How Constructs Influence the Emotional Brand Attachment for Electric Cars

Topic

How Constructs Influence the Emotional Brand Attachment for Electric Cars

Instructions

You are asked to address the four sections below related to the following scenario:
You are part of the team at a marketing research agency. Your agency has been asked to develop an international marketing plan for a client who plans to introduce a new brand of electric cars into international markets. To begin the development of that plan, your line manager asks you to address the following question:
Your client asks you to collect quantitative data by using a questionnaire. The survey aims to test how strongly individuals’ cosmopolitan tendency and long-term orientation influence their emotional brand attachment towards brands of electric cars. Moreover, your client also wants to know how consumers’ product involvement levels or ethnocentric tendencies will influence/moderate these relationships. Designing a questionnaire requires careful planning to assure that adequate data is collected.
Adequate data will enable you to consequently analyse the data and draw the necessary insights for your client. This task requires you to work on the three issues below to complete the initial steps
of the questionnaire design process.

A) Focus on creating an overview table that outlines which scales you would use to measure the constructs/variables you need to measure (see below) to satisfy your clients requirements. The table should clearly show (a) the construct/variable name and the source (reference), (b) a conceptual definition of what that construct represents, and (c) the items/questions to measure each of the constructs/variables.

Long-term orientation and Cosmopolitanism (both are needed)
Emotional Brand attachment
Product involvement or Consumer ethnocentrism (choose one of these)

Note: You can search for the suitable information on the constructs, definitions and question items in the articles listed below. The construct definitions and questions/items for some of the scales (e.g. cosmopolitanism) are not directly found in the articles listed below. In that case, you need to find the original study cited in the article that will contain the full definitions and overview of all the questions/items to measure the construct. This approach is common in finding scales to design a questionnaire.

B) Discuss what issues may arise in terms of data comparability if you use the cosmopolitanism scale or long-term orientation scale (choose one) in two distinct countries (choose a European and one BRIC country). For this purpose you should take a close look at the items/questions used in the scale.

C) Draw out a visual representation of your research model/conceptual framework that shows the relationships between the variables from section A that would be tested after you collect the data. The text
above in bold (Your client….) on the task provides you with hints on how the variables are related to each other. Also, use arrows to show the directions of the effects that you would test.

D) Assume that you will be asked to collect data to measure consumer perceptions towards electric car brands in one European and one BRIC country. Discuss the pros and cons of using an online survey versus a paper survey in the context of this cross-national study. In order to get high marks, you need to go beyond just listing the pros and cons of each method and also offer clear links to the two national contexts and the specific product category, backed by adequate evidence.

Note: It is suggested that you present your assignment in report format.
Therefore, include an introduction that sets the stage for the three sections that
you will discuss in your assignment. You should also briefly outline in the
introduction the two chosen countries and why you chose these countries.

Answer preview

Emotional brand attachment involves the connection between the consumer and the brand, and plays a major role in influencing the consumption decisions (Malär et al., 2011). This paper describes the research constructs and items which would be used to measure how strongly the emotional brand emotion is influenced by cosmopolitanism, ethnocentric tendencies, and long-term orientation. The relevant conceptual framework, as well as a comparison of the online and paper-based surveys, are also presented in this paper. The discussion is contextualized to two countries, namely Brazil and the United Kingdom, where a cross-national study would be conducted. Brazil is selected to represent the BRIC countries, while the UK represents the European economies.

Word count: 2500