Global brand image creation by Swedish born globals

Sammanfattning: Introduction: Born globals are increasingly prevalent and very successful in doing business globally, which is quite remarkable when keeping in mind they operate with limited human and financial resources and international business experience. They have to utilise capabilities in a unique way in order to internationalise rapidly and successfully. Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to gain insights into the process of how born globals build up a strong global brand image while internationalising, as this is understudied in current literature. Research question: How do B2B born globals build up a strong global brand image in the internationalisation process? Methodology: To meet the purpose of our research, a qualitative study was conducted, using semi-structured interviews. Eight Swedish born global new ventures were included in our sample. The respondents were either the CEO’s or co-founders of these companies. The gathered empirical data was evaluated and analysed and linked to contemporary literature to draw accurate conclusions and answer the research question. Findings: Our paper shows that the selected Swedish born globals faced few obstacles in terms of branding at large, and that they successfully managed to create a strong international brand image while internationalising to different extents. This was due to the external support of third parties and networks (e.g. brand ambassadors, key opinion leaders, distributors, resellers and strategic partners) that helped them to put their brand on the map, or their own expertise and reputation. Practical implications: As little is known about the brand image building process for born globals from an international angle, this research could have significant value for both researchers as well as entrepreneurs with the aim to operate globally.