National heritage branding: a case study of the Russian Museum of Ethnography

It is increasingly necessary to understand the meaning and process of branding more precisely. The purpose of this paper is to elaborate on tools for monitoring brand perception as part of brand management. The increasing importance of historical and ethnographical museums determined the choice of venue for this empirical study of brand perception: the Russian Museum of Ethnography (RME) in St. Petersburg, Russia. Its brand was viewed as a combination of functional and symbolic components structured after Gad's 4D-branding model. To describe visitors' perceptions of, and satisfaction with, the ethnographic museum, a sample of relevant indicators was assessed. A method of average and integral indexes was applied. On the basis of this analysis, some conclusions about the interconnection between visitors' characteristics and brand perception were made, and possible changes in the RME activity were proposed. The results can be put in the broader context of understanding the contemporary growing interest in ethnographic and folklore museums. This article contributes to an understanding of the brand perception of an ethnographic museum, which can be applied to other cases throughout the world.