Identification of Marketing Needs and Means of Communication of Romanian Marketing Companies in the Context of the Knowledge Society

A few decades ago, academics and economic pundits used to say that information is the main source of power. However, in the Knowledge Society, as we experience it today, information is readily available for everyone, and the real challenge is to master modern and complex information analysis tools, which can make sense of the information overflow of modern society, thus constituting the true competitive advantages of major economic players. For a competent analyst, data generated by a survey, for instance, can reveal paramount information about consumer behavior, competitive strategies, or any other economic and social environment-related aspect deemed important. The marketing needs of Romanian marketing companies are very diversified, commencing with the research of the needs and demand on the target market, going down to the 4Ps (Product, Price, Promotion, and Placement) and their components. The present marketing research was performed using seven categories of information sources: specialized publications in marketing; specialized publications in economics; information provided by specialized institutions in consultancy and marketing research; information provided by individual marketing specialists; information provided by advertising agencies; information provided by the economic sections of the daily newspapers; and job Websites.     

Relationship and Market Conditions: Outcomes in Marketing Channels

Purpose: In today's highly competitive business environment, many organizations are tending to reduce the number of suppliers to focus on establishing stable and close relationships with a small number of them. The study here analyzes the influence of both market and relationship conditions on trust, commitment, and customer loyalty.

Methodology/Approach: Empirical research was conducted by collecting information from a sample of 304 retailers. A structural equations model is estimated.

Findings: Results support a positive influence of relationship value on trust and, in turn, on long-term orientation and commitment, with the latter as a strong antecedent of customer loyalty. In contrast, dependence on the main supplier does not seem to exert a significant effect on long-term orientation and commitment.

Originality/Value/Contribution: The evidence suggests that relationship conditions are important for creating value in B2B settings. Results shed additional light on the process of calculating, creating and claiming value.     

Perspective on the Economic Evolution of the European Union States Under the Impact of the Pandemic and Financial-Economic Crisis

The European Union,which is at the beginning of its term of office for all Member States in the European Parliament,the European Commission,its governing body a...     

An architectural perspective on service adoption: A platform design and the case of pluggable cross-border trade compliance in e-commerce

Current e-commerce architectures rely on a small number of monolithic application systems. The adoption of innovative IT functionality within these architectures is a tedious and complex task. The purpose of this article is to present a design for a novel platform architecture to improve the pluggability of e-commerce services. More precisely, the pluggability of services in current architectures is described, a platform architecture is introduced, and its effect on pluggability is evaluated by means of a prototype. The enablers for this architecture are the recent innovations of web programming interfaces, delegated resource access, and client-side web application frameworks. Those technologies are common in social media and their potential in enterprise computing is revealed in this work, based on the example of a trade compliance service for cross-border retail. The results of this study suggest that the architectural design has merits as it improves the pluggability of e-commerce services. Hence, e-commerce companies should consider a paradigm shift and move from using self-contained application components to a platform-based adoption of complementary services.     

Strategy on a Page: An ArchiMate‐based tool for visualizing and designing strategy

Nowadays, organizations need to be able to adjust more rapidly to the circumstances of their environment, at a strategic, tactical, and operational level. However, most software tools are designed to support the tactical and operational levels, while at a strategic level there are not many options available. In this paper, we propose a software tool which supports modelling of strategic information, covering several well‐known strategy techniques, and also facilitates the design of highly customizable management dashboards. To validate our proposed software tools, we perform two case studies, with two inherently different organizations, namely a public university and an investment fund.     

Does technology make a difference? Evidence from Spanish hotels

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) have positively contributed to the hospitality industry. In Spain, the third tourism destination in the world, hotels have widely adopted computers and the Internet for the internal processes as well as in their relationships with their providers and customers. While some ICT solutions are common in hotels regardless of their category, others may allow to differentiate across upscale hotels and those of inferior level. This study identifies the most discriminating ICT solutions across 3-, 4-, and 5-star hotels, and discusses their potential for improving efficiency and service quality. In particular, digital technology, loyalty programs, and ambient intelligence are some of the most differentiating technologies, which may be implemented by 3- and 4-star hotels to improve the perceived quality of their processes and services.     

Can the Retailer’s ICT Enhance the Impact of Service Recovery Efforts on Customer Satisfaction?

Abstract

Service recovery remains a topic of considerable interest for both academics and practitioners. This paper aims to explore the relations between recovery efforts and causal attributions, satisfaction, and both conventional and online word-of-mouth, as well as the moderating role of information and communication technologies (ICT) on the relationship between retailer’s efforts and satisfaction with the service recovery. On a sample of 336 retail customers who experienced service failure, we use SEM and multigroup analysis. As a result of the data analysis, there is evidence supporting the positive impact of attributions and recovery efforts on satisfaction, and the influence of the latter on both conventional and online word-of-mouth. Furthermore, the moderating influence of technology in the “recovery efforts-satisfaction” relationship is evidenced. Practical implications for retail managers and further research are presented.