Brand Management beyond Customers and Products: A Stakeholder-centered Perspective

The aim of this paper is providing an overall conceptual framework of brand management in the light of the stakeholder theory and the service-dominant logic, and the evolutionary process occurred during the latest years. In particular, over the past several decades brand management has shifted from the traditional customer-oriented and firm-focused paradigm to a wider vision concerning the process of creation of the brand value. Through an analysis of the current literature on brand management, this paper aims to provide a holistic vision considering the brand as a conceptual construction originated by the interaction between the firm and multiple stakeholders. The findings of this study allow to conceptualize brand management from a stakeholder-centered perspective, in which the brand value must be considered as the result of a dynamic and social process of co-creation of the brand meanings and functions.