Analyzing the Factors to Affect the Formation of the Professional Athlete's Brand Image

Nowadays, developing and managing strong brands are not restricted to products, teams and leagues but they are also followed among specific individual athletes. Hence, the purpose of this research was to analyze the effective factors to make the brand image of athletes.
The present research was applied based on research purpose, field based on data collection, descriptive-correlation based on methodology. The study population consisted of all male students in physical education universities in the city of Mashhad in the second semester of 2013-14 academic year (N=1083). To determine the sample size, PASS software was used. On this basis, the required sample size was estimated to be 308 people. The questionnaire was distributed to a randomly cluster. In order to analyze the research data, confirmatory factor analysis software was used with AMOS21.
The results showed that, factors on and off field, both had a significant relationship with the athlete’s brand image. Furthermore, it was found that the style of athletic competition and sportsmanship, with the highest and lowest loadings of 0.91 and 0.52, impact the athlete’s brand image.
In addition to pay attention to the factors on filed, athlete should look for factors of off field to create a positive image of themselves. Also, personal brand should be based on their competitive advantage to achieve the main goal of branding which is to create a distinction.