Product development is essential for all companies that want to survive in competitive markets regardless of the characteristics of the product that the company sells. Companies that sell products within product categories which can be seen as bad, also need to develop their products in order to remain competitive. If these bad products add a positive attribute, for example that they get organic, a contradiction within the product arises and they get incongruent. This thesis investigates which effects that follow a launch of an incongruent product. The thesis also examines if these effects are affected by the strength of the brand under which the product is launched.A total of 240 respondents participated in an experimental study where product incongruity was manipulated for two different product categories, where one well known brand and one unknown brand were examined in each category.

Cause-Related Marketing (CRM) is a marketing activity that has grown popular in the USA and studies have been carried out that explore how American consumers perceive and react to CRM. In Sweden, however, CRM has not yet found ground to any greater extent, and therefore there is limited research on how Swedish consumers react to CRM and how they perceive it. In this study, eight Swedish consumers are interviewed regarding their perception of CRM. The main findings of the investigation are that Swedish consumers fit well into a model that is based on American consumers? responses to CRM.

Thesis purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to make a contribution, by connecting the transfer of meaning within the context of TV series. The meaning is transferred from the brand to the character in a TV series and then further to the viewer. To look at different role functions that are used in dramaturgy and narrative techniques, we will be able to see how the brand will have a specific role and thereby make the transfer of meaning more successful and effective. This role will have an important impact on product placement according to the meaning that will be transferred from the brand to the viewer, through the character. Methodology: By looking at the transfer of meaning process that is created from the brand, an unstructured observation is applied where we observed the placement and usage of different within a specific TV series. Qualitative strategy is conducted by using a case study.

AbstractBackground: Countries can be seen as brands (nation brands) with brand values that transmitto the country?s products. Country-of-origin (COO), the brands nationality, links the productto an associative network of cultural shared national stereotypes. Through associating thebrand with a country or a region, the credibility of the brand can increase and strengthen thebrand. Therefore COO is used in marketing to position a brand.Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine how luxury fashion brands communicatetheir national identity through analyzing their advertising.

Purpose: The aim of this study is to test four different hypotheses from the aspect of the title of this paper. H 1 Consumers trust the pharmacy employees? advice and suggestions for their purchase decisions more than the brand awareness they have received through the companies marketing communication H 2 Consumers are enough affected of a company?s marketing communication to choose their brand even if the pharmacy employees recommend other brands. H 3 Building brand equity through pharmacies can only be successful if the company has built up a trust for their brand among the pharmacy employees. H 4 Without building brand equity the marketing communication strategy for Ferrosan cannot increase their brand value and create loyalty.

Executive summaryThe aim of this study is to examine how the favourability and brand exposure of Norwegian has been damage by their supplier, Boeing 787:s, problems concerning the aircraft Dreamliner. The theoretical framework underlies the content analysis that has been used to operate the study. In total the empirical data rise up to 623 articles that has been collected and analysed from the media archive Retriever. Compares to before and after Boeing 787:s problem with the Dreamliner, the results indicates that the favourability of Norwegian in the Swedish media landscape during the problems was negatively affected. The results also show that there was no increase in brand exposure for Norwergian during the problems.

The competition for customers in today?s society is growing rapidly. Companies invest a great amount of time and recourses to establish and preserve a strong brand. Repositioning is a process that today is necessary for virtually all brands at some point during its lifetime and is about to change a customer's perception of a brand name, by changing its associations. The goal is to create a new, stronger position for the existing brand.

Inspired by the current debate over the effectiveness of Public Relations (PR), the authors of the following thesis have sought to analyze how PR and advertising differ in terms of how they affect consumers. The subject of the thesis was chosen due to the lacking knowledge of how PR shapes consumer attitudes and intentions. The authors wish to upset the institutionalized myths which dominate in the PR-business. One example of such a myth is that the effectiveness of PR can be measured by the number of press releases an activity produces and that PR?s superiority over advertising is due to its higher trustworthiness.

Background: Around the world, markets deregulates, which leads to increased competition. Meetings between the consumer and the employees of a company determine how the customer perceives the company and / or its brand. This has result in that many companies have realized the importance of internal using the same marketing skills that are used externally. In 2009, pharmacy market went from being a monopoly market to be a regulated competitive market.Problem: Is there any internal conditions for a private company, whose culture and structure was formed under a state monopoly, to create a strong corporate brand?Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to, through a case study, analyze and evaluate the internal marketing in a company which has undergone a change of ownership and retained the same staff.Method: Through interviews with key personnel and staff , data was gathered for the case study, which means that the method is qualitative.

As companies exert themselves to find new ways of achieving market dominance and stronger brands, the phenomenon co-branding has become increasingly popular. By cooperation between two different firms the combined effects can result in synergies not only on the balance sheet, but even through softer values such as Brand recognition, equity and larger market share. Recently the fashion company H&M launched a collection together with the esteemed fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld. The objective of this paper is to examine the effects the collaboration had on consumer?s attitudes towards the two brands.

Thesis purpose The study aims to examine the effects vertical and horizontal line extensions might have on the total parent brand equity in terms of strength and its baseline product regarding of market share, loyalty and penetration under an elapsed period of time. The study aims to investigate a number of actual conducted line extensions effect on the above mentioned aspects of Kellers (1993) definition of brand strength as a part of the total brand equity. Methodology The effect of a number of line extensions of the parent brands and the baseline products is being examined in terms of market share, loyalty rate, cannibalization and market penetration. The thesis is focused on the correlations between these different parameters during a certain elapsed time ratio in order to test our theoretically routed hypothesizes in a deductive manner. Occasional correlations are derived from an indexation of data collected from the Gfk database. Theoretical perspective The study is derived from Kapferers (2004) definition of brand equity, where he is dividing the concept into three parts. This study is focused on Brand strength in particular, which is one of the parameters in the above-mentioned theory.

The main purpose of a logotype is to harmonize with a company?s business concept and culture. This study is based on the receiver?s attitudes about three different logotypes - Volvo, Telia and Mcdonald's. It informs the reader about the importance of a logotype as a mean of communication and if the perceptions of the logotype harmonize with the profile of the company.

In this study the overall aim is to find conditions for greater inclusion of pupils with SEN in X county by investigating teachers' attitudes and views on inclusion. What are the variables that may affect teachers' attitudes towards inclusion. The variables that will be studied include gender, workexperience, what age of students teachers work with and teachers' subjectknowledge. It is based on a system theory perspective with a pragmatic approach to explore how groups of activities involving or affecting each other. It is a quantitative study with a surveys selected as the method.

Title: Shop at us ? and we?ll carbon offset! ? How large and well-known companies affect consumers feelings towards their brand by using green marketing and CSR.Authors: Emilie Jäfvert & Carolin RuthbergAdvisor: Christine TidåsenLevel: Bachelor thesis in Marketing, (15 Swedish credits), Spring 2011Keywords: Green marketing, CSR and branding.Question: How do large and well known companies affect their customer?s view towards their brand by using green marketing and CSR?Purpose: The purpose of this thesis is to investigate how high consumer?s value companies who works with green marketing and CSR, and also to find out how it affects the company brand.Method: We have chosen to do a qualitative research with a deductive approach. We have done five open interviews with companies and ten open interviews with consumers to conduct our research.Theoretical framework: Our theoretical framework includes four different areas; CSR- Corporate Social Responsibility, green marketing, brands and consumers. These sub-chapters include theories that will help the reader get a better understanding of the areas.Empirical studies: We have gathered empirical data by multiple open interviews. Two of the five interviews with the companies were face-to-face, two via email and one over the phone.

For centuries Islam and Muslims have been subject to islamophobic attitudes in the west. The purpose with this study was to see into the making of open and closed attitudes against Islam and Muslims from a conflict in southern Thailand, and also to so see if Muslims are portrayed as more violent than the Buddhist groups in the conflict. The aim of the study is also to see if Muslims fall into a violent stereotype. This was studied by looking at five Swedish newspapers coverage of the conflict, during a given time. To be able to look into this, two theories will be used, the first one is the Runnymede Trust theory, which is about open and closed attitudes against Islam and Muslims.