The role of the brand as a person in business to business brands

Branding is an area that attracts much interest from different perspectives. However, most of the research concerning branding has leaned towards business to consumer (B2C) markets rather than business to business (B2B) markets. When B2B brands are the centre of a study, it is usually their tangible characteristics that are examined. Data is usually collected from either the manufacturers or the buyers, but not necessarily from both of these groups. This study explores the perceptions held by the people involved in both the manufacturing and in the use of the brand. It explicitly considers the relevance of one intangible characteristic of a brand, which is the paradigm of brand as a person, in the context of an industrial engineering B2B market. It examines the different perspectives from both sales and purchasing within the market and considers the wider characteristics that are recognised in that context, which are the country of origin and the brand personality. The results indicate that the brand as a person can be used when conceptualising B2B brands, because brand personality characteristics and brand nationality have been identified by the various players as characteristics of the brands.

► Brand as a person is a feature that is in the minds of the brand owners and the market when they are describing B2B brands.
► Brand personality characteristics and brand nationality are key components of the branded offer.
► Brand users discuss the brand as a person more so than the brand's manufacturer.