The new wave of AI-powered luxury brands online shopping experience: The role of digital multisensory cues and customers’ engagement

Academic literature retains a dearth of empirical evidence of the cutting-edge aspect of artificial intelligence (AI)-powered digital assistance and digital multisensory cues, despite the prospect of these factors on real-life customers' luxury brand online shopping experience. Thus, the aim of this study is to examine the significant pathway and effects of AI-powered digital assistance toward customers’ luxury brand online shopping experience. Drawing on S–O-R (Stimulus, organism, and response) and TRAM (Technology Readiness and Acceptance Model) paradigm, a multi-method research design was deployed to investigate constructs. Firstly, semi-structured interviews were utilized to explore customers' online behavior under the luxury brands and information technology aspect. Secondly, survey data were collected and analyzed by using partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) and fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA). The PLS-based analysis of quantitative data confirmed the exploratory insights of qualitative findings, establishing the connections of AI-powered digital assistance, customer engagement, and customers' luxury brand online shopping experience. Research findings also suggest that customer engagement plays a mediation role in the relationship between AI-powered digital assistance and customers' luxury brand online shopping experience. Besides, digital multisensory cues moderate the relationship between AI-powered digital assistance and customer engagement. Further, fsQCA complements the findings of PLS-SEM that reveal the significant combination of factors that lead to the perceptions of customers' luxury brand online shopping experience.     

基于AHP-TOPSIS模型的京津冀家政服务人力资源供给质量评价研究

依托已有的研究成果构建了家政服务人力资源供给质量评价指标体系,利用AHP-TOPSIS模型对京津冀家政服务人力资源供给质量进行了评价和排名,并使用障碍度模型分析了员工制、准员工制、培训学校、中介制四种类型家政机构人力资源供给质量的关键制约因素,在此基础上,给出了不同类型家政机构人力资源供给质量改善的针对性建议,为家政服务人力资源供给质量的改善提供参考依据。     

“I live with terror inside me”: Exploring customers’ instinctive reactions to terror

Terrorist attacks occur mostly at public service-oriented sites. Consequently, their victims are likely to be customers. The present study explores how customers instinctively react toward the reality of terror in a matrix of 2 × 2 aspects concerning terror circumstances: temporal proximity (brief or long) and physical proximity (close or remote) from the terror event. In qualitative in-depth interviews, customers from France and Israel were requested to share their instinctive reactions and coping strategies when approaching hospitality (hedonistic) and transportation (utilitarian) services. Participants (N = 47) comprised customers having a protracted acquaintance with persistent terror threats. The analysis identified differences in reactions, subject to temporal and physical proximities. When terror attacks are physically close, customers’ emotions, cognitions, and behaviors undergo modification with time. However, when terror attacks occur at a location remote from the customer, customers’ emotions and cognitions, but not their behavior, change with time. These reactions were comparable for the two service contexts. Practical implications were elaborated to enable service establishments (i.e., hospitality and transportation) to design and manage their operations for the short and long term to assist customers in the difficult era of terror.     

Service with improper requests: How fellow customers interpret Employee's judgment call

In this paper, we examined the impact of different judgment calls by service personnel on service satisfaction, in response to inappropriate requests from customers. Based on the stereotype content model, we propose that employees servicing with these requests are often evaluated on two fundamental dimensions, warmth and competence, and the accessibility of one dimension over the other determines overall service satisfaction of fellow customers. Through three experiments, the current research shows that fellow customers perceive service employees who consent to an improper request as higher in warmth but lower in competence than those who reject the request. However, when the compliance has serious consequences for a fellow customer, this negatively affects the competence evaluation but not the warmth evaluation, which in turn reduce customer satisfaction. When the focal customer suffers from the serious consequences, this positively affect both competence and warmth perception, which in turn enhance fellow customer satisfaction. This research could be used to identify ways to handle improper requests made by customers.     

Exploring an in-store customer journey for customers shopping for outdoor apparel

The omni-channel shopping phenomenon creates major challenges for brick-and-mortar stores to remain relevant and appeal to customers. A way to counteract these challenges is to offer customers a journey where in-store experiences enable them to encounter numerous physical and virtual touchpoints evoked by affective, cognitive, physical, relational, sensorial and symbolic responses. This study ascertained the customer journey activated by the experiences causing value and resulting in intentions to revisit a retailer specializing in outdoor apparel. Our web-based survey collected 300 valid responses for analyses. The statistical analyses confirmed a positive relationship between the customer in-shop experience factors and the shopping trip value experienced, which in turn mediated the relationship with intention to repatronage. Some conclusions are made and various suggestions for future research are recommended.     

Is the system reliability profitable for retailing and consumer service of a dynamical system under cross-price elasticity of demand?

Retailing strategy is one of the most crucial factors for industries. A proper retailing strategy can help to enhance consumer service and increase the industry's profit. An improved approach to retailing is suggested in this research to deliver superior customer service while maximizing profits in a dynamic system. The study analyzes a retailing strategy for a demand with cross-price elasticity upon the retail price. A product's cross-price elasticity and the system reliability are critical factors in retailing. Understanding the cross-price elasticity of demand between products helps retailers to make pricing decisions that maximize profits by maintaining demand. Imperfect products are produced due to an imperfect production system. The imperfect ones must be adjusted with some costs to make them perfect for better retailing. The system failure rate is crucial for retailing under cross-price elasticity of demand patterns. Production system reliability, cross-price elasticity of demand, and consumer service are all essential factors that can impact a company's success in the market. The production rate is considered time- and system failure rate-dependent. Contradictory to the literature, a dynamical system is proposed for improved retail management, which is solved using the Euler-Lagrange theory. Finally, one can achieve the expected maximum profit for this retail system with optimum selling prices for different products by reducing the system failure rate. Some numerical illustrations with graphical representations are provided to validate the current study. Numerical examples show that applying cross-price elasticity of demand for more than two identical products provides 35% more profit for the retail industry than a single type of product.     

智慧居家养老服务协同供给的优化路径研究——以广西钦州市智慧居家养老项目的实践经验为例

智慧居家养老服务的协同供给可以形成社会联动效应，降低公共服务成本。运用公共服务协同供给分析框架，通过交叉分类方法从协同主体的利益与目标两个变量的耦合性出发分析广西钦州市智慧居家养老项目中养老服务主体间不同种类的协同关系，可以从加强政府领导、形成合作联盟、建立市场标准、创新扶持政策4个方面完善政府、企业、社会组织之间不同类型的协同供给，实现社会资源的高效利用以及向智慧居家养老服务的发展和转变。     

Effects of individual resources and team-member exchange on service quality

While workplace resources are generally viewed as positively affecting performance, some studies indicate that not all resources increase performance. This study addresses the controversial disparate effects of workplace resources on performance by exploring functionally classified workplace resources in self-managing service teams and their relative impacts on team service quality. Considering membership dynamics and consequences between members, a field experiment was conducted in a cafeteria, with data collected through a working diary for workplace resources and a customer survey to evaluate service quality. Results suggest that efficacy-resources in self-managing teams should be controlled with caution as they may adversely affect team service quality. Supporting the person–situation interactionism perspective, workplace resources interact dynamically with individual employees and with situations. Esteem-resources were found to increase team service quality, while team-member exchange not only improved team service quality but also moderated the impact of esteem-resources on team service quality.