COM 2016 Volume 21

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Open Access
Brand linkages: winners, losers and how to measure these
(Department of Communication Science, University of the Free State, 2016) Nhedzi, Abyshey; Overton-de Klerk, Nina; Bester, Tim
Brand owners constantly seek strategies to improve their brand’s popularity. One such strategy is to seek a co-operative relationship with another brand, termed a “brand linkage”. This study represents one of the first attempts at empirical and experimental research on brand linkages in a South African marketing communication environment. One such brand linkage between Engen (a fuel service station) and Woolworths (a speciality food retailer) is examined. Results showed that awareness of the brand linkage did have a marked effect on the overall rating of Engen. Implementing a pretest–posttest control group design, results also showed that there were statistically significant differences between pre- and post-intervention ratings of Engen (the host brand) for the groups that were exposed to a campaign depicting the brand linkage. The research provides practitioners with a measuring instrument that can be replicated easily and provides insight for marketers on leveraging the value of brand linkages.