DOES PERCEPTION OF COUNTRY OF MANUFACTURING IMAGE, COUNTRY OF ORIGIN IMAGE AND WORD OF MOUTH INFLUENCE CONSUMER BEHAVIOR? THE CASE OF PAKISTAN’S AUTO INDUSTRY

Back to Page Authors: Kamran Maqbool

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Keywords: country of manufacturing, country of origin, word of mouth, brand equity, brand leadership, brand love, consumer behavior

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Abstract: The purpose of this study aims to investigate the effects of country of manufacturing (COM) image, country of origin (COO) image and word of mouth (WOM) on purchase intention through brand equity, brand leadership and brand love. In past literatures it is evident that consumer prefer to purchase brands that provides them with unique values and differentiated features. Therefore a careful understanding of key success factors that may help firms to sustain their brands is very important. This study focuses on COM, COO and WOM effects as key success factors for building brand equity, brand leadership and brand love, because they are found to be important in influencing consumer behavior. A cross-city survey of Pakistan’s auto industry will be conducted to test the hypothesis that will be predicted on a sample of 700 respondents. This study will provide new theoretical insights into factors influencing customers purchase decision making by incorporating brand equity, brand leadership and brand love as a mediator in the relationship between COM image, COO image, WOM and purchase intention. Brand leadership and brand love are emerging concepts in the domain of consumer psychology. Brand love has been regarded as the motivating force behind contemporary hedonic consumption. Yet little quantitative exploration has been done to understand brand leadership and brand love especially in the context of emerging Asian market.

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