[雙語翻譯]外文翻譯--酒店品牌策略（譯文）

1、February 2010 Cornell Hospitality Quarterly 27Hotel Brand Strategyby JOHN W. O’NeILL and aNNa S. MaTTILa? 2010 COrNeLL uNIVerSITyDOI: 10.1177/1938965509352286 Volume 51, Issue 1 27-34Few dispute the value that a brand

2、 brings to a hotel property, but questions remain regarding exactly how the brand creates guest loyalty and how it creates value. Over the past twenty-five years, a brand flag has become an essential element of arran

3、ging a hotel development deal. Because of this, researchers have examined how brands influence top- and bottom-line revenues and overall asset value. Moreover, the effect of the brand on customer satisfaction seems t

4、o be affected by the brand’s franchising strategy.Keywords: brand management; customer satisfac- tion; hotel asset value; franchisingIn the past twenty-five years, the hotel industry has firmly embraced and accepted

5、the value of brand- ing as an essential component of its marketing strategy (Dev et al. 2009), especially given extensive hotel brand segmentation. Beginning with Quality Int- ernational (now Choice Hotels Internationa

6、l) in 1981, most lodging companies have developed multiple brands to serve multiple market segments (Jiang, Dev, and Rao 2002). Beside Choice, companies that offer numerous product tiers include Starwood, Marriott,

7、Hilton, and Accor. This strategy seems to be an accep- ted aspect of hotel operation. This segmentation strategy is based on the idea that a brand name is part of the process of giving tan- gibility to what is essential

8、ly intangible, providing a “shorthand” method of establishing a particular prop- erty’s quality by giving the customer important infor- mation about its product and service, sight unseen (Brucks, Zeithaml, and Naylor 20

9、00). In this regard, the brand’s value is based on potential guests’ awareness of the brand, their perception of its quality, and overall customer satisfaction (O’Neill and Mattila 2004). The remarkable growth of hote

10、l branding rests on the concept that brands provide added value to both guests and hotel companies, in large part because they foster brand loyalty (O’Neill and Xiao 2006). From a corporate strategy viewpoint, well-m

11、anaged hotel brands tend to gain increasing market share (O’Neill and Mattila 2004), even though different parent com- panies take diverse approaches to managing their indi- vidual brand identity. Marriott Internationa

12、l, for instance, is careful to include its corporate name on most of its brands. One exception to this approach is Ritz-Carlton, which was a well-established brand before being acq- uired by Marriott. Other firms, suc

13、h as Starwood and Choice Hotels International, employ a house-of-brands strategy. The individual brand names for each hotel concept stand on their own, typically without including the parent company name (O’Neill and

14、 Mattila 2006). Hilton and Wyndham have used both approaches, depending on the nature of their various hotel brands. Similarly, various chains take different approa-ches to logos and identifying information for their

15、various product brands. Choice Hotels International, at PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIV on February 11, 2010 http://cqx.sagepub.com Downloaded from February 2010 Cornell Hospitality Quarterly 29HOTeL braND STraTegy MarkeTINg

16、 (NOIs) than do others (O’Neill and Mattila 2006), while other brands report consis- tently stronger average daily rates (ADRs) than others do. In an earlier study, we found that ADR (an indicator of a hotel’s “top l

17、ine”) is a better predictor of a hotel’s mar- ket value than is its NOI (an indicator of a hotel’s “bottom line”), but hoteliers would nevertheless wish to drive both (O’Neill and Mattila 2006). In fact, a study publi

18、- shed in this journal has shown that for cer- tain product tiers, hotel brand affects hotel market value above and beyond the impor- tant effects of NOI, ADR, occupancy rate, and number of guest rooms (O’Neill and Xi

19、ao 2006). That same study found that this positive brand effect occurs only in the middle chain scale categories (upper upscale, upscale, and midscale), but not in the top (luxury) and bottom (economy) categories. We

20、 further examined how brand affili- ation affects hotel revenue. The branding literature has demonstrated that consum- ers use brand name as an important qual- ity cue. Our study indicated that consumers are typically

21、willing to pay a price pre- mium for brands they view as being high in quality (O’Neill and Mattila 2006). A con- current study found that brand affiliation, name recognition, and reputation for high- quality service t

22、ogether can contribute as much as 20 to 25 percent of the going- concern value of a successfully operating hotel (O’Neill and Xiao 2006). In addi- tion, a well-managed brand can discourage competition (Dev, Morgan, an

23、d Shoemaker 1995).What We Know about How Brands Create ValueLet us look more closely at the source of customer-based brand equity. One study suggested that the following four compo- nents underlie this equity: brand

24、aware- ness, brand loyalty, perceived quality, and brand image (Kim and Kim 2004). Prasad and Dev (2000) developed a numerical brand equity index that captures brand awareness and consumer perceptions of brand perfor

25、mance. Beyond the advan- tage of awareness and image, brand equity results from benefits of marketing effici- ency and enhanced performance associ- ated with that brand and long-term brand effect based on customer loya

26、lty (Prasad and Dev 2002). Brand equity also allows a chain to expand the brand in a variety of markets (Mahajan, Rao, and Srivastava 1994). For example, in the hotel industry, the level of brand equity may be relat

27、ed to the brand’s ability to geographically exp- and, to expand via franchising, and to deve- lop subbrands. These issues are particularly salient for global lodging organizations such as Marriott or Accor. Well-estab

28、lished brands are intangible assets that serve as a source of strategic advantage and create financial value due to their ability to generate cash flows via rela- tively higher margins (O’Neill and Mattila 2006). In

29、general, major contributors of generating cash flows are customer loy- alty, brand extension including licensing opportunities, and enhanced marketing efficiency (Rao, Agarwal, and Dahlhoff 2004). Hotel brands first

30、create value for guests by helping to assure them of a uniform level of quality (O’Neill and Xiao 2006). As customers’ loyalty grows, the brand owner can capitalize on the brand’s value through price premiums, decre

31、ased price elasticity, increased market share, and more rapid brand expansion. Finally, companies with successful brands benefit in the finan- cial marketplace by improving sharehol- ders’ value (O’Neill and Xiao 2006

32、). Although it is important for hotel owners to be able to recognize the effects of a brand on a hotel’s market value, other benefits associated with a brand, such as guest sat- isfaction and loyalty, should be consi