| Brand is a production of market competition,differentiating products of certain vendors from those of others.It is a sustainable asset symbolizing the core value of products for companies that succeed in managing it.Brand is an intangible asset that expresses itself through physical vehicles,such as trademarks,products,market share,etc.Brand incorporates traits and major selling points of products while products under the same brand share certain concept in common.This embodies the consistency between brand and products and the consistency between products under the same brand.With increasingly wider awareness of brand,relative concepts were proposed in succession,including brand personality,brand equity,brand culture,brand cognition,brand positioning,brand image,brand extension and brand loyalty.On the basis of proposition of these concepts,branding theories experienced a preparation stage before formal establishment,which contains three sub-stages,namely classical brand theory,modern brand theory and contemporary brand theory.During the stage of classical brand theory,scholars came up with the theory of brand image,brand positioning and brand extension.Brand image is composed by tangible and intangible contents,namely the functionality and personality of a brand.With the improvement of life condition and increase in disposable income of people,intangible aspects of brand image have received more attention from consumers.Under such background,distinct brand positioning is important for companies to wield the power of brand.Brand positioning is the business decision on culture orientation and personality of brands.It is the prime task of branding as it connects brands with targeted markets and customers,regulating the direction toward which marketing activities of companies are designed.Brand extension utilizes the influence of a brand to enter a new field.It is a crucial selection in brand development since proper extension eschews additional costs to launch a new brand while improper extension bears a backlash against original brands.This thesis focuses on the brand strategy of BMW for its advanced brand concept and branding management and applies relevant brand theories mentioned above.The BMW Group is one of German traditional and classic luxury automobile and motorcycle manufacturers with a global business scope.It has three automobile brands,namely BMW,MINI and Rolls-Royce and a motorcycle brand named BMW Motorrad and has built up a sales network throughout 140 countries and regions.The Group has made achievements in both brands and products.BMW and MINI were both listed in the top 100 brands in the worldwide range in 2019,especially BMW,which ranked 11th in the list with a value of 41.44 billion dollars.BMW together with Benz and Audi is collectively called as BBA,which is at a leading position in luxury automobile industry.BMW officially entered China since 1994 and established a joint adventure(BMW Brilliance)with Brilliance Auto,a local automaker in 2003.As the biggest sales market in the world,China is of great strategic importance for BMW.Despite differences in the market and consumers,BMW managed to localize its brands from positioning to promotion and gradually gained favors and loyalty from China’s local consumers,occupying a leading position in different segments from middle to high end.BMW’s success derives from its consistent brand value proposition,clear brand positioning,proactive responsibility assumption,timely line extension and collaborative online and offline promotion adapted to the local market apart from persistence in brand core value.This paper mainly analyzes BMW’s brand strategy in China and summarizes available experience and avoidable defects from the strategy.After the analysis on BMW,advice on branding is given to local luxury automobile enterprises.This thesis falls into six chapters.Chapter I is the introduction of the thesis,presenting research background,research significance,research methods and means and structure of the thesis.Competition in China’s automobile industry has transformed into a quality stage from the stage of economies of scale.However,foreign enterprises have been in advantageous position in the local market,especially German ones for their profound brand culture and extraordinary core technology.Due to the impact of the pandemic,despite gradual recovery of local market,both foreign and local enterprises are facing stronger competition.It is the high time that automobile enterprises make full use of their brand influence.Chapter Ⅱ is the literature review on brand and brand theories as well as BMW,composed of foreign and domestic research.Foreign theoretical preparation of branding went through three stages,that is,the stage of classical,modern and contemporary brand theory in succession.A myriad of basic and classic concepts and theories of brand were put forward at these stages,and the classical stage is vital for this thesis.Domestic scholars started relatively late in research on brand theories and mainly focused on brand equity,brand management and brand relations.Study on BMW is usually carried out from the perspectives of brand and marketing,and studies of its brand positioning and brand value are the most common domestically.Chapter Ⅲ introduces basic concepts of brand and illustrates brand theories adopted by this article,i.e.,the theories of brand positioning,brand image,brand development and integrated brand promotion.Thereinto,all these contents of brand have interactions.Brand positioning should be ascertained first when companies develop brand strategy as it plays a guiding role for the other three contents of brand strategy,while the other three contents serve to embody and intensify the positioning of brands.These concepts comprise basic elements of brand theories,and these theories provide theoretical ground for later analysis.Chapter Ⅳ makes an evaluation on BMW.This chapter is composed of three major parts.The first part gives a brief introduction of the BMW Group and its value proposition.The next part presents the overall situation of BMW in China and analyzes its sustainability.The last part is the prime content of this chapter,making a comprehensive analysis on BMW’s brand strategy in China in terms of brand positioning,brand image,brand development and brand promotion through STP model and in accordance with classical brand theories.Thereinto,brand positioning strategy of BMW is most worthy of praise.Chapter Ⅴ focuses on China’s local luxury automobile market from macro and micro perspectives,functioning as the main body of the thesis.The beginning part of this chapter applies PEST Analysis to probe the macro-environment of local automobile market and makes use of Porter’s Five Forces to look into the overall situation of local luxury automobile industry.The middle part of this chapter sums up successful experience and indicates problems of BMW’s brand strategy.The final part of this chapter gives suggestions to local luxury automobile enterprises,including forging credible brands through quality products,making out persistent core value and specialty of their brands,avoiding repetitive or resemblant brand positioning after close competitors,undertaking social responsibility within corporate economic capacity and choosing efficient promotion knit.Chapter VI concludes major findings from above analyses and points out limitations of this thesis.As China’s local automobile market tends to saturation and resident income rises,brand competitiveness is of increasing strategic importance.When enterprises formulate their brand strategy,consistency in the core value is vital to efficient exertion of brand effect and avoidance of unnecessary costs.Local brands have made progress over these years,but aren’t able to shake the leading position of foreign brands like BB A(Benz,BMW and Audi),Tesla and brands of joint adventures.To stand out from the besiege of foreign capital and expand outside world,branding is a prime task to finish.Based on relatively comprehensive analysis on the automobile giant,this thesis makes a summary of referable experience and lessons for local luxury automobile enterprises.It is hoped that the thesis be of theoretical help for later researchers and give practical enlightenment to local luxury automobile enterprises. |
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