Marketing capabilities and innovation. How do they affect the financial results of hotels?

From the point of view of firms’ managers, the knowledge of the factors which explain their firms’ financial results is considered of great usefulness to propose the most appropriate and profitable marketing strategies and actions. This research sets out from this central idea and proposes a model of relationships that considers the marketing results, the marketing capabilities, and the innovation capability as key factors for achieving good financial results. This model is verified via an empirical investigation carried out among 200 directors of hotel establishments in Andalusia, a region in the south of Spain which is one of the country's main tourist destinations. The results indicate that innovation capability is strongly conditioned by marketing capabilities and resources and that this innovation capability affects the financial results of the firms analyzed. Likewise, it is deduced that a market-oriented management philosophy contributes to the development of these marketing capabilities. The implications for management are considered very relevant as they must lead these firms to invest in the development of marketing resources and capabilities, and apply a market-oriented management philosophy if they wish to improve their financial results.     

How to face a political boycott: the relevance of entrepreneurs’ awareness

Despite the growth in the number of consumer boycotts, the marketing literature has paid little attention to the factors that could explain such behavior or the effect of boycotts on entrepreneurial initiatives. Several studies have examined the motivations of customer boycott behavior. Nevertheless, its relation to other attitudinal variables and with firm-related characteristics has not been analyzed or has been dealt with only partially even though the implications are crucial for incumbents and start-ups to adapt their strategies. This paper examines the factors that could explain the consumer’s decision to boycott a brand because of its location in a specific country. The relevance of addressing this gap is based on the boycotts’ impact on local firms and start-ups performance. This study addresses this issue by proposing a model that considers consumer-related variables and the perceived importance of brands. The hypotheses proposed in this research are verified via variance-based partial least squares structural equation modeling. The authors tested their framework during an actual boycott to Catalonian products and firms promoted on social media in Spain. The discussion of the results and their implications contribute to improving entrepreneurs, managers and academics’ comprehension of the determinants of customers’ intentions to participate in a boycott. This can also provide entrepreneurs and managers with a guide to orientate the design and implementation of strategies that enable the reduction of customer abandonment due to political boycotts. The main value of this research is that it provides a comprehensive model that includes different sorts of variables that could be involved in consumer boycott behavior. This model can support flexible entrepreneurial and managerial practices to help entrepreneurs to adapt rapidly to changes in the market due to boycotts.