The growing popularity of spiritual brands: What drives purchase intent?

In this study, we investigate the reason for the growing popularity of FMCG (Fast Moving Consumer Goods) household products branded, promoted and sold in India by local spiritual leaders. We find that religiosity and normative community pressure are important purchase drivers for such products. Surprisingly, pragmatism in the presence of normative pressure also contributes to demand. We argue that self-identity theory provides a contextualized explanation in association with social identity theory to explain the influence of normative pressure on increased demand. The results of the study suggest that integrating social and self-identity theories provides a fuller insight into consumer behaviour in a complex social context.     

Paid,Earned, Shared and Owned Media From the Perspective of Advertising and Public Relations Agencies: Comparing China and the United States

Despite the existence of the “great firewall,” advertising and public relations practitioners in China, much like in the United States, are embracing and enacting social media and digital strategies on behalf of their clients. In this study, we conducted 42 in-depth interviews with advertising and public relations practitioners in the United States and mainland China to explore how emerging media and integrated marketing communication (IMC) are impacting advertising and public relations agencies in the two countries. This cross-cultural comparison revealed several critical insights, which were examined through the lenses of IMC and dimensions of culture. We found that emerging media lead to converging trends in various aspects of agency performance. The blurring of paid, earned, shared, and owned media (PESO) was evidentially observed in how executives of both countries defined and used media. Chinese agencies were media agnostic, concerned more with effectiveness of media practices. The U.S. agencies embraced collaboration and information technology better compared to their Chinese peers. This research contributes to the body of knowledge in strategic communication via providing empirical evidence of how Chinese and U.S. agencies coordinate IMC and perceive PESO media relative and in response to emerging media practices.     

Consumer preferences and the international harmonization of organic standards

Harmonization of technical standards is often advocated as a means to remove technical barriers that reduce the welfare gains available from international trade. Organic standards are not currently harmonized internationally. If domestic organic standards reflect consumer tastes, and consumers have strong preferences for those standards, then harmonization to a common standard may reduce the benefits consumers receive from organic products. Through a consumer survey, conjoint analysis was used to explore the preferences of consumers in the US, the UK and Canada for organic food. The results suggest that consumers in the three countries do not have a strong attachment to the current national organic standards and that international harmonization may be a legitimate food policy goal.     

The role of market orientation,relational capital,and internationalization speed in foreign market exit and re-entry decisions under turbulent conditions

Firms’ internationalization strategies can vary with changing environments. Occasionally, a firm may choose to re-enter a foreign market it had abandoned in the past if environmental conditions have improved. The present study provides insight into the foreign market exit and subsequent re-entry processes. Specifically, we utilize the strategic flexibility perspective to investigate the impact of market orientation, relational capital, and internationalization speed on market exit and re-entry decisions under turbulence in a host market. Using a sample of 156 Turkish firms that operated during the Arab Spring in the Egyptian market between 2010 and 2015, we find that the market-oriented firms are more flexible in their market exit decisions than less market-oriented organizations. In addition, relational capital specific to the host country has a negative impact on market exit decisions under conditions of political conflict. The results also suggest that strong ties with partners in the host country increase the propensity to re-enter the market.     

Child injuries in land vehicles that do not require restraints

Abstract

The goal of this study was to determine the injury profiles of Canadian children who presented to the Emergency Department from 1990 to 2016 due to an injury caused while traveling in a form of land transportation that did not require child restraint. A case series was conducted using data from the electronic Canadian Hospitals Injury Reporting and Prevention Program (eCHIRPP). Children who were injured while travelling on land transportation for which child restraint is not required, who presented to a Canadian Emergency Department that participates in eCHIRPP between April 1, 1990 to August 29, 2016, were included. Overall, 1856 children sustained 2139 injuries (mean age: 9.8?years (SD 4.5), 45.5% male). The majority of children were injured on a school bus (49.3%). The most commonly injured body part was the head or neck (52.6%). The most common type of injury was a superficial or open wound (33.1%), followed by traumatic brain injury (19.3%). Overall, 39.4% of injuries required no treatment in hospital. Overall, approximately 70 children presented to eCHIRPP EDs per year on a land transportation vehicle that does not require restraints. Biomechanical studies are needed to improve safety on land transportation vehicles that do not require seatbelts.     

How right should the customer be?

If your salespeople aren't sure who their boss is--the district manager? the regional manager? the customer?--it could be a sign that your company's sales force controls are working at cross-purposes and that your sales function is in trouble. Sales force controls are the policies and practices that govern the way you train, supervise, motivate, and evaluate your sales staff. They include the types of compensation you offer your people and the criteria your sales managers use to evaluate the reps' performance. These controls let salespeople know which trade-offs the company would prefer them to make when the inevitable conflicts arise between what they want to do (spend lots of time and money to get a sale) and what they actually can do (use limited resources and still get the sale). When sales force controls aren't aligned--when, say, the system simultaneously encourages reps to be entrepreneurial but also to file detailed call reports and check in frequently with their bosses--individuals become discouraged and unproductive, and they eventually leave the company. The authors' research suggests there are significant differences between the control systems of companies that encourage salespeople to put the customer first-outcome control (OC) systems--and those that encourage reps to put their managers first--behavior control (BC) systems. In this article, they list the characteristics of OC and BC systems, describe the potential fallout from conflicts within these systems, and explain how you can tell which control system is appropriate for your firm. In most cases, the right choice will be a consistent system somewhere in the middle of the OC-BC continuum.     

Reflections on international marketing: destructive regeneration and multinational firms

Constant in the evolution of the business enterprise has been its relentless search for competitive advantage. What has been phenomenally different about this quest is that it is, increasingly, a global landscape that defines the firm’s opportunities and challenges. The global marketplace has always been dynamic and complex in terms of the changes it brings, but the last two decades have been exceptionally transformational. In terms of opportunities, firms pursuing international customers have never before faced such open markets, rise in discretionary income, and modern tools for accessing global markets. In terms of challenges, intense competition, complexity of managing multiple markets and coordinating marketing strategy, a host of risk elements, and the sheer difficulty of managing geographic, cultural, and political barriers are among the factors which impede the firm’s success in global markets. Often, these changes come in the form of radical, transformative disruptions. This essay draws attention to major disruptions impacting international marketers and provides insights for appropriate firm response.     

Trade-offs and disappearing acts: shifting societal discourses of diversity in Canada over three decades

In the past few decades, research on minority and disadvantaged groups in the workplace has focused on the discourse of diversity management; however, most of this research has emphasized individual and organizational discourse rather than broader, societal contexts. Our critical analysis of societal/macro level discourse explores the discursive constructions of equity and diversity in Canada, and provides original findings on how these discourses have been produced in the public sphere. We apply quantitative and qualitative textual analysis to articles published from 1986 to 2014 in The Globe and Mail, a nationally distributed newspaper, and the Canadian Employment Equity Act Annual Reports from 1988 to 2013. This paper describes a range of discursive patterns including those focusing on compliance-based equity oriented toward social justice as well as voluntary ‘diversity management’ grounded in corporate self-interest. It demonstrates important trade-offs in who is protected and promoted through the contrasting discourses, and in the types of actors legitimizing these discourses. We provide detailed evidence of these patterns by applying Habermas’ Theory of Communicative Action, and conclude with a discussion of implications for practice and for theory that are suggested in our analysis.