Editorial

Citation

Zahay, D. (2013), "Editorial", Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing, Vol. 7 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/jrim.2013.32507aaa.001

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing, Volume 7, Issue 1

I want to welcome everyone to the first issue of the Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing for 2013. As I write this piece at the end of 2012, I can remember sitting in my office at DePaul University in 1995 when they hooked up my internet browser connection for the first time and thinking, “This is going to change everything.” The internet did change everything, and then some.

Enjoy this issue, which has several interesting articles seek to understand how to market more effectively using the internet, a medium that has become all pervasive in the few short years of its existence. Topics range from understanding word-of-mouth and web site reputation and quality to effective advertising appeals and marketing to African American Millennial consumers on the web. All the papers are grounded in marketing theory that can be applied to implementing new marketing technologies and are a nice blend of theory and practice.

The breadth of countries represented by the national background and university affiliations of the authors in this issue prompted me to use “It Takes a Village” as a theme for my call for involvement and participation in JRIM because it really does take all of us to create the journal and make it meaningful for academicians and practitioners alike (Figure 1). The chance to work with some of our newer scholars in the area to help shape their papers for the journal also reminded me we all still need vibrant outlets for our work in this area.

Figure 1

I hope I can count on your continued support for this journal in 2013 and beyond. We have made a lot of positive changes to the journal this year and I want to thank our Development Editor Jo Alexander and before that Mark Moreau for helping make all these changes possible. We have increased the number and quality of submissions to the journal through reaching out to potential authors directly. Through the help of our dedicated volunteer core of reviewers we have achieved a 30 percent acceptance rate. Creating a standardized list of keywords to help match reviewers and manuscripts has helped considerably in the review process. If you have not had a chance to update your profile with the new list of keywords, please do so as soon as possible.

We are starting to see more articles with a broader strategic emphasis, although as I mentioned last year, we could still use articles relating to business-to-business interactive marketing, channel attribution and other issues of interest to practitioners. We are definitely NOT the journal of web site usability, although many of the articles that are submitted continue to have a narrow focus relating to how consumers interface with web sites and social media networks.

To further broaden our scope, I would also like to see some research that focuses on what engagement is and how it can be measured. I think Don Schultz, Emeritus Professor from Northwestern University and James Pettier, Professor at the University of Wisconsin Whitewater, will have some thought-provoking ideas for research on customer engagement in their invited piece on social media for our next issue.

This year I was able to speak on Meet-the-Editor Panels at three conferences and did find a number of like-minded researchers who have promised to submit papers to our journal. The journal continues to have a lower profile than it should, especially in North America. To improve our profile and the quality of submissions, I am looking to make some changes to the associate editor structure. I would like to have co-associate editors for each geographic region. The primary goal of the AEs would be to serve on Meet-the-Editor Panels at conferences they attend internationally. The goal of this effort is again, to raise the profile of the journal and increase the quality of submissions.

We have a standard presentation on the journal that can be personalized for particular conferences and have a representative from Emerald, Megan Beech, a publisher assigned to help us market the journal. Please let me know if you would like to help by becoming an AE or serving on the Editorial Advisory Board. The role of the EAB will be to help promote the journal but also to primarily help with manuscript review. Editorial review board members should be prepared to help with as many as three to four manuscripts a year, depending on submissions and fit with interests.

Angela Hausman is currently editing a special issue on Psychosocial and Behavioral Principles Related to Web Design and Conversion. I am also planning another special issue on the past, present and future of interactive marketing and am looking for someone to edit that special issue. We welcome other special issue proposals as well so let us know your ideas.

Debra Zahay