Employee Based Brand Equity: Building Brand Value for Employees through Internal Branding

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to examine the role of internal branding in explaining employees brand equity in serviceindustry. A conceptual model, which incorporates the internal branding mechanisms, namely the human resources,leadership, and internal communication, is proposed to understand their effect on employee based brand equity. Aquantitative research methodology, using structural equation modeling, was adopted to understand the role of internalbranding in creating brand equity for employees. Data were collected from the customer contact employees in hotel andrestaurant industry. The findings supported the sequential link for: internal branding – brand awareness – brand imageand perceived quality – brand commitment. Even only internal communication and leadership were found to significantlyaffect brand awareness; this brand knowledge was then positively influenced the brand image and perceived brand qualityof employees. Moreover, the results found that as employees have a more positive perception of brand image and quality,they are more likely to be committed to the company brand. Therefore, this study confirmed the importance of internalbranding to increase employee brand equity, which in turn, translates into a strong brand for customers. In addition, thisresearch is one of the limited studies adopting an employee perspective for brand equity as well as studying the role ofinternal branding mechanisms in building that brand equity.