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In the last 15 years, online sales of second-hand products have grown substantially due to changes in the economy, increasing interest in sustainability and the new opportunities offered by the alternative markets. However, little is known about the antecedents of customer retention in this particular online market. To this effect, the aim of this research is to bring new insights about what retains shoppers and creates loyal behaviour in this market by presenting a loyalty model based on expectancy-value theory and building on Olsen's satisfaction-loyalty model.

To achieve the above-mentioned purpose, a survey comprised of 507 respondents who had purchased second-hand products via an online platform during 2020 was used to test the model.

The results validate both the satisfaction-loyalty model and the mediator role of the fulfilment of expectations between perceived quality and satisfaction. The results also indicate that customer fulfilment of expectations depends only on the perception of product quality. Perceived product quality was also the dimension that most influenced satisfaction, followed by perceived vendor quality. Last, the dimensions that contributed most to loyal behaviour were satisfaction with the vendor and with the website.

The originality of this research lies in the validation of the unique satisfaction-loyalty model for online second-hand purchases. The value of this research is that it adds knowledge about effective strategies for platform owners and sellers to enhance customer satisfaction and loyalty in online second-hand markets.

The purpose of this paper is to establish a framework for clarifying and extending the concept of inter‐firm market orientation (IMO) and to complement the relatively small body of literature related to this concept.

The conceptual framework is informed by empirical research based on a longitudinal multi‐case study.

This research identifies a nexus linking IMO with value creation in inter‐firm partnerships. The findings also suggest that IMO has an impact on companies' performance in terms of knowledge transfer, innovation and market access.

IMO contributes to value creation processes in the context of strategic networks.

A discussion of these findings, together with implications for practice and proposals for further research, is provided.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss institutional influence on customer relationship management (CRM) practices and the restructuring of portfolios during the merger of two pharmaceutical companies.

An explanatory case study from the perspective of the focal actor.

Isomorphic pressures and some organizational conditions are identified as relevant factors in the redefinition of the customer, the outcome of which is the deinstitutionalization of some CRM practices and the restructuring of customer portfolios. It is also proposed that procedural legitimacy drives the change within the network organization.

This study reported in this paper is idiographic and explores one case. Further longitudinal research is needed in order to generalize the findings.

CRM practices are contingent upon how isomorphic pressures are coped with and how the institutional arrangements are utilized during the merger.

This paper contributes to the discussion on institutional influence on CRM in network organizations.

The purpose of this paper is to examine and review the available literature on ethical/unethical behaviour of pharmaceutical companies and to determine the ethical issues, unethical behaviour by analysing, summarising and categorising the factors related to these issues and unethical behaviour as were studied during the period 2008-2017. Essentially, this paper presents a critical analysis of the available literature on the subject and avenues for future research.

This paper adopted the systematic review approach to achieve the purpose of this study and examines the most relevant literature from online existing database sources, available between 2008-2017 by using the keyword search method. Then studies are categorised and summarised, using previously developed theories and frameworks, which have provided evidence to the universal consensus that ethical behavioural outcomes are dependent on the interplay of individual, organisational and environmental factors and have reordered to fulfil the purpose.

The findings identify that ethical issues related to pharmaceutical companies as were studied during the period 2008-2017 are drug pricing, drug safety and gift-giving. The organisational variables appeared to be the dominant cause of these ethical issues and unethical practices along with other determinants such as environmental and stakeholders. A large number of studies were in the western country context. Theoretical research has studied more comparatively empirical studies.

This review provides insights for understanding the ethical issues, unethical behaviour and determinants related to these issues of pharmaceutical companies and provides insights where the literature is standing. This review only includes studies between 2008-2017, which are related to the ethical issue of pharmaceutical companies, therefore, the view is only of the past 10 years papers. This review provides gaps and insight into the source of ideas for future research and will help the researchers in guiding ethics-related information in the context of pharmaceutical companies.

This study will help the practitioners and policymakers in informing about the issues that required the urgent need to solve and will shed some light to focus and formulate strategies for successful competitive advantage. This study will help researchers who are seeking information related to ethics and ethical behaviour in pharmaceutical companies.

To the best of my knowledge, this review of understanding ethical/unethical behaviour in pharmaceutical companies of the past 10 years between 2008-2017 has not been done to date. This study is filling the gap by bringing all the information about ethics in pharmaceutical companies at one place, which works as an index of ethics-related study in this specific pharmaceutical company context.

This research aims to provide a synthesis of the normative prescriptions from the scientific literature as it relates to customer loyalty tracking and an evaluation of how close practice comes to these prescriptions. It offers a description of the landscape for how and why aspects of loyalty measurement and management converge and/or diverge.

Data is gathered through in‐depth telephone interviews with 92 senior level marketing managers across a variety of industries.

The overwhelming majority of firms view customer loyalty as a top strategic priority but only one in four has a formal definition of customer loyalty. Customer satisfaction and likelihood to recommend are the two most tracked measures. The findings also demonstrate that few firms are relatively sophisticated in their analytics capabilities and only half examine how loyalty influences business outcomes.

The current study uses single respondent per firm.

The results provide compelling evidence that managers need to determine more consciously what customer loyalty means in the context of their business. Furthermore, firms could benefit from the use of more sophisticated and advanced modelling approaches which have the potential to uncover patterns in customer data and link with business results.

This is the first study in the scientific literature that investigates how close what managers are actually doing in practice comes to scientific prescriptions for tracking and engaging with customers in an effort to engender customer loyalty.

To the extent that customer relationships with service providers provide value to service firms suggests that these relationships can be viewed as social capital. This paper seeks to use social capital as a theoretical framework to examine the effect of these relationships on customer loyalty.

Data were collected using an online survey of 342 adult consumers of services.

Results of structural equation modeling analyses indicate that social capital variables explain unique variance in customer responses. The effect of each of the three forms of social capital – structural, cognitive, and relational – are contingent on whether the service is personal (e.g. hairstylist, medical services) or non‐personal (e.g. mechanic, banker).

This research suggests that customer relationships can be viewed as social capital and that the form and content of such relationships are important in terms of influencing customer loyalty.

Managers can build “social capital” by focusing on its three forms – structural, cognitive, and relational social capital. The paper provides prescriptions for such relationship building activities. Such social capital translates into firm value/profits through customer loyalty.

This study uses a theoretical framework from research in social capital to help explain the value of customer relationships with individual service providers to the firm. The idea of social capital is compelling to service managers since it implies that investments in relationship building tactics have real results for firm profitability.

The purpose of this paper is to develop a scale for the measurement of service quality at the manufacturer–doctor interface of the pharmaceutical supply chain and to study the impact of service quality on doctor’s satisfaction and doctor’s prescribing behavior. Doctors from two major states of South India were selected for the study. A doctor perceived service quality scale with three dimensions having eight items was developed through confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) in the pharmaceutical context. Structural equation modeling (SEM) technique was used to show the relationship between service quality, satisfaction and prescribing behavior. The critical factors of service quality were identified, and a model was developed showing the relationship between service quality, doctor’s satisfaction and doctor’s prescribing behavior which has not been explored in any research. This model will be helpful in further development of new concepts and for analyzing the reasons for the failure of doctors in providing quality service. 

A total of 200 doctors from three major cities of South India were selected. A doctor perceived service quality scale with three dimensions having eight items was developed through CFA using Parasuraman Service quality scale (Parasuraman, 1985, 1986, 1988) as the basis in the pharmaceutical context after focus group discussions with company experts, retailers, doctors and academicians. SEM technique was used to examine the impact of service quality on doctor’s satisfaction and prescribing behavior.

There is no universal set of dimensions and items that determine service quality in manufacturing industries, especially at the manufacturer–doctor interface of the pharmaceutical supply chain though service quality plays a very important role in affecting the performance of manufacturing industries. The critical factors affecting the quality of service for a pharmaceutical company at the manufacturer–doctor interface of the supply chain were identified, and its impact on doctor’s satisfaction and their prescribing behavior were studied.

This research contributes to the development of service quality scale for measuring service quality in pharmaceutical manufacturing company, especially with reference to manufacturer–doctor interface of the supply chain which was not thoroughly explored earlier. A model was developed showing the positive relationship between service quality and doctor’s satisfaction and doctor’s prescribing behavior in pharmaceutical supply chain which is a new concept not proved experimentally.

The study is very useful for the pharmaceutical manufacturing companies to identify the service quality factors affecting doctor’s satisfaction and their prescribing behavior thereby leading to development of new measures for improving the performance of the pharmaceutical supply chain. This study can lead to identification of problems involved in pharmaceutical supply chain and also leads to generation of new ideas and development of new concepts for influencing doctor’s satisfaction and doctor’s prescribing behavior which in turn can help in providing better health.

This study actually has a direct impact on the society. If factors affecting doctor’s satisfaction and prescribing behavior are identified automatically, the end consumer, i.e. patient, can be satisfied in a better way, and better medical care can be provided. If doctor’s problems are identified, then better solutions can be provided to patients; this in turn has a lot of positive impact on the pharmaceutical company and society in general.

This research will act as a base for generating ideas relating to how quality service provided by a company will have an impact on doctor’s satisfaction and his prescribing behavior in pharmaceutical supply chain .To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first of its kind of the conceptual aspects of service quality, satisfaction and loyalty explained in terms of pharmaceutical supply chain as service quality, doctor’s satisfaction and doctor’s prescribing behavior and proved experimentally.

The purpose of this paper is to understand how fairness garners loyalty by breeding trust in the pharmaceutical wholesaler‐pharmacy relationship. Specifically, the paper seeks to understand if the two dimensions of fairness – procedural and distributive – contribute differently in fostering the two types of trust – credibility and benevolence. The paper further aims to examine how the two dimensions of trust mediate the fairness‐loyalty relationship.

Data from 156 retail pharmacies on their relationship with the pharmaceutical wholesalers are used to test the hypotheses. The mediation models are tested using the Barron and Kenny procedure.

The findings of this paper show the importance of both procedural and distributive aspects of fairness on the part of pharmaceutical wholesalers as perceived by the pharmacies. Each aspect of fairness plays a more prominent role for fostering a particular type of trust, which, in turn, leads to loyalty.

Future research may investigate the antecedents to fairness to unearth additional insights as to how organizations can manage their customers' perceptions of fairness and thereby enhance their trust and loyalty.

Pharmaceutical wholesale is a competitive business to retain pharmacies by building loyalty thus balancing pharmacies' dependence on the more powerful pharmaceutical manufacturers in the pharmaceutical supply chain. Given the intense competition, the wholesaler that does a superior job in creating a competitive advantage leveraging fairness to engender trust will get to benefit in recruiting and retaining more pharmacies.

This paper contributes to the fairness‐trust‐loyalty stream of literature by examining the mediation effects at the sub‐dimension level of the fairness and trust constructs. The paper also has practical implications, especially given the low gross margins for pharmaceutical wholesalers and the growing threat of direct distribution of pharmaceuticals or disintermediation by the manufacturers using third party logistics companies, such as united parcel service. The paper shows how wholesalers may be able to build loyalty with the pharmacies by signaling fairness and fostering trust.

The goal of this research is 1) to check if shopping prescription consciousness is a fundamental decision-making characteristic, 2) to know its weight and position into consumer decision-making styles (DMS), and 3) to compare results between France and China.

A quantitative survey using the Consumer Styles Inventory (Sproles and Kendall, 1986) is done with 308 French and 221 Chinese pet food buyers. Factorial, multivariance, clustering and discriminant analyses are run.

Findings reveal that shopping prescription consciousness is a fundamental decision-making characteristic. Although this concept scores the same in both cultures, correlations between shopping prescription and other characteristics vary from a culture to another, showing a different prescription follower profile. In addition, opposite to our expectations prescription consciousness has a discriminant role on DMS in France but not in China. Finally, culture impacts overall DMS.

The Chinese sample is weak. This study must be replicated in more product categories and involve more countries. This paper attempts to enrich prescribed consumption knowledge in a cross-cultural context.

This paper 1) enriches academic understanding of the decision delegation concept, in a cross-cultural context, and 2) encourages organizations involved in complex products to set up loyalty qualitative programs and prescriber networks to ease shopping decision and consequently increase sales.

This is the first time that decision delegation and prescription is studied according to decision-making styles in a cross-cultural context.

This study aims to examine the influence of brand awareness on brand equity with the mediating role of brand association and perceived quality.

This research is applied in terms of the objective and descriptive survey in terms of methodology because its objective is to describe the studied conditions or phenomena and also the relationship between research variables that have been conducted in the field method.

The results explained that 53% of respondents are female and 47% of respondents are male. Most respondents are between 30 and 40 years old, and the youngest respondents are less than 30 years old. Most respondents were specialists, and the 134 respondents were subspecialists. The results explained that the significance level of the Kolmogorov–Smirnov test for research variables is less than 0.05 and has an abnormal distribution. The abnormality of the data in this study directed the authors to use PLS software to analyze the data.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, it is the first time that research is prepared to study the impact of these marketing parameters on dentists’ prescription behavior.