Proceedings of 4th European Business Research Conference
9 - 10 April 2015, Imperial College, London, UK, ISBN: 978-1-922069-72-6
Market Orientation and Brand Performance: The Mediating
Role of Brand Orientation
Mazuri Abd Ghani and Norjaya Mohd Yasin
Market orientation and brand orientation have been considered important success
factors to a firm’s brand performance. The objective of this paper is to examine the
mediating role of brand orientation in the relationship between market orientation and
brand performance in Malaysian hotel industry. The Malaysian service industry has
gained greater attention in today’s business environment since it has been a major
player in the growth of Malaysian economy. The industry is contributing more than 50
percent of the nation’s real GDP. One of the most promising service industries in
Malaysia is the hotel industry. To align with the Industrial Master Plan to meet the
economic agenda of the nation, branding strategy is crucial because brand is
considered as an organization’s primary asset. The study was based on a sample
gathered from middle-level managers of star-rated hotels in Peninsular Malaysia,
using a self-administered questionnaire. Of the total 500 questionnaires distributed,
221 were usable, giving a response rate of 44.2%. Partial Least Squares (PLS)
approach was employed to analyze the data and to test the hypotheses. The results
suggested that brand orientation mediates the relationship between market
orientation and brand performance of hotels. This finding offer an evidence on
relationships among the study variables as well as the mediating role of brand
orientation strategy in observing the effect of market orientation practices on brand
performance in the hotel industry. The findings of this study provide insights to
hoteliers with regard to the importance of deploying and establishing a brand
orientation strategy in an effort to improve brand performance in the hospitality sector.
Field of Research: Marketing
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Mazuri Abd Ghani, Faculty of Business Management and Accountancy, Universiti Sultan Zainal
Abidin, Terengganu, Malaysia, Email: mazuri@unisza.edu.my
Norjaya Mohd Yasin, College of Business, Prince Sultan University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia,
Email: nyasin@pscw.psu.edu.sa