the customer defines quality and, in turn, that quality creates customer satisfaction that leads to an improved competitive position (Reed et al., 2000).
Steenkamp (2000) describes that quality on micro level identifies an important variable for producers and as well as consumers. As quality competition has supplanted price competitions managers put product quality on their priority of
strategic issues. Wolf (1986) state that regardless of the type of industry, size of the company, quality has become an essential element of competitive strategy.
Porter’s (1980) theory regards quality posits that superior quality is an effective product differentiation strategy to create customer loyalty, lower price elasticity, and present barriers to competition. In line with Porters theory is the theory of Peters and Waterman (1982) whereas they identify quality as one of the key variables determining the success of a company.
Holbrook and Corfman (1985) describe the value that comes with quality can be seen as “a relativistic preference characterizing a subjects ‘experience’ of interaction with some object. With basically saying that quality value is personal and depends on the situation. They distinguish three dimensions of perceived value: preference, subject- object interaction, and consumption experience. The third dimension is of importance for this research in finding the relative importance from experience with reference towards quality.
2.4 Utilitarian
To make clear what utilitarian means, a comparison with hedonic will be made. Dhar and Wertenbroch (2000) explain that consumer choice is driven by hedonic and utilitarian consideration. Where they describe hedonic goods as fun, pleasure, excitement, and comes along with experience whereas utilitarian goods are primarily instrumental and functional (kitchen appliance, tools, bicycle etc.). Many goods involves both dimensions, varying in degrees, but consumers also categorize some products as mainly hedonic or utilitarian (Batra and Ahtola, 1990).
Strahilevitz and Myers (1998) describe utilitarian goods as those whose consumption is more cognitively driven, instrumental, goal oriented, and accomplishes a functional or practical task.
Mainly all the theory towards utilitarian is focused on shopping utilitarian aspects (Bloch and Bruce, 1984). Hirschman and Holbrook (1982) describe that utilitarian value reflects shopping with a mentality. These kind of shoppers may find value only if the shopping chore is completely getting done, and even better in a fast way. Time is hereby an important factor.
Utilitarian consumer behaviour has been described by Batra and Ahtola (1991) as ergic, task-related, and rational. To perceive utilitarian shopping value it might depend on whether the particular consumption need stimulating the shopping trip was accomplished. This could state that a product is maintained in a deliberant and efficient matter.
2.5 Sensory dimension
Nowadays products rarely promise what they do what the promise to do. Dumaine (1991) article “Design That Sells and Sells and . . .” stated that it is not surprising that consumers increasingly make a brand choice based on aesthetic values and visual design. Sensory can be seen as product design whereas product design is a broad term. Bloch et. all (2003) conducted a research on individual differences in the centrality of visual product aesthetics. For their purpose the centrality of visual product aesthetics (CVPA) is explained as the overall level of significance that visual aesthetics hold for a particular consumer. On an individual level, consumers with a high CVPA believe that being surrounded with beautiful objects positively influence the quality of their daily lives or allow them to satisfy higher level needs. In return they receive from the
aesthetic properties of the product is recognition and held dear (Yalch and Brunel, 1996).
The importance of sensory comes clear from Lindstrom (2005) article where he explains that a total sensory experience increases the consumer’s ability to memorize a brand. In the literature of sensory many articles and discussions were found. Especially in marketing is sensory seen an important factor of commercial success. All the literature around sensory comes down on the five human senses: scent, sight, hearing, taste and touch. These five senses are described below.
2.5.1 Scent
According to Gulas and Bloch (1995) they state that scent is relevant to consumption in two forms. The first form relates to the scent that is directly associated with an evaluation object that could be the product itself or a salesperson. The second reflect the overall ambient environment. Scent awakes memories that a human being collects through their entire life and links it to earlier experiences. In marketing literature scent is an area that has been studied for many years and underlines the effects of consumer behaviour on scent. Two empirical studies that examined the effects of ambient scent in consumer behaviour context are done by Bone and Ellen (1994) and Hirsch (1995). In the first study the results showed that consumers are spending more time on catalogue-shopping task in a room that’s been manipulated by scents than in an unscented room. The second study done by Hirsch (1995) showed an increase in spending money on slot-machines when people where surrounded in a pleasantly scented environment. The conclusion here was that scent influences consumer behaviour.
2.5.2 Sight
Sight is one of the most important and powerful sensory senses that is related to visual merchandising marketing. Research has investigated neurological responses to sense stimuli or even store layout. It comes visible that sight is one of the most common sense in perceiving goods and services (Renvoise and Morin, 2005). Hultén (2011) describes in his article about multi-sensory brand-experience concepts. Where the sense of sight is the most powerful one for discovering changes and differences in the environment.
2.5.3 Hearing
Turley and Milliman (2005) published a study on the impact of purchases and consumption environment. They recognized that sound (music) is the most commonly studied general interior cue. Areni (2003) suggest that customer’s affective and cognitive responses to experiences in-store influence the likelihood of behaviours which directly impact an organization’s financial returns. Besides, background music in-store is attributed to influence customer perception, specifically the degree of attention and information processing of critical store elements such as visual stimuli and salesperson’s arguments. In contrast states North et al. (1999) that music can ‘prime’ the selection of certain products by stimulation consumers to recall the related knowledge. Furthermore the intensity of pleasure that generates during listening to in-store music influences customer perceptions what in return can also enhances or create customers’ attitudes towards a store and/or its elements (Dube and Morin, 2001; Gorn et al., 1993; Grewal et al.,2003; Oakes, 2003).
2.5.4 Taste
Hultén et al. (2009) describe in their study of the multi-sensory brand experience that taste is the most distinct emotional sense and often interacts with other senses. The sense of taste refers to joyful, positive experiences and is seen by Gobé (2001) as a way of interacting with customers and influence their experience. By the hand of adding taste to a certain brand it can create for a brand hedonic dimensions expressed by multiple sense expressions (Hultén et al., 2009).
2.5.5. Touch
Grohmann (2007) research on the effect of touching clearly demonstrated that tactile input influences product evaluations. Their experiments show that tactile input has a positive effect on the evaluation of products with characteristics best explored by touch, particularly for high quality levels.
2.6 Affective dimension
The affective dimensions refer to emotions, moods and satisfaction (Westbrook, 1998). Three subjects that are studied intensely in the marketing literature. The satisfaction part is discussed in above paragraph 2.2.
2.6.1 Emotions
Westbrook (1998) describes consuming emotions as the set of emotional responses elicited specifically during product usage or consumption experience. Consumption emotion is distinguished from the related affective phenomenon of mood (Gardner 1985) on the basis of emotion’s relatively greater psychological urgency, motivational
potency, and situational specificity. Bagozzi et al. (1999) addresses the emotional behaviour in marketing by consumers. They concluded that emotions in marketing are ubiquitous. They influence information processing, mediate responses to persuasive appeals, measure the effect of marketing stimuli, initiate goal settings, enact goal directed behaviours, and serve as ends and measures of consumer welfare. Morrison and Grane (2007) made a distinction in the cognition, action and social behaviours. Morrison and Grane (2007) conducted a study on building a service brand by creating and managing an emotional brand. What become clear from their research is that whatever service brand is being provided, it is clear that customer emotion plays an important role in the selection, consumption and continued loyalty toward that service brand. The challenge for marketer’s lies, in their vision, is to create and manage a positive emotional brand experience before, during, and after the service brand purchase. Moreover, it is of importance to provide a unique emotional brand experience.
2.6.2 Mood
According to Gardner (1985) has the word “mood ” a wide range of usage and meaning. One might use the term to describe a phenomenological property of an individual’s ‘subjectively perceived affective state. For example a person maybe in a happy mood or a hostile mood. In other words Gardner (1985) sees mood as a feeling state that are subjectively perceived by individuals. Researcher in psychology indicates that mood states are an important influence for customer behaviour, judgment, and recall. Clark and Isen (1982) explain that a mood state seems to bias evaluation and judgment about a brand. They associate it with looking at one’s world through rose colored glasses while a bad mood may analogously colour evaluation.
is frequently
2.7 Behavioural dimension
At the level of the behavioural dimension traditional consumer’s research is mainly focused exclusively on the choice process that generates purchase decisions in actual buying behaviour (Holbrook and Hirschman, 1982). On the other hand made Alderson (1957) a clear distinction between buying and consuming. His contrast was further extended in Boyd and Levy’s article published in the Harvard Business Review (1963) where they discussed the consumption system on focussing on a brand-usage behaviour. They explained that by focussing on the configuration of activities involved around consumption, their point of view reached attention to the experiences with a product that one gains by actually consuming it. Aggarwal (2004) study presents that consumer response depends on the type of relationship norm that are salient at the time of brand interaction and influences the behaviour of consumers. The results of his experiment showed that since a delay in request for a return favour is likely to be seen as an attempt to get something free from the partner, it is in conflict with the exchange norms leading to a poorer evaluation. An study done by Fitzsimons et al. (2008) describe the process that consumers either consciously or unconsciously starting to act or live in a certain lifestyle when they are confronted with a brand’s behavioral characteristics. From here brands show that they have the power to include a certain lifestyle. Consumers are feeling attached to their kind of lifestyle and feel a strong relationship that in returns influences the behavior.
2.8 Intellectual dimension
The construct of intelligence has been defined in many ways. Guilford (1950) is one of the first authors who introduced psychological writings on creativity and intellect. According to Guilford (1956) creativity is defined as divergent thinking and is an
important component of human intellect. Divergent-thinking is likely to occur in non-realistic thinking, when one is simply free to do so and finds it rewarding. Guilford (1967) demonstrated that all consumers have the potential to identify creative stimuli and respond favorably to them. Thus, consumers can be expected to produce and appreciate new ideas. People like new things and produce divergent thoughts and ideas themselves. Hirschman (1983) describes it as “the ability to learn and understand or to deal with new or trying situations.” Moreover, Wechsler (1958) defines intelligence as “the capacity of an individual to understand the world about him and his resourcefulness to cope with it challenges”. Another view on intelligence comes from Sternberg (1977). He describes intelligence as “dynamic information processing capabilities”. From a marketing literature point of view customers favour brands where least or no effort is needed in the decision making process (Lee and Labroo, 2004). On the other hand, Berthon et al. (2007) studied the intellectual side of consumers by describing that consumers become more and more clever in their consumer behaviour. From this behaviour customers become more creative what could result in a gold mine for firms or on the other hand in a black hole. Firms have paid little attention to the phenomenon of creative consumers. They concluded that the creative consumer is likely to be an increasingly important force for change and innovation in many markets.
3 Hypotheses
In this study, the aim is to find empirical results how important experience is for customer satisfaction and if this effect is different for utilitarian brands. Also the relative importance of an experience towards quality is an aim of this study. To do so the brand experience scale of Brakus et al. (2009) is used for this research. Besides, with this research the expectations are that utilitarian brands capture a different brand experience than its hedonic counterpart. And that quality plays a role in the brand experience for utilitarian products. Before drawing the hypotheses a short overview is giving that acts as a framework.
Brakus et al. (2009) state that a brand experience effects customer behaviour. They used a structural equation model to catch causal validity between brand experience and customer behaviour. Their estimated model fitted the data reasonable well. All path coefficients in de model where significant (ps < .05). As they predicted that brand experience affects satisfaction and loyalty both directly and indirectly through brand personality. For this research I want to challenge the outcome of their research with brands that are known for their utilitarian aspects. Expectations towards customer satisfaction will be different as utilitarian brands can catch a different experience. Besides, it is interesting to find out if a brand experience has any relative effects on customer satisfaction at all for brands with utilitarian values. It is shown that a brand experience effects direct and indirect customer satisfaction. But is it as important for utilitarian versus hedonic brands? From this the first hypothesis is created.
H1: The importance of a brand experience towards customer satisfaction is different for utilitarian brands
Proven by previous studies, for example by Pine and Gilmore (1999), it is clear that brand experience provides a value. By this the expectations are that when a brand evokes more than one experience dimension, and there for has a higher score on the scale, the more a customer is satisfied with the brand. Because experiences result from stimulations and result to pleasurable outcomes it is expected that an effect on the brand experience scale stimulates behaviour and in return affects the customer by returning to the brand. The most wishful scenario is that a brand experience makes customers become loyal to the brand and recommend it to others and less likely to buy another brand.
One of the research goals is to find out if quality is of importance for a brand experience. Holbrooke and Hirschman (1982) explain that perceived quality exist in the consumption of the product, since consumers buy products not only for the product but also for the experience-bringing services. They explain that the consumption experience influences the behaviour of the consumer. As consumption experience and usage behaviour are closely related, since usage behaviour will often produce different consumption experience. Besides, Holbrook et al. (1982) found indirect support that an experience show patterns of relationships among purchasing reasons including quality related aspects. As utilitarian shopping value consist of efficient shopping it is expected that quality could play a role in the evaluation of their experience with a brand. To test this the quality experience was created and included in this research. From this the second hypothesis is given.
H2: Quality has a greater effect on a brand experience for utilitarian brands than for non-utilitarian brands
Bloch and Bruce (1984) studied on shopping utilitarian aspects. They describe utilitarian consumer’s behaviour as ergic, task-related, and rational (Batra and Ahtola 1990; Engel et al. 1993; Sherry 1990a). Perceived utilitarian shopping value might depend on whether the particular consumption need stimulating the shopping trip was accomplished. Often, this means a product is purchased in a deliberant and efficient manner.
Hirschman and Holbrook (1982) speak about utilitarian shopping value whereas it reflects shopping with work mentality. In other words, utilitarian value may be most relevant in explaining shopping trips described by consumers ‘as “work” where they are happy simply to get through it all. It can be assumed that utilitarian brands score different on the brand experience scale by Brakus et al. (2009). Especially for the intellectual and behavioural experience dimensions, as they represent a cognitive style of thinking. The expectations for this research are that the intellectual and behavioural experience dimensions will affect customer satisfaction for utilitarian products. From this theory the third hypothesis is created.
H3: The intellectual and behavioural experience dimensions from Brakus et al. (2009) have a greater effect on customer satisfaction for utilitarian products than for non-utilitarian products.
Both sensory and affective experiences have shown affects towards customer satisfaction in the study of Brakus et al. (2009). The three determinants of customer satisfaction: customer expectations, perceived quality, and perceived value are seen to influence hedonic brands more than utilitarian (Fornell et al.,1996). Sheth et al. (1991)
included the cumulative conceptualization of customer satisfaction where he describes that hedonic brands are seen as goods and services that changes customer behaviour and that these goods demonstrate to be symbols of personal and social identity. Moreover, Dhar & Wertenbroch (2000) literature showed that hedonic brands are products that can be characterized on the hand of affective and sensory experiences of aesthetic or sensual pleasure, fantasy and fun. Also Holbrook and Hirschman describe that hedonic values are subjective and personal. That they are more related to fun and playfulness than from task completion. From this the last hypothesis is given.
H4: The sensory and affective experience dimension from Brakus et al. (2009) has a greater effect on customer satisfaction for non-utilitarian products than for utilitarian products
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4 Research method
As the hypotheses are developed this next chapter will explain the research design for this study. At first, the research design is given with an explanation of the research method. Next the questionnaire set up is given that has been used to collect the results.
4.1 Research design and data collection
In this study, the aim is to find empirical results if a brand experience is of importance for utilitarian brands and if it influences customer satisfaction. To do so an explanatory research design is necessary and set up. To collect this quantitative data a questionnaire will be set up. Questionnaires are known to enable studies to identify, describe, to examine, and explain relationships between variables - in particular cause-and-effect relationships. The construct of the questionnaire exist of two parts. The first part is designed for the utilitarian brands, known for its functional use. Within this part respondents are asked to select a brand they are known with or experienced before. The utilitarian category in part one is household appliances. The brands respondent could select of where: Princess, Braun, Philips, Siemens, Bosch, Kitchen Aid, Hema, Tefal, Krups, and others. The second category in part two exists of its counterpart non-utilitarian. For the second category apparel is selected. Apparel provides in a functional use but for this category well-known fashion brands are used that are surrounded by commercial advertisement and are known for their brand image. Here the brands where: Zara, H&M, River Island, Abercrombie & Fitch, Victoria Secrets, Diesel, G-star, Gucci, Louise Vuitton, Armani, and others. In the second part again respondents are asked to select a brand they experienced in the past and the same questions are provided as in part one.
Respondents will randomly be selected to answer the questionnaire. The two parts in the questionnaire (utilitarian and non-utilitarian) both consisted of three sections. The first section of the questionnaire contained five items focused on the background of the participants. Section two contained of twelve questions corresponding to the dimensions of the brand experience scale from Brakus et al. (2009). These questions included statements that measure the four dimensions (sensory, affective, behavioral, and intellectual) of a total brand experience. For each brand 12 seven-point items (3 items per dimension) were presented, scored on a seven-point Likert scale ranging from “strongly disagree” (1) to “strongly agree” (7) . In the last section of the questionnaire the focus was on the new dimension quality and customer satisfaction. The new quality dimension consisted of five items and also scored on a 7 point Likert-scale. Here the question, for example, consisted of: “The quality of the selected brand is not of importance to me”; “The quality of the selected brand influences my purchase intention.” Satisfaction and loyalty is measured by the hand of five items created by Oliver (1980). Two of them were: “I am satisfied with the brand and its performance, “my choice to purchase this brand has been a good one.” Again the items were measured on a seven-point Likert scale ranging from “strongly disagree” (1) to “strongly agree” (7).
To address the research questions the questionnaire was distributed through e-mail under University students, Facebook friends and family. The questionnaire took around 10 till 15 minutes to finish.
5 Results
The next chapter presents the collected data from the questionnaires. All data was collected via Survey Monkey and imported in SPSS. First the sample group is explained. Second, reliability of the scales is tested. In the third part the correlation among the different variables are calculated. In the end the hypotheses of this research are tested.
5.1 Response data
To collect the data over the internet this research was conducted via Survey Monkey. In total 90 respondents completed the questionnaire. Initially the total was 104; fourteen participants that started the survey did not complete it and were discarded from the dataset. The questionnaire was send among a sample group of student, family and friends. The sample consisted of almost 50/50 female/male (50.6% female and 49.4 % of male). The majority of the group was between 25 and 34 years old (74.2%) the second age group 35 to 44 existed of 11.2%. Education level of the sample presented that 42.7% completed their Bachelor degree (HBO), followed by 37.1% who have a Master degree.
A small part (5.1%) of the education level was a Doctor degree. Their marital states showed a majority of unmarried (80.9%) people and 13.5% of the group was married.
Variables % F Age (1-5) 18 – 24 9.0 8 25 – 34 72.2 67 35 – 54 11.2 10 55 – 64 1,1 1 65 - 75 1,1 1 Education (1-5) Doctoral degree 5,6 5 Master degree 37,1 33 Bachelor degree 42,7 38 MBO 5,6 5 Other 8 8 Marital status Unmarried 80,9 72 Married 13,5 12 Divorcee 4,5 4 Widower 1,1 1 Employment status Employed 77,5 69 Self-employed 7,9 7
Out of work looking for work 1,1 1
Student 7,9 7
Retired 5,6 5
Table 1 Results respondent data: percentages and frequencies
5.2 Scale analysis
To make sure that the extracted/interpreted factors are internally consistent the Cronbach’s Alpha and Principal Component analysis were conducted to find any differences.
Each item of the brand experience scale was tested if they are internally consistent. In other words: do all items measure “something similar?”. This will
present if the items in the scale behave (very) differently from others. All four dimensions of Brakus et al. (2009) research (i.e. sensory, affective, behaviour, and intellectual) where tested. The new included dimension quality was also tested to find out if it was internally consistent. The dimensions were tested with three items and scored on a seven-point Likert scale ranging from “strongly disagree” (1) to “strongly agree” (7).
Before starting, the negative questions in each item were recoded. After recoding the question the Cronbach’s alpha was computed and the four dimensions showed all a positive result among each other. After computing the individual reliability for each dimension separate, with one item deleted, all the Cronbach’s alpha showed a positive outcome (table)
The variable quality consisted of five questions in total and also scored on a 7 point Likert-scale. One example of the questions was “the quality of the selected brand is not of importance to me”. By analysing the five questions a very low Cronbach alpha appeared. Even when items were deleted the Cronbach showed a low result. To make sure they were pointing to the same direction the questions where tested individual with one of the other questions. After looking carefully at the questions it became visible that only question four and five where measuring what they were supposed to measure. The two questions resulted in a Cronbach alpha of .876; interpreted as an excellent internal consistency. The two questions where: “the quality of the selected brand influences my purchase decision” and “the quality of the selected brand is of importance for my overall brand experience. The first three questions did not show a strong consistency among each other. Even after deleting one item the Cronbach alpha did not become >.6.
The other variable in this research is satisfaction. The variable satisfaction consisted of five items. When running the Cronbach’s alpha for satisfaction a very positive result came up. An excellent consistency of .840 was measured among the five questions. Table 2 presents an overview of the Cronbach Alpha’s.
Variables α Items Sensory .745 3 Emotional .784 3 Behaviour .607 3 Intellectual .703 3 Quality .876 5 Satisfaction .840 3 Table 2 results Cronbach Alpha analysis
5.3 Correlation
To find out if there was correlation between the variables the Pearson’s correlation analyses was used among the variables (table 3): sensory, affective, behaviour, intellectual and the new variable quality. Most of the variables among each other showed a positive correlation. The expectations that the sensory and the affective variable where strongly correlating came clear with a correlation of .688 (p<0.01). As in the literature framework was mentioned, is the sensory dimensions strongly associated with the emotion of the human brain. The visual aspects of brands change the way consumers think, feel and act of different brands (Lindstrom 2005). The variables behaviour and intellectual showed a low correlation among each other. This was surprising as expectation were that consumers behave by first think and then acting. Also the variable sensory and quality did not score high on correlation .292 (p<0.01). As expected was there a strong correlation identified between the variables customer satisfaction and quality.
Sensory Emotion Behavior Intellectual Satisfaction Quality Sensory .688** .496** .341** .285** .292 Emotion .688** 412** .473** .447** .427*** Behavior .496** .412** .195** .275** .338** Intellectual .341** .473** .195** .368 .304 Satisfaction .285** .447** .275** .368** .713** Quality .292 .427*** 275** .368** .713**
Table 3 Results Pearson’s correlation analysis household **. Significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed). ***. Significant at the 0.05 level (2-tailed).
5.4 Descriptive
In the following part a more in-depth analyses is presented by the hand of descriptive by each dimension. For both brand categories (household products and apparel) a distinction is made (table 4). It is interesting to noticed that the new included variable quality scored the highest mean score for both categories (household M=5.9; SD= 1.023 and apparel M=5.39; SD=1.073). The quality items questions were: “the quality of the selected brand is not of importance to me”, the quality of the selected brand influences my purchase behaviour”, and “the quality of the selected brand is of importance for my overall brand experience”. The rating was done on a seven-point Likert scale ranging from “strongly disagree” (1) to “strongly agree” (7) . With the highest mean it could state that quality is a variable that is important when looking at the brand experience of a brand. Whether the brand has utilitarian or a non-utilitarian purpose. Also customer satisfaction showed a high mean score for both categories what shows that customers are quite satisfied and loyal to their selected brand. The dimensions behaviour and intellectual differentiate from the rest as they stimulate in a different way.
Household brands Variables N=89 M SD Independent variables (1-7) Sensory 4,88 1,601 Affective 4,09 1,443 Behavior 3,48 1,399 Intellectual 3,00 1,365 Quality 5,9 1,023 Dependent variable (1-7) Customer satisfaction 5,69 1,007 Apparel brands Variables N=89 M SD Independent variables (1-7) Sensory 5,48 1,078 Affective 4,28 1,462 Behavior 3,98 1,382 Intellectual 3,51 1,28 Quality 5,39 1,073 Dependent variable (1-7) Customer satisfaction 5,44 1,381
Tabel 4Descriptives independent and dependent variables categorized on household and apparel brands: mean and SD
5.5 Multicollinearity
From the Pearson’s correlation analysis it became clear that there was a low significant effect between the items quality and sensory (.292). On the other hand the independent items emotion and sensory showed a quite high significant correlation among each other (.688). These outcomes could be a sign that there is multicollinearity among these variables. They are related to each other what can lead to a loss of reliability. An explanation is needed why the emotion item is high correlated with the sensory aspects of a brand. As been explained in the theory by Lindstrom (2005) he describes that a total sensory experience experience increases the 31
consumer’s ability to memorize a brand. These memories come partly form sensory experiences as product design and other senses (Bloch et al. 2003). From this consumers hold emotions that are individual. These set of emotional responses especially evoke during product usage and consumption experience (Westbrook, 1998) It was expected that sensory has a positive correlation among emotions. Multicollinearity could be the reason for these striking results. As the results of the Pearson’s correlation analysis presented different correlation among the other variables multicollinearity was tested among all of them with satisfaction as the dependent variable. Whereas the tolerance and de VIF is analysed. As there is no clear criterion for analysing multicollinearity of linear regression models, judgment can be made by checking statistics as the tolerance and the variance inflation factor (VIF). However, the rule of thumb for detecting multicollinearity for the tolerance and the VIF are discussable.
Table 5 is carried out to give more insight in this matter. From the analysis came a somewhat surprising outcome. From all the four brand experience dimensions from Brakus et al. (2009) plus the variable quality no collinarity problems showed off. This could implicate that the variable emotion is of importance to the other variables. It also implicates that the variables are independent and correlate among each other. Somewhat surprising as the correlation among the independent variables where low.
Model collinarity statistics
Collinearity Statistics Tolerance VIF Quality ,868 1,152 Sensory ,930 1,075 Emotion ,751 1,331 Behavior ,956 1,046 Intellectual ,800 1,250 Tabel 5 Multicollinearity: tolerance and VIF - Dependent Variable: Satisfaction
As the results from table 5 are not strong enough to base conclusions of a more in-depth research is needed to find out if there is multicollinearity. Table 6 shows that with an eigenvalue of six quality shows a high score (83%). The other independent variable showed a low variance proportion. There are no effects of two independent variables scoring both high on the variance proportions at the same low eigenvalue. This means that the variances of the regression coefficients of both predictors are not depending on each other. It basically says that the correlation among the independent variables is strong. Only with an eigenvalue of 4 sensory and emotion score relatively high. The correlation for emotion and sensory was relative high (r=.688) what could state that there is multicollinearity.
Model Eigenvalue Condition Index
Variance Proportions
(Constant) Sensory Emotion Behavior Intellectual Quality
1 5,603 1,000 ,00 ,00 ,00 ,00 ,00 ,00 2 ,137 6,407 ,01 ,06 ,04 ,12 ,65 ,01 3 ,123 6,758 ,00 ,16 ,03 ,70 ,04 ,01 4 ,074 8,719 ,00 ,37 ,59 ,00 ,26 ,01 5 ,049 10,694 ,12 ,40 ,32 ,16 ,03 ,14 6 ,015 19,611 ,87 ,00 ,02 ,02 ,01 ,83
Table 6 Collinearity diagnostic - Dependent Variable: Satisfaction
5.6 Moderation
The following analysis investigates if the effect of the dimensions on customer satisfaction is influenced by the type of brand for which they are measured. For example, is the effect of the dimensions on customer satisfaction different for utilitarian brand in compare with the non-utilitarian brands. The regression analysis (table 7) gives a clear overview from these results. From these results it is clear that there is a difference in the two groups utilitarian and non-utilitarian.
Utilitarian brands ß t Sig R2 Sensory -0,045 -0,528 0,599 Affective 0,322 3,817 P <,05 Behavior 0,043 0,528 0,599 Intellectual 0,166 1,872 0,065 Quality 0,548 6,556 P <,05 0,538 Non- utilitarian brands
ß t Sig R2 Sensory 0,771 9,209 P <,05 Affective -0,08 -0,858 0,393 Behavior 0,137 1,517 0,133 Intellectual 0,031 0,375 0,708 Quality 0,049 0,65 0,517 0.623 Tabel 7 regressive analysis
5.7 Hypothesis testing
In the following section the hypotheses will be tested by the hand of the multiple regression analysis.
The first hypotheses state that the importance of a brand experience towards customer satisfaction is different for utilitarian brands. To find out if this is supported the ANOVA-test was carried out to analyse the effects of each dimension on customer satisfaction. The results show that indeed all dimensions have an effect on customer satisfaction, when they are measured for both utilitarian and non-utilitarian. The results of the ANOVA analysis show that when measured for a brand with a utilitarian characteristics that quality has the highest effect on customer satisfaction (F(5,376)=3.925, p<.05) whereas for non-utilitarian the results are much lower and different (F(1,920)=2.473, p<.05). The sensory dimension shows that the effect of sensory on non-utilitarian ((F(12,42)=8.473, p<.05) is much different than for utilitarian brands (F(4,683)=3.473, p<.05). With these result it can be state that the
type of brand (utilitarian & non-utilitarian) moderate the outcome on customer satisfaction. The first hypothesis is supported.
The next hypothesis states that the degree how consumers experience quality affects customer satisfaction for both utilitarian and non-utilitarian. A very interesting result from this analysis is that the quality part for experience scored the highest of all (ß=0.548; t=6.556; p<.05) for utilitarian brands. These results give new insights for the research in brand experience. The expectations of the quality experience where positive for utilitarian brands as for these products consumers rely on quality, less than the sensory and emotional experience dimension, as they provide in a functional need. The quality dimension also scored significant for non-utilitarian brands only much lower (ß=0.049; t=.655; p<.05). By looking on the correlation-coefficient for utilitarian we also find strong results. For the dependent variable satisfaction with the independent variable quality the results showed also a significant correlation-coefficient (R= .733; R2= .0538). Another interesting insight is the variance of the dependent variable satisfaction towards the independent quality variable. The total variance from the ANOVA analysis for utilitarian and non-utilitarian brands showed that customer satisfaction has a high variance in the explained (regression) variable quality (table 8). With other words, the quality experience explains the dependent variable in this case, customer satisfaction. Hereby hypothesis 2 is supported.
Utilitarian Non-utilitarian
Model Squares Sum of Model Squares Sum of Regression 772,062 Regression 54,518 Residual 1401,061 Residual 113,393 Total 2173,124 Total 167,910 Tabel 8 Anova analysis
As it is confirmed that the effects of a brand experience is different for utilitarian brands, the next step is to find out if there are differences in the degree of the experience dimension for utilitarian brands. To explorer this further the third hypothesis states that the intellectual experience and the behavioural experience have a greater effect on customer satisfaction for utilitarian brands than for non-utilitarian brands.
The results show that the intellectual dimension significantly affect customer satisfaction (ß=.166; t=1.872; p<.05) for utilitarian products. Thus, for utilitarian brands consumers are satisfied when the degree of intellectual experience increases. It is not very strong but significant. The effect of intellectual for non-utilitarian brands also showed significant results but is less effective on customer satisfaction (ß=.031; t=.375; p<.05). On the other side, the behavioural dimension showed a strong significant effect with the non-utilitarian brands (ß=.137; t=.1.517; p<.05). It was expected that the behavioural dimension showed stronger effects for the utilitarian brands. The utilitarian brands showed a lower degree of importance for the behavioural dimension (ß=.043; t=0.528; p<.05). As they both show significant effects it is interesting to see that the degree of the intellectual dimension is more of importance than the degree of behavioural when a brand is functional. And that the behavioural dimension shows a higher degree of importance for non-utilitarian brands. So they both have a different effect on utilitarian and non-utilitarian but do not have a
greater effect on utilitarian than non-utilitarian. With these two results hypothesis three is not supported.
Now that it is confirmed that the degree of intellectual and the behavioural experience dimension have a different effect on customer satisfaction for utilitarian brands the following analysis will find out if the sensory and the affective experience dimension have also a different effect for both product categories. The first results show that the sensory experience has the highest significant effect for non-utilitarian brands (ß=0.771; t=9.209; p<.05). These results where expected and state that the sensory dimension is of great importance to gain customer satisfaction for non-utilitarian brands. To put the results in contrast with non-utilitarian (ß=-.045; t=-0.528; p<.05) it is clear that for utilitarian sensory is not significant. These results are not surprising as the expectation were that the degree of sensory experience was the most important dimension for a non-utilitarian brand experience. Than the affective dimensions showed no significant affect for non-utilitarian brands. The counterpart utilitarian did (ß=.322; t=3.817; p<.05). These results are suprising. The effect of affective towards utilitarian brands show a significant effect on customer satisfaction. This was more expected by non-utilitarian as brands are more involved with emotions. As we did not find a significant effect of affective for non-utilitarian this is a new insight. Summarized, non-utilitarian brands with a high degree of the sensory the affective experience results in satisfied customers but the affective dimension is not significant. Hypothesis four is not supported.
6 Conclusions – Discussion
Branding is an important topic for gaining commercial success in the modern commercial world nowadays. Brands succeed by trying to get close to the dreams of their target groups. They create a better world, and with the brand they strive to deliver one (van Ham, 2002). Branding consists of multiple dimensions and many academic literatures are written about better understanding the world of branding. Theories about why branding is so important helps many brand managers and
commercial brands to understand their audience and to develop and create a brand that add something for their public. The question to brand or not to brand is no longer a question. Widely argued is that consumers prefer brands with a certain perceived value they obtain. It makes consumers able to make quick, efficient choices and
judgements by relying on a brand. By relying so they expect certain standards, quality, and services that reduces the risk for their social environment and standards. Basically, they avoid complex information overload and help as a guide for consumers (van Ham, 2002).
This research went deeper in on the phenomena of brand experience. It became clear from the theory that a brand experience arises in variety of settings when consumers search for, shop for, and consume a brand (Brakus et al., 2009). The purpose for this research was to find out how important brand experience is for
customer satisfaction and if this is different for utilitarian brands versus non-utilitarian brands. As it is known that quality is an antecedent for customer satisfaction, the essence of this research was to find if quality adds an important role for a brand experience. The brand experience scale from Brakus et al. (20096) was used and quality was included to find the relative importance of it. The results from this research shed new light in the world of brand experience, their relationship with
customer satisfaction, and differences for utilitarian- and non-utilitarian brands. New insights are discovered for academic literature but also to bring in practise for
branding and marketing managers.
The first and importance result is that a brand experience affects customer satisfaction both for utilitarian and non-utilitarian brands. With other words this means that for gaining customer satisfaction a brand experience is of importance in nowadays commercial success. Brand experience results in customer satisfaction by the four dimensions: sensory, affective, behaviour, intellectual and quality. They weight all different on each other and one is more important than the other. What is interesting for the research questions is that there is a distinction for utilitarian and non-utilitarian. The regression and moderators showed that consumers do evaluate a brand experience different for utilitarian than for non-utilitarian. This is the most revealing result from this study as there was no theoretical support for this before. All theory towards brand experience and customer satisfaction was done among non-utilitarian brands. It became clear that also for non-utilitarian brands a brand experience is of important as it affects customer satisfaction. By knowing which dimensions are important for utilitarian brands strategies can be developed for achieving customer satisfaction.
Quality experience is an important topic for brand experience. Quality
emerged and showed the highest effect on customer satisfaction for utilitarian brands. Consumers evaluate quality in their brand experience and this experience counts for their overall judgment of satisfaction. It became clear that quality is one of the most important parts for a brand experience to achieve customer satisfaction for utilitarian brands. Surprising for the utilitarian brand experience where the results for affective and intellectual. Expectations were low for their outcome. Affective showed an strong
significant towards customer satisfaction. For management important to know that with including emotions into their brand experience for utilitarian it will lead to customer satisfaction. The other surprising outcome was that intellectual is also of importance when consumers look for functional brands. It must make them to think more about the brand. All though the other dimensions showed significant results the sensory dimension did not. Consumers shopping for a utilitarian purpose tend to agree with the fact that how the product “looks” like is not of importance. Whereas quality scored high for utilitarian it scored lower for the counterpart non-utilitarian. Here the sensory dimension resulted in the highest effect on customer satisfaction and scored quality seemly low. Another surprising result from this research is that the affective experience showed no significant outcome for non-utilitarian. It was expected that due to the high involvement of sensory the affective dimension would also show an effect.
7 Managerial implications
The findings of this study have some important implications for management in the field of branding. Especially those specialised in improving experiential environments. This research presents that there are distinctions in brand experiences. Primarily for utilitarian and non-utilitarian brands.
Bases on the new insight, managers should create different experiential strategies for their product groups. Specifically for those that work for multi-national brands that produce utilitarian and non-utilitarian brands. For example, when management aim is to reach the attention of hedonic consumers their focus must lie on the sensory experience rather on the intellectual and behavioural experience of the brand. Whereas utilitarian brands should focus on a strategy where the quality experience is well presented, visible and that the intellectual dimension also finds
attention. It is important to notice that the affective dimension for utilitarian is quite strong for customer satisfaction. As this was not expected utilitarian brands can distinguish themselves with including an emotion in their experience. As sensory did not showed any importance for customer satisfaction. It does not mean that the sensory experience should not have any attention. From this research no significant relations where found. The most important point is that consumers must feel the presence of quality when they experience a brand to come to a positive customer satisfaction when it is target on utilitarian brands. This also states for non-utilitarian but in a different degree of experiencing.
To emphasize this point of attention managers should take every single dimension into account. From the results and Brakus et al. (2009) research it became clear that every dimension has a significant effect on customer satisfaction. Only the proportion of each dimension is different for the type of product. It is for managers important to decide with which type of brand/product they work. All the dimensions enhance each other and eventually result in the overall brand experience.
As this research shows that there is not one type of consumer it could be of great importance for managers to study and focus more on the psychological concept of experience. With the brand experience scale of Brakut et al. (2009) and this research, that included quality, and separated utilitarian from non-utilitarian it is crucial to get to know the consumers in an in-depth matter. Managers can use the brand experience scale but should also focus on the psychological part of that experience. As this is done the communication of that brand/product should fit in the focus of the brand experience strategy.
8 Limitations
All though interesting new insight appeared and the aim of the research is reached a view limitation were there.
The first limitation in this research was the fact that utilitarian and non-utilitarian is difficult to describe. Consumers can differ in their opinion what they see as utilitarian and non-utilitarian. For this research the choice was household brands (utilitarian) and apparel (non-utilitarian). For some consumers apparel can also be seen as utilitarian as it is clothing. If foresees in a functional need. But for this study fashion brands where selected that are heavily surrounded by marketing and commercial aspects. The functional need was less of importance.
Another limitation in this research is the fact that it does not measure to which extend customer satisfaction is measured. It came clear that brand experience shows an affect on it. It does not show if this affect is positive or negative. In the questionnaire and the scale the words “negative” and “positive” where not showed. For future research this is an important point to include.
Despite, the size of the sample group was good but a larger one could give stronger results to come to the conclusions. The sample size was measured in the Netherlands among students, family and friends. This could limit the results to cultural differences. An experience could be completely different for consumers in Asia as they have different thoughts and subjective experience with a brand. Also no types of consumers were categories. As mentioned before there is not one type of consumers. The results are limited to a sample size group that differences in age, income, education etc.
9 Further research
This research included a new insight for brand experience: quality. It became clear that it shows affects towards customer satisfaction with utilitarian products and non-utilitarian brands. For further research managers should focus on new arising variables. As consumer behaviour changes along the way so does the experience changes. For example, it could be of importance that service is an experience that influences the relationship with customer satisfaction. Focusing on marketing changes and changes in consumer behaviour will be an advantage for capturing and improving the brand experience.
This research was mainly based on customer satisfaction. Further research can go more in-depth and investigate the affect towards other important facts as loyalty, brand personality etc. These topics are highly discussed in marketing journals, research nowadays.
