Antecedents to student-based brand equity : student brand loyalty and perceived quality in higher education

It is clear that postgraduate business students are becoming increasingly analytical in their course and university selection. MBA and other Master of Business students are more aware of the risks involved in choosing the right course and university to study at. For Australia the higher education industry has been one of the fastest growing service exports and Australia's third largest behind tourism and transportation and is worth $4 billion. With the increasing global competition of university degrees the ability of countries like Australia to continue to capture these benefits over tiie longer term is unclear. The aims of this thesis was first to enable manager's within non elite branded universities to better understand what steps are needed to enhance student based brand equity and secondly, to contribute to the understanding of how consumer based brand equity is created and maintained within a unique service environment of a university.