The matchup effect of spokesperson and product congruency: A schema theory interpretation

This aricle examines the matchup hypothesis or the notion that the congruence in advertisements between spokesperson characteristics and product attributes is related to observed variations in source credibility, product evaluations, perceived product gender, and other measures of advertising and communication effectiveness. Schema theory is used to interpret the results of previous inquiries into the matchup hypothesis, and the results of two experiments that provide additional insight into how schema might be changed by a spokesperson/product match are reported. Areas of future research into the matchup hypothesis on schema theory implications are discussed. © 1994 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

The joint effects of advertising and product trial: A source-monitoring perspective

Various sequences of exposure to advertising and product trial were examined using a source-monitoring framework. The findings suggest that memories of positive product-trial experience can be enhanced by advertisement exposure and such facilitation is greater when the temporal separation of the two information sources is minimal. In contrast, when product-trial experience is negative, the reverse is true. A source-monitoring explanation is put forth to understand the role and limit of memory (re)-construction from advertising exposure and product-trial experiences.     

Brand equity and the exacerbating factors of product innovation failure evaluations: A communication effect perspective

When both high-equity and low-equity brands experience an innovation failure, does the high-equity brand fare better? This study investigates this question by exploring how consumers view and evaluate brands following an innovation failure. The researchers examine whether brand equity, preannouncement of the innovation, and word-of-mouth from an opinion leader exacerbate or alleviate the negative impact of the failure. Two experiments with a total of 816 subjects show that high-equity brands suffer less than low-equity brands from the adverse effects of innovation failures. However, innovation failures are more detrimental to high-equity brands that have preannounced the innovation and to low-equity brands that do not receive supportive word-of-mouth from an opinion leader after the failures occur.     

Coordination mechanisms in cross-functional teams: a product design perspective

Marketing research has shown that cross-functional team structures are not a universal panacea for shortening development times or improving success rates. Marketing research has nonetheless included the claim that marketing-led teams result in superior performance in cross-functional teamwork, in comparison with sales-led or design-led structures. The premise has been that marketing structures are more participative, more efficient, and more effective than sales-led or design-led structures. This paper presents a more nuanced view. Analysing factors such as contingency, closure, and attitude, the paper argues that the effectiveness of any one functional base or organisational arrangement depends on the customers and on the technologies by which these customers are served. On the basis of a literature review and five case studies, the paper specifies why and how cross-functional teams should be design-led when the task is to open up new ways of envisioning or to generate new ideas for the future.     

How e-WOM recommendations influence product consideration and quality of choice: A motivation to process information perspective

A laboratory experiment examines the effects of electronic word-of-mouth (e-WOM) on consumer consideration and choice of an experience product. Specifically, we manipulated the number of consumer recommendations and the optimality of the recommended product in a realistic online shopping environment. The results indicate that e-WOM is likely to result in more time considering the recommended product. For consumers more motivated to process information, e-WOM recommendations lead to more time spent on the choice task overall. Further, consumers with less motivation to process information make suboptimal decisions based on e-WOM recommendations. Consumers with a high motivation to process information are willing to accept recommendations and switch from declared attribute preferences, but choose only optimal products.     

Information direction, website reputation and eWOM effect: A moderating role of product type

This article examines how the electronic word of mouth (eWOM) information direction (positive vs. negative) and a website's reputation (established vs. unestablished) contribute to the eWOM effect. The article describes a study focusing on the moderating role of the product type (search vs. experience). The results of the experiment show that the eWOM effect is greater for negative eWOM than for positive eWOM, greater for established websites than for unestablished websites, and greater for experience goods than for search goods. The results support the moderating effects of product type on the eWOM information direction-website reputation-eWOM effect relationship. The impact of negative eWOM on the eWOM effect is greater for experience goods than for search goods. Similarly, the impact of website reputation on the eWOM effect is greater for experience goods than for search goods. The findings provide managerial implications for an Internet marketing strategy.     

Country-of-origin effects on product quality judgments: An information integration perspective

Functional measurement methodology is used to examine the simultaneous effects of country-of-manufacture and price information on judgments about product quality and overall product evaluation The results suggest that a simple (constant weight) averaging model adequately accounts for the cognitive algebra used by consumers to integrate country image and price cues Also, the derived scale values for country image and price suggest that these variables produce roughly equivalent (and strong) effects on product Judgments Implications of these results for future research on country-of-origin effects are discussed.     

Congruence in the assessment of service quality between employees and customers: A study of a public health care delivery system

Using social information processing theory, we examined the congruence between employee and customer assessments of organizations' service quality. The setting was a public health care delivery system. Contrary to expectations, employee assessments of service quality were lower than those of their customers. Also unexpectedly, employees with professional training had less congruent assessments than other employees. As expected, employees with longer tenure and those in departments with stronger customer service work climates had more congruent assessments relative to their customers. The results have implications for both management theory and for managers interested in developing customer-centered organizations.     

自我概念一致性与品牌偏好关系研究:自我差异的调节作用

本文研究了自我差异对自我概念一致性与品牌偏好关系的调节作用。结果表明,当消费者感知到高水平的自我差异时,理想的自我概念一致性(相比现实的自我概念一致性)对品牌偏好的影响更大;而当消费者感知到低水平的自我差异时,现实的自我概念一致性(相比理想的自我概念一致性)对品牌偏好的影响更大。因此,企业不仅要深刻认识到消费者自我概念在品牌个性塑造中的重要性,而且必须将自我概念一致性与自我差异相结合,针对消费者不同自我差异水平进行品牌个性的细化塑造。     

Parent-protecting advertising in product line extensions: Role of communication strategy,message type and extension type

Product line extension, the introduction of new products under the same brand name in a given product category, is a growing practice of product innovation in many industries. However, when companies launch line extensions, information of the new products positively or negatively affects consumer evaluations of the parent products in the same line, generating the so-called spillover effects. Through two experimental studies, the current research explores how marketers can employ appropriate communication strategies and message types in advertising to induce favourable spillovers or to avoid negative spillovers in product line extensions. Experiment 1 investigates the interaction between communication strategy and line extension type. Results reveal that for vertical high-end extensions and for horizontal line extensions, ads using relational strategy that focuses on the relatedness between products in the line increase consumer valuation of the parent product; for vertical low-end extensions, ads with elaboration strategy that stresses the uniqueness of the extensions avoid negative spillovers on parents. Experiment 2 further examines how message type moderates the spillover effects in elaboration ads. Results show that, compared with numerical messages, literal messages engender smaller valuation decreases on the parents and consequently alleviate undesirable spillover effects for most types of product line extensions.     

Development time and new product sales: A contingency analysis of product innovativeness and price

Opposing theories and conflicting empirical results with regard to the effect of development time on new product sales suggest the need for a contingency analysis into factors affecting this relationship. This study uses a unique combination of accounting and perceptual data from 129 product development projects to test the combined contingency effect of product innovativeness and new product price on the relationship between development time and new product sales. The results show that for radically new products with short development times, price has no effect on new product sales. When the development time is long, price has a negative effect on the sales of radical new products. The findings additionally show that price has no effect on sales for incremental new products with short development times and a negative effect for incremental new products with long development times. Together, these findings shed new light on the relationship between development time and new product sales.     

Empathy and the salesperson: A multidimensional perspective

Prior studies of empathy have yielded conflicting findings regarding the effectiveness of empathy in improving salesperson performance. This article integrates a multidimensional conceptualization of empathy from the psychology literature with existing theory from marketing literature to suggest that perspective taking, empathic concern, emotional contagion, and controlling behaviors will differentially effect salesperson performance. Responses from a survey of business-to-business salespeople indicate that empathy has both positive and negative effects. Implications of the findings are explored. © 1995 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Rebate usage: A motivational perspective

This study investigates the motivational factors in consumer rebate usage. Three motivational factors were identified and tested: price consciousness, perceived time and efforts associated with rebate redemption, and perceived satisfactions from using rebates to obtain the savings. The variables were operationalized by Likert-type statements. Validity and reliability were assessed and found to be acceptable. Moreover, the three factors were found to be useful in predicting consumers' decisions to redeem rebates. Managerial implications and recommendations for future research are offered. © 1994 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

The case method: A perspective

The task of preparing a case is similar to writing a legal brief or an essay insofar as all three should contain a thesis or main point and argumentation or logically arranged facts and inferences. However, different from a brief or an essay, case studies should not contain a conclusion. A case should lead the reader through the facts, but it should not offer a firm or fixed resolution or moral judgment. Ideally it should leave the reader with the opportunity to create and insert their own conclusion. A good case study should be amenable to the following kinds of questions or analysis procedures:

1. What is the problem? or What is at stake?
2. What are the non-normative or factual issues involved?
3. What are the normative or ethical issues involved?
4. What are the alternatives available?
5. What decision would you make?

     

Retail relationships and store loyalty: A multi-level perspective

An important factor in retail store loyalty is interpersonal relationships between retail salespeople and customers. However, relationships can also exist at the person-to-store level. This paper examines the linkages between trust in a salesperson, trust in the store, and repeat purchase intention. A model of store loyalty which includes relationships at both the person-to-store as well as person-to-person level is tested. The findings reveal that for those with an interpersonal relationship, trust and commitment to the salesperson are directly linked with purchase intention as well as indirectly through store attitude. For customers without a salesperson relationship, trust in the store leads to loyalty indirectly through store attitude, but does not have a direct impact on purchase intention. The results illustrate the existence of multi-level relationships between customers and stores and how those relationships link to store loyalty. The research adds to our understanding of the complexity of relationship retailing, while providing further evidence of the value of generating and maintaining interpersonal relationships as a retail strategy.     

Trust and direct marketing environments: A consumer perspective

The desire to establish long‐term customer relationships has led companies to consider normative as well as outcome related aspects of relationship development. Much of the research undertaken in this field has focused upon such activity in business‐to‐business markets. The current study sought to examine these issues, from the consumer perspective, in relation to approaches made by firms using direct marketing techniques, specifically direct mail. Empirical assessment was made of a sample of consumers in relation to their receptivity to product and service offerings from firms, and the effects of commitment, trust and privacy concerns upon this receptivity. In conclusion, some implications for marketing practice in developing customer relationships in direct marketing environments are discussed.     

Organizational analysis and information-systems design: A decision-process perspective

Acquiring relevant information, processing it sensibly and acting rationally on the results is central to proper functioning at all management levels of an organization. To improve these capabilities is a major concern of developers of management information systems, yet a growing consensus indicates that it is infeasible to initiate system development by modeling a total organization's information system. Thus, many systems designers— drawn less from the ranks of technologists than of experienced managers—have scaled down aspirations, and are thinking of parts of an organization rather than of the whole. This change of philosophy has emerged most clearly in marketing, where Chambers comments that “attempts to construct large scale models in marketing have generally resulted in failure… the management scientist has now recognized that it is usually better to begin by solving smaller segments of the total problem” [9].Failure of systems designers to adapt their efforts to the structure of the organization and to the people in it also has impeded successful development of information systems. Researchers and managers long have recognized the necessity for such adaptation [25, p/ 483] and also have been concerned by other behavioral problems raised by information systems [25, 3].This study presents a structure for development of “partial” information systems in their organizational context. It utilizes a growing body of empirical knowledge—drawn mainly from marketing—to help analyze organizations in terms of operational guidelines for the development of information systems.     

American political values and agency theory: A perspective

This paper explores the historical American political values which have shaped modern financial theory and agency theory. Financial agency theory's intellectual roots are shown to be located in the liberal tradition which espouses the instrumental nature of property and property rights. The paper also argues that financial theorists should recognize that, historically, economic efficiency was not a value or end in itself but merely a means by which more fundamental social goals might be achieved. Fred R. Kaen is a Professor of Finance at the University of New Hampshire. He has written many articles about financial markets and international financial management. His work has appeared in The American Economic Review, The Journal of Finance and The Journal of Money Credit and Banking. He will be spending next year at the Norwegian School of Economics and Business as a Visiting Professor of Finance. Allen Kaufman is an Assistant Professor of Business Administration at the University of New Hampshire. He has written a number of books including Capitalism, Slavery and Republican Values and his work has been published in the California Management Review, the Journal of Political and Military Sociology, and Business Horizons.Larry Zacharias is an Associate Professor of Management at the University of Massachusetts. He holds a law degree and has written many articles about corporate law and anti trust.