Marketing and Consumer Rights Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2250 words

Marketing and Consumer Rights - Essay Example In addition to this, consumer rights are an important imperative in manufacturing businesses nowadays as they are an important tool for enhancement and differentiation of the product offer. The zone of tolerance has been sited as an important concept in both the service management and consumer rights literature, and has been employed to model the relationship between different expectation levels (Zeithaml, Berry, Parasuraman, 1993) and has been used to supply a range, or scale upon which to place a particular outcome. Brands however can mean different things to different consumers. These differences largely stem from the way and manner brands can be perceived or understood. A cursory review of the history of brands informs us that consumers' perceptions of brands have not been static. It has evolved over the years as understanding of the concept deepened. Amber (2000) has defined brand equity as an intangible asset built by marketing, and which exists largely in the heads of stakeholders, especially those of the end consumer. The author further pointed out that if a company got its brand equity right, profits should largely take care of it. The importance of this statement can be understood from the components that make the equity of a brand. These are brand awareness and brand image. A brand that consumers have good knowledge about and can readily recall with favorable associations is an enduring asset to whoever owns it. Furthermore, it would have favorable image and therefore well perceived. Such a brand can be said to have a higher equity or value. It is not too difficult to sell products and services with this brand name tacked on it. Higher volumes of sales at minimal costs transcend into higher profits. Hart (1998) has outlined key principles for creating and building brand names. Some of the strategic considerations she counsels brand name creators to consider borders on (i) whether the new product or service is innovative or not (ii) line extensions are planned for the future and (iii) the nature of protection the brand can afford. It has been stressed that any name chosen should ideally be easy to pronounce, understandable to consumers and also consistent with the cultural values and norms of where it is to be applied. Parasuraman et al. (1988) claims that consumer perceptions of quality of service are a result of evaluating service delivery in relation to pre-consumption expectations known as the "disconfirmation" model. Disconfirmation models are based on the disconfirmation paradigm (Oliver, 1980). Quality is therefore defined as the gap between consumer's expectations and perceptions, and a customer will perceive quality positively only when a service provider meets or exceeds his expectations. Based on this paradigm Parasuraman et al.