Competing Through Online Service Failures and Recovery Strategies

The ideas of service failure and recovery strategies have been transformed, due to the internet environment, from a consumer-provider perspective to a multifaceted web quality activity. The research on service failure and recovery strategies has been well-developed in terms of the consumer's viewpoint of service as well as the responsibility for recovery conventionally expected to be allotted to the marketer. On the contrary, existing research indicates that there is a limited range of understanding of consumer-website interactivity relating to online service failure and recovery strategies as well as less understanding of the highly diverse characteristics of computer-mediated marketing environments (CMMEs). The perspectives of CMMEs relate to online customer behavior as distinct from conventional behavior. In fact, providers are involved in intense activity in the online environment in terms of market competition, as customers are positioned just a click away from switching providers in the case of service failure.

Social Media, Online Brand Communities, and Customer Engagement in the Fashion Industry

Fashion brands have shifted communication to social media as part of evolutionary modern-day marketing approaches to reaching consumers. Brands have adjusted to a vocal customer through back-and-forth interchange on social media platforms that have progressively facilitated for online brand communities. Social media brand communities serve to engage audiences in interactive settings that resonate with individual consumers across different levels. As brand awareness is augmented, brand impressions are conceived, brand-customer relationships are formed, and a sense of community is fostered around a brand, consumers exploit association to such social media brand communities in advancing social identity. The following chapter explores the impact of social media brand communities on Millennials in the fashion industry, while considering the social identity theory. The chapter focuses on theoretical and managerial implications. This chapter considers the influence social media brand communities and social identity may have on a fashion brand.

Social Media and Social Entrepreneurship

Information plays an important role in the individual lives of people, and social media as an aspect of online information phenomenon is an exciting topic to explore in terms of its impact on social entrepreneurship. Many theoretical fields have contributed to the development of social entrepreneurship, looking in particular at the financial, political, and psychological impacts. This chapter is unique since it focuses on social enterprises and the impact of evolving technologies on social entrepreneurship. This chapter contributes to the literature on social media usage in social enterprises and offers a better understanding of the issues in the specific context of developing countries.

Smartphones

Understanding the adoption of technologies is crucial for researchers and practitioners, as identifying key factors helps to predict and explain users' attitude towards adopting or rejecting technology. However, as smartphones are well-diffused technologies, there is contention that research efforts shift to understanding their usage comprehensively. As personal technologies that users make meaning of, smartphone usage is assumed to be more comprehensive than that of previous generation mobile phones. This chapter examines how the usage of smartphones is redefining and increasingly adding value to consumer consumption processes.

Disruptive Technology in the Smartphones Industry

The impact of identity on brand loyalty has taken precedence as an area of focus in recent marketing research. This has occurred in an era defined by technological revolution, which has created market disruptions, and there are implications for customer-brand relationships. Nonetheless, existing research has failed to acknowledge the impact of socio-psychological attributes and functional utility maximization. Knowledge that illuminates how firms can reposition themselves to sustain brand loyalty when disruptions occur in today's complex and globalized business environment is also required. The chapter presents an empirical investigation into the phenomenon of brand switching behavior among consumers in a specific competitive market, particularly in the smartphone industry. It explores how resistance could be built from an identity theory perspective, as emphasis has historically been placed on the functional utility of products at the expense of social meanings. This chapter provides consideration for market disruptions in the smartphone industry. It confirms that the literature does not capture other non-utilitarian factors such as socio-psychological benefits; hence, there are underlying factors that motivate consumers to continue buying brands they buy.

The Dynamics of Social Media and Value Co-Creation

Social media is considered trustworthy by consumers, and this has resulted in a strong consumer focus on social media to acquire information related to products and services. There are various benefits offered by social media, but security is a major concern as viruses and other threats can affect a huge number of users of social media. These platforms are not well governed. Indeed, they are highly decentralized and could easily be accessed, and this presents a high risk of illegal activity. Businesses continue to reap the benefits of incorporating social media into their strategies. There has been a shift in focus from conventional media to online and digital media in the form of social networking sites, wikis, and blogs. This has given rise to viral marketing as a means of effective communication and sharing information. The current chapter aims to explore the relationship between social media and value co-creation.

Calculation of Facebook Marketing Effectiveness in Terms of ROI

This chapter demonstrates how to assess the performance of organic and sponsored activities on Facebook using the data available in Facebook Ads Manager, Facebook Page Insights, and Google Analytics. The main aim of the proposed ROI calculation model is to connect common social media marketing objectives with the analytical information available. The main emphasis is put on the technical aspect of ad performance assessment. The authors explain how the Facebook attribution system and post-impression algorithm work, describe the relation between advertising goals and metrics displayed as achieved campaign results, and demonstrate how to derive ROI indexes from different Facebook conversions. The chapter also includes a practical example how to calculate current and future value of ongoing ads.

Service Failure and Recovery Strategy in Computer-Mediated Marketing Environments (CMMEs)

The success of an online recovery strategy is largely attributed to the provider's response speed. Essentially, engagement in conversation with the customer immediately after he/she complains shortens the pre-recovery phase. Service firms expect complaints from consumers when a service failure occurs. Advances in modern information and communication technologies (ICT) infrastructures have changed the way in which customer-firm interactions take place and the nature of the conduct of services. Computer and internet technologies mean that services can be provided over long distances without the requirement for the physical presence of customers and employees. With the continued rapid development in the field of modern computer-mediated marketing environments (CMME) more and more services will be delivered in technology-mediated environments (TMEs). This chapter provides some insights on failure recovery strategies as competitive tools in computer-mediated marketing environments.

The Dynamics of Social Media Marketing Content and Customer Retention

Social media platforms are the key tools to facilitate online engagement; however, to stimulate a discussion, the content published on the platforms is significant as it must appeal to different consumers. The quality of the content and platform type is key to successful engagement. Maintaining positive relationships with consumers is a vital activity for many brands in social media. Trust, satisfaction, fairness, and mutual dependency are key factors to retaining customers. Moreover, positive brand attitudes and higher purchase intentions were found to be linked to positive evaluations of companies' social media postings. To maintain value, firms use social media platforms that facilitate consumer-to-consumer as well as consumer-to-business engagement. Drawing from social influence theory, this chapter explores how social media marketing content (SMMC) impacts customer retention.

Online Service Failure

Digital media literature suggests that social media has eased the process of conceptualizing the customer, inclusive of their perception of fairness in the recovery provision. This is because individuals in social media reveal personal information and engage in online conversation and online communities. However, the inherited risk in social media such as the rapid spread of online negative word-of-mouth and the ease of switching behavior to other online providers no longer permits superficial understanding of customers' perception of failure-recovery experiences. Drawing on extant conceptual theories, the current chapter examines online failure and recovery strategies and argues that effective recovery strategies not only enhance the development of marketing communication programs but act as an effective tool for customer retention.