Branding Vs Foreign Branding

Branding vs Foreign Branding BY csillasus Branding: Country of origin vs Foreign branding (part 3 of the article) Country of origin stands for the country where a product is coming from. Countries over time have built up a profile/image on the global scale, which can manifest itself in either positive or negative perceptions (Warren, 2013) towards the country and its manufactured goods. Some countries are well known for their fine cuisine (e. g. Italian food) or favoured because of their high quality products with big reliability (German car industry).

Country of origin can be viewed as a stereotype (Maheswaran, 1994), which consumers can use as certainty for product quality. Its effects are defined as the extent to which the place of manufacture influences product evaluations'' (GurhanCanli and Maheswaran, 2000b, p. 309). On the other hand foreign branding is used for advertising and marketing purposes, when a company labels its products or services with a foreign or foreign-sounding name, thus making the customers believe that the good is originated from that particular country. In fact Foreign branding highly builds upon the positive effects of COO.

Costumers associate the foreign sounding brand, with its COO''s high quality and/or advanced technology. Especially new, yet unknown brands can use this branding strategy effectively. When customers meeting with a new brand name, they will attach it with a country or region where is might be coming from. Having their opinion and stereotypes connected with that particular country, they will then make their purchase decision highly influenced by their COO perceptions. Companies that use foreign branding are benefiting from a given countrys reputation, positive attributes and image, thus aining a valuable advantage over domestic products.

This association has become a highly important factor regarding costumers globally, COO is considered to make the nine tenth of the magic''. Furthermore it has been found that all products originated form a foreign country, are subject to COO effects (C. Min Han and Vern Terpstra, 1988) An interesting further discussion could be concerning foreign brandings ethical issues. A brand is a promise made by a company about a particular product also a quality certification and the way how the company differentiate its products in the competition.

Indicating that a particular product originates from a given country and thus promising the customer the qualities it has been associated with, though it does not originate from that particular country, is misguidance of the customers. Although it is legal to use foreign branding globally, it can be seen as ''cheating or deception'' from the customers'' point of view, who might Just find out at home after purchasing a certain product, that the made in ... '' label is actually saying something different then they were willing to pay for. Studied cases: Mars- Dolmio (Italian) foreign branding strategy