Editorial

Citation

Morgan, R.E. (2007), "Editorial", International Marketing Review, Vol. 24 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/imr.2007.03624aaa.001

Editorial

Welcome to our first issue of 2007. The first paper by Cort, Griffith, and White addresses the internationalization of professional service firms from an attribution theory perspective. Specifically, the authors seek to understand the factors motivating managers toward internationalizing their firms. They model the influence of salient causal factors on a cognitive consequence (expectations of success) thereby influencing a behavioral consequence (international success). This nomological network is examined among a sample of USA-based professional service firms and is empirically tested using structural equation modeling. The results suggest that attribution theory provides excellent insights into the managerial mindsets that drive the internationalization process.

In our second paper, Palmer and Quinn explore international retail divestment via a case study of Ahold (a Dutch food multinational retailer). The authors develop their insights from a series of in-depth interviews with investment banks and executives. The authors observe new insights into the multidimensional nature of the international retail divestment construct. Their main conclusions are that rather than portraying strategic and opportunistic approaches as binary opposites, a retailing firm may have varying degrees of approaches to international retail divestment, and these may not necessarily be isomorphic across different countries.

Viswanathan and Dickson present the third paper which revisits the fundamentals of standardizing global marketing strategy. They advance a model examining standardization and adaptation in marketing strategy incorporating: homogeneity of customer response to the marketing mix; transferability of competitive advantage; and, the degree of economic freedom. In examining the relationship between these constructs, marketing strategy standardization is considered in the context of feedback effects, research on competition, and the extant standardization literature. Therefore, Viswanathan and Dickson adopt a distinctive approach emphasizing feedback effects to explain the dynamics of standardization.

In our fourth paper, Nelson and Paek report a content analysis of print advertising across seven countries – the USA, Brazil, China, France, India, South Korea, and Thailand. Local editions of global magazine were compared to assess the extent of standardization in execution elements (advertising copy, models) across product nationality (multinational, domestic) and category (beauty, other). Deviating from previous studies that advise against global strategy in Asia, these authors find that advertisers generally practice global advertising strategies, but to varying degrees. Specifically, their findings are that: local editions deliver more multinational than domestic product ads across all countries, except India; multinational product ads generally tend, to varying degrees, to use standardized strategies and tactics more than domestic product ads; beauty products (cosmetics, fashion) are more likely to use standardized approaches than are other products (e.g. cars, food, household goods).

The final paper develops the fascinating construct of consumer animosity. In this paper, Riefler and Diamantopoulos: present a literature review of the pertinent theoretical strands that underpin this construct; identify specific issues for future research; and, propose a reconsideration of its measurement offering an alternative perspective for its operationalization. From their exploratory study, the authors contend that consumers differ in their animosity targets and there may be a panoply of reasons causing animosity feelings such as economic, political, religious, or personal antecedents.

We trust that you will enjoy reading this issue.

Robert E. MorganCo-editor