Managing Brand Identity During a Merger: Indosat's Phase-Specific MPR Strategies

Corporate mergers disrupt organizational identity and challenge stakeholder trust. This study develops a phase-specific Marketing Public Relations (MPR) framework that explains brand identity transitions during corporate mergers. A sequential mixed-methods design examined 30 YouTube advertisements and interviews with three senior marketing practitioners across the pre-merger (2020–2021), transition (2022), and post-merger (2023–2024) phases of Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison. Campaign records and platform interactions provided descriptive engagement indicators. The findings identify three communication mechanisms: Identity Anchoring, Organizational Sense Giving, and Identity Consolidation, forming the proposed Brand Transition Marketing Public Relations (BT-MPR) Framework. View-through rates increased from 54% to 68%, while comment volume rose by 64%. These patterns suggest an association between phase-specific communication strategies and audience engagement, although the single-case design limits causal inference and generalizability. Marketing managers should align communication strategies with merger phases to preserve brand continuity and strengthen stakeholder trust.