Search results

This paper aims to investigate potential consumers’ willingness to pay for robot-delivered services in travel, tourism and hospitality, and the factors that shape their willingness to pay.

An online survey yielded a sample of 1,573 respondents from 99 countries. Independent samples t-test, Analysis of variance (ANOVA), cluster, factor and regression analyses were used.

Respondents expected to pay less for robot-delivered services than human-delivered services. Two clusters were identified: one cluster willing to pay nearly the same price for robotic services as for human-delivered services, whilst the other expected deep discounts for robotic services. The willingness-to-pay was positively associated with the attitudes towards robots in tourism, robotic service experience expectations, men and household size. It was negatively associated to travel frequency, age and education.

The paper’s main limitation is its exploratory nature and the use of a hypothetical scenario in measuring respondents’ willingness to pay. The data were gathered prior to the COVID-19 pandemic and do not reflect the potential changes in perceptions of robots due to the pandemic.

Practitioners need to focus on improving the attitudes towards robots in tourism because they are strongly and positively related to the willingness to pay. The marketing messages need to form positive expectations about robotic services.

This is one of the first papers to investigate consumers’ willingness to pay for robot-delivered services in travel, tourism and hospitality and factors that shape their willingness to pay.

Online social networks (OSNs) provide users with mechanisms such as social circles and individual selection to define the audiences (i.e., privacy policy) of the shared information. This privacy decision-making process is a hard and tedious task for users because they have to assess the cost-benefit in a complex environment. Moreover, little is known about how users assess the cost-benefit of matching the elements of online communication and their interests. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to develop and test a research model to understand the impact that the types of receivers and the sensitivity of messages have on privacy decisions.

A study was conducted to understand how users evaluate the cost-benefit of the disclosure action in online social networks for the different types of receivers identified and the sensitivity of the message. Data from 400 respondents was collected and analyzed using partial least squares modeling.

The findings of this study demonstrated a trade-off variance between the perceived cost-benefit and the disclosure of sensitive information with different receiver types. Disclosing personal information with trusted receivers, influencer receivers and receivers from the circle of coworkers had a positive significant effect on social capital building. Conversely, disclosing personal information with receivers from the circle of family or unknown receivers had a significant negative effect on social capital building and even a significant positive effect on privacy concerns.

Recent literature has documented the increasing interest of the research community in understanding users' concerns and interests in making the most suitable privacy decisions. However, most researchers have worked on understanding the disclosure action from a user-centered perspective and have not considered all of the elements of online communication. This study puts the focus on all of the elements of communication during disclosure actions, taking into account the properties of the message and receivers and the impact on users' cost benefit value.

The purpose of this study is to examine the influence of online customer reviews (OCRs) and electronic word-of-mouth (eWOM) on customers’ purchase intention (PUI). This study also investigates the cultural differences between the customers in India and UK as regards the influence of OCR and customers’ PUIs.

This study has used socialisation theory, theory of reasoned action, congruity theory and expectation value theory, along with the existing literature to develop the conceptual model. The theoretical model has been validated using the PLS-SEM technique on a survey involving 305 and 280 respondents for India and UK, respectively.

The findings highlight that gender has no effect on UK customers’ PUIs, whereas age and gender have considerable impacts on Indian customers’ PUIs.

The study only examines the cross-cultural difference between a European country (UK) and an Asian country (India). Also, since the sample size is low, the findings did not represent a generic view.

The proposed model has provided important inputs to the organisations to understand consumer behaviour particularly the study would help marketing departments to formulate their marketing strategies regarding OCR and customers’ PUI.

This study is unique in understanding the implications of OCR and their influence on customer purchase decisions of UK customers and India’s customers. This study also helps to understand the impact of age and gender on OCR and PUIs.

Pay what you want (PWYW) is a participative pricing mechanism that permits customers complete freedom to choose prices. PWYW literature reports the influence of external reference price (ERP) on customers' price decisions and payments. The current research examines the influence of ERP presence, salience and understanding at the seller level by analysing customers' perceptions of seller price image dimensions and purchase intentions.

Study 1 tests the impact of ERP presence and salience in controlled lab settings while Study 2 takes this investigation further by including the moderating effect of ERP understanding on seller price image dimensions and purchase intentions in online settings.

Results illustrate the positive impact of ERP presence on all seller price image dimensions excluding the perceived price level. Perceived price fairness mediates the impact of ERP presence on perceived value. ERP salience positively impacts price processability. ERP presence and salience attached to it positively impact customers' purchase intentions through seller price image dimensions.

This is possibly the first paper to investigate the ERP effect on seller price image dimensions in a PWYW context that lacks fixed posted prices.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of product and customer dimensions in the contribution of brand experience to the formation of true brand loyalty. The dimensions included are brand credibility, affective commitment and involvement. Synthesising past studies, the researcher proposes brand credibility and affective commitment to mediate the relationship between brand experience and true brand loyalty. Furthermore, the researcher investigates the variation in hierarchical pattern, i.e. brand experience-brand credibility affective commitment-true brand loyalty, under different levels of involvement.

The variations in hierarchy were compared by design. The authors investigated the variations in hierarchy on the basis of products which belong to different level of involvement, on the basis of individual differences in involvement, and on the basis of the interaction of product involvement and subject involvement. Multi-group invariance tests in SEM were used to explore model variations.

The hierarchy-of-effect model was found to vary based on the level of product involvement, subject involvement and interaction involvement. Three patterns of hierarchy have been observed: the first pattern was observed in high-high groups (both product involvement and subject involvement were high), the second pattern was observed in low-low groups (both product and subject involvements were low) and the third pattern among high-low or low-high groups.

The variation observed highlights the need to segment the market by interaction involvement. This would be useful for managers engaged in building sustainable consumer-brand relationships.

This study considered the interaction of product approach and subject approach in defining involvement which is rarely attempted in research. The study also integrates the variations in the role of customer dimensions, namely involvement, brand credibility and affective commitment with the relationship between the central constructs brand experience and true brand loyalty. The variations observed are among a socio-economically homogeneous sample of respondents.

As organizations increasingly engage with consumers over mobile devices, there is a growing need to understand how consumers react to impression management over platforms with limited textual content. The purpose of this paper is to empirically assess how different impression management tactics can be used in mobile media to enhance consumer perception-attitude-intentions toward a corporate brand.

We surveyed 670 consumers and estimate structural equation models and repeated-measures ANOVAs to determine how short passages employing alternate impression management tactics influence consumers’ perceptions, attitudes and purchase intentions.

Results reveal that each impressions management tactic (i.e. ingratiation, intimidation, organizational promotion, supplication and exemplification) influences consumer perceptions, attitudes and intentions. The authors compare differences in how the impressions management tactics influence each stage of the perception-attitude-intentions model and find evidence that initial differences in perceptions favoring ingratiation and exemplification appeals become magnified for purchase intentions.

Recent calls for research focus on an understanding of how consumers process information on reduced-content platforms of small-screened mobile devices. These results provide empirical evidence of the use of impression management and the difference between five impression management tactics on enhancing consumer perception-attitude-intentions model.

The results of this study will provide marketers with insights to optimize communications and corporate brands with consumers over mobile media.

This paper adds to the nascent yet vital literature on mobile marketing by focusing on how impression management tactics influence perceptions, attitudes and intentions through the short message characteristic of mobile platforms. The authors develop a framework for how corporate brand management can strategically use impressions management tactics in this novel domain.

This study aims to analyze the most effective type of emoji for deriving positive marketing results by determining whether the relationship between brand attitude, brand attachment and purchase intention is moderated by the various types of prosocial expression-based brand emojis used.

An online survey was administered to Koreans in their 20s. Starbucks brand emojis were classified into three types: static gesture, animated gesture and a combined animated gesture and displayed word. A moderated–mediation analysis was performed to verify the research hypotheses. Gender, age, region of residence, frequency of Starbucks use and Starbucks favorability were used as control variables.

Animations in emojis were shown to strengthen the marketing effect. Further, combining animated prosocial gestures and displayed words had a more positive marketing effect than merely applying animated prosocial gestures.

This study closely examined the role of verbal, in the form of colloquial words, and nonverbal aspects, in the form of emojis, in the creation of positive business outcomes. Additionally, the positive marketing effect of animated emojis is discussed from a mechanistic point of view by linking research results to those in the field of neuroscience (mirroring by mirror neurons).

The concept and practice of e-services has become essential in business transactions. Yet there are still many organizations that have not developed e-services optimally. This is especially relevant in the context of Indonesian Airline companies. Therefore, many airline customers in Indonesia are still in doubt about it, or even do not use it. To fill this gap, this study attempts to develop a model for e-services adoption and empirically examines the factors influencing the airlines customers in Indonesia in using e-services offered by the Indonesian airline companies. Taking six Indonesian airline companies as a case example, the study investigated the antecedents of e-services usage of Indonesian airlines. This study further examined the impacts of motivation on customers in using e-services in the Indonesian context. Another important aim of this study was to investigate how ages, experiences and geographical areas moderate effects of e-services usage.

The study adopts a positivist research paradigm with a two-phase sequential mixed method design involving qualitative and quantitative approaches. An initial research model was first developed based on an extensive literature review, by combining acceptance and use of information technology theories, expectancy theory and the inter-organizational system motivation models. A qualitative field study via semi-structured interviews was then conducted to explore the present state among 15 respondents. The results of the interviews were analysed using content analysis yielding the final model of e-services usage. Eighteen antecedent factors hypotheses and three moderating factors hypotheses and 52-item questionnaire were developed. A focus group discussion of five respondents and a pilot study of 59 respondents resulted in final version of the questionnaire.

In the second phase, the main survey was conducted nationally to collect the research data among Indonesian airline customers who had already used Indonesian airline e-services. A total of 819 valid questionnaires were obtained. The data was then analysed using a partial least square (PLS) based structural equation modelling (SEM) technique to produce the contributions of links in the e-services model (22% of all the variances in e-services usage, 37.8% in intention to use, 46.6% in motivation, 39.2% in outcome expectancy, and 37.7% in effort expectancy). Meanwhile, path coefficients and t-values demonstrated various different influences of antecedent factors towards e-services usage. Additionally, a multi-group analysis based on PLS is employed with mixed results. In the final findings, 14 hypotheses were supported and 7 hypotheses were not supported.

The major findings of this study have confirmed that motivation has the strongest contribution in e-services usage. In addition, motivation affects e-services usage both directly and indirectly through intention-to-use. This study provides contributions to the existing knowledge of e-services models, and practical applications of IT usage. Most importantly, an understanding of antecedents of e-services adoption will provide guidelines for stakeholders in developing better e-services and strategies in order to promote and encourage more customers to use e-services. Finally, the accomplishment of this study can be expanded through possible adaptations in other industries and other geographical contexts.

This paper aims to investigate the effects of service quality and perceived price (monetary and behavioural price) on the revisit intention of patients to hospitals, as well as the mediating role of perceived price on the relationship between service quality and revisit intention.

This paper distributes questionnaires to outpatients in three major cities in Malaysia, namely, Penang, Melaka and Johor. Patients who were in the foyer, dispensary area and waiting area were intercepted where their responses were sought. The responses obtained from 400 patients were analysed using the structural equation modelling technique. Besides analysing the path coefficients, this study has examined the common method variance, bias and indirect effects of the relationships.

The results suggest that patients pay more attention to certain values in their search for the best health-care service and subsequently move on to new values. Pricing is an effective strategy to promote favourable behavioural intentions amongst patients. Better service quality is reflected in the reasonableness of monetary costs incurred by patients in acquiring health-care services. Patients who received poor services will be more likely to compare such services to the medical costs incurred to ascertain the worthiness of the amount paid. In addition, service quality also influences how patients perceive spending their time and efforts (waiting for nurses and physicians, as well as queueing in hospitals) as worthy and vice-versa. Their revisit intention will also be affected by the extent of which they invest their time, energy and efforts to search for relevant information.

The hospitals which desire to charge additional fees should enhance their service quality to reflect price equity. This is imperative in view of the pricing structure which can be relatively complex in subsequent follow-up treatments that may affect the decision of patients on the sources of health-care services.

Given the inevitable increase in medical fees, the perceived price can be a key determinant to the overall judgement patients had in terms of the health-care services received and the time and efforts sacrificed. However, the importance of monetary price and the behavioural price is still relatively unstudied, particularly their influence on revisit intention in the health-care setting.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impact of transformational leadership (TL) on building trust and hence, its influence on the commitment level of the employees to achieve the desired work outcomes. It also examined whether transformational leaders were able to psychologically empower employees so as to increase their commitment level and thus reduce the employee turnover intentions (TIs) in the small- and medium-sized (SME) IT companies operating in Delhi NCR, India.

Data were collected from 420 employees (168 females and 252 males) of SME IT companies operational in Delhi NCR, India. They responded to questions about their leader’s TL and their own psychological empowerment (PE), commitment and trust.

The findings of the study show that transformational leaders were able to create a higher level of PE and trust amongst their employees. Further, it was also found that this led to an increase in their commitment level and hence, a decrease in their TI. The findings of the study also suggest that trust, commitment and PE act as mediators.

Limited sample size is a possible limitation of the study. One more limitation of the study is the data collection method, i.e. through survey. It was self-reported, taking only the perspective of the employees; it may not be a completely accurate response.

With TL, leaders can psychologically empower followers to do things in a better way and can develop trust in employees resulting in high commitment; highly committed employees in turn reduce the TIs. If followers do not have faith in their own capability, it may not be possible for them to complete their job effectively.

This study adds to the existing literature; it clarifies the process by which transformational leaders enhance followers’ meaning in life through PE and develop trust resulting in high commitment.