Influence factors of customer-based brand equity: A study on China mobile phone industry

Competitions among enterprises are actually competitions among brands, and competitions among brands depend on the level of brand equity. Brand equity is vital for companies to strengthen their competitive position. Most previous studies revealed that two sets of the brand equity measure which was brand satisfaction and brand loyalty grouped into the same loyalty dimension. However, this study separates these two sets of measures into customer satisfaction and customer loyalty and examines the mediating effects of customer loyalty between brand knowledge, customer satisfaction, and customer-based brand equity. This study aims to investigate the effect of brand awareness, brand association, perceived quality, and customer satisfaction on customer-based brand equity in China mobile phone industry, through customer loyalty, which provides the basis for brand strategic decision-making. Based on the data collected through top five and other mobile phone brands in China, the empirical tests used a structural equation modeling via partial least squares approach to prove the hypotheses. The results show that customer loyalty has a significant mediating effect on relationships between brand associations with brand awareness, perceived quality, and customer satisfaction on brand equity.