How organisations generate and use customer insight

Abstract

The generation and use of customer insight in marketing decisions is poorly understood, partly due to difficulties in obtaining research access and partly because market-based learning theory views knowledge as a fixed asset. However, customer insight takes many forms, arrives at the organisation from increasingly diverse sources and requires more than mere dissemination if it is to be useful. A multiple case study approach is used to explore managerial practices for insight generation and use. Multiple informants from each of four organisations in diverse sectors were interviewed. Findings reveal the importance of value alignment and value monitoring across the insight demand chain, to complement the information processing emphasis of extant research. Within the firm, the study suggests the importance of customer insight conduct practices including insight format, the role of automation and insight shepherding, to complement the much-researched process perspective. The study provides a basis for assessing the effectiveness of insight processes by both practitioners and scholars.     

Labor-market exposure as a determinant of attitudes toward immigration

This paper re-examines the role of labor-market competition as a determinant of attitudes toward immigration. We claim two main contributions. First, we use more sophisticated measures of the degree of exposure to competition from immigrants than previously done. In addition to education, we focus on the protection derived from (self-assessed) investments in job-specific human capital and from specialization in occupations that are (objectively) intensive in communication tasks. Second, we explicitly account for the potential endogeneity arising from job search. Methodologically, we estimate by instrumental variables, an econometric model that allows for heterogeneity at the individual, regional and country level. Drawing on the 2004–2005 European Social Survey, we obtain the following main results. First, natives that dislike immigrants tend to work in low-immigration jobs, biasing OLS estimates. Second, working in jobs that require high levels of specific human capital leads to relatively more pro-immigration attitudes, although this effect is only found for respondents with more than 12 years of schooling. Third, the degree of manual (communicational) intensity of workers' occupations has a negative (positive) effect on their pro-immigration views. This effect is the most significant, both in a statistical and in a quantitative sense, and is distinct from the protection from immigrant competition provided by formal education. Overall our results suggest a large role for skill-based labor market competition in determining individual attitudes toward immigration.     

The role of complementary products on platform adoption: Evidence from the video console market

This paper studies the importance of the interdependences within platform-based markets. Specifically, the work examines the influence of complementary product portfolios on the adoption of platforms by individuals. The study analyzes data from a panel of 17 video game platforms in three regions (the US, Japan and Europe) for the period between 1989 and 2011. The results suggest that platform adoption is driven by the availability and users of complementary products. The study also finds that this impact is stronger when platform providers jointly manage the in-house complementary product portfolio and the platform. These findings reveal that decisions on complementary products act as strategic drivers of adoption in platform-based markets.     

Extending Rosenberg's idea about conjoint effects

In Rosenberg's work can be found the basis for both a path analytical approach-where relationships between variables are explained—and an R Square measurement—where a variable is explained—for nominal variables. The first approach has been expanded enormously by different authors. In this article we dig into the R Square alike problem. The ideas of predictability and accounted variation—in terms of percentage changed over time—and a simple statistic like percentages are on the basis of the measurements that we present, with a similar aim as the R square, but applied to contingency tables. For cross-sectional data this measurement is based on the percentage of cases in a category of the dependent variable for the particular combination of categories of the predictor ones making this figure as big as possible. We call this measurement the Coefficient of Predictability, P Square, and its value can be interpreted as the percentage of unpredictability which is accounted for by the variables in the model. With change data we try to explain why the percentage of cases in a category of a variable changes over time. This means that we have to look at the relationship between time and this variable, controlling for another set of variables. The variation is explained when the relationship gets down to zero, and the closer to this value, the better the explanatory power of the variables in our model. We call D Square to this measurement of accounted variation.     

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger: The evolution of competition and entry‐order advantages in economically turbulent contexts

We examine the evolution of competition and entry‐order advantages in markets under macroeconomic distress. Through formal modeling of early‐mover advantages along industry life cycles subjected to economic shocks and based on simulation findings, we propose that such shocks exogenously induce temporary industry discontinuities that shift the relative value of distinct asset endowments, thereby switching the bases for competitive advantages vis‐à‐vis those found in stable contexts. A vital trade‐off then emerges between a firm's financial flexibility and its pace of investments in isolating mechanisms, such that the former operates as a contingency factor for the latter. As such, flexibility superiority boosts early‐entrants' advantages, while it alternatively gives laggards a much desired strength to out trump first‐mover rivals. Our study informs entry‐order advantage theory and management practice in economically turbulent contexts. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

‘Recession push’ and ‘prosperity pull’ entrepreneurship in a rural developing context

In this paper, the ‘recession push’ and the ‘prosperity pull’ hypotheses are used to analyse the effect of growing non-farm wage employment on entrepreneurship in a rural developing context. Data are collected in a rural household survey in 110 communes in central Vietnam which includes subjective owner assessments of reasons for starting non-farm businesses. This way it is possible to separately test the two hypotheses by distinguishing opportunity and necessity entrepreneurs. We use clustered probit regression analyses and control for possible endogeneity in order to predict participation in entrepreneurship. The results show that better access to non-farm wage employment increases the likelihood of becoming an opportunity entrepreneur but has no effect on necessity entrepreneurship. This, therefore, supports the ‘prosperity pull’ hypothesis but not the ‘recession push’ hypothesis. The growing non-farm economy is likely to accelerate the emergence of opportunity entrepreneurship in rural areas. However, necessity entrepreneurs are suffering from a lack of individual and household assets which pushes them into entrepreneurship regardless of non-farm job opportunities in the surrounding area.     

Time series modeling of histogram-valued data: The daily histogram time series of S&P500 intradaily returns

Histogram time series (HTS) and interval time series (ITS) are examples of symbolic data sets. Though there have been methodological developments in a cross-sectional environment, they have been scarce in a time series setting. Arroyo, González-Rivera, and Maté (2011) analyze various forecasting methods for HTS and ITS, adapting smoothing filters and nonparametric algorithms such as the k-NN. Though these methods are very flexible, they may not be the true underlying data generating process (DGP). We present the first step in the search for a DGP by focusing on the autocorrelation functions (ACFs) of HTS and ITS. We analyze the ACF of the daily histogram of 5-minute intradaily returns to the S&P500 index in 2007 and 2008. There are clusters of high/low activity that generate a strong, positive, and persistent autocorrelation, pointing towards some autoregressive process for HTS. Though smoothing and k-NN may not be the true DGPs, we find that they are very good approximations because they are able to capture almost all of the original autocorrelation. However, there seems to be some structure left in the data that will require new modelling techniques. As a byproduct, we also analyze the [90,100%] quantile interval. By using all of the information contained in the histogram, we find that there are advantages in the estimation and prediction of a specific interval.     

Differentiated effects of formal and informal institutional distance between countries on the environmental performance of multinational enterprises

This research examines the influence of environmental institutional distance between home and host countries on the standardization of environmental performance among multinational enterprises using ordinary least-squares (OLS) regression techniques and a sample of 128 multinationals from high-polluting industries. The paper examines the environmental institutional distance of countries using the concepts of formal and informal institutional distances. The results show that whereas a high formal environmental distance between home and host countries leads multinational enterprises to achieve a different level of environmental performance according to each country's legal requirements, a high informal environmental distance encourages these firms to unify their environmental performance independently of the countries in which their units are based. The study also discusses the implications for academia, managers, and policy makers.     

Drivers of environmental innovation in Majorcan hotels

Using a database of Majorcan hotels, this paper examines several previously untested determinants of environmental innovations in hotels derived from the Porter hypothesis and from the specifics of knowledge transfer in the tourism industry. The empirical analysis is original in that it distinguishes between eight types of environmental innovations. The results show that hotels’ general predisposition to implement innovations, manager remuneration based on environmental performance, staff satisfaction, environmental accounting, and trainings are important determinants of the overall environmental innovation activity of Majorcan hotels. Moreover, the use of environmental management systems is associated with innovations with cost-saving potential, whereas the hotel star category is associated with innovations that contribute to hotel quality, such as wastewater treatment, noise reduction, noise isolation, and visual impact improvements. Furthermore, high levels of staff satisfaction are related to the implementation of water-saving and noise reduction innovations, as such innovations require staff participation, whereas the role of information sources in explaining innovation adoption varies based on the technical complexity of innovations. The paper concludes with policy implications for sustainable tourism development, recommendations for the hoteliers, and directions for future research.     

Relationships of retail brand manufacturers with retailers

Abstract

Previous researchers have discussed the convenience of manufacturing retail brands. However, they have seldom developed any empirical work. In this article we present an analysis framework to study the impact of the production of retail brands on the manufacturer's relationship with the retailer, depending on the manufacturer's competitive position in the brands they produce. The model presented is empirically tested through a covariance structure model. In order to do this, we use the data from a postal survey aimed at business units manufacturing retail brands in the Spanish market for mass commodity products.