DIMENSIONS OF INTEGRATED MARKETING COMMUNICATION (IMC) AND THEIR IMPACT IN CREATING BRAND EQUITY IN THE QUICK SERVICE RESTAURANT (QSR) INDUSTRY IN COIMBATORE CITY

Brand Equity plays a major role in the highly competitive Quick Service Restaurants (QSR) industry in India. There are a variety of factors which affect the brand equity that a company commands in the market. Integrated Marketing Communication (IMC) is an emerging concept in marketing wherein all the major promotional activities are used to create a synergic output and send across a clear and consistent message to the customers. This study aims to find out the impact of five major tools of IMC namely Advertising, Word of Mouth, Sales Promotion, Event Sponsorships and Public Relations which are most applicable in the QSR industry on the four major dimensions namely Brand Awareness, Brand Association, Perceived Quality and Brand Loyalty which aid in creating Brand Equity. The study was conducted by collecting data from a sample and analyzing the data using statistical tools to find any relationships between the above mentioned variables. The findings suggest that marketers should focus on building favorable opinion about the brand amongst customers and take care regarding the news published about the brand since it affects brand image. Moreover, it was also found out that making people aware about the brand and the perceived quality about the brand play the major role in creating brand equity more than other factors.