Home sweet virtual home

2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 398-417 ◽  
Author(s):  
Debika Sihi
Keyword(s):  
Competitive Advantage ◽  
Information Search ◽  
Digital Technologies ◽  
Consumer Information ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Purchase Decision ◽  
Prior Work ◽  
High Involvement ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Sales Agents

PurposeDigital technologies have made it possible for organizations to enhance service delivery and provide consumers a way to experience a product or service before even seeing it in person. Prior work has validated consumer purchase decision-making models like the Engel, Kollat and Blackwell (EKB) model in digital and multi-channel purchase environments. This research aims to explore the various impacts of digital technologies, specifically virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) features, on the different stages of the EKB model in a high involvement purchase decision context. In addition, the use of such technologies is examined as a competitive advantage for sales agents.Design/methodology/approachAn in-depth market analysis of VR and AR technologies related to residential real estate is conducted. Then the research questions are analyzed through detailed feedback gathered from 33 prospective home-buyers and realtors in the USA.FindingsInsights from buyers and sales agents (realtors in the context of this research) suggest that VR and AR technologies can enhance consumer information search and expedite the time consumers spend evaluating purchase alternatives. As these technologies advance in their customization features, they may also increase the conversion between alternative evaluation and purchase, but only if they are realistic and provide high quality experiences. Finally, digital technologies are viewed as becoming a necessity in high involvement sales contexts, suggesting that additional features or innovative ways to use these technologies may serve as sources of competitive advantage for sales agents.Originality/valueThis is one of the first research studies to explore the perceived impacts of VR and AR technologies on the stages of the EKB model consumer decision model. It builds on prior work and offers direction for future research.

scholarly journals A systematic review of consumer information search in online and offline environments

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Anu C. Haridasan ◽  
Angeline Gautami Fernando ◽  
Saju B.
Keyword(s):  
Systematic Review ◽  
Information Search ◽  
Perceived Risk ◽  
Consumer Information ◽  
Consumer Search ◽  
External Information ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Research Opportunities ◽  
Consumer Information Search

Purpose The purpose of this study is to identify major themes and potential research opportunities in online and offline consumer search. Design/methodology/approach A systematic review was conducted based on 118 articles identified from prevalent journal databases. Keywords frequency analysis was carried out to identify the major themes. An inductive thematic analysis was carried out to verify the generated themes. Findings Results show that uncertainty, knowledge, perceived risk, price, experience and involvement are the major themes associated with consumer information search. Uncertainty, one of the major themes of offline search, has not been studied in the online search context. Similarly, the previous experience needs to be explored in the context of the offline search. Finally, potential research opportunities for future research has been summarized based on the retrieved themes. Research limitations/implications The systematic review provides an in-depth understanding on the current research on information search literature with future research directions. Practical implications This study helps retailers to understand the key elements that motivate consumers to perform external information searches from online and offline sources and to curate targeted information provision strategies to influence purchase decisions. Social implications Consumers with limited internet availability may access channels prior to decision-making. The themes identified in this study can aid policymakers to design affordable access to these channels. Originality/value This study adds to the sparse literature on systematic reviews on consumer search for online and offline channels.

Emerging trends in digital transformation: a bibliometric analysis

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Raghu Nandan Chawla ◽  
Praveen Goyal
Keyword(s):  
Bibliometric Analysis ◽  
Business Models ◽  
Digital Technologies ◽  
Citation Network ◽  
Digital Transformation ◽  
Intellectual Structure ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Strategic Decisions ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Research Areas

PurposeUbiquitous digital technologies are driving organisations to embrace non-traditional digitally transformed business models incessantly. Heterogeneous literature contributions have resulted in a spur in the research related to business transformation driven by digital technologies in recent years; consequently, the research under the digital transformation (DT), even though becoming a hotspot, remains very fragmented. The authors endeavour to holistically present the literature's intellectual structure under DT as a concept, its evolving journey and the emerging research streams in the business and management domains using the techniques of bibliometric analysis.Design/methodology/approachBy performing bibliometric analysis on 234 research articles published over the last 20 years in the DT domain, retrieved from Thompson Reuters Web of Science TM, this study culls out thorough insights from the citation, co-citation and keyword analysis. Further emerging research streams were evaluated using VOSviewer software.FindingsThe study depicts an overall incremental trend of year-on-year publications, authors' performance, publication journals, associated institutions and research driving countries, along with key insights from co-citation network analysis. Furthermore, the study evaluates four research areas – organisational impacts, applied applications and insights, operational processes and social aspects, comprising eighteen research streams that comprehensively cover-up research under the DT domain.Research limitations/implicationsThe study contributes to the literature of DT by amalgamating the status of the present research, but more importantly, by deriving the research areas and research streams, which can be further expanded by researchers as future research streams.Practical implicationsFor the practitioners, the study aims to act as a ready reckoner repository with practice-oriented literature references to facilitate them building knowledge and taking effective strategic decisions to harness the benefits of DT more proficiently.Originality/valueThis study illustrates the bibliometric structure of the DT literature and presents insights from the growth of the literature year-on-year.

Resources, capabilities and competitive advantage of minor export crops farms in Sri Lanka

2018 ◽  
Vol 28 (5) ◽  
pp. 478-502 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vilani Sachitra ◽  
Siong-Choy Chong
Keyword(s):  
Sri Lanka ◽  
Competitive Advantage ◽  
Dynamic Capabilities ◽  
Process Management ◽  
Relationship Building ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Resources And Capabilities ◽  
Physical Assets ◽  
Export Crops

Purpose The agribusiness sector has long been acknowledged as a major source of livelihood to many people in developing countries. Hence, determining the resources and capabilities influencing farm-level competitive advantage are vital to better understand and formulate appropriate strategies to increase the competitiveness ofminor export crops farms. This study aims to understand of the link between resources-capabilities-competitive advantage for appropriate measures to be recommended to enhance the competitive position of the smallholding farms. Design/methodology/approach This study adopts the resource-based view in combination with dynamic capabilities. The scope comprises owners of farms who possess experience in commercial cultivation of minor export crops in Sri Lanka. A self-administrated structured questionnaire was used to collect data. Findings Based on the responses from 456 farm owners, results of the multiple regression analysis indicate that variables representing resources such as human assets, physical assets, financial assets, institutional capital, collective action and entrepreneurial identity; and dynamic capabilities such as organisational learning, relationship building, quality management and marketing are significantly associated with competitive advantage of the minor export crops farms. Reputation and farm process management capability are the only two insignificant variables. Taken together, the resources and dynamic capabilities investigated explain 89.3 per cent of the variation in competitive advantage, in which 82 per cent is contributed by resources. Originality/value The findings provide useful insights not only in terms of understanding the link between resources, dynamic capabilities and competitive advantage but also how resources and capabilities can be channelled and leveraged to bring about competitive advantage to the minor export crops farms. Theoretical and practical implications as well as future research directions are provided.

Webrooming and showrooming: a multi-stage consumer decision process

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Srabanti Mukherjee ◽  
Swagato Chatterjee
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Information Search ◽  
Structural Equation ◽  
Product Type ◽  
Equation Modeling ◽  
Purchase Decision ◽  
Decision Making Process ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Channel Choice ◽  
Multi Stage

PurposeThe purpose of this research is to propose and validate a theoretical framework explaining web-rooming and showrooming as a multi-stage decision-making process. The authors have used consumer purchase decision-making theories to propose a model that identifies showrooming and webrooming as a combination of two decisions, channel choice during information search and channel choice during actual purchase. Further, the authors explored how various antecedents of showrooming and webrooming have differential effects on various stages of a purchase decision-making process and how product type moderates the relationships.Design/methodology/approachThe authors have conducted empirical research, whereby 243 responses were obtained from a cross-sectional survey. The authors have used structural equation modeling and multiple regression analysis to validate our theoretical model.FindingsWebrooming or showrooming is a multi-stage decision-making process for the consumers. First, consumers decide whether to search online or offline and then whether to buy online and offline. Different individual, purchase context-related and channel related factors impact these decisions. Product type governs which variables will be more important than others.Originality/valueThe research looks to enhance the understanding of the consumer's decision-making process during showrooming and webrooming while also helping retailers design and implement appropriate strategies that could affect consumers during information search and actual purchase.

Digital tools and smart technologies in marketing: a thematic evolution

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Estrella Diaz ◽  
Águeda Esteban ◽  
Rocío Carranza Vallejo ◽  
David Martín-Consuegra Navarro
Keyword(s):  
New Technologies ◽  
Market Competition ◽  
International Marketing ◽  
Digital Technologies ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Disruptive Technology ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Performance Determinants ◽  
Smart Technologies ◽  
The Impact

PurposeThis paper aims to analyze the evolution of digital and smart technologies and their relationship with different themes within marketing journals. In addition, this study has included the evolution of digital and smart technologies in relevant International Marketing (IM)/International Business (IB) journals to describe the impact of technology on this specific area to draw some interesting conclusions.Design/methodology/approachA bibliometric approach is applied in this research using science mapping analysis to visualize and reveal the evolution of smart and digital technologies in this specific academic area.FindingsBy combining science maps with performance indicators, the results of this study suggest that new technologies are related to eight main topics within marketing journals: implementation-completion, perceptions, behavior, market competition, adoption-diffusion model, social media, competitive advantage and disruptive technology. Additionally, this work provides new avenues for future research. When analyzing IM and IB journals, the findings highlight six thematic areas: perceptions-eWOM relationship, innovative foreign markets, performance determinants, Japan, industrial research and China.Originality/valueThis study contributes theoretically to developing and describing a framework for research in smart and digital technologies in the general marketing and international marketing/business fields. It adds a coherent perspective on the points of contact in marketing evolution, where smart technology has a meaningful role. This study outlines the changing questions surrounding the touchpoints as well as emerging research topics.

Knowledge transfer in family business successions

2015 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 17-37 ◽  
Author(s):  
Britta Boyd ◽  
Susanne Royer ◽  
Rong Pei ◽  
Xiaolei Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Transfer ◽  
Competitive Advantage ◽  
Family Business ◽  
Family Firms ◽  
Family Businesses ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Business Environments ◽  
Theoretical Reasoning

Purpose – Knowledge often is the fundament for strategic competitive advantage. Thus, it is highly relevant to understand better how knowledge is transferred from one generation to the next in family businesses. The purpose of this paper is to link the competitive advantage realisation in family businesses to the success of transferring strategically valuable knowledge in different business environments to the next generation. Design/methodology/approach – Building on the contingency model of family business succession (Royer et al., 2008) knowledge transfer in family businesses from different cultures is investigated in this paper. From a resource-oriented and transaction cost inspired perspective two family businesses with a similar industry background from China and Europe are compared regarding knowledge transfer in the context of family firm succession taking into account the respective transaction atmosphere. Findings – Different successions for two long-lived family firms are illustrated in a systematic fashion: based on the theoretical elements suggested both cases are described to get insights into the usefulness of the theoretical reasoning developed. On the basis of these, the cases are compared with each other and conclusions for both cases are drawn. Implications for theory and practice as well as avenues for future research are sketched. Originality/value – The focus of the current study is to gain more insight into long-lived family businesses by comparing two cases over a period of more than 200 years with regard to strategically relevant resources as well as the underlying transaction atmospheres. Implications for family firms depending on the resource types and transaction atmosphere are discussed.

The impact of involvement on engagement with brand posts

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 277-301
Author(s):  
Ana Margarida Barreto ◽  
Diogo Ramalho
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Consumer Involvement ◽  
Future Research ◽  
High Involvement ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Level Of Involvement ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
Business To Consumer ◽  
Post Hoc ◽  
The Impact

Purpose This paper aims to look at the effects of different levels of involvement (high and low) on social media (Facebook) users' engagement (likes, shares and comments) with different types and formats of brand content. Design/methodology/approach The authors analyzed user reactions to 1,156 Facebook posts from eight business-to-consumer brands (goods and services). Based on a post hoc test, four product/services were identified as belonging to the group of high-involvement and the other four as low involvement. Findings The data suggest that, when involvement is low, users in general engage more with brand posts regardless their format (text, image and post) or type (hedonic and informative), or even the interaction of both. Moreover, low involvement leads users prefer to comment on brand content, whereas higher involvement is associated with to sharing it. Exceptions were observed for images (both hedonic and informative) and for hedonic image and video in both low and high involvement users. Research limitations/implications The goal was not to measure users’ attention to each type of post. Moreover, the authors did not have access to information regarding which devices were used to access the online content and whether that aspect might have an impact on users’ reactions. Neither do they claim that engagement necessarily reflects positive reactions, as any content analysis of users’ reactions was beyond the scope of this project. Practical implications These findings are expected to help brand managers and social media strategists to better select content based on their marketing goals, as well as to provide a potential explanation for the success of campaigns. Originality/value As far as we are aware, no previous study has attempted to observe the mediated effect of consumer involvement on brand posts considering their type and format. We also believe that this is the first observation of how behavior differentiates according to the target audience’s level of involvement. This paper also proposes a convenient framework for categorizing social network sites content. Suggestions for future research are made at the end.

Nonlinear and complementary effects of responsive and proactive market orientation on firms’ competitive advantage

2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (4) ◽  
pp. 841-859
Author(s):  
Fabian F. Osorio Tinoco ◽  
Miguel Hernández-Espallardo ◽  
Augusto Rodriguez-Orejuela
Keyword(s):  
Competitive Advantage ◽  
Market Orientation ◽  
Hierarchical Regression ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Manufacturing Companies ◽  
Positive Interaction ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Positive Effects ◽  
Proactive Market Orientation

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to clarify how responsive market orientation (RMO) and proactive market orientation (PMO) create competitive advantage. Design/methodology/approach Nonlinear and interaction effects are tested by applying hierarchical regression analysis to a sample of 272 Colombian manufacturing companies. Findings The results show that although market orientation promotes the competitive advantage of a business, both approaches – responsive and proactive – exhibit saturation effects and a positive interaction. Research limitations/implications The main limitation of this study is the cross-sectional design and the use of a single source for data collection. It is suggested that future research includes different orientations combined with these two market orientations – responsive and proactive – for achieving competitive advantage. In addition, further studies could replicate this analysis for different environmental conditions. Originality/value This paper simultaneously evaluates the nonlinear and complementary effects of RMO and PMO. From a strategic standpoint, it presents an empirical confirmation of the familiarity trap, the failure trap and the positive effects of combining RMO and PMO.

scholarly journals The impact of product assortment size and attribute quantity on information searches

2017 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 191-201 ◽  
Author(s):  
Krisztina Rita Dörnyei ◽  
Athanasios Krystallis ◽  
Polymeros Chrysochou
Keyword(s):  
Information Search ◽  
Consumer Information ◽  
Product Attributes ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Information Display ◽  
Product Categories ◽  
Product Assortment ◽  
Information Searches ◽  
Consumer Information Search ◽  
The Impact

Purpose This paper aims to investigate the impact of assortment size and attribute quantity on the depth and content of consumer information searches. Design/methodology/approach For a computer-aided experiment using an information display board, participants (n = 393) were placed in a simulated shopping situation that involved choosing a product among three sets of frequently purchased, low-involvement, FMCG alternatives. Findings The findings show that when the assortment size increases, consumers acquire information from more products and cues but sacrifice product attributes. In particular, this sacrifice comes at the expense of secondary product attributes (e.g. nutrition information, country of origin), whereas primary product attributes (e.g. brand name, price) remain constant. Attribute quantity does not have a significant effect on information search. Practical implications Provided that several strategies rely on providing more information to consumers with the aim of making more deliberate and better choices, the findings suggest that they may have a limited effect in product categories in which the assortment size is wide. The authors discuss the implications for category management and public policy. Originality/value Information searches are measured by means of three different variables (searched cues, searched products and searched attributes), which enable a more complex exploration of the consumer information search process.

Digital touchpoints and multichannel segmentation approach in the life insurance industry

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mónika Anetta Alt ◽  
Zsuzsa Săplăcan ◽  
Botond Benedek ◽  
Bálint Zsolt Nagy
Keyword(s):  
Marital Status ◽  
Technology Acceptance ◽  
Life Insurance ◽  
Information Search ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
Consumer Information ◽  
Online Information ◽  
Convenience Sample ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Channel Preferences

PurposeDigital technology is revolutionizing insurance distribution allowing the insurer companies to reach customers via multichannel. The aim of this study is to segment potential customers of life insurance based on their information search, purchasing channels and personal characteristics in the digital environment.Design/methodology/approachThe study uses cross-sectional research survey. In total, 422 questionnaires were collected through a convenience sample of the Romanian population. The data was segmented based on consumer information touchpoints (online vs offline), purchase channel preference (offline by a professional vs online by a standardized platform) and personal characteristics (age, marital status and children).FindingsThe channel segmentation analysis revealed that information channel preferences are the most important clustering variables, followed by purchase channel preferences, marital status, having children and age. Four distinct segments were identified: young fully offliners (23.7%), mature fully offliners (31.5%), committed online searchers (23.2%) and cross-channel onliners (21.6%).Practical implicationsInsurance companies should adapt their communication and distribution strategy based on multichannel segmentation and should focus on digital touchpoints with costumers.Originality/valueFirstly, the paper reveals multichannel and hybrid segmentation for life insurance. Secondly, it extends the already studied retail channels with search engines and companies' websites. Thirdly, it extends the behavioural variables for channel segmentation with technology acceptance behaviour, attitude towards life insurance, knowledge about life insurance, attitude towards personal selling and quality appraisal of online information sources.

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