Brand equity (BE) previously focused on consumers’ perceptions under brand marketing stimuli, they often used financial performance indicators for evaluating brand value (Aaker,1996;Keller,1993). However the primary stakeholders of a service brand are employees (Brexendorf & Kernstock,2007).Thus, the enhancement of employee- based BE could be an important topic for in-depth investigation in the fields of brand and internal marketing. Morhart (2009) was the first to introduce the concepts of brand-specific transformational leadership (TFL) and brand-specific transactional leadership (TRL) based on employees’ brand-building behavior. Theory asserts that leaders should endeavor to influence employees through the internalization of brand values and a brand-based role (Morehart,2001) . In the process of brand internalization, leaders with brand experience and brand knowledge should also uphold and constantly reaffirm brand values because they're more capable than ordinary leaders to clearly convey brand values (Hoffman,1999). For this reason, brand-specific leadership based on employee brand-building behaviors is the focus of this study. This study adopts hierarchical linear modeling for individual and organizational-level analyses. This research to investigate (1)whether TFL and TRL have directly affect employee-based individual-level BE.(2)whether TFL and TRL have indirectly affect employee-based BE as an individual-level mediator.(3)how managers use brand-specific leadership to elicit employees’ perceived brand value congruence for improved employee-based BE.

The interaction between brand managers and his/her social networks in any firms constitute a complex social system. This study posited that the quality of the relationship between a brand manager and his/her networks is imperative in fostering the quality of internal brand management which in turns increase the employee based brand equity. The participants for the study were 124 brand managers from Dubai firms specializing in consumer goods. The quantitative data was analyzed using structural equation modeling (SEM). Network size and cost was found to affect information generation and knowledge dissemination.

This study examines the effect of brand-specific transformational leadership (BSTL) on employee-based brand equity (EBBE) with the mediating mechanism of empowerment. We explore the newly emerging concept of ‘employee based brand equity’ particularly from the perspective of brand-specific transformational leadership in the service industry. Furthermore, we explore the perspective of empowerment, structural and psychological empowerment, as the mediating mechanism between BSTL and EBBE. We highlight the direct and indirect effects of BSTL on EBBE and employs hierarchical linear modeling (HLM). 578 questionnaires were collected from multilevel data of subordinates and their supervisors at 58 well-known service brand units in Taiwan. Our research results implicate that: (1) BSTL is positively related to employee base brand equity; (2) Structure empowerment is a mediator factor of BSTL and employee base brand equity relationship; (3) Psychological empowerment is a mediator factor of BSTL and employee base brand equity relationship. This study presents three key contributions. This study provides the following research contributions: (a) In contrast to previous studies that focused on customer brand equity, we initiate the quantitative research of research on frontline employee based brand equity. (b) This study suggests and confirms that BSTL influences EBBE through the mediation of structure empowerment and psychological empowerment, which further contributes to EBBE research. (c) Finally, this study applies a hierarchical linear model to conduct a cross-level analysis of EBBE. Consequently, this study provide evidence supporting the previous assertion that comprehensive insight into service organizational behaviors can be achieved only by employing cross-level analysis and mediating factors.