Measuring Purchasing Groups Performance in the Health Care sector

For many decades, governments in Western countries have attempted to control health costs. One of the strategies used is through purchasing groups, since consolidated needs generate additional savings. Although various aspects of purchasing groups have been studied, performance measurement has been neglected; due to the lack of proper measures, tensions between the purchasing group and its members can't be addressed with more objective information. However, appropriate performance indicators are considered a prerequisite to successful collaboration. Using the in‐depth case of a Canadian purchasing group in the health care sector, this article suggests a set of performance indicators to measure results considering dimensions of the purchasing process and the interactions between the purchasing group and its members (who are also its customers). © 2018 ASAC. Published by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

A conceptual model to imply a negative innovation assessment framework on consumer behaviors through the electronic business platforms

Online retail platforms significantly impact consumers' purchasing decisions. Satisfaction, purchase intent, and repeat online shopping drive the platform's purchasing decisions. In contrast, individuals do not purchase products due to dissatisfaction and lack of purchasing intent. It will cause hesitation and spread negative feedback to influence online consumer behaviors. This research proposes a conceptual model incorporating the Status Quo Bias (SQB) and the Negative Online Purchase Decision-Making Process (NOPDMP) to suggest a new framework for evaluating the maintained consumer behavior of online shopping platforms. The questionnaires following the proposed conceptual model were collected from the sample data from participants of 384 experienced respondents using online shopping platforms. Data were analyzed for the causal relationship using Structural Equation Model. The implications of the assessment framework that incorporates the influence of negative factors can weigh the decision to purchase products and improve and reduce shopping cart abandonment on e-commerce platforms. This framework can also describe instances of negative perspectives regarding incentive alignments with actual behaviors.     

The use of event related potentials brain methods in the study of Conscious and unconscious consumer decision making processes

The question of whether consumer purchasing decisions are conscious choices or unconscious has long been studied in marketing. The ability to measure mental changes with high temporal resolution makes the EEG-based event-related potentials (ERP) method very useful in studying the distinction between consciousness and unconsciousness. Although experiences with brands significantly affect the awareness or unconsciousness of decisions to purchase, ERP studies have ignored experiences of consumers in relation to brand purchases. For this purpose, EEG recordings of participants were taken in the order they saw brand names: experienced brands, review-based brands, and unknown brands. Participants chose one of the three options for the brands they saw on the screen: buying, not buying, and no idea. 35 people participated in the study. The results indicate that early ERPs, which are unconscious mental reactions, related to purchase decisions for previously unknown brands. Late ERPs associated with conscious mental reactions are related to purchasing review-based brands or experienced brands. We conclude that purchasing decisions about unknown brands occur as a result of automatic, unconscious mental processes, whereas purchasing decisions about previously experienced brands and based on consumer reviews result from conscious mental processes. Our study is the first that demonstrates the relationship between ERP's and purchasing decisions, with an experimental design focused on consumer experience and consciousness.     

Retail investors and financial advisors: New evidence on trust and advice taking heuristics

This paper investigates factors that influence trust and advice taking among retail investors when consulting with financial advisors and making real-world portfolio decisions. The data reveal that non-expert retail investors trust their advisors a lot. Trust formation appears to be well described by a simple heuristic that relies substantially on the advisor's communication style when deciding how much to trust and delegate investment decisions. Portfolio decisions appear to depend more on investors' perceptions about the investor–advisor relationship than on the risk and return characteristics of investments comprising the portfolio choice set. This evidence supports Pentland's (2008) “honest signals” as a more powerful mechanism underlying investor trust than standard metrics based on past performance. Trust and advice-taking heuristics can be interpreted as well adapted to the environment of the non-profit bank cooperatives in which they are observed, implying that trusting based on simple honest signals, although vulnerable to exploitation, can be interpreted as ecologically rational. Features of the investor's environment typical of non-profit cooperative banks imply that the heuristics investors use can perform rather well without requiring investment experience or financial sophistication, which most investors in our sample are well aware they lack.     

Training strategic thinking: Experimental evidence

Strategic behavior is crucial for strong firm performance, especially in competitive environments. Thus, designing a good strategy is a key issue for firms. Designing a strategy requires a combination of strategic thinking—which involves analyzing a firm's strategic environment, defining a vision of its future, and devising new ideas to out-think competitors – and strategic planning – which implies using these ideas to formulate a business plan. Although many firms excel at strategic planning, few devote enough resources to strategic thinking, which results in strategic insanity (i.e., firms repeatedly applying the same strategies with the expectation of different outcomes). To foster a strategic environment within a firm, firm managers and other workers must show willingness for active involvement in a firm's strategic decisions. Nevertheless, not everybody has the skills to do so, as many firms lack work force training programs. This study shows, experimentally, how training affects firms' strategic behavior. The starting point is two groups of individuals with initially equal qualifications who play in a sequential game whose rules hinder the calculation of equilibria. The members of only one of the groups previously receive a treatment entailing a process of training and learning that aims at fostering strategic thinking. The results point to a significant increase in the number of strategic decisions in the treatment group in sharp contrast to the control group, confirming the initial hypothesis (i.e., the positive impact of training).     

Risk‐taking propensity in supplier choice: Differences by sex and decision frame in a simulated organizational buying context

Past research concerning decision framing has found that buyer's choices tend to be risk averse for decisions framed as a gain and risk seeking for choices framed as a loss. Attribution theory suggests that women may be less likely to take risk than men when faced with similar decision‐making problems. The present study sought to determine whether there would be differences between men and women with respect to their supplier choices based on how the purchasing decision was framed. Two experiments were conducted: one using a price‐based purchasing scenario and the other using a price‐based and a quality‐based purchasing scenario. For the price‐based scenario women tended to make more risky supplier choices than men when the purchasing decision was framed as a loss, and less risky supplier choices than men when the purchasing decision was framed as a gain. No differences between the sexes were found for the quality‐based scenario. © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

Female consumers as agents of change for transforming the environmental sustainability landscape

Faith in others (FIO; governments and businesses) can be seen as society's predisposition to handle environmental problems. The article examines whether women, who undertake a large majority of household purchases, can influence change in consumption practices so as to contribute to sustainability initiatives. Understanding women's character in this manner is informative, it helps us to consider how a women's role as a household purchasing agent is an important nexus to environmental sustainability. The study found that FIO has an influence on women's purchasing decisions. The study provides additional support to strengthen women's role in environmental matters. Not all women were found to be sustainability‐minded. In the challenges faced by women with respect to their influence, evidence from this research suggests that if women have more faith in governments and businesses it would make them more eco‐savvy to act as agents of change for transforming the environmental sustainability landscape.     

Relevant or redundant: Elite consumers' perception of foreign-made products in an emerging market

Abstract

This paper examines the attitudes of elite Pakistani consumers concerning their preferences for foreign-made products and how these preferences influence purchasing decisions. Data were collected from a sample of 250 buyers using a mixed methodology consisting of focus groups and a questionnaire survey. The results show a link between the country of origin (COO) of products and purchasing decisions. The nature and extent of this link vary across product class and purchasing decisions. A means-end chain (MEC) analysis revealed a close link between consumers' liking for foreign products connected with how they valued those products both psychologically and physiologically. The findings have implications for attaining a competitive advantage by using marketing strategies to target elite customers. As a pioneering study, this paper advances the theoretical knowledge, providing a framework as well as specific guidelines for practitioners to conceptualise the COO construct. The paper also suggests a strategic direction that successfully targets the elite consumer segment in Pakistan.     

Consumers' experiences of cold chain food packaging: A qualitative study among women in South Africa

Food packaging defines a product's uniqueness and strengthens consumers' relationship with a brand, in this way offering functional and experiential benefits. Although cold chain food is predicted to become even more important to consumers, consumers' experiences of the packaging of these products have been neglected in the literature. Thus, this exploratory study investigated these experiences of female participants in Potchefstroom, South Africa, using semi‐structured interviews and a projective technique assisted by ambiguous mock packaging. The findings reveal that despite marketers' intention to use packaging to lure consumers to purchase food products, participants also valued functionality and quality in cold chain food packaging. This study also identified a dislike of carton boxes and preference for plastic bottles for this kind of packaging, as well as further negative and positive characteristics for consideration by manufacturers. Although brand loyalty and price sensitivity were stronger considerations for some participants than the packaging, the latter seemed to play a pre‐eminent role in most participants' purchasing decisions. Therefore, it is recommended that when designing packaging for frozen and refrigerated foods, product developers and manufacturers should take into account consumers' experiences, requirements and needs of the packaging specific to cold chain food. Our research offers a starting point for designing cold chain food packaging that complies as closely as possible with consumers' expectations.     

Young millennials,environmental orientation,food company sustainability,and green word-of-mouth recommendations

Threats loom for the global food supply. Food companies are taking action, yet consumer awareness lags. A sustainability materiality (SM) index was created that asked young millennials if issues related to a food company’s environmental footprint, ethical governance, community engagement, and nutrition-related actions influenced their product purchasing decisions. In comparison to their peers, those who held new ecological paradigm-related values were more likely to report that the SM index issues influenced their purchasing decisions. They offered more green word-of-mouth (WOM) recommendations to their friends. Regardless of their environmental orientation, those who purchase products consistent with the SM index are more likely to provide green WOM recommendations. Purchasing products consistent with SM index issues mediated the relationship between proenvironmental orientation and green WOM recommendations. Perceived personal ability was unrelated to green WOM recommendations. Educating and enlisting young consumers to offer green WOM recommendations will increasingly become a strategic business concern.     

Impact of product-specific variables on consumers' post-consumption behaviour for apparel products: USA

Abstract Companies spend valuable resources developing and distributing products to please the consumer; however, products that do not match consumer performance expectations during post-purchase use often result in consumer dissatisfaction. This situation can lead to redress-seeking behaviour and negative repurchase behaviour. Understanding factors influencing consumers' post-purchase behaviour can provide retailers with information to make accurate purchasing decisions and improve interpretation of the post-return data. This study examines product-specific variables for apparel purchases and their relationship with post-consumption behaviour. Product cost and product type were found to be related to redress and repurchase behaviour among dissatisfied consumers. Implications for apparel retailers and consumer educators are discussed.     

Survey of Internet users’ attitudes toward Internet advertising

Many have speculated about the current state of Internet advertising (IA), how it compares to advertising in general (GA), and its implications for traditional marketing models and practices. Although many estimates exist regarding who uses the Internet as well as guidelines about how best to design IA, little is known about Internet users’ attitudes toward IA, much less what characterizes these attitudes. To test this, a national sample of over 400 participants with at least some exposure to the Internet was surveyed. The results revealed no majority opinion of IA: approximately a third of respondents liked, disliked, and felt neutrally toward IA, respectively. A regression analysis indicated that enjoyment of looking at Internet advertisements, its informativeness, and its utility for making behavioral (purchasing) decisions contributed to participants’ attitudes toward IA. Enjoyment of looking at IA contributed the most to attitudes toward IA, yet at the same time appears to be one of IA's weakest features. In order to assess whether attitudes toward and perceptions of IA might reflect attitudes toward advertising in general by this demographic group, rather than attitudes toward IA per se, responses were compared to those of a demographically weighted-to-match national sample of over 1,000 who answered similar questions in regard to advertising in general. The results indicate that more respondents found IA to be informative and trustworthy than a demographically similar sample found GA. Even though the attitudes and perceptions of IA and GA were significantly different, the structure of GA and IA attitudes was the same. Implications for the design of IA are discussed.     

An investigation of problem-solving support and relaxation motivations on e-WOM

As a consequence of greater computer-mediated consumer-to-consumer communication within the firm's marketing communications, there has been a growing need to understand these digital interactions more explicitly. That is, we still know little about the exact extrinsic and intrinsic motivations that drive electronic word-of-mouth. The purpose of the paper is to better understand why members within community-based websites develop a need to exchange and/or develop a social bond within the community. Questionnaire data were gathered from 147 members of an online beauty forum in Australia. The findings highlight that those members seeking problem-solving support in combination with elements of relaxation will be more inclined to exchange with other community members and develop a social bond within that community. Marketing managers can capitalise these findings by strengthening problem-solving support systems and creating environments where community members can also relax and unwind to increase the exchange between members and also increase the social bonds within the community.     

Environmental profiles of female apparel shoppers in the Midwest,USA

Abstract Concern for the environment has become an accepted part of our lifestyle. A largely untapped consumer commodity with strong reuse or recycling potential is textiles and apparel. Apparel retailers can benefit from a knowledge of the environmentally concerned apparel shopper and can be instrumental in extending society's appreciation for environmental responsibility. The purpose of this exploratory study was to segment female apparel shoppers into environmentally oriented groups and to profile each group with respect to importance of store attributes, lifestyle activities, general environmental attitudes and textile disposal patterns. Factor analysis, stepwise multiple regression and chi-square analysis were used to analyse data from 113 returned questionnaires. The results indicated that environmental groups can be profiled for textile/apparel products and that each group places emphasis on a different set of store/product attributes when making patronage and purchasing decisions. Profiles of each environmental group with suggestions for retail marketing approaches are provided.     

Does Cultural Background Affect Volunteering Behavior?

The purpose of this qualitative investigation is to help nonprofit organizations which rely heavily on the support of volunteers increase the effectiveness of their marketing by accounting for differences in cultural background among community members. It was conducted in the multi‐cultural Australian context and included 79 participants from different cultural backgrounds. Findings indicate that as a whole, cultural groups differ significantly with respect to their attitudes, social norm and perceived behavioral control over volunteering. Nonprofit organizations are unlikely to be successful in attracting volunteers from a range of different cultural backgrounds unless they account for heterogeneity among volunteers and customize marketing messages. To the authors' knowledge this is the first study that investigates differences in attitude, social norm and perceived behavioral control regarding an important social marketing issue: changing the volunteering behavior of individuals in a multi‐cultural society.     

Outranking methods in support of supplier selection

Initial purchasing decisions such as make-or-buy decisions and supplier selection are decisions of strategic importance to companies. The nature of these decisions usually is complex and unstructured. Management Science techniques might be helpful tools for this kind of decision making problems. So far, however, the application of outranking methods in purchasing decisions has not been suggested in purchasing or operations research literature. In this paper we show by means of a supplier selection example, that an outranking approach may be very well suited as a decision-making tool for initial purchasing decisions.     

Are entrepreneurs influenced by risk attitude,regulatory focus or both? An experiment on entrepreneurs' time allocation

“Hybrid entrepreneurs” — those who maintain a wage job while starting a new enterprise — outnumber pure entrepreneurs in many countries. Yet, how hybrid entrepreneurs allocate their working hours between these two activities is not well understood. To better understand the relationship between hybrid entrepreneurs' division of time between their wage jobs and new enterprises we develop a model that captures hybrid entrepreneurs' decisions on the tradeoffs between financial risk and return as it relates to time allocation. We test two hypotheses based on utility theory, and challenge them with two hypotheses based on regulatory focus theory in a controlled experiment with 25 early stage entrepreneurs and 29 undergraduate students. In the computer-based experiment, entrepreneurs' and students' time allocation decisions (tied to monetary incentives) are used to test what would motivate them to work more or less hours in their entrepreneurial startups. We find that the actual time allocation decisions of the student group are somewhat in tune with utility theory, but that the entrepreneurs' time allocation decisions are better explained by regulatory focus theory.     

Finding critical success factors for virtual community marketing

Previous studies have identified critical success factors related to using virtual communities as a marketing channel. These studies have followed two research trends that connect the virtual community to actual purchasing. One is finding relationships between the operational elements of a virtual community and members’ intent to purchase and the other is finding relationships between characteristics of virtual community members and their intent to purchase. The model for this study reflects both trends. In addition, the model reflects research related to factors of customer satisfaction and the measurement of marketing success in terms of sense of community and loyalty. Conclusions from this research have been verified empirically with survey data collected from 292 virtual community members representing nine profit-oriented virtual communities. This study confirms that operational elements of a virtual community and characteristics of virtual community members affect the success of virtual community marketing. It is also confirmed that perceptions of usefulness, trust, and commitment toward the virtual community are important intervening effects. However, not all factors studied in the model were found to be significant in relationship to successful virtual community marketing. The analysis of the results from this study should be helpful to practitioners who use virtual communities as a marketing channel.     

Unintended Consequences: How Suppliers Compensate for Price Concessions and the Role of Organizational Justice in Buyer‐Supplier Relations

“You get what you pay for” is one of life's lessons that predominates in purchasing decisions individuals make in their personal lives. The results of this study suggest this lesson should also prevail among management when price‐related purchasing decisions in businesses are being made. An evaluation of over 1,700 purchasing instances across seven years of a longitudinal panel data set collected from Tier 1 production suppliers to the six major North American automotive Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), Chrysler, Ford, General Motors, Honda, Nissan, and Toyota, found that suppliers compensate for price concessions and price reduction pressure from the OEM in the year following the concession, by reducing product quality, service support, and R&D expenditures associated with goods provided to the OEM. This industry is particularly relevant because it is highly adversarial, yet at the same time reliant on interdependence. The results show that supplier price concessions granted to an OEM led to compensatory supplier behaviors of reduced quality and R&D expenditures toward that OEM. Further, the results suggest that the organizational justice dimensions of distributive justice, procedural justice, interpersonal justice, and informational justice can ameliorate negative supplier compensatory activities. A buyer–supplier relational environment that engenders organizational justice tactics such as open and honest communication with suppliers provides suppliers the expectation of an acceptable return on business over the long term, provides help to suppliers to reduce costs, and builds supplier trust of the OEM had generally positive effects on quality, service, and R&D expenditures. From a management perspective, these results indicate there is a very real risk versus reward issue associated with pressuring suppliers for price reductions.