Professional Documents
Culture Documents
arket
Research
Brand Orientation
of Museums: Model
and Empirical Results
Carsten Baumgarth
Introduction
Background and
Model Development
Abstract
Keywords
Brand Orientation
A general framework that focuses on the internal prerequisites of a strong brand is brand
orientation. A specific variant of marketing
orientation, it is characterized by the importance accorded to the brand in all management
decisions as well as by a high level of systematic brand management (Hankinson, 2001a,
2001b; Urde, 1994, 1999). The ideal outcome
is a relatively constant and consistent brand
offer, clearly differentiated from competing
products in a way that is relevant to current
and potential customers. Researchers have
concentrated on the development of a conceptual framework (Bridson and Evans, 2004;
Hankinson, 2001a; Wong and Merrilees,
2005) or on measures of the correlation between
brand orientation and performance outcomes
(Ewing and Napoli, 2005; Hankinson, 2001b;
Napoli, 2006).
Among these researchers, Ewing and Napoli
(2005) conceptualize brand orientation as a
three-dimensional construct comprising interaction, orchestration and affect, whereas
Hankinson (2001b) proposes seven elements.
The former study derives its model from
explorative factor analysis without first establishing a theoretical foundation for the structure, while the latter is based on a narrowly
Acknowledgements
The author wishes to
thank Keith Crosier,
the three anonymous
IJAM reviewers, and
the IJAM Editor,
Franois Colbert,
for their insightful
and constructive
comments on this
article.
Because museums operate in a challenging economic and social environment, greater professionalism in museum
management is becoming increasingly necessary. Brand management is one building block available, though it
will have to overcome ideological resistance to the importing, by cultural institutions, of practices from the
world of commerce. The body of knowledge regarding the application of brand management to museums is
confined to a few published case studies and conceptual frameworks. The author presents and tests a new model
for brand management in the sector, grounded in relevant general literature and made up of four layers: values, norms, artifacts and behaviours. Questionnaire responses from 245 museums in Germany provided the data
for an empirical test, which confirmed the fundamental structure of the new model. The application of the model
is measurement of the internal anchorage of brand orientation and brand management, and assessment of
their effect on museum performance. The descriptive results show that branding has achieved little penetration
in this sector. The author draws conclusions, discusses managerial implications and identifies research directions.
Branding, brand orientation, brand management, museums, model
31
focused empirical study of fundraising charities in the United Kingdom. Neither framework allows for distinction among different
layers of brand orientation.
The theoretical foundation of the alternative conceptual framework proposed here is
found in the market orientation literature
(Avlonitis and Gounaris, 1999; Homburg
and Pflesser, 2000; Kohli and Jaworski, 1990;
Kohli, Jaworski and Kumar, 1993; Narver and
Slater, 1990), within which two perspectives
can be distinguished. The behavioural variant describes the phenomenon in terms of
concrete behaviours and is typified by Kohli
and Jaworskis approach to the topic; its cultural counterpart is related to a more fundamental view of the organization, as in Narver
and Slater. The proposed model combines the
two and transfers them to the specific context
of branding.
Construction of the proposed model begins
with Scheins (1992) corporate culture model,
which identifies three layers focused on values, norms and artifacts. To complete the
new model, I add a fourth layer, behaviours,
which corresponds to the behavioural perspective on market orientation. Homburg and
Pflesser (2000) propose a similar model for the
analysis of market orientation. Figure 1 uses
examples to illustrate these four layers of brand
orientation. The statement by the director of the
Guggenheim Museum (United States) emphasizes the high degree of relevance accorded to
branding by top management. The corporate
design style book by the MuseumQuartier
Wien (Austria) exemplifies explicit norms for
the execution of branding. The planning
objective for the rebuilding of the Museum of
rsum
MOTS CLS
32
Modern Art (United States) describes an artifact or symbol that expresses the brand idea.
The corporate advertisement for the Hamburger Kunsthalle (Germany) is an instance of
brand-oriented behaviour, in the form of a
practical marketing communications initiative. Thus the values layer measures the role of
branding in overall strategic planning and
managers understanding of basic branding
rules demonstrated by such systematic
brand management practices as constant and
consistent brand positioning. The norms layer
assesses the extent to which such rules and
regulations, whether explicit or implicit, determine the basic operations of brand management, such as the formal integration of brand
communication. The artifacts layer relates to
the perceptible symbols that reflect the brand,
such as corporate architecture, staff uniforms
or organizational stories. The new, fourth,
layer, behaviours, encompasses all concrete
actions undertaken in support of the brand
brand-related market research or marketing
initiatives, for example. Unlike the other three
layers, behaviours is characterized by an emphasis on the external operating environment.
Hypotheses
The new model proposes a causal chain from
abstract values and related norms to symbolic
artifacts and concrete behaviours, which is
consistent with the theory of organizational
behaviour (e.g., Katz and Kahn, 1978) and
with the market orientation model developed
by Homburg and Pflesser (2000). The supposition is that corporate commitment to the
brand and managerial understanding of the
En raison de leur contexte conomique et social hautement comptitif, les muses doivent hausser le niveau de professionnalisme de leur management. La gestion de la marque prsent un intrt malgr une certaine rsistance idologique limportation, par des institutions culturelles, de pratiques managriales propres au monde des affaires. Le corpus de connaissances
sur la gestion de la marque dans le secteur musal se rsume la publication de quelques tudes de cas et de cadres conceptuels. Lauteur prsente et teste un nouveau modle de gestion de la marque pour le secteur, inspir de la littrature pertinente et comportant quatre variables: valeurs, normes, artfacts et comportements. Les 245 muses allemands sonds ont
fourni les donnes ncessaires un test empirique, qui a confirm la structure fondamentale du modle. Les applications
vises taient la mesure de l ancrage interne de lorientation sur la marque et de la gestion de la marque, et lvaluation
de leffet sur rendement du muse. Les rsultats montrent que le branding est peu pratique dans ce secteur. Lauteur tire des
conclusions, discute des implications managriales et propose des voies de recherche future.
Branding, orientation sur la marque, gestion de la marque, muses, modle
Figure 1
Brand-oriented norms
Brand-oriented artifacts
Source: www.mqw.at
Brand-oriented behaviours
Corporate image advertising. Hamburger
Kunsthalle, Hamburg
rEsumEN
PALABRAS CLAVE
Source: www.kreativhife.de
However, such norms can function effectively as rules guiding the execution of branding strategy only if they are based on common
values (Homburg and Pflesser, 2000) and are
both understood and accepted by the employees. Symbolic artifacts can disseminate awareness of the museums brand and its branding
strategy internally, and thereby encourage
acceptance of the norm-led rules among the
staff. This positive relationship between norms
Al funcionar los museos en un ambiente social y econmico de gran complejidad, se requiere cada vez ms de un mayor profesionalismo en la gestin museal. El manejo de la marca es una de las herramientas disponibles, aunque este requiera superar una
resistencia ideolgica a la importacin, por parte de instituciones culturales, de prcticas del mundo de los negocios. Los conocimientos en materia de aplicacin del manejo de marca en la gestin de museos se limitan a unos cuantos estudios de caso
publicados y marcos conceptuales. El autor presenta y pone a prueba un nuevo modelo de manejo de marca en el sector, un modelo
basado en publicaciones generales pertinentes al caso y construido en cuatro capas: valores, normas, artefactos y comportamientos. Las respuestas a una encuesta por parte de 245 museos en Alemania proporcionaron los datos para un anlisis emprico,
el cual confirma la estructura fundamental del nuevo modelo. La aplicacin del mismo es en s una medida del anclaje interno
de la orientacin y el manejo de marca, y la evaluacin de sus efectos sobre el desempeo del museo. Los resultados descriptivos
muestran que el branding ha logrado muy poca penetracin en este sector. El autor alcanza conclusiones, discute las implicaciones administrativas e identifica orientaciones de investigacin.
Branding o marca, orientacin de marca, manejo de marca, museos, modelo
33
Methodology
Sampling and Data Collection
To test the model, a questionnaire was designed
and mailed to a sample of museums in Germany
that were representative (with respect to their
size, the focus of their collections and their
funding sources) so that the findings could be
confidently generalized. Target respondents were
members of top management of the museums
surveyed, as the most reliable source of detailed
and accurate responses to the questions. Because
there is no official database covering the whole
German museum landscape, a list of addresses
had to be generated specifically for this purpose.
The list was derived by combining the International Council of Museums membership
list with an Internet search of relevant German
Web sites such as www.webmuseen.de.
The content of the self-completion questionnaire derived directly from the proposed
brand orientation model. Questions and scales
for measurement of the different constructs
were constructed on the basis of precedents in
the literature on brand orientation and museum
branding. The outcome was pretested among
museum managers and in October 2006 a refined
questionnaire was sent to 590 top museum
managers in Germany. Almost exactly half of
the managers (48.1%) responded. Of the identified museums, 17 had closed or merged with
another museum or cultural institution; 25
target respondents declined to participate on
principle or for lack of time; the remaining nonrespondents failed to return the questionnaire.
The data set for analysis was thus the combined responses of 284 senior managers. For
valid results, it was necessary to remove those
containing any missing values in the exogenous and endogenous variables. After cases with
more than 10% relating to the items of the
four brand orientation constructs, or more
than 15% missing values of the performance
International journal of arts management
This article is reproduced with the permission of the International Journal of Arts Management
Figure 2
Behaviour
Brand orientation
as a value
H1
Performance
Norms of
brand orientation
Market
performance
H3
H6
Behaviour of
brand orientation
H2
H4
Artefacts of
brand orientation
items, had been duly eliminated, 245 questionnaires remained valid for data analysis.
Missing values were replaced by estimated values in SPSS via the EM procedure.
More than half of the respondents met the
top-management criterion: 10% managing
directors, 39% directors and 10% acting directors. They represented a broad spectrum of
museum sizes (49% up to 5 employees; 24%
more than 20 employees), number of visitors
(36% up to 10,000 per annum; 20% more
than 100,000), and collection focus (25% art/
film/photo; 24% culture/religion/music; 22%
history; 17% people/local history; 14% natural sciences). Almost half of the museums
(46%) were state-funded, a third were private
institutions (33%) and the remainder were
hybrids of various kinds. Altogether, the sample fulfils the stated sampling objectives, and
the study thus accurately reflects the practice
of brand orientation and brand management
in German museums.
Because the data set analyzed derives from
only 245 questionnaires, the requirement for
multi-normal distribution of the variables is
not universally fulfilled. Taking account of the
early stage of the research and the mixture of
formative and reflective constructs, a decision
H5
Cultural
performance
35
Hypothesis Testing
The study next analyzed both the structural
model and the individual hypotheses.
The results for the complete model show
Q2 values of 0.13 and 0.05 for the market performance and cultural performance values,
respectively both above the threshold level of
the Stone-Geisser test (Chin, 1998). Additionally, the explained variances of approximately
24% of market performance and 14% of cultural performance support the relevance of
brand orientation to the success of museums.
In short, the global fit and explanatory power
of the model are acceptable.
Testing of the hypotheses by bootstrapping
(n = 1,000) and t values confirm all four hypotheses related to the museum brand orientation
model at a significant level. Thus, brand-oriented
values have a positive impact on brand-oriented
norms (H1), which in turn have a positive effect
on brand-oriented artifacts (H2) and behaviours (H3). Those artifacts also have a positive
influence on brand-oriented behaviours (H4).
Furthermore, the results confirm assumptions
about the link between brand orientation and
performance. Brand-oriented behaviours have
a positive impact on both cultural performInternational journal of arts management
This article is reproduced with the permission of the International Journal of Arts Management
cSV**
Weight
t value
New
0.73
0.53
3.26/
1.39
1.47
0.42
4.54
0.50
2.59/
1.32
1.54
0.44
5.13
New
0.39
-0.11
0.88
0.82
1.48/
0.89
1.04
0.28
3.34
New
0.47
0.18
2.83/
1.31
1.09
0.31
4.66
0.58
0.37
3.29/
1.52
1.60
0.40
5.57
New
0.33
3.53/
1.38
1.14
0.23
3.72
0.50
0.19
2.39/
1.45
1.19
0.11
1.72
New
0.50
0.19
2.06/
1.33
2.09
0.13
1.52
New
0.60
0.27
2.78/
1.48
2.10
0.08
0.98
New
0.86
0.79
4.00/
1.29
1.14
0.18
2.87
0.63
0.31
2.13/
1.23
1.53
0.39
4.74
Item
We have discussed the management
of our brands intensively.
Values
Norms
Mean/
SD
pSA*
Construct
Source
Table 1
(continued)
Volume 11, NUMBER 3 spring 2009
This article is reproduced with the permission of the International Journal of Arts Management
37
pSA*
cSV**
Mean
/SD
Variance
inflation
factor
Weight
t value
Construct
Source
Table 1
0.50
0.22
3.12/
1.73
1.12
0.36
5.13
New
0.71
0.53
3.05/
1.53
1.56
0.18
2.11
New
0.74
0.63
2.55/
1.44
1.38
0.38
4.50
New
0.37
0.11
2.80/
1.47
1.20
0.51
7.43
0.73
0.53
3.28/
1.51
1.95
0.23
1.99
New
0.67
0.47
3.54/
1.49
2.06
0.20
1.67
New
0.73
0.53
4.51/
0.87
1.33
0.08
1.43
H, E, B
0.64
0.31
3.94/
1.22
1.59
0.03
0.44
New
0.53
0.29
2.37/
1.37
1.23
0.12
1.23
New
0.31
2.33/
1.37
1.25
0.53
6.97
0.58
0.32
2.65/
1.30
1.25
0.33
4.29
Item
Artifacts
Behaviours
*pSA = proportion of substantive agreement; ** cSV = substantive-validity coefficient (see Anderson and Gerbing, 1991)
Sources: B = Baumgarth (2007); H = Hankinson (2001b); E = Ewing and Napoli (2005); S = Schramm, Spiller and Staack (2004)
38
Table 2
Source
Mean/SD
Indicator
reliability
W**
5.96/5.89
0.51
3.80/4.24
0.47
8.11/7.33
0.80
4.46/4.62
0.70
3.05/4.39
0.59
4.26/4.70
0.69
Visitor satisfaction
3.18/2.50
0.73
3.72/3.01
0.66
Attraction of sponsors
6.11/5.70
0.56
Increase in recall
3.23/2.38
0.83
3.35/2.60
0.82
3.52/3.22
0.76
Construct
Item*
Expansion of the collection
Cultural
performance
Market
performance
Cronbachs
alpha
Average
variance
extracted
0.71
0.41
0.82
0.54
*Two questions for each goal (importance and achievement); multiplication of the two values (range of the goal index: 125); 1 = positive; 25 = negative
**W = Witt, 2000
2
2
R additional
R basis
2
1 R additional
R 2additional and R 2basis are the R-squares of the cultural performance and market performance
variables, shown in Figure 3, when the single
brand orientation construct is used or omitted
in the structural model. As a rule of thumb,
f 2 values of .02, .15 and .35 can be taken as
indicators of small, medium and large effects
of a construct in the model. The brand orientation layers have only small effects (f 2 artifacts
= 0.04; f 2 norms = 0.03; f 2 values = 0.06)
within the market performance construct, as they
do within the cultural performance construct
Findings
To render the results of the tests more useful
to managers and consultants, the scores related
39
Figure 3
Behaviour
Brand orientation
as a value
0.709***
Performance
Norms of
brand orientation
R2 = 50.3%
Q2 = 0.182
0.393***
0.654***
Artefacts of
brand orientation
R2 = 42.8%
Q2 = 0.204
Behaviour of
brand orientation
R2 = 46.1%
Q2 = 0.164
0.354***
0.487***
0.375***
Market
performance
R2 = 23.7%
Q2 = 0.131
Cultural
performance
R2 = 14.1%
Q2 = 0.052
This article is reproduced with the permission of the International Journal of Arts Management
Figure 5
Figure 4
Behaviours***
100
Norms***
100
100
Artefacts***
*** : p < 0.01
Values
(index)
Norms
(index)
Artefacts
(index)
Behaviours
(index)
54.6
45.3
45.0
43.8
Successful museums
70.1
60.3
63.7
62.0
Average
62.3
52.7
45.3
52.8
Controlling integrated
communication*
47
36
Image survey*
14
Controlling differentiation*
27
Analysis of non-visitors*
28
Visitor survey*
33
0
25
50
75
100
41
Figure 6
Specific facilities*
Sepecial events*
Product
Opening hours*
Exhibition concepts*
Integration
of employees
Brand manual*
Brand workshops*
Brand meeting*
Communication
Website
Visitor magazines
Events
Posters
Brochures
Promotion
Museum clubs
Direct marketing
Public relations
Cinema ads
Outdoor ads
Print ads
Radio ads
TV ads
64
62
43
16
25
17
85
14
84
45
92
30
61
44
86
4
77
71
29
14
0
25
50
75
100
Discussion
Theoretical Implications
Previous studies of brand orientation have
measured the construct in a global or multidimensional manner. A new model is proposed, derived from theoretical work in the
areas of corporate culture and market orientation, which distinguishes explicitly among four
layers of brand orientation. Not only are these
layers components of the brand orientation
42
construct, but there is a logical and processoriented structure to the model. The first layer,
the values dimension, influences the next, the
norms dimension, which in turn affects the
next two layers of brand orientation: artifacts
and behaviours.
The model was developed and empirically
tested in the context of museum services, but
it is flexible. There is scope to transfer it to
other cultural services as well as to consumer
products and services in general. The studies
on which it is partly based were focused on the
business-to-business sector and the media sector. The new model contributes generally to
marketing theory and practice by offering a
comprehensive and manageable scale for measuring brand orientation.
International journal of arts management
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Managerial Implications
The model and findings also have several implications for practical museum management.
First, they unequivocally demonstrate to museum
managers the importance of a discipline imported
from the business world. Applied effectively,
brand management offers considerable potential for the improvement of a museums cultural and market performance. Second, they
illustrate the importance of adopting brand
orientation throughout a museums organization. The values, norms, artifacts and behaviours
that are causally linked in the model are key
elements in implementation of that orientation. They can guide diagnosis of the brands
strengths and weaknesses (for instance, via
management workshops) and hence form the
basis of a branding strategy.
The model further suggests the proper process for effective implementation of brand management. As a first step, responsible managers
should define and adopt brand-oriented values.
Then they should formulate brand-oriented
norms, via branding manuals and positioning
statements. As the next step, they should manipulate such brand-oriented artifacts as elements
of building design. Lastly, they should adopt
brand-oriented behaviours, such as implementing
control mechanisms and engaging in corporate
identity campaigns.
References
American Association of Museums. 2000. Code of
Ethics for Museums. Available online: http://www.
aam-us.org/museumresources/ethics/coe.cfm.
Anderson, J.C., and D.W. Gerbing. 1991. Predicting
the Performance of Measures in a Confirmatory
Factor Analysis With a Pretest Assessment of Their
Substantive Validities. Journal of Applied Psychology, Vol. 76, no 5, p. 732740.
43
This article is reproduced with the permission of the International Journal of Arts Management
Wong, H.Y., and B. Merrilees 2005. A Brand Orientation Typology for SMEs: A Case Research
Approach. Journal of Product and Brand Management, Vol. 14, no 3, p. 155162.
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