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This article aims to explore the concept of chain value of the public port system in Ecuador from the perspective of importing/exporting companies, analyzing how perceived value in the use of port services affects customer satisfaction and the intermediate links of the influence of trust and commitment on customer loyalty.

Relying on a survey of 634 Ecuadorian companies with experience in international trade as port users and a theoretical framework well-established in the literature on consumer behavior, the empirical study found evidence of a positive and significant relationship with the knowledge of chain effects.

The findings confirm the chain effect and reveal ways to maintain an ongoing satisfactory, trust and committed relationship with users, thereby ultimately gaining and maintaining their loyalty. The conclusions suggest how this postulate can help to close the gap referred to the effective management of port services, and point out that port managers should be concerned with a continuous in-depth understanding of the perceived value and its chain effects.

The authors add evidence of the use of the postulate of the chain of effects on these dimensions, whose applicability is very well established, tested and consensual for the doctrine in industrial marketing. In contrast, it is scarcely present in the port relationship with its users.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming consumers' experiences and how firms identify, create, nurture and manage interactive marketing relationships. However, most marketers do not have a clear understanding of what AI is and how it may mutually benefit consumers and firms. In this paper, the authors conduct an extensive review of the marketing literature, develop an AI framework for understanding value co-creation in interactive buyer–seller marketing relationships, identify research gaps and offer a future research agenda.

The authors first conduct an extensive literature review in 16 top marketing journals on AI. Based on this review, an AI framework for understanding value co-creation in interactive buyer–seller marketing relationships was conceptualized.

The literature review led to a number of key research findings and summary areas: (1) an historical perspective, (2) definitions and boundaries of AI, (3) AI and interactive marketing, (4) relevant theories in the domain of interactive marketing and (5) synthesizing AI research based on antecedents to AI usage, interactive AI usage contexts and AI-enabled value co-creation outcomes.

This is one of the most extensive reviews of AI literature in marketing, including an evaluation of in excess or 300 conceptual and empirical research. Based on the findings, the authors offer a future research agenda, including a visual titled “What is AI in Interactive Marketing? AI design factors, AI core elements & interactive marketing AI usage contexts.”

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of what (service) experience is and examine it using three distinct perspectives: customer experience (CX), employee experience (EX) and human experience (HX).

The present conceptualization blends the marketing and organizational behavior/human resources management (OB/HRM) disciplines to clarify and reflect over the meaning of (service) experience. The marketing discipline illuminates the concept of CX, whereas the OB/HRM discipline illuminates the concept of EX. The concept of HX, which transcends CX and EX, is examined in light of its recent development in service research. For each of the three concepts, key themes are identified, and future research directions are proposed.

Because the goal that individuals seek to achieve depends on the role they are enacting, each of the three perspectives on experience (CX, EX and HX) should have a different focal point. CX requires to focus on the process of solving customer goals. EX necessitates to think in terms of organizational context and job content that support employees. Finally, the focus of HX should be on well-being via enhanced gratification, and reduced violation, of basic human needs.

This paper offers an interdisciplinary perspective on (service) experience and simultaneously addresses CX, EX and HX in order to reconcile the different perspectives on experience in service research.

The study advances an enhanced model encompassing psychological involvement, denoted as the psychological continuum model (PCM) and perceived customer service quality as intermediaries in the association between subjective customer knowledge (SCK) and behavioral loyalty. The purpose of this study is to assess the mediating role of psychological engagement and consumers' perceived service quality in the relationship between SCK and behavioral loyalty among members of nonprofit sports service organizations. Additionally, the study aims to examine the impact of membership duration on the relationship between consumer knowledge and behavioral loyalty.

The study used a quantitative research design, and primary data were collected through a structured questionnaire from 527 members of nonprofit Chinese sports clubs who were selected using a simple random sampling technique. A 5-point Likert scale questionnaire was developed to measure all constructs in the intended research model. The suitability of the measurement model was analyzed by performing confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used to analyze the data using AMOS-24.

The results of the overall direct effect indicate a significant influence of subjective knowledge on perceived service quality, perceived service quality significantly and positively influences psychological engagement; psychological engagement was found to be an important predictor of consumer behavioral loyalty.

The results offer information for nonprofit sports club (NPSC) managers who seek to increase the attractiveness and retention of their clubs' members by establishing the importance of subjective consumer knowledge.

Following the increasing trend of artificial intelligence (AI) research in hospitality literature, this critical reflection paper aims to identify AI-assisted mindfulness as a critical yet under-investigated issue and to contribute feasible directions for future research.

The authors first conceptualize a framework explaining the effects of mindfulness design in AI interventions on improving human mindfulness. The authors then identify opportunities for interventions in AI-assisted mindfulness for the tourism, hospitality and events industries. Finally, the authors propose potential themes for AI-assisted mindfulness research.

This study contributes three major conceptual works. First, we conceptualize a framework of AI-assisted mindfulness, showcasing that the scope of AI-assisted mindfulness spans from AI interventions to state mindfulness and then to trait mindfulness. Second, the authors offer two approaches to strategic thinking, one from mindfulness (i.e. mindfulness-focused niche markets and activities) and one from AI applications (i.e. AI-facilitated devices and platforms), to identify opportunities for AI-assisted mindfulness interventions. Third, for both management- and marketing-oriented AI-assisted mindfulness research, the authors propose 18 themes.

This critical reflection paper offers directions for future knowledge creation in AI-assisted mindfulness in the tourism, hospitality and events industries.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this critical reflection paper serves as the first in hospitality and tourism literature to systematically propose the research issue of AI-assisted mindfulness, offering directions and themes for future research.

This paper aims to identify the kind of internal climate leaders should offer health-care professionals to promote a patient safety culture in public hospitals managed by social health organizations in Brazil.

Two surveys were applied to health-care professionals working at three Brazilian public hospitals. The internal climate survey reached 1,013 respondents, and the patient safety culture survey reached 1,302 participants. Both factor and regression analyses were used to analyze the study model and determine how internal climate influences patient safety culture.

Results indicate that to promote a patient safety culture among health-care professionals, leaders should generate an internal climate based on trust to foster pride in working in the hospital. Possibly, the trust dimension is the most important one and must be developed to achieve job satisfaction and provide better services to patients.

All the hospitals studied were managed by the same Organização Social de Saúde. Due to the limited responses concerning the respondents’ profiles, demographic variables were not analyzed.

This research reveals that the trust and pride dimensions can most strongly influence a positive patient safety culture, helping hospital leaders face this huge managerial challenge of consistently delivering high standards of patient safety.

This research studies the promotion of a patient safety culture in public hospitals managed by social health organizations, characterized by greater flexibility and autonomy in health-care management and by a greater need for accountability.

This study aims to fill several gaps in the literature. First, it examines the Umrah industry from the supply side, investigating the pivotal factors for travel agencies’ performance. Second, it empirically investigates service leaders’ competencies specific to the hospital and tourism industry. Third, it clarifies whether there is a direct impact of organisational service orientation on business performance. Fourth, it explores the influence of network capabilities in a service context, specifically in travel agencies, which has rarely been discussed.

This is a mixed-method study with sequential explanatory research design. First, a quantitative approach was conducted with 150 authorised travel agencies in Indonesia, with two manager-level employees representing each agency. The data were analysed using descriptive statistics and structural equation modelling. A qualitative study was conducted to enrich the findings by interviewing the Director of Umrah and Hajj Development of the Ministry of Religious Affairs of the Republic of Indonesia and three other respondents.

Service leaders’ competencies and resource capacity significantly influence organisational service orientation, leading to enhanced perceived service quality and performance. In addition, resource capacity influences network capabilities, improving performance.

This study identifies factors affecting the performance of Umrah travel agencies in an intensely competitive environment, which has rarely been discussed. This sheds light on how travel agencies can survive and succeed in this competitive industry. Moreover, this study provides evidence regarding the role of network capabilities in the tourism industry and the impact of organisational service orientation, both directly and indirectly, on performance.

This paper aims to investigate the interrelated role of relational commitment and dependence as drivers of key performance outcomes. Specifically, the authors provide a conceptual model of the impact of commitment on relationship value dependence and switching cost dependence. The authors further investigate how these dimensions of dependence offer differing noneconomic and economic paths to strategic and financial performance.

Survey data was collected from 296 purchasing agents across multiple industries located in the USA. The conceptual model and accompanying hypotheses were tested via partial least squares structural equation modeling.

The results show that the relational path is driven by affective and normative commitment, which are related to relationship value dependence. Conversely, calculative commitment is related to switching cost dependence. This economic path is related to both strategic and financial performance, whereas the relational path is more closely related to strategic as opposed to financial performance outcomes.

This study extends research on Business-To-Business (B2B) relationships by leveraging social exchange theory to examine the interrelated roles played by two forms of dependence on performance outcomes. Thus, the authors answer Scheer et al.’s (2015) call for research into the two distinct types of dependence – relationship value and switching cost dependence – and their roles in determining B2B relationship outcomes. The findings contribute to the literature by integrating social exchange and relationship marketing concepts to develop a dual pathway approach to B2B partnerships.

The results suggest that dependence is not necessarily negative for firms. Specifically, buyers can and do still exhibit positive performance, both strategic and financial, in relationships with suppliers even when dependent on the relationship. Regardless of whether buyers are dependent due to a relationship or economic factors, both can, in different ways, lead to positive strategic and financial outcomes. Together, the authors contribute to the understanding of B2B partnerships by offering guidelines for both buyers and suppliers in the dyad.

The authors derive a comprehensive model depicting primarily relational and economic paths to performance through different types of commitment and dependence. The authors contribute to the literature by demonstrating that relational and economic paths to success are not the same, highlighting how firms could influence performance even when the relationship is not necessarily characterized by generally positive relational benefits and behaviors.

Drawing upon the stimulus-organism-response model, this study aims to explore the impact of soft aspects of service quality on revisit intention through the mechanism of perceived empathy.

For the examination of the hypothesized relationships, the study adopts structural equation modelling to analyse the data of 562 respondents (i.e. 281 family members and 281 inpatients).

The empirical results suggest that service quality increased family member empathy perception, which, in turn, improved inpatients’ revisit intentions.

Past studies have focused on the roles of overall service quality. The authors have extended the literature by examining the specific but important aspect of service quality and its effects on emotional response. Importantly, the study explains that the affective reactions of a patient’s family, fastened with perceived empathy, have a central role in influencing the patients’ subsequent reactions. Moreover, the prior studies collected the data either from hospital employees or patients. However, in the present study, the authors used a unique sample (family members as well as patients) to have a deeper understanding. Thus, the study enhances the literature on the stimuli-response (i.e. service quality – revisit intentions) relationship in the context of service marketing in general and health care in specific. Important academic and managerial contributions and recommendations for future research are discussed.

Effective customer journey design (ECJD) is considered a key variable in customer experience management and an essential source of brand meaning and pro-brand behavior. Although previous research has confirmed its importance for driving brand attitudes and loyalty, the role of consumer-brand identification as a social identity-based influence in this relationship has not yet been discussed. Drawing on construal level and social identity theories, this paper aims to investigate whether effective journeys and the resulting overall journey experience are equally powerful in driving brand loyalty among customers with different levels of consumer-brand identification.

The present article develops and tests a research model using data from the European and US service sectors (N = 1,454) to investigate how and when ECJD affects service brand loyalty.

Across two cultural contexts, four service industries and 33 service brands, the results reveal that ECJD is a crucial driver of service brand loyalty for customers with low consumer-brand identification. Moreover, the findings show that different aspects of journey effectiveness positively impact the valence of customers’ experience related to those journeys – a process that is ultimately decisive for their brand loyalty.

This study is unique because it generates theoretical and practical knowledge by combining the literature streams of customer journey design, customer experience and branding. Furthermore, this work demonstrates that consumer-brand identification is a critical boundary condition to be considered in the relationship between ECJD and brand loyalty in services.