Search results

As globalization becomes ever more prominent, the role of media and advertising is increasing. Ideally for large multinationals that have the resources to take advantage of globalization there exists a larger “market” to which products can be sold. To create and sustain their market, these multinationals companies use aggressive advertising strategies. Television is a aggressive advertising media for these companies. In India television advertising has been expanding throughout the 1990s. Close on the heels of multinationals, domestic companies are also using television as a media to reach the Indian masses. As a result, the number of television commercials is increasing. With this the frequency and time of advertising pods, in a program, are also increasing. This competition between the program content and advertising pods is known as “clutter”. This advertising clutter and has led to companies questioning the efficiency of the medium of communication, in terms of reducing the competitive rivalry and creating a brand impression. This paper aims at understanding this relationship between advertising clutter and multiple activities a viewer might be involved in i.e. polychronic use of time: as proposed by Kaufman and Lane (1994). The study concludes that Indian youth exhibit mental nomadship rather than channel or physical nomadship, at current levels of advertising. Furthermore, channel nomadship has a significant relationship with the person who has control over the remote and the time for which the television is being watched. Physical nomadship has a significant relationship with age, gender and education level. Finally, mental nomadship was related to gender and education level. The study also has important implications for managers.

This study focuses on home country institutions as sources of variation in the level of foreign investment into India. Our findings support the idea that institutional voids found in India are less of a deterrent to investments from home countries with high levels of institutional development than from home countries with similar institutional voids. Overall, foreign investments in India are found to be significantly related to the strength of institutions within home countries. The levels of both approved and realized foreign direct investment (FDI) are strongly influenced by economic factors and home country regulative institutions, and weakly influenced by home country cognitive institutions. When considered separately, the cognitive institutions and regulative institutions within a given home country each significantly influence the level of approved/realized FDI into India. However, when considered jointly, only the strength of regulative institutions is predictive of FDI inflows.

Advertisements are the first point of contact a marketer has with a prospective consumer. It is at this stage that a marketer gets an opportunity to leave an impression in the minds of a reader and to differentiate a reader from a prospective customer. Marketers achieve this objective with the help of two tools of advertising i.e. attractiveness cues and information cues. Given the limitation of time, space and financial resources marketers have been forced into a tradeoff between information cues and attractiveness cues. This tradeoff has given rise to skepticism in the minds of customers and policy makers concerning the balance between the two cues and resulting ethical issues. This paper aims to carry out a content analysis of advertisements in magazines in order to study this tradeoff between information and attractiveness cues in advertisements.

To pursue the research objective, it was decided to collect data through content analysis of advertisements. To judge the level of informative and attractiveness cues in advertisements, classification by Resnik and Stern and Pollay along with imagery questions were used. The classification determines the level of advertising information based on 14 criteria or cues. The classification is an established baseline and has also been tested for reliability in other cultures. To collect data it was decided to use magazine advertisements as these are a preferred means for advertising OTC drugs. In order to select the sample various Indian and US magazines were reviewed. Indian magazines focusing entirely on health and women could not be found; therefore two popular women's magazines were chosen which discussed health topics. For interpreting the content of the advertisements two coders, who were trained in marketing research, were chosen. Data collection resulted in 170 unique advertisements across India and USA.

The results of the study highlighted that, although both US and Indian OTC advertisements were trading off in favor of attractiveness cues, Indian advertisements were more imbalanced. Indian advertisements on an average have 4.83 attractiveness cues out of 6.60 cues per advertisements while US advertisements have 4.55 attractiveness cues out of 7.54 cues per advertisement. Indian advertisements not only have on an average fewer information cues, but also fared badly in terms of the type of cues. The US marketers were found to be more socially responsible in terms of advertisements ethics as compared to Indian marketers in the context of the OTC drugs industry.

The study was limited to OTC drugs; a more detailed study should be carried out to compare advertising content by specific product categories. Difference in scope of magazines used in this study may have influenced the adequacy of sample, as profile of target customers in the two magazines was a little different.

The results indicated that the Indian OTC advertisers needed to re‐evaluate the industry standards and become more ethical and socially responsible to give the industry a global outlook and acceptance.

The paper highlights the need for companies to adopt a proactive and socially responsible attitude and improve information content of Indian OTC advertisements as per international industry standards.

The paper will be of value to corporate and social policy makers and also to marketers.

The present study aims to identify and study the online privacy concerns, its explanatory variables and their affect on reactions and online purchasing behavior of Indian consumers. Globalization means that companies are setting manufacturing units where their cost dynamics are most attractive and then servicing the customers in different markets. Therefore, today, most of the globalized firms are using technology to overcome physical barriers with the customer. The value chains are being reorganized to come up with innovative strategies for sales, delivery and service channels. These strategies use Internet as a competitive tool, thereby providing marketers with a completely new landscape to work with. This channel means that now even the tangibles (products) are being sold on the basis of intangibles (services). In this landscape, the success of an online business depends on its capability to think globally and act locally. Sensitivity displayed by a company to effects of cultural nuances on a consumer’s psychological constructs will determine the success of a company and its strategy. It is in this backdrop that the current study was undertaken.

To establish a relationship of the consumer privacy concerns and consumers’ reactions and their online purchase behavior, data were collected on the basis of a self-administered structured questionnaire. Data were collected from 150 respondents. Confirmatory factor analysis in LISREL (8.70) was done to check the validity of the scale. Incremental fit indices and parsimonious fit indices were used to interpret whether the model fit the data. Further, data were analyzed using factor analysis, correlation and chi-square tests.

The study found several significant correlations between consumer’s online privacy and their behavior. The study made attempt to study only linkages and not a causal relationship. This study found that there was a correlation between online privacy concerns and consumer behavior. Indian consumers opted to voice and complain about privacy concerns, and hence, companies need to invest in recovery strategies. Furthermore, Indian consumers exhibited more of a refrained behavior rather than hedonic purchase behavior. However, refrained behavior was a first step toward the latter. To promote refrained behavior, marketers need to work with a model which provides Indian consumers with an assurance of procedural fairness and fair information practices. These companies need to invest in software, rewards, detailed privacy notices and tangibles to motivate customers into transacting online. Armed with this information a marketer can also invest into the right kind of privacy and security tools.

Due to the limited sample size, the results of the study can be generalized to a limited extent.

The results would help online marketers maneuver the target consumer’s behavior in the desired direction. The results would help companies design and invest in the right kind of privacy and security tools, for the target segments matching the sample.

The manuscript is based on a unique data set collected for this study. The references have been cited as per American Psychological Association (APA) rules. The work is original.