The influence of brand image and company reputation where manufacturers market to small firms: A customer value perspective

Branding research has largely focused on consumer goods markets and only recently has attention been given to business markets. In many business markets the company's reputation has a strong influence on buying decisions which may differ from the more specific product related influence of the brand's image. In this paper we investigate these differences by testing the hypotheses about the influences of brand image and company reputation on customers' perceptions of product and service quality, customer value, and customer loyalty in a business market where there are three manufacturers marketing their brands directly to a large number of small firms. The results indicate that the brand's image has a more specific influence on the customers' perceptions of product and service quality while the company's reputation has a broader influence on perceptions of customer value and customer loyalty.     

商业银行零售客户金融消费权益：受损表征及保护策略

在客户金融服务维权意识日益增强、金融消费权益保护监管逐渐强化的背景下,如何有效维护金融消费者的合法权益成为国内商业银行面临的新课题。根据作者的管理经验,从专业精神、交易安全、服务态度、服务效率、服务外包等角度出发,分析了商业银行零售业务客户金融消费权益受损的主要表征,并在此基础上探析了我国商业银行零售业务客户的金融消费权益保护策略。     

An empirical analysis of multiple services and choices of consumer in the Swedish telecommunications market

Received analyses state that firms can use a multiple services offering strategy to retain customers and capture new customers. Factors that determine the multiple services strategy include product discount, service provider and customer characteristics. Consequently, this study addresses the fundamental question: what are the key determining factors that explain the probability that a consumer buys multiple services? A generalized Poisson regression model is employed to examine whether the product discount, service provider, socio-economic variables and geographical location impact consumer decisions. Data from a national survey in 2009 commissioned by Post-och Telestyrelsen, the Swedish telecommunications regulator, are analyzed. The results clearly show that the discount, service provider and income of the consumer affect the consumer׳s buying decision. A consumer who receives a discount or has a high income is more likely to buy multiple services or select more services from the current service provider into his basket than a consumer who does not receive discount or has lower income. Service providers, cable TV operators and telecommunications carriers can also lock-in their consumer and expand their market position from one particular service to another using bundling service. Thus, this may be the time for the telecommunications regulator to consider the market definition.     

新疆移动服务营销策略浅析-以乌鲁木齐市场为例

本文以服务营销组合策略为依据,简述新疆移动通信有限公司概况,分析新疆移动乌鲁木齐市场服务营销组合现状并从中发现问题,然后以乌鲁木齐市消费者需求为出发点,提出新疆移动乌鲁木齐市场服务营销组合策略的改善意见,为提高服务水平、企业竞争优势提供可行性依据。     

Experience as a moderator of involvement and satisfaction on brand loyalty in a business-to-business setting 02-314R

This paper examines the relative influence of two key antecedents of brand loyalty—satisfaction and involvement and the moderating role of experience, using a sample of business buyers. The central argument of this paper is that the strength of the effect of these variables on attitudinal brand loyalty will vary with the level of customer experience with purchasing the service. Building on previous research which examined low-risk, customer product settings [Kim, J., Lim, J.S., & Bhargava, M. (1998). The role of affect in attitude formation: A classical conditioning approach. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science 26 (2): pp. 143-152; Shiv, B., & Fedorikhin, A. (1999). Heart and mind in conflict: The interplay of affect and cognition in consumer decision-making. Journal of Consumer Research 26: 278], this study shows that for a high-risk setting, involvement with the service category will be more dominant in its influence on brand loyalty than satisfaction with the preferred brand. Furthermore, it was found that experience moderated the influence of involvement and satisfaction on attitudinal brand loyalty for a high-risk business-to-business service. This study provides new insights into the theory and practice of buyer behavior and business-to-business brands.     

腾讯如何挖淘宝墙角

淘宝商城新规引爆新一轮B2C平台争夺战，面对腾讯的橄榄枝，中小卖家会离开吗？     

Service leadership for adaptive selling and effective customer service teams

Companies are increasingly relying on customer service teams to deliver quality service critical for repeat business and profitability. But these teams need leadership to be effective. This study proposes that service leaders promote quality customer service by encouraging teams to develop adaptive selling capabilities. Data were collected from 113 customer service team leaders and 285 team members from a sample of consumer electronics retailing firms in Beijing, China. Data support the reasoning that by espousing service values, listening to customers, and encouraging improvements, service leaders help their teams become capable adaptive sellers. Results further suggest the contribution of team adaptive selling on customer team task performance, orientation to customers, and ability to recover from shortcomings in service. Findings extend recent research that leaders can have substantial impact by strengthening teamwork among followers by finding that service leaders develop customer service teams to be effective adaptive sellers.     

The characteristics of videos on demand for television programs and the determinants of their viewing patterns: Evidence from the Korean IPTV market

Korea's video-on-demand (VOD) market is led by pay TV service providers, especially internet protocol television (IPTV) service providers, and VODs for television programs (TV-VOD) represent the largest share of VOD in the country. TV-VOD is therefore of strategic importance to providers in terms of their current sales share and future growth. Focusing on the time-shift characteristics of TV-VOD and the serial complementarity of television programs, this study examines how various factors such as the characteristics of paid vs. free VOD services, and the average and variance of broadcast ratings affect VOD viewing patterns. An empirical analysis was conducted using data for TV-VODs of all television programs broadcast by major Korean broadcasters in 2015. The key findings are as follows: (1) There is an inverted-U shape relationship between broadcast ratings and TV-VOD views. This implies that there exists a positive window effect between the original broadcast and TV-VOD, with an exceptional substitution effect in segments with very high ratings. (2) Even if the average ratings are similar, there are more VOD views for programs that have a large fluctuation in ratings between episodes, mainly due to serial complementarity. (3) In terms of the distribution of VOD views over time, the initial concentration is higher in paid VOD packages and dramas, which implies that immediate decay appears for TV-VOD content because of subscriber preferences for novelty and the serial nature of drama shows. The study concludes with various implications for VOD service providers and policy makers.     

Developing network insight

A challenge facing organizations is that of amalgamating possibilities which do not exist in a transparent and concentrated form, but rather as dispersed individual cognitive ‘pictures’ perceived by managers embedded in business networks. Based on our research of business networks involving manufacturers of consumer goods, pharmaceutical companies, producers of semiconductors and telecommunication and utility service providers, we propose the concept of network insight, which does not consist merely of extant pictures held by individual managers, but is grounded in the practice of inter-firm exchange. We argue that developing network insight is a managerial challenge encompassing the amalgamation of dispersed pieces of atomized network pictures through heedful, multilateral interactions. Such a managerial activity transcends the task-specific knowledge base of managerial cognition and leads to objectified organizational learning within a business network. Managers that develop insight in business networks are able to mobilize other actors and create a competitive advantage for their organization that is crucial for innovation and growth.     

Differences in consumer loyalty and willingness to pay for service attributes across digital channels: A study of the Japanese digital content market

In this paper, the impact that the Internet access device has on consumer loyalty behaviors relative to Internet content was explored. To do so, a mixed logit demand function for mobile and PC subscribers to digital content was estimated and consumers’ willingness to pay for attributes related to specific content providers and their levels of service quality were measured. It was found that significant differences in loyalty and willingness to pay for service quality factors existed between mobile and PC Internet content subscribers, suggesting that while content may be developed as device independent, consumers interact differently with similar Internet content accessed through different devices. Specifically, the willingness to pay for more robust and more frequently updated content was on average higher in the mobile segment than in the PC segment. In addition, the overall switching costs consumers attributed to specific content providers via the mobile channel were far higher than through the PC channel. These results suggest that more robust content management systems must be developed to accommodate for such differences in consumer behavior.     

Is advertising an underappreciated driver of sales growth in B2B markets? Theoretical perspectives and empirical evidence

While firms in consumer markets spend hundreds of billions of dollars on advertising each year, firms in business markets are comparably hesitant to adopt advertising as a means to drive business and generate sales growth. Instead, a widespread belief is that sales success in business markets results from a quality focus and sales force support. Challenging these beliefs, this study proposes that B2B advertising can have effects that are meaningful and unmatched by effects resulting from a quality focus and sales force spending. Furthermore, we hypothesize that B2B advertising can help unlock dormant potentials in the established success drivers. We test the proposed effects empirically, drawing on more than 12,000 observations of the advertising expenses, quality focus, sales force spending, and sales growth of more than 2000 U.S.-based B2B firms between 1990 and 2015. This research provides novel insights for researchers and managers concerning the benefits of B2B advertising spending and the interplay between different success drivers in generating sales growth in business markets.     

Technology Push or Market Pull? Strategic Orientation in Business Model Design and Digital Start-up Performance*

The digital revolution is fundamentally reshaping the business landscape by generating abundant new opportunities and novel business models. As a new source of value creation, a start-up’s business model is critical for its survival and growth. How, then, should a digital start-up design its business model? The present study departs from existing viewpoints on the topic and proposes a strategic orientation view. By integrating the resource-based view and the demand-side perspective, we examine the impact of strategic orientation in business model design on the performance of start-ups in the digital economy. Using a data set of digital start-ups, our empirical results show that both technology and consumer orientations are beneficial to the performance of start-ups. However, it would be counterproductive for a digital start-up to seek a balance between both strategic orientations in business model design. Furthermore, the positive relationship between consumer orientation and firm performance becomes more prominent in a highly open technological environment, but is weakened in environments characterized by high user interactivity. This study advances business model design research by proposing a strategic orientation view, and contributes to business model theory building by offering an integrated view that embraces the resource-based view and the demand-side perspective.     

Development of a Service Guarantee Model

Much has been written about service guarantees and their various proposed benefits. Following the literature, many writers regard a guarantee as a tool to jump-start quality improvements and/or see in them the ultimate way to gain a competitive edge. The objective of this paper is to consolidate our understanding of the working of guarantees. Based on a literature review and an exploratory study, a set of explicit propositions on the impacts of service guarantees was advanced. These propositions were then integrated into a single conceptual model. The model shows the impacts of well-designed guarantees on operations and service quality, consumer behavior, and finally on business performance.     

Application and performance impact of stage–gate systems – the role services in the firm’s business focus

Although service innovation is important, knowledge of new product and service development, including the positive effect of stage‐and‐gate‐type systems, has been derived almost exclusively from studies in the manufacturing sector. In the present paper, we address two important questions: How do differences in the firm’s business focus, which describes whether a firm puts more emphasis on products or services in its business activities, influence the usage of such formal innovation processes? Is stage‐and‐gate‐type systems’ impact on innovation program performance contingent on the firm’s business focus? Unlike previous studies, we not only differentiate service and manufacturing by industry classification codes but also apply a continuous measure to take into account the blurring of boundaries between the manufacturing and service businesses. Based on a comprehensive discussion of service‐specific characteristics and their implications for innovation management and using a cross‐industry, multi‐informant sample of innovation programs from 272 firms with 1,985 informants, we find empirical support for firms with a stronger focus on the service business being less likely to use stage‐and‐gate‐type systems. Furthermore, the use of stage‐and‐gate‐type systems fosters innovation program performance, and this effect becomes stronger as the business focus shifts toward services. This result implies that service‐based firms can benefit from stage‐and‐gate‐type systems to a greater extent than product‐based firms. Our research also demonstrates the gap between the desired level of innovation process formalization and its current usage in practice, especially for firms with a dominating service business.     

Extended revenue forecasting within a service industry

Revenue forecasting is an important topic for management to track business performance and support related decision making processes (e.g. headcount or capital expenditure). It focuses on how a business recognises operating revenue, which can differ from the point at which a sales order is won. Whilst there are many publications detailing forecasting theory, in a business context these largely focus on sales order recognition alone.This paper describes the development of a revenue forecasting tool appropriate for service provision. The organisation involved in the development of the revenue forecasting tool will remain anonymous for commercial reasons but will be referred to as “Organisation A”. The targeted outcome was to extend the forecast window from one month to three months with an error rate of no more than ±10%. The tool was required to consolidate supporting data, adopt appropriate analysis/projection techniques and extend the forecast window in a specific and complex business environment.The resulting tool returned high level results that were aligned to the original targets, and was developed with three components using a combination of projection approaches appropriate to the operating environment. Whilst limited to a specific service industry as a trial, the paper provides a useful reference point for revenue forecasting in complex service businesses and provides a basis for further research opportunities for extended revenue forecasting and business analysis approaches within other service industries.     

The Grid and CRM: from ‘if’ to ‘when’?

The ‘Grid’, an initiative of the distributed computing community, offers unprecedented levels of computing power for organisations to apply to solving their business problems. Uniquely it also offers the communications infrastructure required to overcome the ‘tyranny of distance’ observed by Blainey (The Tyranny of Distance, Melbourne: Sun Books) in his analysis of the socio-economic development of Australia. However, recent reports of the ‘death of distance’ and consequent strategies of trans-national companies to centralise their operations are tempered by reports of a growing ‘psychic’ distance with their customers. This paper reports the application of high-performance computing (HPC) to modelling consumer behaviour within a large UK financial services company in order to predict not only ‘if’ a certain type of customer behaviour was likely to occur, but also ‘when’. The resultant impact on their customer relationship management strategy leads to the observation that Grid Computing should offer many new opportunities for managing the problem of ‘psychic’ distance that attends a strategy of revenue growth through widening the geographic scope of operations, and scale efficiencies through physical centralisation.     

Who’s Displaced First? The Role of Race in Layoff Decisions

We test empirically the proposition that race significantly affects an employee's layoff chances. Using data from a financial firm (N = 8918), we find that whites are less likely to be laid off than nonwhites and that, among nonwhites, Asians are less likely to be laid off than blacks or Hispanics. These findings are statistically significant after controlling for structural factors (business unit, occupation, and job level) and individual characteristics (tenure and performance rating). A similar pattern of racial differences exists in other employment practices more actively monitored by the firm, including promotions, pay raises, and performance ratings. Yet these differences are smaller than those in layoffs and are significant for blacks only, not for Hispanics. Our findings suggest that monitoring personnel decisions can reduce racial inequality. Furthermore, our findings highlight that racial differences in employment outcomes vary among minority groups.     

An investigation of the relationship between behavioral processes, motivation, investments in the service business and service revenue

Despite the established benefits of services in manufacturing companies, very few managers are motivated to invest resources in extending the service business. On the basis of a combination of qualitative and quantitative research approaches, we illustrate that managers cannot be easily motivated. Managerial motivation to extend the service business in manufacturing companies is more like a process that must grow organically. To do so, managers have to overcome some of the typical behavioral processes of manufacturing companies. In greater detail, we explore how the disbelief in the financial opportunities of services risk aversion in exploiting strategic opportunities, setting overambitious objectives and an overemphasis on obvious causalities limit managerial motivation to extend the service business. If manufacturing companies can overcome these behavioral processes, the managerial motivation will increase, leading to more investments in the service business and thus enhancing service revenue and overall profitability.