CONSUMERS' PERCEPTION ON BRAND IDENTITY OF SHOPPING CENTRES

Abstract

Many researches have been focused on the attributes that affect the performance of the shopping malls and thorough researches have also been done on the branding of consumer products and company. However, the brand identity of Singapore's shopping centers, rather than has products and company, has not been discussed extensively and the effectiveness of branding of shopping centers on the consumers' perception has yet to be discovered. From the results, city malls such as Suntec City and Ngee Ann City are perceived to be more attractive in quality, atmosphere, variety, recreational, service and accessibility while the suburban mall such as Jurong Point and Causeway Point are perceived to have a more reasonable price level and efficient. In terms of product, the four shopping malls are attractive and Suntec City is perceived to be the best, followed by Ngee Ann City, Jurong Point and Causeway Point. In terms of brand identity, the malls have little or no influence on the consumers' perception but the city malls have a stronger brand identity as compared to the suburban malls in terms of the 6 brand identity variables - brand personality, symbols, brand/customer relationship, self-expressive benefits, emotional benefits and organizational associations. We can conclude that a shopping center with good functional benefits may not have a good brand identity. However, shopping center with stronger functional benefits like Suntec City, may have a better brand identity. To conclude, marketers should thus apply different marketing or branding strategies and plans according to the different segments in order to carve out a niche for themselves and gain competitive advantage.