Corporate Branding in Pharmaceutical Industry

Non-functional attributes include symbolic attributes (Aaker 1991, Keller 1993, Farquhar & Herr

1993, Chen 1996, Park et al. 1986) which are the intangible features that meet consumers’ needs for

social approval, personal expression or self-esteem (Keller 1993, Hankinson and Cowking 1993, de

Chernatony and McWilliam 1989, Pitta & Katsanis 1995). Consumers linked social image of a brand,

trustworthiness, perceived value, differentiation and country of origin to a brand.

Social Image

Lassar et al. (1995) limit the reference of the image dimension to the social dimension, calling it

social image as social image contributes more to brand equity. Social image is defined as the

consumer’s perception of the esteem in which the consumer’s social group holds the brand. It

includes the attributions a consumer makes and a consumer thinks that others make to the typical user

of the brand.

Perceived Value

Value appeared in several brand equity models (Feldwick 1996, Martin and Brown 1991, Lassar et al.

1995). Lassar et al. (1995) define perceived value as the perceived brand utility relative to its costs,

assessed by the consumer and based on simultaneous considerations of what is received and what is

given up to receive it. Consumer choice of a brand depends on a perceived balance between the price

of a product and all its utilities (Lassar et al. 1995). A consumer is willing to pay premium prices due

to the higher brand equity.

Trustworthiness

Brand equity models (Martin and Brown 1991, Lassar et al. 1995) regard trustworthiness of a product

as an important attribute in assessing the strengths of a brand. Lassar et al. (1995) define

trustworthiness as the confidence a consumer places in the firm and the firm’s communications and as

to whether the firm’s actions would be in the consumer’s interest. Consumers place high value in the

brands that they trust.

Differentiation/Distinctiveness

The Marketing Science Institute (Leuthesser 1988) states that the...