Branding and relationships: Customer and supplier perspectives

This paper explores and investigates the role of branding within financial services. Specifically, the study aims to assess the importance of branding and its associated elements including brand image and brand experience in the relationships that exist between consumers and their financial brands. It aims to achieve this through research, which identifies gaps between the managerial and consumer perspectives on branding in relationships in retail financial services. It is well established that the characteristics of services are different from those of manufactured goods and that service personnel play a central role in the services experience. Moreover, the concept of relationship marketing within services proclaims the importance of one-to-one relationships between businesses and customers as well as relationships between consumers and their brands. Drawing from the fields of brand management, relationship marketing and services marketing, this research aims to investigate the perceptional differences between consumers and suppliers in relation to the importance of branding in financial service relationships. The research findings indicate that brand experience appears to be far more salient than brand image in shaping and building meaningful and lasting brand perceptions and promoting customer retention.     

Mature Australian consumers' adoption and consumption of self-service banking technologies

The slow diffusion of self-service banking technologies (SSBTs) into the mature consumer market necessitates research to understand better this growing section of the population and the diversity that exists within this market. This research analyses the 50+ market through a segmentation approach based on the level of use of SSBTs. Three segments were identified: non-users, low users and medium-to-high users of SSBTs; these are profiled by frequency of use and demographic variables. The medium-to-high user segment embraces a range of SSBTs and uses credit cards to facilitate their financial activities. Non-users and some low users prefer the customary way of conducting transactions and enjoy the personal interaction with the bank employee. These two segments do, however, have a moderate level of credit card use. Finally, a small percentage of diffusion discontinuance was identified in this study of the mature consumer market.     

Myopic loss aversion and the equity premium puzzle reconsidered

Benartzi and Thaler [The Quarterly Journal of Economics 110 (1995) 73–92] offer a quasi-rational explanation for the equity premium puzzle. We reconsider their methodology and, making a simple modification to it, find that their analysis is not robust.     

滨海新区研发与转化基地建设中的科技中介服务体系构建

国内外科技园区的发展实践证明,科技中介服务体系的建立与完善是研发与转化基地建设必不可少的重要基础和支撑。本文结合滨海新区的实际,对滨海新区研发与转化基地建设中的科技中介服务体系的目标定位、结构设计以及高效运行的保障措施进行了重点探讨。     

青年农民工市民化的制约因素分析

青年农民工市民化,是指他们在身份上获得城市居民相同的合法身份和社会权利的过程,最明显的标志是获得所在地的城市户口及相应的社会权利。但是在推进青年农民工市民化过程中,仍然存在着思想障碍、制度障碍、政策障碍、组织障碍、青年农民工自身素质障碍等方面的限制,制约了青年农民工市民化的顺利推进。     

奥运会对举办城市的影响研究

本文结合以往奥运会举办城市的实际,分析举办奥运会对举办城市的影响,既包括经济影响,也包括带来的社会影响。奥运会对举办城市的影响是积极的,但同时也带来一些问题,如何扩大积极影响,解决它所带来的一些问题是北京急需考虑的。