Research On Brand Equity Of Chinese Professional Football Clubs From The Perspective Of Fans

Under the realistic background of the overall social and economic downturn caused by the epidemic,CSL clubs are generally facing the dilemma of high investment and low return,and the annual net loss often exceeds 100 million yuan.It is urgent to improve themselves hematopoietic function and enhance their profitability as soon as possible.The "cutting expenditure" of China’s professional football clubs is the general trend,and the "open source" should be taken.The opinions on accelerating the development of sports industry and promoting sports consumption issued by the State Council proposed to strengthen the construction of sports brands and focus on the management of intangible assets,pointing out the direction for the development of China’s professional football clubs.As the most important intangible assets of professional football clubs,brand equity is as valuable as the tangible assets of clubs.The research on how to develop and protect brand equity,how to formulate a clear brand development strategy and how to better interact with fans is of great significance to the future development of professional football clubs in China.Based on this,through theoretical and empirical research,this study deeply discusses the constituent dimensions and driving relationship of brand equity of Chinese professional football clubs from the perspective of fans,so as to provide reference and suggestions for the brand construction of professional clubs.At present,scholars’ research on the brand equity structure of sports clubs in China is relatively scattered,and there is a lack of comprehensive and in-depth discussion on the brand equity of clubs.This paper combines theoretical research with empirical research,comprehensively uses the research methods of literature,interview,questionnaire and mathematical statistics,combined with the tracing of brand equity theory and the literature analysis of sports club brand equity,constructs a theoretical model based on the cognitive emotion behavior theory paradigm,puts forward the driving relationship hypothesis,conducts a questionnaire survey on the fans of professional football clubs,and makes a statistical analysis of the data.The research comprehensively extracts the constituent dimensions of China’s professional football club brand assets based on the perspective of fans,standardizes and develops the measurement scale of club brand image,deeply analyzes the driving relationship between the hierarchical elements of club brand assets,and puts forward the Enlightenment of club brand management according to the research conclusion.The main conclusions of this paper are as follows:First,from the perspective of fans,the brand equity of Chinese professional football clubs include three dimensions:club image,fan identity and fan loyalty.The formation path of professional football club brand equity:fans’ cognition of the club image can trigger their own attitude response,and then produce loyalty and other behavioral intentions to the club.Second,the brand image of China professional football club includes six factors:team performance,watching experience,historical details,sense of social responsibility,fan relationship and management.Third,the club image has a driving relationship with the fan identity,the club image with the fan loyalty,and the fan identity with the fan loyalty.Fan identity is a kind of high-level psychological commitment,which plays a complete intermediary role between club image and fan loyalty.Fourth,the individual differences of fans(gender differences,age differences,education differences,income differences and professional differences)have a significant impact on the club’s brand assets to varying degrees.The test of the antecedent variables of the demographic characteristics of club brand equity helps sports marketers understand who will be more or less affected by the management of brand equity drivers in brand marketing.Based on the research conclusions,this paper puts forward the management enlightenment of brand equity of professional football clubs in China:(1)update the concept,and branding is the core of building a century old football club.The brand construction of professional football clubs should realize the concept transformation from "tangible" to "intangible",from physical form to value form,from achievement oriented theory to the coordinated development of football industry and football industry.(2)To innovate in practice,the brand strategy of professional football club is to develop the brand equity.The development of professional football club brand assets should realize multi-dimensional development,driving force empowerment and fan oriented practical innovation.