The Mediating Role of Brand Association in Public Higher Education Institutions in Malaysia: Determinants of the Effect of Positioning on Consumer Loyalty

The research aims at testing a model of a study that determines the determinants of consumer loyalty at the higher education institutions (HEIs) in Malaysia, with reflection of brand association as the mediator. Although much has been done concerning loyalty in the business sphere, there has been little research conducted on positioning and brand association and their impact on building loyalty in the field of higher education, especially among international students. The survey on a structured survey tool consisting of measures using a Likert-scale was administered to 150 undergraduate and postgraduate students across different Malaysian PUBHIS. Cronbach's alpha, Composite Reliability, and the Fornell-Larcker criteria confirmed that the constructs were reliable and valid. There were four hypotheses tested using multiple regression. It has been found that positioning has a significant effect on consumer loyalty ( rho = 0.205, p = 0.012) and brand association ( rho = 0.260, p = 0.001). Brand association has a large coefficient that predicts loyalty (0.585, p < 0.001) and fails as a mediator of the positioning-loyalty association (0.053, p = 0.439). These findings imply that positioning and brand association are separate but related forces in loyalty. The article fulfils one of its gaps, which suggests that the paper combines the constructs of the dimension of attitudes and those of behaviour to loyalty within a higher education setting. The implication is that specific positioning strategies are required such that the emotional and cognitive connectedness with the students is addressed to strengthen the competitiveness of the institutions. Further studies are also needed to investigate more aspects, including perceived risk and culture, and the background of people, in a longitudinal or mixed-method study.