QUESTION 1:
Hatch and Schultz seem to suggest that a gap between the perception of the company and the culture of the organization are a bad thing to have. What is the basis for their argument that a gap is less preferred to no gap?
How does the research of Davies, Chun and Kamins (2010) differ from that of Hatch and Schultz (specifically in terms of the recommendations made and the nature of the gap).
Do Hatch and Schultz make any distinction in terms of the directionality for the type of gap encountered, and if not why might this be short-sighted.
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QUESTION 2:
Explain why it is not necessarily effective to promise more than the product can deliver in order to get a sale.
What steps can a marketer take to enhance post-purchase satisfaction?
Is it better to base your reputation on CSR’s or CA’s?
Would an approach which focuses on CSR be more effective for a company with a great reputation or a poor reputation?
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QUESTION 3:
Harley-Davidson is an iconic brand that is well known in the United States. It virtually invented the big “bruiser” type bikes and has been around since 1903. The problem is that the company’s main market (Baby Boomers) have been on the decline in number and the company is finding it difficult to replace them. Moreover, motorcycle ownership seems to be on the downswing worldwide. Essentially Harley must get ahead of the demographic curve with new customers while somehow keeping faith and appeal with its fanatical old ones. That’s where YOU come in, develop a marketing strategy to help them accomplish this by focusing on the following 4 questions:
1)What errors would Ted Levitt say that Harley made? How could they be corrected?
2)Who are potential consumers of Harley? How can Harley effectively segment the market?
3)Kevin Keller notes that brand equity is made up of brand awareness and brand image. Under which category would you place most of Harley’s problems, awareness or image? Using Brown &Dacin’sarticle as aguide, how can Harley build their brand equity and their market share?
4)What would Kim and Maubourne of “Blue Ocean” fame suggest in terms of how Harley could recapture their market? Has Harley made any attempt to pursue a “Blue Ocean” strategy to recapture their market?
Answers:
Q1
1.A gap between image and culture means there's inconformity between what the employers in company does and what stakeholders think the company would do. Corporate brand can do a lot for the company. The gap may cause confusion among consumers because today with internet word-of-mouth spread so quickly that positive image of the company is really important. So the perception of the company and the culture of the organization should better be consistent. That’s why a gap is less preferred.
2.Hatch and Schultz think that the gap is always a bad thing for the company. However, the research of Davies, Chun and Kamins (2010) found that where employees have a more positive view of the company reputation than customers, the future sale will grow up, which is a good thing. It’s a bad thing only when employees have a relatively negative view of the company reputation than customers,which would decrease future sales. The first one recommends companies to using branding tool kit by aligning three different gaps to build corporate brand. The latter one recommends marketing department and hr department in a company to cooperate together.
3.No，they don't.
4.This is short-sighted because the gap can be divided into three cases where one exceeds another, under another or both in similar level. These 3 different cases of gaps bring different outcomes. So it’s short-sighted to see them all as the same bad thing.
Q2
1.Because what consumers know about the company influences their reaction to company’s products. When promised more, the expectation of consumers towards the product increase. When the expectation is more than the perceived value the product can bring, consumers will be less satisfied.
2.To enhance post-purchase satisfaction, company can manipulate CA association by leveraging what consumers know to compensate for what they don’t know and can’t evaluate about a product. Like lower the expectation of consumers before purchase. When important product attributes can’t be fully evaluated prior to purchase,consumers will use CA association as the basis for inference. So they will still gain satisfaction after discovering more attributes of product after purchase.
3.It’s better to base reputation on CA’s. Because it has greater impact on both specific product attribute perceptions and the overall corporate evaluation than on CSR.
4.It will be more effective for a company with a great reputation. Because company with poor reputation should focus on CA to generate the contrast effect which cause the evaluation of the product to be higher.
Q3
1.Levitt would say that Harley should have a broader perspective about the company. The brand Harley is about selling a lifestyle that enable people to get away from their white-collar life and become a secret biker. However, Harley is now focusing too much on selling their product motorcycles. They want to gain younger customers so they want to sell the motorcycles that appeal to them, which is product myopia. What they should do is have a broader perspective, keep their brand culture at the cool lifestyle
And they also did research on what young people like, and produce motorcycles that are preferred by them. This is also wrong and what they should do is to research on what customers want instead of what they preferred among available alternatives.
2.Potential consumers of Harley are the people from 20 to 40 years old who have well-paid jobs, like freedom, challenge and excitement and in above average social class. The market should be segmented into 2 parts. The first is to maintain the old customers from baby-boomers generation. The second is to develop potential market of young people of X and Y generation.
3.I think it should be brand awareness. Because over those many years history of Harley, the Brand image has deeply embedded in people’s mind who know this brand. However, with time past by, there are more and more young people who aren’t aware of this brand. Instead, when talking about motorcycles, they may first think of brands like Suzuki, Honda, Yamaha and so on. So nowadays Harley should work harder on its brand awareness.
To build brand equity, Harley should focus on both corporate abilities and corporate social responsibilities. For CA, Harley should make better products so that consumer perceptions of product attribute and overall product evaluation can go up. For CSR, Harley should shoulder more societal obligations so that the trustworthiness of the company would be enhanced.
4.According to Kim and Mauborgne, Harley could recapture their market by the following methods. First, focus more on switching non-customers into customers than making current customers happy because the purchasing power of current customer is limited and there’s so much that can be earned in the potential market of non-customers. Second, try to de-segment and find the similarities between different segments so that they can fulfill the demand across different buyer groups. Third, focus more on the product than the technology behind it, consumers will be more satisfied with better and cooler motorcycles. Fourth, differentiate but also subtract all the redundant things they are doing.
Harley has made an attempt to recapture their market by start developing modern motorcycles that appeal to younger customers, they want to turn the non-customers from x and y generation into their customers. They also tried to use niche strategy to get the female rider market, which succeeded in doubling the female customers number in the past 10 years.