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This paper aims to complement the current understanding about user engagement in electronic word-of-mouth (eWoM) communications across online services and product communities. It examines the effect of the senders’ prior experience with products and services, and their extent of acquaintance with other community members, on user engagement with the eWoM.

The study used a sample of 576 unique user postings from the corporate fan page of two German firms: a service community of a telecom provider and a product community of a car manufacturer. Multiple regression analysis is used to test the conceptual model.

Senders’ prior experience and acquaintance positively affect user engagement with eWoM, and these effects differ across communities for products and services and across their influence on “likes” and “comments”. The results also suggest that communities for products are orientated toward information sharing, while those discussing services engage in information building.

This research explains mechanisms of user engagement with eWoM and opens directions for future research around motives, content and social media tools within the structures of online communities. The insights on information-handling dimensions of online tools and antecedents to their use contribute to the research on two prioritized topics by the Marketing Science Institute – “Measuring and Communicating the Value of Online Marketing Activities and Investments” and “Leveraging Digital/Social/Mobile Technology”.

This research offers insights for firms to leverage user engagement and facilitate eWoM generation through members who have a higher number of acquaintances or who have more experience with the product or service. Executives should concentrate their community engagement strategies on the identification and utilization of power users. The conceptualization and empirical test about the role of likes and comments will help social media managers to create and better capture value from their social media metrics.

The insights about the underlying factors that influence engagement with eWoM advance our understanding about the usage of online content.

This study aims to conceptualize and test the effect of consumers’ perceptions of complaint handling quality (PCHQ) in both traditional and social media channels.

Study 1 systematically reviews the relevant literature and then carries out a consumer and manager survey. This approach aims to conceptualize the dimensionality of PCHQ. Study 2 tests the effect of PCHQ on key marketing outcomes. Using survey data from a German telecommunications company, the study provides an explanation for the differences in outcomes across traditional (hotline) and social media channels.

Study 1 reveals that PCHQ is best conceptualized as a five-dimensional construct with 15 facets. There are significant differences between customers and managers in terms of the importance attached to the various dimensions. The construct shows strong psychometric properties with high reliability and validity, thereby opening up opportunities to treat these facets as measurement indicators for the construct. Study 2 indicates that the effect of PCHQ on consumer loyalty and word-of-mouth (WOM) communication is stronger in social media than in traditional channels. Procedural justice and the overall quality of service solutions emerge as general dimensions of PCHQ because they are equally important in both channels. In contrast, interactional justice, distributive justice and customer effort have varying effects across the two channels.

This study contributes to the understanding of a firm’s channel selection for complaint handling in two ways. First, it evaluates and conceptualizes the PCHQ construct. Second, it compares the effects of different dimensions of PCHQ on key marketing outcomes across traditional and social media channels.

This study enables managers to understand the difference in efficacy attached to different dimensions of PCHQ. It further highlights such differences across traditional and social media service channels. For example, the effect of complaint handling on social media is of particular importance when generating WOM communication.

This study offers a comprehensive conceptualization of the PCHQ construct and reveals the general and channel contingent effects of its different dimensions on key marketing outcomes.

Many start-ups are in search of cooperation partners to develop their innovative business models. In response, incumbent firms are introducing increasingly more cooperation systems to engage with start-ups. However, many of these cooperations end in failure. Although qualitative studies on cooperation models have tried to improve the effectiveness of incumbent start-up strategies, only a few have empirically examined start-up cooperation behavior. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Drawing from a series of qualitative and quantitative studies. The scale dimensions are identified on an interview based qualitative study. Following workshops and questionnaire-based studies identify factors and rank them. These ranked factors are then used to build a measurement scale that is integrated in a standardized online questionnaire addressing start-ups. The gathered data are then analyzed using PLS-SEM.

The research was able to build a multi-item scale for start-ups cooperation behavior. This scale can be used in future research. The paper also provides a causal analysis on the impact of cooperation behavior on start-up performance. The research finds, that the found dimensions are suitable for measuring cooperation behavior. It also shows a minor positive effect on start-up’s performance.

The research fills the gap of lacking empirical research on the cooperation between start-ups and established firms. Also, most past studies focus on organizational structures and their performance when addressing these cooperations. Although past studies identified the start-ups behavior as a relevant factor, no empirical research has been conducted on the topic yet.

This paper aims to conceptualize and empirically test the determinants of service interaction quality (SIQ) as attitude, behavior and expertise of a service provider (SP). Further, the individual and simultaneous effects of SIQ and its dimensions on important marketing outcomes are tested.

The narrative review of extant research helps formulate a conceptual model of SIQ, which is investigated using the univariate and multivariate meta-analysis.

There are interdependencies between drivers of SIQ that underlines the need to conceptualize service interaction as a dyadic phenomenon; use contemporary multilevel models, dyadic models, non-linear structural equation modeling and process studies; and study new and diverse services contexts. Meta-analysis illustrates the relative importance of the three drivers of SIQ and, in turn, their impact on consumer satisfaction and loyalty.

The meta-analysis is based on existing research, which, unfortunately, has not examined critical services or exigency situations where SIQ is of paramount importance. Future research will be tasked with diversifying to several important domains where SIQ is a critical aspect of perceived service quality.

This study emphasizes that, although the expertise of an SP is important, firms would be surprised to learn that the attitude and behavior of their employees are equally important antecedents. In fact, there is a delicate balance that needs to be found; otherwise, attitudinal factors can have an overall counterproductive effect on consumer satisfaction.

This paper provides an empirical synthesis of SIQ and opens up interesting areas for further research.

Particularly in volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) business conditions, staff in supply chain management (SCM) look to real-time (RT) data processing to reduce uncertainties. However, based on the premise that data processing can be perfectly mastered, such expectations do not reflect reality. The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether RT data processing reduces SCM uncertainties under real-world conditions.

Aiming to facilitate communication on the research question, a Delphi expert survey was conducted to identify challenges of RT data processing in SCM operations and to assess whether it does influence the reduction of SCM uncertainty. In total, 14 prospective statements concerning RT data processing in SCM operations were developed and evaluated by 68 SCM and data-science experts.

RT data processing was found to have an ambivalent influence on the reduction of SCM complexity and associated uncertainty. Analysis of the data collected from the study participants revealed a new type of uncertainty related to SCM data itself.

This paper discusses the challenges of gathering relevant, timely and accurate data sets in VUCA environments and creates awareness of the relationship between data-related uncertainty and SCM uncertainty. Thus, it provides valuable insights for practitioners and the basis for further research on this subject.

To inform and optimize frontline service interactions associated with higher education recruitment, the linguistic content and context of online posts by brand ambassadors and prospective students in a brand community are examined.

Using Linguistic Inquiry Word Count (LIWC) with content analysis, the authors examine over 20,000 online communication posts to identify prospects’ needs and communication styles that may inform brand ambassadors’ outreach efforts.

Analysis reveals linguistic differences between brand ambassadors’ and prospective students’ posts across public and private spaces, suggesting gaps in exchange efficacy. Publicly, prospects express more positive emotion, affiliation and authenticity than in private posts, where posting engagement is the highest. Prospects overall low clout language, combined with brand ambassadors’ low authenticity scores, suggest limited influence in exchange efforts. Theoretically, findings suggest that given the hedonic nature of public exchanges, this is where brand ambassadors may be more influential than in private, utilitarian informational exchanges. An integrated influencer marketing servicescape model is developed to guide future research.

Findings extend and integrate the online servicescape and influencer marketing literatures by revealing the importance of service interaction context and linguistic styles in enhancing frontline informational exchanges. Aligning linguistic language such as analytical thought, clout, authenticity, emotional tone, temporal focus and affiliation between public and private contexts may enhance authenticity in frontline service interactions, thereby enhancing communication effectiveness.

The purpose of this paper is to examine customer engagement behavior (CEB) in digital environments. Specifically, the paper seeks to determine the factors that affect CEB in the different parts of the digital service process.

A longitudinal, qualitative, single-case study is used to examine CEB in digital environments. The selected case company is a provider of streaming TV services. Both primary data, gathered from interviews, focus groups and participant observations in meetings with a selected focus group, and secondary data, gathered from company websites sources, were used.

This study shows that CEB is determined by different factors in different phases of the digital service process. Moreover, the results show that engagement is highlighted during the front-end phase of the process. During the back-end phase, the role of engagement is realized by maintaining and updating solutions.

The originality of the research is based on the study of CEB in the context of the digital service process. The factors that affect CEB are classified as customer-based, firm-based and context-based factors.

The purpose of this paper is to clarify the different roles and implications of a manufacturer's branded retail operations on its international strategy. The roles are analyzed through two dimensions, brand strength and the role of branded retail as a sales channel.

A multiple case study approach is used to look at the international development of branded retail in four companies, LEGO, Nokia, Iittala and H & M.

This study finds that there are at least two approaches to implementing branded retail strategy internationally that can be and often are overlapping. Emphasis on branding appears to be important in both approaches. However, the role of the branded retail as a direct sales channel differs between the case companies. The paper discusses and demonstrates the importance and role of branded retail for companies not generally seen as retailers, from both sales and brand management perspectives.

The paper contributes by narrowing the evident research gap regarding this current and seemingly global phenomenon.

The purpose of this paper is to identify the main activities that startups outsource and the elements involved in outsourcing decisions.

A multi-case study composed of Brazilian startups was conducted. Data through interviews and secondary sources were obtained. Two groups of startups were considered and analyzed comparatively: startups in the development stage and in the sales stage.

The findings show that even though the literature suggests that the core business should not be outsourced, some startups do have to outsource this kind of activity. That was the main difference found between startups in the sales stage and in the development stage: the former group has a solid structure, knowledge and resources, so they can keep the core business inside the firm; whereas the latter group has little experience, scarce knowledge and resources, making outsourcing a more attractive alternative.

Theoretically, this paper approaches a perspective underexplored in the innovation and management literature: outsourcing in startups. It highlights how outsourcing, as a decision between making and buying, can help startups to improve success potential. In practice, this paper discusses and demonstrates why and what can be outsourced by startups in the development and in the sales stages to overcome their limitations and, consequently, achieve better innovative results.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the bibliography citations from dissertations submitted to the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Rutgers University from the ten-year period of 2003-2012. The objective of the analysis is to aid in collection development decisions, facilitate outreach to graduate students in the department and to understand possible changes in disciplinary methodologies and research needs in the field over the last decade.

Descriptive research design was used for the study. Bibliography citation data were extracted from all dissertations submitted to the Department of Spanish and Portuguese from the period 2003-2012. Statistical analysis was performed on the collected citation data, and conclusions were drawn from the results.

The study demonstrates that, despite the oft-mentioned “decline of the monograph”, the monograph remains very heavily used by PhD students in Spanish and Portuguese at Rutgers University, and that monographs continue to be cited at significantly higher rates and for longer periods than journal articles. This holds true for the humanities dissertations in Spanish literature as well as social science dissertations in Spanish linguistics. The study further finds that open access journals in Spanish literature are cited more frequently than closed access journals.

The findings suggest that it is more user-responsive to allocate retrospective collections funds for filling in monographic gaps than journal coverage gaps, as journal articles are cited less frequently and for shorter periods, while monographs are cited more frequently and for slightly longer periods after they are published. The findings also suggest that current monographic expenditures be maintained or augmented to continue serving current and future graduate student research needs in Spanish and Portuguese. Further, the large number of monograph chapters cited suggests that book chapter document delivery services could be an important addition to a library’s suite of services if it is not already provided.

This paper is the first analysis of Spanish and Portuguese dissertations conducted at Rutgers University and provides important contextual information for meeting the research needs of graduate students in the department through collection development and related services. Other research has documented that dissertation citation patterns are at least partially predictive of faculty citation patterns, making the findings of this study applicable to serving faculty research and collections needs in the department, as well. The findings are relevant to collection development, access services and librarian-department liaison relationships.