Marketing and Branding Research

Gaining customer loyalty is key to achieving repeated purchases that have ripple effects on sale revenue, market penetration, and profitability for firms. Can brand attachment guarantee customers’ loyalty? Based on the assumptions of the theory of customer equity, the study evaluated the interactions of brand attachment, customer loyalty, customer equity, and customer loyalty, focusing on Nigeria's telecommunication industry. A survey-based approach to research with 1,035 active subscribers of five telecommunication companies in Nigeria was examined. Regression analysis was used to test the four-way hypotheses formulated in the study. Overall, the result showed that brand attachment had a positive and significant effect on customer loyalty. However, the link between brand attachment and customer loyalty was explained through customer trust to suggest a full mediation effect. Further analysis revealed that customer trust explained significant variation in customer equity. The study concluded that customer trust is a critical factor in achieving the benefit of brand attachment and customer equity. The study recommended that the management of the telecommunication companies in Nigeria invest significant resources to secure their customers' trust and adhere to the dimension of value, brand, and relationship equity given their concomitant effect on customer satisfaction and loyalty.

The dynamics of contemporary economic processes urge researchers in the marketing field to study pricing outside of its traditional role. Modern customer-oriented approaches examine price levels as an instrument which contributes to retention and attraction of clients. Retention and expansion of client base is a subject-matter of the concept of customer equity which aims at long-term enhancement of customer relationship value. This value depends directly on the price levels defined by business organizations. Therefore, excessive application of discounts and sales may be risky for the company as it may turn its clients into “discount hunters” which will have detrimental impact on customer equity. In this regard, the current study aims to discover opportunities to enhance price competitiveness through promotion of customer perceived value. In pursuance of the objective of the present study, the drivers influencing the perceived value and particularly the technology and equipment equity were examined. As a result, the content of the factor was clarified and its positive impact on the level of customer perceived value was established. Guidelines were established for building technology and equipment equity, enhancement of the perceived value of products, and price competitiveness.