The pricing of European airbnb listings during the pandemic: A difference-in-differences approach employing COVID-19 response strategies as a continuous treatment

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a major shock to the global tourism industry. Given its peculiarity, this paper analyzes one of the most intriguing questions in the Airbnb literature – the pricing of Airbnb listings – by taking advantage of a difference-in-differences methodology that largely draws on variations in country-level policy responses to the pandemic. Relying on a dataset containing weekly information from 130,999 continuously active listings across 27 European countries from 2019 to 2020, this study first investigates the exogenous impact of response policies (proxied by the COVID-19 Stringency Index) on demand. Secondly, accounting for the endogeneity of both demand and prices, this research analyzes pricing responses to demand variations. Results show that: i) increases in the COVID-19 Stringency Index cause significant declines in Airbnb demand; ii) increases in demand cause, on average, increases in Airbnb prices; and iii) pricing strategies between commercial and private hosts differ substantially.     

The antecedents of digital collaboration through an enhanced digital platform for destination management: A micro-DMO perspective

While the tourism sector shifts towards digital transformation, Destination Management Organisations (DMOs) often struggle to adapt to their changing technological environment. This study explores the antecedents of digital collaboration and develops a framework for micro-DMOs to enhance effective destination management through digital technologies. An integrated sequential qualitative approach was adopted by conducting multi-phase interviews, in addition to designing and trialling a real-world trial digital platform. The research provides empirical evidence that digital collaboration is essential for micro-DMOs, necessitating them to transform their current “websites” into digital platforms which act as a hub for business stakeholders to actively be involved in. Antecedents of successful digital collaboration include mutuality, trust, control, and leadership which may be manifested differently from non-digital collaboration. Additionally, the study identifies three aspects for digital collaboration; marketing, networking and knowledge sharing that demands specific attention. Our results have theoretical, methodological, and practical implications for academia, industry and policymakers.     

Toward a new business model of retail industry: The role of brand experience and brand authenticity

While the customer-to-manufacturer (C2M) business model has received increasing attention as a new business model for e-commerce and retail industry, little is still known about it and the effect of its approach. This study aims to understand how brand-related stimuli in C2M environments affect customer responses as the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic. The outcomes reveal that the Sensory, affective, and intellectual aspects of brand experience positively influence brand authenticity. Brand authenticity has a positive effect on behavioral intention, such as reuse intention and word-of-mouth. Additionally, this research finds that social presence moderates the association between the sensory aspect of brand experience. Thus, this study can suggest a C2M business model as a means of sustainable operation of the retail industry to both researchers and practitioners in relation to the retail industry.     

Digital marketing communication in global marketplaces: A review of extant research,future directions,and potential approaches

Digital marketing communication, that is, communication through digital or electronic media among businesses and consumers, is growing rapidly, especially during the COVID-19 era. We propose a framework for analyzing digital marketing communication along four major dyads, business-to-consumer (B2C), business-to-business (B2B), consumer-to-consumer (C2C), and consumer-to-business (C2B). We review and summarize, for researchers and practitioners, the literature during 2000–2021 in these dyads along four major components: goals; channels, media, and platforms; content; and responses. We find that extant research in digital marketing communication pertains mostly to a specific, national level rather than a global level, despite the porousness of national boundaries for digital marketing. We derive important insights, identify key research gaps and questions in each of the dyads along these dimensions. We suggest approaches to address these research questions under three major components: substantive issues, data, and methods. These approaches can offer the insights that managers need to better formulate digital marketing strategies in local and global contexts.     

双边政治关系、制度质量与中国对外直接投资*

本文利用中国与其他国家在联合国大会决议的投票行为作为双边政治关系的代理变量，以中国对89个国家2003—2015年对外直接投资数据为样本，分析了双边政治关系对中国对外直接投资的影响。研究表明：整体而言，中国的对外直接投资会受到双边政治关系的显著影响，政治关系的亲密有利于中国对外直接投资的增加。东道国制度质量可以降低中国对外直接投资对双边政治关系的敏感度，且制度质量的调节只能在中国对比自己制度质量高的国家投资时发挥作用。以2008年为分界点，后危机时代双边政治关系对投资的影响更加显著，双边政治关系的经济效应也会显著地受到东道国制度质量的调节。此外，中国改善与“一带一路”沿线国家的政治关系，可以促进中国的对外直接投资。     

Disentangling the effect of services on B2B firm value: Trade-offs of sales,profits, and earnings volatility

In the face of declining business and growing pressures from low-cost competitors, many business-to-business (B2B) manufacturers have moved from their previously successful product-centric strategies to more service-oriented business models. Yet despite their substantial investments in services, firms fail to understand the performance ramifications of these offerings. With a longitudinal data set (2001–2016) of 227 B2B manufacturers listed in the S&P 1500 index, this study disentangles the simultaneous effects of financial-based mechanisms that link the service ratio (i.e., share of a firm's revenue generated from selling services) to firm value. The findings reveal significant trade-offs across these mechanisms. Although the service ratio monotonously boosts sales growth, it has U-shaped curvilinear relationships with profitability and earnings volatility. These effects also depend on industry- and firm-level factors. Industry maturity positively moderates the effects of the service ratio on sales growth and profitability. However, business scope has an adverse effect on the service ratio–profitability relationship. Finally, industry turbulence negatively moderates the effect of services on earnings volatility.     

Best classification algorithms in peer-to-peer lending

A proper credit scoring technique is vital to the long-term success of all kinds of financial institutions, including peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platforms. The main contribution of our paper is the robust ranking of 10 different classification techniques based on a real-world P2P lending data set. Our data set comes from the Lending Club covering the 2009–2013 period, which contains 212,252 records and 23 different variables. Unlike other researchers, we use a data sample which contains the final loan resolution for all loans. We built our research using a 5-fold cross-validation method and 6 different classification performance measurements. Our results show that logistic regression, artificial neural networks, and linear discriminant analysis are the three best algorithms based on the Lending Club data. Conversely, we identify k-nearest neighbors and classification and regression tree as the two worst classification methods.     

The effect of mandatory CSR disclosure on firm profitability and social externalities: Evidence from China

We examine how mandatory disclosure of corporate social responsibility (CSR) impacts firm performance and social externalities. Our analysis exploits China's 2008 mandate requiring firms to disclose CSR activities, using a difference-in-differences design. Although the mandate does not require firms to spend on CSR, we find that mandatory CSR reporting firms experience a decrease in profitability subsequent to the mandate. In addition, the cities most impacted by the disclosure mandate experience a decrease in their industrial wastewater and SO₂ emission levels. These findings suggest that mandatory CSR disclosure alters firm behavior and generates positive externalities at the expense of shareholders.     

Employee brand engagement on social media: Managing optimism and commonality

This article considers how employees engage with B2B firms on social media, a topic that is largely overlooked in the extant brand engagement literature. Using the results from a large-scale study of employee brand engagement on social media, we identify two key drivers of employee brand engagement using the content analysis tool DICTION—namely, optimism and commonality. Employees of top-ranked and -rated firms express higher levels of optimism and commonality in their reviews of their employers on social media than do their counterparts in bottom-ranked and -rated firms. This permits the construction of a 2 × 2 matrix that allows managers to diagnose strategies for increasing or improving employee brand engagement. This creates four different kinds of employee brand engagement situations, and offers human resources and marketing managers different strategies in each case. We demonstrate how practitioners and scholars can shed new light on the way stakeholders engage with brands.