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1 – 10 of 368Addressing the significant differences between referral programs and traditional promotional marketing, this paper aims to investigate and examine the impact of how reward-related…
Abstract
Purpose
Addressing the significant differences between referral programs and traditional promotional marketing, this paper aims to investigate and examine the impact of how reward-related information is presented within referral programs and how it interacts with reward size and reward allocation.
Design/methodology/approach
This study adopts framing effect and equity theory to build the relationship between reward presentation, reward size and reward allocation. Then, two scenario-based experimental studies are designed and conducted on Amazon Mechanical Turk.
Findings
The results show that there is no direct impact of reward presentation on referral likelihood, while the effect relies on reward size. As the levels of reward size increase, the referral likelihood gradually shifts from percentage form to dollar form as perceived size mediates the interaction effect on referral likelihood. Further, adding information about reward allocation also indicate the different impacts of equity and inequity on influencing the above findings.
Originality/value
The study contributes to the literature by introducing reward presentation and emphasizes its impact on individual’s behavior decisions in the context of referral programs. This study extends and broadens the scope and effectiveness of the framing effect on traditional promotional marketing strategies, while also bridging the gap in the literature by examining the combined role of information about rewards.
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Sai Ma, Qinghong Xie, Jiaxin Wang and Jingjing Dong
Customer referral programs (CRPs) are popular; however, they often generate low referral rates. The authors propose that certain CRP referral tasks may hinder consumers’ referral…
Abstract
Purpose
Customer referral programs (CRPs) are popular; however, they often generate low referral rates. The authors propose that certain CRP referral tasks may hinder consumers’ referral likelihood. This study aims to explore the effects of referral tasks (communication content and approach) on customers’ referral likelihood on social platforms and the role of self-construal.
Design/methodology/approach
This study establishes a theoretical model based on online social platforms and conducts three scenario-based experiments. The authors obtain data from consumers on Sojump platform and test the hypotheses using analysis of variance (ANOVA) analysis and mediation analysis in SPSS. The valid sample sizes for these three experiments are 288, 203 and 214, respectively.
Findings
Three experimental studies indicate that communication content and approach have a significant effect on referral likelihood. Furthermore, the effect of communication content on referral likelihood depends on the communication approach. Self-construal plays a moderating role in the effect of communication content and approach on perceived social costs.
Originality/value
CRPs typically involve tasks and rewards; consumers are asked to complete a referral task and then receive a reward. Both tasks and rewards can affect an individual’s willingness to participate; however, existing studies on CRP focus primarily on the reward component. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to systematically investigate the role of referral tasks (communication content and approach) in CRPs. The authors extend the related research by examining the impact of referral tasks on consumers’ willingness to recommend. In addition, this study introduces self-construal into CRPs research.
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Fei Zou and Yanju Zhou
The goal of this study is to investigate the mediating effect of referral rewards on consumer willingness to recommend poverty-alleviating products and to identify the most…
Abstract
Purpose
The goal of this study is to investigate the mediating effect of referral rewards on consumer willingness to recommend poverty-alleviating products and to identify the most effective referral rewards for incentivizing consumers to recommend poverty-alleviating products.
Design/methodology/approach
Tournament rewards and piece-rate rewards are designed based on the theory of indebtedness, the related literature and the actual background. SPSS 26.0 and AMOS 17.0 are used to analyze the structural equation model.
Findings
According to the structural equation analysis, the following findings were found: under the tournament reward condition, social image, feelings of indebtedness and perceived reward value negatively affect consumer willingness to recommend. Under the piece-rate reward condition, social image and feelings of indebtedness significantly negatively affect consumer recommendation willingness, while perceived reward value significantly positively affects consumer recommendation willingness. The mean recommendation willingness of the tournament reward group is significantly lower than that of the control group. In contrast, the mean recommendation willingness of the piece-rate rewards group is significantly higher than that of the control group.
Originality/value
Based on the study findings, the authors propose that enterprises apply piece-rate rewards to incentivize consumers to recommend poverty-alleviating products when designing such rewards. In this way, the sale of poverty-alleviating products can be improved.
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Xu Chen, Yingliang Wu, Junfeng Liao, Wenming Zuo and Rujie Zhong
The incentive cost of enterprises increases significantly with the rapid growth of the social commerce (SC) market. In this context, enterprises need to develop the optimal…
Abstract
Purpose
The incentive cost of enterprises increases significantly with the rapid growth of the social commerce (SC) market. In this context, enterprises need to develop the optimal strategy to improve incentive effectiveness and reduce cost. Different types of consumers’ responses to incentives bring different values to enterprises. Hence, this paper proposes the social commerce value network (SCVN) to help enterprises study the contributions of different types of consumers to the network.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on the graphical evaluation and review technique (GERT), the authors construct the social commerce value GERT (i.e. SCV-GERT) network and design three progressive experiments for estimating the value contributions of “network stage”, “consumer type”, and “resource type” to the SCVN under the same incentives. The authors initialize the SCV-GERT model with consumer data in SC and distinguish the most valuable consumers by adjusting the incentive parameters.
Findings
The results show that the SCV-GERT model can well describe the value flow of SCVN. The incentive on forwarding consumers brings the greatest value gain to the SCVN, and social trust contributes the most to forwarding consumers.
Practical implications
Under the guidance of the results, platforms and enterprises in SC can select the optimal type of consumers who bring the maximum network value so as to improve the effectiveness of incentive strategy and reduce marketing costs. A four-level incentive system should be established according to the ranking of the corresponding value gains: forwarding consumers > agent consumers > commenting consumers > potential consumers. Enterprises also need to find ways to improve the social resource investments of consumers participating in SC.
Originality/value
This paper investigates the incentive problem in SC grounded in the SCVN and uses the GERT method to construct the SCV-GERT model, which is the first attempt to introduce GERT into the SC context. This study also makes up for the lack of comparative research on different types of consumers in SC and can provide support for enterprises’ customer relationship management and marketing decisions.
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Yajun Zhang, Yongge Niu, Zhi Chen, Xiaoyu Deng, Banggang Wu and Yali Chen
Online retailers are pioneering the incentivization of customers to generate more product reviews by rewarding them. However, little is known about the impact of reward types on…
Abstract
Purpose
Online retailers are pioneering the incentivization of customers to generate more product reviews by rewarding them. However, little is known about the impact of reward types on customers' review behavior, including review frequency and sentiment. To address this gap, we investigated the effects of different reward types on customers' review behavior and how these rewards influence customers' review behavior.
Design/methodology/approach
We collected secondary data and empirically tested the hypothesis by analyzing the change in reward policy. Regression and two-stage Heckman models were applied to investigate the effects, with the latter used to control potential selection issues.
Findings
The results revealed that monetary rewards can stimulate customers to generate more positive product reviews. Furthermore, the reward amount has a negative moderating effect on the aforementioned relationship. Additionally, customer tenure negatively moderates the relationship between monetary rewards and review behavior.
Originality/value
This study contributes to the understanding of user-generated content motivation and provides managerial implications for reward programs.
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Le Yi Koh, Ying Sien Peh, Xueqin Wang and Kum Fai Yuen
The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a brand-new phenomenon in customer consumption patterns. This resulted from heightened health awareness brought on by the COVID-19 epidemic…
Abstract
Purpose
The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in a brand-new phenomenon in customer consumption patterns. This resulted from heightened health awareness brought on by the COVID-19 epidemic. There is a dearth of appropriate health psychology perspectives in the existing study examining the effect of COVID-19 on consumers’ use of crowdsourced logistics (CL) platforms. In order to provide unique and thorough insights into how consumer health concerns can affect consumers’ subjective views and their decisions to use CL, this study combines the health belief model and the technology acceptance model.
Design/methodology/approach
Five hundred valid responses from an online survey that was created and administered in Singapore were analysed using structural equation modelling.
Findings
The findings show that all of the suggested constructs have a favourable influence on consumers’ intentions to use CL. The suggested model also demonstrates high explanatory power, with perceived usefulness serving as the primary driver, followed by perceived ease of use and self-efficacy.
Originality/value
The study advances previous academic research on CL and offers guidance to CL companies and lawmakers for promoting sustainable and secured last-mile delivery.
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Yuanyuan Wu, Liuyan Chen, Eric W.T. Ngai and Pengkun Wu
The objective of this study is to investigate the interaction effect between incentive type (financial and compassionate incentives) and the ethicality of merchant strategy on…
Abstract
Purpose
The objective of this study is to investigate the interaction effect between incentive type (financial and compassionate incentives) and the ethicality of merchant strategy on consumer willingness to post positive reviews, while also examining potential variations in consumer responses based on consumption experience, shopping frequency and social class.
Design/methodology/approach
Building upon construal level theory, we hypothesized the moderating influence of the ethicality of merchant strategy and examined the three-way interaction among consumers’ demographic characteristics (i.e. consumption experience, shopping frequency and social class), incentive type and the ethicality of merchant strategy. To empirically test our hypotheses, we conducted four experiments and employed ANOVA for data analysis.
Findings
The ethicality of merchant strategies moderates the association between incentive type and consumer willingness to post positive reviews, with compassionate incentives eliciting more pronounced moral judgments toward merchant strategies compared to financial incentives. The moderating effect of the ethicality of merchant strategy on the relationship between incentive type and consumer willingness to post positive reviews is particularly strong among consumers who have favorable consumption experiences, engage in frequent shopping and belong to lower social classes.
Originality/value
This study contributes to the existing literature on online reviews by examining the impact of compassionate incentives on consumer review behaviors, analyzing the ethicality of merchant strategies within the realm of online reviews and investigating variations in consumer responses to merchant strategies regarding consumption experience, shopping frequency and social class.
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Chanho Song, Min Chung Han, Sung-Hee Wendy Paik and Michael Y. Hu
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of reward redemption programs on donation amount, donation percentage and donation intention in the context of a bank credit…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of reward redemption programs on donation amount, donation percentage and donation intention in the context of a bank credit card.
Design/methodology/approach
A 2 × 2 × 3 experiment is implemented with 1,070 consumers accessing a national US-based sample with a small compensation. The authors use general linear model to test the proposed hypotheses.
Findings
The findings show the main effects of reward types, limited-time message and value of reward redemptions on the percentage of donations and overall donation intention to charity. The type of reward (cash/points) is found to interact with the limited-time message and with the value of reward redemptions.
Originality/value
No prior studies have addressed the relationship between credit card redemption rewards and scarcity messages in the donation context. The study contributes to the understanding of the effectiveness of credit card redemption rewards with scarcity message in improving a consumer’s donation intention.
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Brittany Beck, Melanie Moore Koskie and William Locander
This study aims to contribute to the ongoing discussion of how consumers approach shopping directly via social media by explicating decisions related to trust on social media and…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to contribute to the ongoing discussion of how consumers approach shopping directly via social media by explicating decisions related to trust on social media and how various types of electronic word of mouth (eWOM; ratings and reviews, recommendations and referrals and social media communities) contribute to these decisions.
Design/methodology/approach
A total of 198 respondents with experience shopping directly via social media were instructed to select the platform on which they had the most shopping experience (Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Pinterest, etc.) to answer relevant survey questions. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used for analyzing the results.
Findings
Findings reveal that eWOM provided by strong ties (recommendations and referrals; social media communities) is superior to weak ties (ratings and reviews). Surprisingly, ratings and reviews do not significantly relate to trust in the retailer, suggesting that this information may be necessary but not sufficient for trusting retailers on social media.
Originality/value
This research distinguishes trust decisions related to shopping on social media and clarifies how each type of eWOM uniquely influences trust in the retailer by using tie strength theory.
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Bryan Johnson and William T. Ross
The purpose of this study is to contribute to previous research on customer relationships by quantitatively examining differences in the monetary benefits obtained by consumers…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to contribute to previous research on customer relationships by quantitatively examining differences in the monetary benefits obtained by consumers using social and commercial relationships to make purchases from small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
Design/methodology/approach
Customer transaction and relationship data from an SME in the USA is used to quantitatively assess the value of different marketplace relationships in an entrepreneurial context. Tobit regression is used to empirically model and test the impact of specific relationship characteristics on customer discounts.
Findings
Customers using social connections to make purchases obtain significantly larger discounts than customers using commercial connections; customers using direct connections attain significantly larger discounts than consumers using indirect connections (referrals). Interestingly, when examined by connection type, direct and indirect connections do not produce significant differences for social connections, yet they yield notable differences for commercial connections. The findings provide valuable insights to entrepreneurs for understanding and managing customer relationships.
Originality/value
This study empirically demonstrates that social relationships can be both prevalent and influential in the marketplace. The methodology used to quantitatively assess the monetary value associated with different methods of engaging with SMEs allows objective comparisons among different types of customer relationships. Quantification also allows important relationship characteristics to be empirically examined, including how the relationships compare to one another and to nonpersonal marketing activities. Ultimately, these novel contributions generate important insights to help marketers and entrepreneurs better understand customer relationships.
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