E-fulfillment across product type: a review of literature (2000–2020)

Purpose This paper aims to review the literature on “E-fulfillment” with respect to marketing and operations issues in the current dynamic and complex e-tailing environment and thereby generate significant insights. Design/methodology/approach This paper is based on a systematic literature review on e-fulfillment focusing on marketing and operations issues therein. This systematic literature review consists of a critical review on e-fulfillment under planning (review question initialisation), searching (literature search), screening (literature evaluation), extraction and synthesis and reporting phases to conceptualise e-fulfillment. A total of 122 research articles have been reviewed to explore e-fulfillment and to develop key constructs and propositions. Findings This review provides the following three outcomes. First, the varied-fulfillment definitions have been critically reviewed, leading to synthesis, and thereby, an e-fulfillment definition is provided. Further, the variations for e-fulfillment across product types, which have been identified as a key variable for e-fulfillment, have been explored. Second, authors find five e-fulfillment components at the marketing and operations interface: website quality, customisation strategy, distribution strategy, last mile delivery and return management. Continuing with the e-fulfillment interface with marketing, the linkages between e-fulfillment and select post-purchase consumer behaviours measures across different product types have been reviewed. The paper thus with a focus on synthesising e-fulfillment literature from a process perspective emphasises the consumer behaviour metric for measuring e-fulfillment performance. Practical implications This study would help academicians, researchers, e-tailers and practitioners to understand e-fulfillment from a process perspective. For the researcher, it presents areas for future research by giving possible research directions in this emerging area. This study also brings out the impact of e-fulfillment according to product type on the post-purchase consumer behaviour measures, which will help e-tailers to link e-fulfillment to consumer behaviour metrics. Originality/value The paper classifies the fragmented literature to develop constructs and propositions for e-fulfillment. This is the first kind of study on e-fulfillment process and its impact on select post-purchase consumer behaviour measures across product types.

Booth Attractiveness: Scale Development and Model Testing from a Mental Budgeting Perspective

Given the importance of booth attractiveness at trade expositions, this study sets out to develop a scale measuring booth attractiveness (Study 1) and to examine its effectiveness in motivating attendees’ purchasing behavior (Study 2). Study 1 includes three steps: (1) item generation through a thorough review of the literature, focus group, and comments from experts, (2) item purification with exploratory factor analysis using 122 samples, and (3) reevaluating items with confirmatory factor analysis using 129 samples. A six-dimensional scale of booth attractiveness was developed in Study 1. Based on the theory of mental budgeting, Study 2 was conducted to examine the effects of booth attractiveness on the mechanism of attendees’ purchasing behavior using 323 samples. Results of Study 2 suggest that booth attractiveness could directly motivate impulse buying or indirectly through mental budgeting. Impulse buying, then, results in post-purchase guilt and anticipated satisfaction. Meanwhile, postpurchase guilt reduces anticipated satisfaction.

Choice, Purchase Decision and Post-Purchase Dissonance: The Social Media Perspective

Social media tools have emerged as an imperative source of information for customers. However, the relationship between information volume on social media and consumer choice quality remains blurred in literature. The study sought to examine the relationship between choice overload on social media and product choice quality, and how choice quality influences post-purchase dissonance. The study employed a positivist research paradigm and an explanatory design to examine the relationship between the various constructs. Using a purposive sampling method, Responses from 249 respondents were quantitatively analyzed. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was utilized. The outcome revealed a direct significant effect of choice overload on poor choice quality and a strong positive association between choice quality and post-purchase dissonance using social media tools. The distinctiveness of the study adds to the existing literature by extending the current understanding of post-purchase dissonance and consumer behavior in general.

Customer Engagement and Loyalty Issues in Omnichannel Fast-Food Industry

Building on Social Exchange Theory and Congruity Theory, this study aims to examine the relationships between channel integration quality (i.e., channel-service configuration and integrated interaction) and congruity (i.e., self-brand image congruity and value congruity) towards customer engagement; as well as the impacts of customer engagement on customer behavioural loyalty (i.e., repurchase intention and positive WoM). Adopting convenience and snow-ball sampling methods, a total of 151 valid questionnaires were collected and analysed using SPSS 25 and SmartPLS 3.0 software. Congruity aspects play significant roles in influencing customer engagement, while channel integration qualities do not. This result could be attributed to the unique characteristics of the fast-food products and Malaysian fast-food consumers. Importantly, customer engagement influences both transactional (i.e., repurchase intention) and emotional (i.e., intention to spread positive word of mouth) loyalty positively. The findings provide useful insights to both academicians and practitioners to plan for different omnichannel strategy in the effort to increase customer engagement and desired post purchase behaviours.

The Psychology behind Luxury Consumption

This paper will talk about the psychology of consumption of luxury products and experiences and how individuals get emotionally connected to them. This paper discussed new drivers, forms, and consequences of luxury spending. Also, the belief that the psychology of luxury consumption is driven by a series of conflicts between what luxury is to oneself and the external factors that drive luxury consumption. These tensions influence consumer behavior and the post-purchase feelings of consumption of luxurious products or experiences. Since some individuals regard non-luxury items as inferior merely because they are non-luxury, they also conclude that more expensive goods are of more outstanding quality, without any evidence about their absolute level of quality or longevity. Another angle that we discuss in detail is how self-esteem plays a role in impacting a person's choice of purchases and instilling a sense of belonging. This paper is going to be based on an amalgamation of primary and secondary research and will contribute to self-awareness of people who do and do not indulge in luxury buying and what goes behind the mindset of both categories. This will also help brands decide on their unique selling propositions to appeal to their respective target groups.

Facilitators and inhibitors to visualising information in organisational practice

<p>The benefits of visual artefacts and methodologies have been well documented in the strategy literature. However, this work has concentrated on the ‘how to do’ and ‘why to do’ of visualisation. It remains unclear why, given this widespread promotion, visualisation is not utilised more for communicating and developing strategy. This thesis explores the ‘doing’ of strategy visualisation through a practice lens by examining the processes through which visualisation services are adopted by organisations. Using a qualitative approach, I studied ten organisations in five countries that create visualisations for clients and identified common facilitators and inhibitors of visualisation adoption, discussing its implications for strategy. The study’s findings expand upon the literature on facilitators and inhibitors to visualisation, discovering that these factors are personal and contextual in nature. Personal factors include: - prospective clients’ experience of prior visualisation outcomes; - predispositions for or against visualisation; - prior knowledge about visualisation and associated services; - partiality towards particular visualisation consultants; and - the capability to distinguish specific organisational needs for visualisation. Contextual factors such as organisational culture, and ability to approve the service within an allocated budget, also influence the adoption of visualisation. Based on a greater understanding of these factors, a heuristic framework was developed to relate these facilitators or inhibitors to four process phases: Pre-contact → Contact → Commitment → and Post-purchase Evaluation. My research findings benefit practitioners, by clarifying facilitating and inhibiting factors to visualisation adoption and suggesting interventions based on these. The findings also have implications for methodology and theory development: they indicate the value of studying strategy visualisation through a practice lens; add to our understanding of how visualisation can clarify and support strategy making; and enable insight into the dynamics of visualisation adoption to provide reasons why visualisation is not as widespread a practice as its proponents suggest it should be.</p>