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Journal of Strategic Marketing

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Consumers' true brand loyalty: the central role of commitment

Abdelmajid Amine Available online: 10 Jan 2011

To cite this article: Abdelmajid Amine (1998): Consumers' true brand loyalty: the central role of commitment, Journal of Strategic Marketing, 6:4, 305-319 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/096525498346577

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JOURNAL OF STRATEGIC MARKETING 6 305319 (1998)

Consumer s true br and loyalty: the centr al r ole of commitment

A BDELM AJID A MIN E

ESA, U niversite Paris Val de Marne, IRG Cre teil and DMSP Dauphine R esearch Centers, 35 Voie Felix Eboue, 94000 Cre teil, France

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In current highly com petitive environm ents, im proving consum ers loyalty to brands allows firm s to secure a com fortable long-term position in the m arket-place. This article aim s at placing the issue of brand loyalty within a larger perspective than a set of repetitive discrete transactions between consum ers and brands. Two different approaches for analysing brand loyalty are then discussed: the downstream one, based on observing consistent purchases of a brand over a period of tim e and the upstream approach, which focuses on the m otives that are behind a repeat purchasing of a brand. The relevance of the latter approach is then shown by highlighting the crucial role of the consum ers com m itm ent to the brand in better understanding the loyalty phenom enon. Therefore, our article proposes an integrative conceptual fram ework of true brand loyalty including its m ain cognitive and affective causes and effects. KEYWOR DS: Brand commitment; true brand loyalty; inertia repurchasing; conceptual framework
IN TRODUCTION

The recent renewal of interest, both from the theoretical and practical marketing perspectives, in the old concept of loyalty may be related to the increasing levels of uncertainty and competitiveness within most economic areas. Most markets are nowadays so segmented and overstocked that, to sustain or enhance their positions, firms are obliged to focus more tightly on their customer portfolio. In such a context, which is likely to last, the difficulty of capturing new segments of consumers emphasizes the need for preserving the present markets through building or improving consumers loyalty to brands. Hence, maintaining consistent purchase behaviour of a brand for a long time becomes a strategic goal for firms to preserve their business and their profits. The issue of brand loyalty became more crucial for national brands because of the harsh competition due to private labels and generic products. The high performance of the latter on main consumer goods markets (37% on average in 1995 in the French market-place) represents a serious threat to well-established brands. This market configuration contributes to re-establishing the concept of loyalty as the core of the marketing strategies of firms. Customers loyalty, which was already an important objective in managing brands, becomes a crucial condition for the national brands survival in particular. Various reasons may explain consumers behaviour when they buy the same brand repeatedly. This consistent behaviour may be due to some contingent factors such as store
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loyalty, lower price, narrow assortment, etc. It could inversely express an attachment to this brand or a conviction about its superiority compared to the competitive brands on functional, symbolic or psychological attributes. In fact, the consistent purchase of a brand depends on the consumers perceived benefits related to keeping on this relationship with the brand (search effort reduction or increasing satisfaction). Therefore, it seems necessary for practitioners as well as for academics to understand better the consumers relationships with the brands through relevant conceptualization and measurement of the loyalty construct. The literature on the brand loyalty issue distinguishes two main approaches to define this construct: the behavioural one suggests that the repeat purchasing of a brand over time by a consumer expresses their loyalty, while the attitudinal perspective assumes that consistent buying of a brand is a necessary but not sufficient condition to true brand loyalty and it must be complemented with a positive attitude towards this brand to ensure that this behaviour will be pursued further. The objective of this article is to demonstrate the relevance of the attitudinal view of loyalty by highlighting the central role of commitment in better understanding the brand loyalty issue and to develop an integrative framework of the loyalty construct including its main cognitive as well as affective causes and effects. Our article is therefore organized to correspond with this proposed intent. We first discuss briefly the contribution of the downstream approach of the brand loyalty issue and show its failure in operationalizing this construct. Then we underline the relevance of the upstream approach in understanding consumers true loyalty and stress the crucial role that brand commitment plays in this process. In the third section, we analyse the antecedents and consequences of true brand loyalty and propose a conceptual framework to understand the loyalty phenomenon more fully. Finally, we point out some theoretical and managerial implications of our brand loyalty conceptualization and suggest some tracks for further research.

QUESTION ING THE VALIDITY OF T HE DOWN STREAM APPROACH TO BRAND LOYA LTY

The downstream perspective of brand loyalty

Every marketer covets high loyalty and does everything possible to maintain it because the success of a brand in the long term depends on its regular buyers. Academic research has also emphasized the importance of brand loyalty in the consumer decision process. The concept of brand loyalty has been understood for a long time as the act of consumers repeatedly buying the same brand. Many definitions were then proposed using various behavioural measures instead of trying to give a theoretical meaning to brand loyalty. The first studies on brand loyalty defined this concept as a sole brand purchase. This can be seen as the extreme form of proportional loyalty where 100% of the purchases made by a consumer within a product category go to this brand. However, if this can be met within monopolistic markets or in less-frequently purchased goods (durable products), the rule is that markets are very often structured around numerous brands which induce buyers to purchase more than a single brand even if they are loyal to one of them. Furthermore, some researchers used the most purchased brand in a product category rather than the unique brand as an indicator of loyalty (Cunningham, 1966). Moreover, other behavioural measures were proposed including the purchase sequence (Kahn et al. 1986) or the period of time during which a brand is purchased (Krishnamurthi and R aj, 1991).

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Nevertheless, albeit useful and easy to measure through panel or scanning data, this behavioural approach of loyalty does not enable either researchers to differentiate the various buying situations and personal motives that may induce consumers to buy the same brand or marketers to act to maintain consistent behaviours over time. Hence, this view of the brand loyalty issue is less explanatory and predictable than its large use might suggest. This conceptualization of loyalty through its consequences (downstream approach) presents the disadvantage of not supplying any explanation of the consistent purchasing behaviours observed. Moreover, Jacoby and Chestnut (1978), who reported more than 50 different measures of brand loyalty, criticized the behavioural measures as being both static, whereas the loyalty process is dynamic and lacking a strong conceptual basis. Indeed, repeat brand purchasing can have numerous and different sources such as brand commitment, limited number of brands proposed by the customary retail store, lowest (or highest) brand pricing, store loyalty and absence of promotions on competitive brands. However, can we talk about brand loyalty in all of these situations? Some previous studies (Jacoby and Kyner, 1973; Jacoby, 1975; Schiffman and Kanuk, 1987) provided a preliminary response to this question. They suggested that brand loyalty cannot be reduced to its behavioural dimension (repeat purchasing of the same brand). It is progressively admitted that this concept cannot be measured only by observing consumer behaviour or tracking the purchase frequency of a brand via store scanning or panel data. It seems necessary to be sure that this consistent purchasing is intentional and will be continued in the future before concluding about effective brand loyalty.

The need to disting uish true brand loyalty from spurious loyalty
Hence, researchers attention was drawn to the conditions that lead to attitude-congruent buying behaviour. Brand loyalty measures consequently evolved to include some attitudinal measurement tools besides the behavioural indicators. Day (1969) suggested a simultaneous consideration of the consumers attitude towards the brand and their repeated buying behaviour to develop a composite index for loyalty. The attitudinal component here refers to a strong internal disposition of the consumer to continue buying the same brand. This dimension was operationalized through the measurement of the strength of consumers attitudes towards the brand which induce resistance to brand substitution when some situational changes occur in the customary selling conditions. More recently, Agrawal (1996) operationalized the strength of the attitudinal component of brand loyalty through the relative price differential which is necessary for consumers to switch to a competitive brand (given the habitual price levels of the brands studied). This price differential represents an obstacle built in front of the consumer to test the intensity of their dispositional basis for repeated purchase of a particular brand. If they intend to shift to a cheaper brand, their attitude strength towards the usual brand is low and vice versa. Nevertheless, this operationalization of the intensity of brand attitude by Agrawal (1996) presented some limits, such as price changes over time or from store to store, which do not allow the precise definition of a fair price reference and, hence, the extent of loyalty to the brand. Even if the operationalization of the attitudinal component of loyalty meets various goals, it now seems clear that the entire brand loyalty phenomenon cannot be appraised if the traditional definition of loyalty is not extended over the behavioural area to include an

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attitudinal dimension. In their attempt to model customer loyalty, Dick and Basu (1994) noted that both a strong positively valenced attitude and repeat patronage are required for loyalty. Hence, a consumer is viewed as really loyal when either their relative attitude towards the brand is highly favourable or the latter is clearly differentiated from other competitors as well, as they consistently purchased the same brand. This definition of the attitudinal bond to the brand joins the pattern proposed in more recent works to describe the notion of brand commitment (Baldinger and R ubinson, 1996; Samuelsen and Sandvick, 1997). Those considered as highly loyal consumers to a particular brand are only those who purchase it repeatedly and are strongly committed to it. Bloemer and Kasper (1993) highlighted the theoretical and managerial implications of using this attitudinal bond to the brand to distinguish between spurious loyalty (or inertia) and true loyalty (see Fig. 1). This differentiation makes it essential for the retailer or producer to know whether the consistent purchasing behaviour may be pursued further (true loyalty) or may be stopped when a change in the store assortment or the selling conditions occurs (inertia). Furthermore, East (1997) noted that consistent purchases will be made on the basis of habits or routines that are formed to enable the consumer to cope more effectively with time pressures and search efforts. Inertia repeat purchasing of a brand appears then to be a habitual behaviour to reduce both mental (attributes comparison) and physical search efforts (store attendance). This spurious loyalty occurs when several brands are approximately equal and induces some buying habits that indeed remain unstable because they require no change in the selling conditions. Consequently, consumer loyalty may readily break down when there is a change in the habitual supply conditions, encouraging brand switching. Figure 1 also shows that habitual behaviours may take a form other than inertia repeat purchasing: true brand loyalty. The difference is that the former repeat purchasing behaviour depends on the decision process followed in the initial purchase. True brand loyalty mostly exists in highly involving conditions and tends to explain the behavioural relationships between the consumer and the brand through the attitudinal dimension of loyalty (or commitment). Hence, consistent with numerous researchers that were inspired by the original work of Jacoby and Kyner (1973, p. 2), we view true brand loyalty as an effective buying behaviour of a particular brand (and not only an intention to buy it), repeated over time (its buying proportion exceeding 50% of the purchases made within a product category) and reinforced with a strong commitment to that brand. In summary, we can state that to overlap the whole phenomenon of consumer brand loyalty, the consistent purchase of a brand must be strengthened with a positive attitude towards it. Encompassing this attitudinal bond to the brand, besides repeated patronage, in the
Consistent Purchasing Behaviour

True Brand Loyalty

Inertia Repurchasing

FIGURE 1.

Differentiation of main co nsistent purchasing behaviours.

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conceptualization of the loyalty issue, allows us to ensure an appropriate distinction between true brand loyalty and other habitual buying behaviours. The behavioural approach of the loyalty issue, albeit useful, fails to explain the factors underlying repeat purchase of brands. The attitudinal view, through the notion of brand commitment, seems to be more relevant for distinguishing between true brand loyalty and other consistent buying behaviours.

THE RELEVANCE OF THE UPSTREAM APPROACH TO BRAND LOYA LTY

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The upstream approach to brand loyalty is based on identifying the motives behind true brand loyalty. The central role of commitment in the upstream approach is analysed first and then the benefits of including brand commitment to understand the loyalty phenomenon better are underlined.

The central role of brand com m itm ent in the loyalty phe nom enon
In the behavioural approach, the stochastic models used to measure and predict consumer loyalty admit that previous purchase patterns are sufficient to ensure consistent future behaviours. This perspective is open to criticism because different motives could be at the origin of a repeat purchase behaviour and, depending on these reasons, the purchasing of the brand may or may not be pursued over time. The notion of commitment is then central to understanding better the mental processes underlying the repeat purchasing of a brand, particularly by distinguishing between a highly probable pursuing behaviour (true brand loyalty) and a less probable one (inertia). According to Jacoby and Kyner (1973) . . . the notion of commitment provides the essential basis for distinguishing between brand loyalty and other forms of repeat purchasing behaviour. They completed this statement by explaining that . . . the concept of commitment holds promise for assessing the relative degrees of brand loyalty. It is now generally accepted that consistent purchasing behaviour could have two main explanations. It may be due to the consumers tendency to reduce or avoid search efforts because the product is perceived as low involving. Then there is a high probability of interrupting this consistent buying and switching to another brand at the first opportunity or inducement to do so (price increasing, new brand launching or brand out of stock). These situations describe a spurious customer loyalty to the brand. A consistent behaviour may also result from a commitment to the brand enabling the customer to resist changing the brand. Samuelsen and Sandvik (1997) stated that commitment describes bonds (or attitude strength) between the customer and a particular brand thus extending the meaning of loyalty over the simple repeat purchasing of a brand (behavioural phenomenon). This commitment can have two main causes: affective reasons such as attachment or emotional feelings towards the brand (affective commitment) or cognitive motives such as perceived risk or perceived variations in performance among the competitive brands (calculative commitment). Originally, the distinction of commitment types (affective and calculative) found its roots in organizational behaviour research. Affective commitment expresses the extent to which an individual likes to maintain their relationship with an object (here a brand) on the basis of their affective attachment to and identification with this object. This kind of commitment is

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not due to an evaluation of the brand on the disaggregate level of its attributes. It comes from a holistic judgement of that brand in terms of liking or attachment. Consequently, one may conclude that affective commitment tends to reduce the customers propensity to substitute another brand for the habitual one. Calculative commitment allows the consumer to maintain their consistent purchasing behaviour as long as the benefits attached to this brand exceed the costs of switching to another brand. This relationship is based mainly upon a cognitive= psychological evaluation of the brand (the more secure) which implies that the consumer appears as seemingly loyal for opportunistic reasons. These two kinds of commitment contribute to differentiating the motives underlying repeat purchasing behaviour, thus improving our knowledge about the mental processes that occur with any consistent behaviour. Nevertheless, even if the dimensionality of the commitment construct is widely accepted among marketing researchers, essentially, given its various antecedents, affective and calculative commitments could have various effects on the duration of the relationship between consumers and brands. One can hypothesize that the former type of commitment may ensure a longer term consistent behaviour rather than the latter because it depends less on contingent factors which could interrupt the purchasing of the usual brand. The emotional motives of brand loyalty are more likely to result in stable and enduring relationships between consumers and brands.

The contribution of the upstre am approach to the brand loyalty issue

While the downstream approach to brand loyalty is mostly interested in describing and counting out the consumers repeat purchasing of a brand, the crucial task in the upstream approach is to discover what are the different motives for consumers to remain loyal. The marketing literature review reveals different potential sources, for consumer consistent purchasing behaviour that can be classified into three groups: cognitive motives and affective sources, which are both based on particular care for the brand as a target of commitment on the one hand and a kind of haphazardly repeated choice of a brand due to a lack of alternative choices, store loyalty or lower prices on the other. Consequently, the latter case cannot be understood as a real form of loyalty, because it does not satisfy the first condition of brand loyalty, that is a biased= non-random behavioural response (Jacoby and Kyner 1973, p. 2). To illustrate these situations, let us analyse three seemingly loyal consumers with consistent purchasing behaviour. Each one of them is assumed to buy brand X with the same proportion of purchases. From the downstream perspective, they can all be considered as equally loyal to the brand, whereas the upstream approach may differentiate them on the basis of the motives behind their repeat buying of the same behaviour. From the latter view, three different profiles may be identified. The first consumer can be emotionally committed to this brand because they enjoy, for hedonistic or symbolic reasons, their relationship with it (brand liking/ attachment). The second individual may be cognitively committed to the brand because they perceive that choosing this particular brand is less risky than buying another one (costly brand change). The last consumer can be mainly moved by search effort avoidance or a lack of alternatives without any care for the brand itself (inertia). The first situation described above is probably the most secure perspective for marketers because it ensures a long-term consistent purchasing behaviour. The second case suggests a

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moderately comfortable perspective for the firm due to its opportunistic orientation, while convenient repeat purchasing of a brand may be sustained only if the market-place structure remains unchanged (e.g. number of main competitive brands and brands differentiation). The last situation is the least reliable and secure because the seeming consumer loyalty is in fact a spurious one which may induce them to turn their back on the habitual brand at the first available opportunity. True brand loyalty is obviously more than consistent purchase behaviour. It additionally includes an attitudinal component operationalized through the notion of commitment to this brand. Commitment appears as a key variable for customer retention in the long-term perspective.

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ANTECEDEN TS AN D CONSEQ U EN CES OF T RUE BRAN D LOYALTY

Among the antecedents of brand loyalty proposed in the marketing literature, we can distinguish two main types of loyalty cause: indirect sources, which influence brand loyalty through some mediating variables (involvement and satisfaction) and some direct antecedents, which affect brand loyalty thoroughly (perceived differences among alternatives, perceived risk, brand sensitivity and brand attachment= liking). Nevertheless, prior to analysing indirect and direct motives to consumers commitment to brands, it is useful to recall that a preliminary general condition to true brand loyalty must always be implicitly met: the market shares structure. The role of this factor, also called the perceived extent of choice, was emphasized by R aj (1985) who showed that brand loyalty in a product class varies with the number of significant competing brands within this category. When there are only few brands under consideration within a product class, the loyalty level automatically increases due to the high probability of purchasing a specific brand. In the extreme case, when a customer buys the sole perceived significant product or brand, this behaviour cannot be considered as an expression of true loyalty because no other serious alternative is available. Consequently, a narrow choice in a product category, seen in terms of significant brands market shares or brands popularity, spuriously improves repeat purchasing behaviour. This consistent brand buying may express more inertia or constrained repeated behaviour rather than loyalty with commitment to that brand.

Indire ct sourc es of true brand loyalty

Two main indirect sources of true brand loyalty may intervene: a high level of involvement in the product category and the consumers satisfaction with the brand consequent to its previous consumption or use. These two factors appear more as some necessary but not sufficient conditions to true brand loyalty. Consumer involvement level is often presented in the marketing literature as an antecedent of brand loyalty. Involvement must be understood here as personal relevance of a product or its perceived importance to someone. Several studies have noted that high involvement in a product class may enhance consumer loyalty (as repeat purchase behaviour) to a brand in the same category (R obertson, 1976; Thompson, 1980; Traylor, 1981; Assael, 1992). Nevertheless, this conclusion is based mainly on some theoretical assumptions and has weak empirical support. Moreover, according to some recent studies (Walker and Knox, 1997; Amine, 1998), it seems that the strength of the relationship between these two variables is only low to

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moderate even if statistically significant. Thus, although frequently considered as a cause of consumer loyalty, the involvement construct appears more as being indirectly related to brand loyalty probably because it operates at the aggregate level of product categories, whereas the concept of loyalty concerns a more disaggregate level of brands. To illustrate this situation, it is reasonable to imagine that consumers could be highly involved in a product category (e.g. wine), without being necessarily loyal to a specific brand, because the purchase is motivated by hedonistic or experiential reasons which may lead to variety-seeking behaviour rather than to loyalty to a particular brand. Brand switching depends here more on consumption situations (such as the sort of meal to be eaten or the absence/ presence of guests) than on involvement level. However, the relationship between low involvement and a lack of true loyalty to the brand is probably more realistic. A recent empirical work (Amine, 1998) showed that consumers exhibit low brand loyalty when they have low involvement with the product category. This finding provides reasonable support for the proposition that low brand loyalty is likely to occur when consumers are less involved in the product category. Then, low product involvement seems to be a sufficient condition for stating that a consumer cannot be committed to a brand because they have no strong beliefs or feelings about it. The notion of satisfaction is also considered here as an indirect source of brand loyalty, for two reasons. Although the marketing literature admits the assumption that satisfaction is linked to loyalty, the earlier concept seems to explain consumers buying habits including all of their consistent purchasing behaviours (van Birgelen et al., 1997). Satisfaction appears then as a variable that cannot discriminate between true brand loyalty and inertia repeat purchasing. Moreover, some brand-switching behaviours take place even if the consumer is satisfied with their habitual brand. It is the case of exploratory behaviour, such as variety seeking, which expresses the consumers tendency to switch from one brand to another for other motives (e.g. need for novelty and change or satiation) than dissatisfaction (McAlister and Pessemier, 1982). However, because dissatisfaction is a sufficient reason to break the consumers consistent purchasing behaviour, we assume that it is relevant to analyse satisfaction as an indirect source of true brand loyalty which may interact with other variables (brand sensitivity and brand attachment) to influence consumer loyalty.

D irect cog nitive and affective antecedents of true brand loyalty

Besides involvement and satisfaction variables, marketing literature review reveals some other potential sources of consumer brand loyalty. Of these antecedents to brand loyalty, four factors seem to be relevant to our analysis because they distinguish between true and spurious loyalty cases and are more tightly related to the brand loyalty concept. All of these factors, namely perceived differences about alternatives, perceived risk, brand sensitivity and brand attachment= liking, have in common the fact that the brand is at the centre of the consistent behaviour they produce. They are not only expected to influence brand loyalty but also probably intervene to moderate the relationships between the latter and consumer involvement and between loyalty and satisfaction level. This assumption seems so probablistic, as we showed earlier, that true brand loyalty is indirectly related either to consumer involvement or satisfaction. Perceived differences about the competitive brands depend on the consumers familiarity or expertise with the product category, which enables them to detect more subtle differences

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among the brands on the basis of functional or psychological attributes. Brand loyalty appears then as a mechanism to reduce the ambiguity and complexity of the purchase decision due to subtle and obvious variations in brand performance. Martin and Goodell (1991) stressed the role of this variable as a mediating factor of the relationship between the involvement nature of the product and consumer loyalty to a particular brand. Furthermore, the concept of perceived differences among the brands is supposed to influence the calculative type of brand commitment. These perceived variations in performance among the brands generally result in risk perception associated with the choice task. The bigger these perceived differences the more uncertain the decision result. R oselius (1971) showed that brand loyalty is often used by consumers to reduce their perceived risk, which covers two components: the probability of making a wrong choice and the importance of the negative consequences of this wrong choice. However, even if the brand is the source of the consistent behaviour induced by perceived risk, the commitment to this brand seems more determined by cognitive (brand attributes) or psychological (social consequences) reasons than by affective motives such as brand attachment= liking. Consequently, the two facets of risk tend to explain the consumers calculative commitment to a particular brand. A third source of brand loyalty is represented by the concept of brand sensitivity, which is considered in the literature as a mediating variable between involvement and loyalty (Laurent and Kapferer, 1985). Brand sensitivity represents a psychological variable describing the consumers tendency to use brand information as a determining criterion in the choice process. Thus, one can expect that, when a consumer is highly involved in a product class and is strongly brand sensitive, it is extremely probable that they will be loyal to a particular brand. Brand sensitivity is consequently assumed as having an influence on both calculative (perceived differences about brand attributes) and affective (holistic evaluation) commitment. The last factor that could explain consumers loyalty better is their affective commitment to a brand. This variable results in a holistic judgement of the brand and expresses positive feelings and affective attachment to this brand (e.g. like dislike). This affective bond to the brand expresses consumers brand liking or attachment which is defined as an emotional feeling that a consumer develops towards a specific brand which expresses their psychological closeness to that brand. It consists in a holistic or aggregate judgement of the brand independently from its functional and instrumental attributes. This affective bond to the brand is supposed to be independent from a specific purchasing situation and may explain the affective brand commitment type. Brand sensitivity tends to be a common trait in understanding and explaining consumer true brand loyalty. This variable seems to interact with the different cognitive and affective motives to influence the consumers commitment to a brand (either calculative or affective).

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S om e consequences of true brand loyalty

Two major consequences of brand loyalty on consumers attitudes and behaviours have been suggested in previous studies: the consumers confidence in the brand and positive word of mouth communication or brand support. These variables are seemingly correlated to each other, so that when a consumer is confident in a brand to which they are committed, they tend to defend it from negative opinions or rumours and incite = require others to buy it. The consumers confidence in a brand allows them to maintain greatly their propensity to

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buy the habitually purchased brand and to resist brand switching even if the product becomes deficient for a while, less competitive or is a target of negative rumours. More loyal consumers are less tempted to turn their backs on their habitual brands as a consequence of small price changes in favour of competitive brands or due to a temporary alteration of the brands image (Agrawal, 1996). This phenomenon describes an asymmetric substitution in favour of the brands with high loyalty levels in the market-place and indicates the potential trust stock that these brands may benefit from. The importance of the trust construct has already been demonstrated in sustaining vendor supplier relations (Chow and Holden, 1996). We expect that, when applied to the consumerbrand relationship, the trust in the purchased brand may be viewed as a leverage of its credibility, which in return may reinforce the consumers repeat buying behaviour. As a consequence of a high level of confidence in a brand, true loyal consumers may develop positive word of mouth communication (or brand support) about the brand they are committed to. One could expect that they prescribe it to others and induce new consumers (family and friends) to try it, resulting in a widening of loyal customers. Furthermore, committed consumers defend their brand from negative opinions or rumours and represent a stable hard core of consumers which can comfort the firm during crises. Consumer brand support is supposed to be influenced (reinforced) by consumer satisfaction from past experiences with the brand. People may strongly defend a brand and may advise their relatives to buy it when they are highly satisfied with it (from utilitarian, symbolic and psychological viewpoints). Hence, brand support appears as a key variable in building and= or maintaing the popularity of a brand. We can now propose the following conceptual framework which includes the main causes and consequences of true brand loyalty, as depicted in Fig. 2.
C ON CLUDING THOUGHTS AND RESEARCH PR OPOSITIONS

Our article shows the broader scope of the upstream approach to the brand loyalty issue as well as the relevance of the notion of commitment to the brand in understanding better the loyalty phenomenon as it is shown in our proposed conceptual model. Brand commitment should be viewed as a long-run end pursued to achieve long-run competitive advantage. Hence, maintaining regular customers, which is a strategic goal for firms, requires ensuring the consumer commitment to the brand, to make their purchase patterns less casual and more predictable. Baldinger and R ubinsons (1996) findings showed that brand commitment is a good predictor of loyal consumers and positively influences the customer retention rate. Thus, even if a brand with a high market share is more likely to have more loyal consumers than a small brand, its propensity to keep them in the long term depends on its ability to make them strongly committed to it. Thus, each firm may try to develop or reinforce the consumers attitudinal bonds to its brands through marketing actions. In particular, based on our framework, the task of managing loyalty could be performed by turning communication efforts into cognitive or affective sources of brand commitment. Promotional efforts are then likely to be used as a strategic tool to improve customers commitment to the brand and therefore enhance their retention over time (Martin and Goodell, 1991). For speciality or shopping goods which need extended decision processes, these efforts might be employed in raising cognitive motives for brand loyalty by communicating about the potential negative consequences of a poor choice if the consumer is tempted to switch brands. Hence, increasing the perceived risk associated with brand

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High involvement

High satisfaction

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A N T E C E N D E N T S

Perceived Differences among the brands Perceived Risk Brand Sensitivity

Brand Liking or Attachment

TRUE BRAND LOYALTY

Calculative Commitment

Affective Commitment

Consistent Purchasing Behaviour

C O N S E Q U E N C E S

Positive Word of Mouth Communication (Brand Support)

Consumer s Confidence in the brand

FIGURE 2.

Conceptual framework of true brand loyalty construct.

substitution is a first way of making consumers more committed (cognitively) with brands. Advertising efforts could also focus on brand-specific attributes to magnify the perceived differences in performance between the customary brand and competitors, thereby enhancing the loyalty status of customers.

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The communication strategy may also aim at activating affective sources of true loyalty for self-expressive or badge value products. Broad promotional efforts can then contribute to building or improving brand liking by creating and promoting a friendly, pleasant and kindly image for the brand. This may occur through advertising investment to enhance the congruence between the brands personality and the consumers self-image. The notion of brand personality or image, which expresses the values and status of the brand (Aaker, 1997), is used by consumers as an extended self to manifest their own personalities and values to other people (Belk, 1988). The notion of congruence expresses a psychological closeness (in terms of similarity or complementarity) between consumers and brands identities. The tighter is this proximity the more attached to the brand the consumer is. So, the diagnosis of consumerbrand congruence, based on their shared values, enables an understanding of the psychological associations between these two entities. Hence, creative executional devices may help to enhance the perceived psychological closeness between individuals and the brand resulting in a commitment to the latter for emotional reasons. The mere implications of the commitment concept in the consumerbrand relationship developed above are consistent with the specific positioning strategies for managing brand images proposed by Park et al. (1986). These authors argued that brand image management may focus on its functional or symbolic distinctive characteristics and should not only help establish this brands position and, therefore, enhance its market performance, but may also maintain this image over time. A brand with a main functional dimension is designed to solve consumption-related problems whereas a brand with a symbolic concept is designed to associate the consumer with a desired group, role or self-image. The former brand image strategy should be used to enhance cognitive commitment whereas the latter might be employed to reinforce affective or emotional commitment. However, to be durably successful, these brand management strategies require that functional as well as symbolic concepts continue to be valued by target customers, otherwise the firm might reposition the brand in order to preserve consumers commitment. To protect this meaningful consumer brand bond in the market-place, Fournier and Yao (1997) went further and proposed replacing the brand loyalty issue within a broader relationship perspective. Furthermore, Blackston (1992) noted that to earn consumers commitment and trust, the brand or the corporation as a whole must send some signs that they have listened to them and responded suitably. Direct marketing provides the brand (or the firm) with the possibility of manifesting its interest and awareness to its clients needs through means of (relationship) marketing to consumers one at a time. Data-based marketing is then very useful in analysing previous and ongoing consumers relationships with the brands and identifying those who are worthy and= or vulnerable to the marketing efforts of the firms. In summary, we offer some theoretical explanations and managerial implications for a powerful and interesting phenomenon: true brand loyalty. Our conceptual framework represents an attempt to produce a comprehensive view of the concept of (true) brand loyalty by distinguishing between direct versus indirect and cognitive versus affective motives for brand loyalty. It points to the crucial role of brand commitment in explaining the long-term orientation in the relationship between consumers and brands. However, the task of empirical validation of the links between this construct and its causes and effects, which are shown in our framework, are left to future research. Moreover, some additional work on the commitment issue is quite worthwhile because this pattern offers a benchmark to those managers that are concerned with building loyalty programmes and provides more useful information for researchers for understanding better the

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correlates of loyalty with other concepts and consumer characteristics. In particular, two research directions seem promising to us: (1) measurement of true brand loyalty and (2) broadening the scope of the loyalty topic to encompass corporate entities (firms or stores). The first research task involves the development or improvement of reliable and valid measurement tools particularly for the commitment construct. The indexes proposed in the literature operationalize this attitudinal bond by setting some obstacles or difficulties to prevent consumers acquiring their usual brand. These obstacles introduce some temporary changes in the customary selling conditions of a brand (habitual brand out of stock or promotional effort on competitive brands) to check individual tendencies to remain loyal or to substitute brands. Nevertheless, what is indeed tested by so doing is the intention of the consumer to continue their purchasing behaviour of a particular brand through visiting other stores or delaying the product purchase. However, according to a recent study carried out by Fitzsimons and Morwitz (1996), only a small part of consumers intentions are actually converted into effective acts. Hence, one can appreciate the risk of trusting completely in results based on the intentions to buy. Thus, what is needed to operationalize the true brand loyalty construct better is to dissociate behavioural effects from attitudinal motives (either cognitive or affective) by developing distinct measures for repeated buying behaviour (through panel data) and brand commitment levels (through attitudinal scales). The second research area deals with the opportunity of extending our conceptual findings to the case of corporations. In addition to its relevance at the brand level, the upstream approach of loyalty and the active role that commitment plays in the consumerbrand relationship may have great potential for explanation of the links between customers and firms or retail stores viewed as corporate brands. The marketing literature shows that customers loyalty to stores or firms is more frequently related to their perceived images. Hirschman (1981) showed that when customers have a favourable store image this leads them to increase their repeat store frequentation. In this customer to store relationship both cognitive and affective factors are likely to be crucial in the determination of the overall store image. Therefore, the potential ability of commitment to explain consumers attitudes towards the store as well as their repeat patronage seems very significant. Our conceptual framework should act as a starting point for future efforts on this topic by transposing those antecedents and consequences of commitment that seem appropriate to the case of corporate entities (satisfaction with the stores services, perceived differences among stores, store attachment and store trustworthiness). In addition, some other factors, such as the stores overall perceived prototypicality, which may influence consumers frequentation behaviour (Ward et al., 1992), should be included as potential sources in analysis of the store loyalty issue.
ACKN OW LEDGEMENTS

The author gratefully acknowledges helpful comments from Guy Cornette and the anonymous reviewers of the journal.
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