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1 – 10 of 662Estelle van Tonder, Stephen G. Saunders and Leon T. de Beer
In the absence of direct employee involvement, customers sharing knowledge and know-how with other customers during self-service encounters is key for promoting service quality…
Abstract
Purpose
In the absence of direct employee involvement, customers sharing knowledge and know-how with other customers during self-service encounters is key for promoting service quality. This study assessed the extent to which customer support and help during self-service encounters could simply be explained by multiple motivations of the social exchange theory.
Design/methodology/approach
A survey approach was followed. The model was tested among 258 electronic banking customers in South Africa and later cross-validated among 253 electronic banking customers in Australia. Multi-group confirmatory factor analysis with country as the grouping variable, latent variable modelling and indirect tests were performed to assess interrelationships among diverse factors that may contribute to customer support and help during self-service encounters, as accounted for by motivations of the social exchange theory.
Findings
Adequate model fit was obtained for the combined structural model, which was based on the invariant model. Value contribution and competence affirmation, pleasure derived from helping, reciprocity and reputation enhancement are relevant motivations of the social exchange theory that may impact customer support and help through knowledge sharing.
Research implications
The study provides a simplified and more cohesive explanation of customers' motivations for engaging in customer support and helping behaviours during self-service encounters.
Practical implications
Service providers seeking guidance on knowledge sharing among customers, which may lead to greater service quality, should benefit from this research.
Originality/value
The findings contribute to greater understanding of social exchanges by customers who provide support and help to other customers during self-service encounters, and that ultimately may affect service quality.
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Stephen G. Saunders, Dani J. Barrington and Srinivas Sridharan
– This paper aims to present a definition of social marketing that considers the purpose and role of social marketing beyond behaviour change.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to present a definition of social marketing that considers the purpose and role of social marketing beyond behaviour change.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper reviews present social marketing definitions and then bolsters its underlying theoretical structure with insights distilled from three schools of thought: macromarketing, transformative consumer research and the capability approach.
Findings
Guided by the three theoretical streams, we introduce our definition, namely: social marketing is the application of marketing principles to enable individual and collective ideas and actions in the pursuit of effective, efficient, equitable, fair and sustained social transformation.
Practical implications
We present a list of practical implications derived from our definition of social marketing. We stress that our social marketing definition better reflects the need to balance the effects (efficiency and effectiveness) and the process (equity, fairness and sustainability) of social marketing practices. By our definition of social marketing, the marketer becomes a facilitator and participant rather than a behaviour change agent.
Originality/value
The paper introduces into social marketing three streams of thought that represent the most contemporary aspects of economic, market and consumer philosophy. We believe our definition can better guide social marketing in its quest to transform societies to be capable, free, equitable, fair and sustainable.
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Many service employees rely on non-contractual voluntary customer tips as a major source of their income. The purpose of this paper is to empirically test the relationship between…
Abstract
Purpose
Many service employees rely on non-contractual voluntary customer tips as a major source of their income. The purpose of this paper is to empirically test the relationship between the service employee’s cognitive evaluation of the tip (expectations-disconfirmation tip gap), affective state (AS) and displayed emotions (DE) toward customers in the workplace.
Design/methodology/approach
An experimental, between-subjects, scenario-based research design was conducted on 107 waiters in the US restaurant industry. A simple mediation model was first tested, before testing a more complex moderated mediation model that was developed to investigate if employees self-control (SC) moderates the relationship between the employees tip gap, AS, and DE.
Findings
An employee’s negative disconfirmation tip gap negatively influences the employee’s AS, which in turn results in negative DE toward customers in the workplace. However, an employee’s positive tip gap does not positively influence the employee’s AS, relative to the control. In addition, employees’ SC does not moderate the relationship, which suggests that when employees experience negative tip disconfirmation they may openly violate the service provider’s display rules and service scripts, and display negative emotions toward customers in the workplace.
Research limitations/implications
The scenario-based research design was limited to self-reported perceived levels of SC and DE. The scenario was also limited to one country and one tipping context (i.e. restaurants). Future studies could compliment these findings by conducting both qualitative studies, and survey research that relies on actual tipping data or re-enactments of actual service encounters.
Practical implications
Service managers not only need to manage display rules and service scripts to influence employee DE, but also need to manage employee tip expectations, especially when employees expect to receive tips that are greater than actual tips (i.e. negative disconfirmation). Communicating and educating employees on customer tipping and what tips to expect should be central to managing employees who rely on customer tips.
Originality/value
Tipping has received very little attention in the services management literature. This study broadens the focus of tipping research in the literature by presenting a more complex expectations-disconfirmation tip gap model.
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V. Dao Truong, X. Dam Dong, Stephen Graham Saunders, Quynh Pham, Hanh Nguyen and Ngoc Anh Tran
This paper aims to examine how social marketing intervention programmes to measure, evaluate and document social marketing impact.
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine how social marketing intervention programmes to measure, evaluate and document social marketing impact.
Design/methodology/approach
A systematic review of 49 nutritional behaviour intervention programmes (2006–2020) was conducted. To examine the social marketing impact of the programmes, a logic model of social impact was used. The model comprises inputs (the resources used for an intervention programme), outputs (the direct products resulting from the use of resources), outcomes (short- to medium-term programme effects) and impacts (long-term programme effects on the individual, community or societal levels).
Findings
Most intervention programmes set the goal of encouraging their target audience to increase fruit and vegetable intake, choose healthy food items, drink less sugary beverages or consume low-fat diaries, while few others sought policy or systems change. Multiple criteria were used for impact evaluation (e.g. exposure and reach, changes in knowledge, awareness, attitudes, behaviours and body mass index). (Quasi) experiments were the most popular method used for impact measurement, followed by the pre-post model of impact. Positive changes were found in 33 programmes, often reported in terms of short-term outputs or outcomes. Long-term impact particularly on the broader societal level was not indicated.
Originality/value
This research offers a systematic review of how social marketing impact is measured, evaluated and documented. It also provides some guidance for social marketers on how to shift from a reductionist, behavioural outcome-focussed approach towards an “expansionist” impact approach that explicitly considers social marketing impacts on the quality of life of individuals, communities and societies.
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V. Dao Truong, Stephen Graham Saunders and X. Dam Dong
Social marketing has gained widespread recognition as a means of motivating behaviour change in individuals for societal good. Many opinions have been shared regarding its…
Abstract
Purpose
Social marketing has gained widespread recognition as a means of motivating behaviour change in individuals for societal good. Many opinions have been shared regarding its potential to affect society or systems-wide change, leading to the macro-or systems social marketing (SSM) concepts and ideas. This paper aims to critically appraise the SSM literature, identify key features and highlight gaps for future research.
Design/methodology/approach
A search was conducted of peer-reviewed SSM articles published from 2000 to March 2018 inclusive. A number of online databases were mined, including but not limited to Google, Google Scholar, Scopus, PubMed, Cochrane and Medline. Key social marketing outlets (Social Marketing Quarterly and Journal of Social Marketing) were browsed manually. In total, 28 SSM articles were identified.
Findings
SSM adopts a dynamic systems thinking approach; it is an orientation, not a theory or model; it is multi-method; and it recognises that intervention can occur on multiple levels. Yet, greater attention should be given to the complexities of the systems context and the power structures and relations that exist between stakeholders. Significant issues also include stakeholder voice and participation, the use and reporting of theories and models, the measurement of long-term intervention outcomes and the undesirable impacts of SSM.
Originality/value
This paper identifies issues that need to be addressed if social marketing is to become a more system-oriented means to positively influence societal change. Implications for theoretical and practical development of the social marketing field are provided.
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Stephen Graham Saunders and V. Dao Truong
The purpose of this paper is to explore the dynamic nature of behaviour change over time and to gain insights into the effectiveness of social marketing efforts at three different…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the dynamic nature of behaviour change over time and to gain insights into the effectiveness of social marketing efforts at three different intervention points under three different delay time conditions.
Design/methodology/approach
A system dynamics simulation modelling approach was used.
Findings
The findings showed that the effectiveness of social marketing interventions at different points of intervention and delay times is dependent on complex dynamic system interactions and feedback loops.
Research limitations/implications
As the dynamic simulation model was an abstraction or simplified representation, it was only useful to gain insights into generalised patterns of behaviour over time.
Practical implications
The paper provided practical guidance to social marketers’ intent on gaining insights into “where to do” and “when to do” social marketing rather than “how to do” social marketing.
Originality/value
The paper provided theoretical and practical insights into the temporal nature of behaviour change and the effectiveness of social marketing interventions in influencing behaviour over time.
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Estelle van Tonder and Stephen Graham Saunders
This study aims to broaden understanding of customer helping behaviour in the banking environment and provide strategic direction for much-needed further research regarding its…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to broaden understanding of customer helping behaviour in the banking environment and provide strategic direction for much-needed further research regarding its role and management within the customer service journey.
Design/methodology/approach
Gift-giving literature was further explored to identify plausible characteristics of customer helping behaviour in the banking environment.
Findings
Customers’ acts of helping could be complex in nature and may involve multiple actors, including customer helpers, gatekeepers, and other members of customer helpers’ networks. Moreover, customer helpers and their helping networks may operate in both offline and online environments, in various stages of the service experiences, and ultimately in the customer journeys. Furthermore, the help customers provide to other customers could be framed by socially constructed arrangements that seem to be (1) dynamic in nature, (2) comprising of joint efforts by multiple actors, and (3) within diverse and interlinked helping environments. Accordingly, several research implications for the banking environment are identified.
Originality/value
Key to services in the banking environment may be the complex and synthesised helping systems among customers that evidently could affect product adoption, use, and customer loyalty of customers receiving help throughout the service experiences and customer journeys. Accordingly, guided by gift-giving literature, the current paper sets the research agenda.
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In the last four years, since Volume I of this Bibliography first appeared, there has been an explosion of literature in all the main functional areas of business. This wealth of…
Abstract
In the last four years, since Volume I of this Bibliography first appeared, there has been an explosion of literature in all the main functional areas of business. This wealth of material poses problems for the researcher in management studies — and, of course, for the librarian: uncovering what has been written in any one area is not an easy task. This volume aims to help the librarian and the researcher overcome some of the immediate problems of identification of material. It is an annotated bibliography of management, drawing on the wide variety of literature produced by MCB University Press. Over the last four years, MCB University Press has produced an extensive range of books and serial publications covering most of the established and many of the developing areas of management. This volume, in conjunction with Volume I, provides a guide to all the material published so far.
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Estelle van Tonder, Stephen Graham Saunders, Mwarumba Mwavita and Sohee Kim
This study aims to examine customer helping and advocacy behaviours within dyadic financial service relationships involving customers and fellow customer helpers.
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine customer helping and advocacy behaviours within dyadic financial service relationships involving customers and fellow customer helpers.
Design/methodology/approach
The gift-giving literature was used to propose a customer-to-customer interaction model, which was tested and cross-validated among electronic banking customers in South Africa (n = 404) and Australia (n = 244). Self-administered questionnaires were distributed to respondents who are users of electronic banking services and who previously received help with the service from a fellow customer. Data analysis included multi-group structural equation modelling.
Findings
The findings support the view that selected source credibility dimensions may influence greater affective commitment towards fellow customer helpers at various levels. Subsequently, further altruistic gift-giving in the form of customer helping and advocacy behaviours may result from higher levels of affective commitment. Feeling secure in their relationships with fellow customer helpers, customer recipients of help are likely to further socialise other customers who may share a common interest in the service category (e.g. electronic banking), but do not necessarily support the financial service provider of the customer.
Originality/value
The findings extend the conceptual domain of affective commitment and shed light on the factors contributing to the development of strengthened bonds between customers and fellow customer helpers within dyadic financial service relationships. Additionally, greater financial service socialisation and use may be achieved when the helping and advocacy behaviours of customer helpers are not restricted to a specific service provider. Subsequently, the current investigation advances knowledge of the underlying processes involved in motivating these desired service outcomes and behaviours.
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