Business Commons^™

The Complexity Of Understanding Online Product Evaluation Expressions In The Chinese Cultural Context: How Ratings And Reviews Tell A Different Story, Mousumi Bose, Lei Ye

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Most online retail websites provide consumers the opportunity to elicit feedback about products and services through ratings and reviews. Extant research has suggested that product ratings and reviews may be reflective of consumers’ cultural views. Little research exists that discusses this lack of consistency between ratings and reviews beyond that suggested by Hofstede’s cultural typology. This research shows that although consumers may provide higher ratings, review texts provide a different perspective: consumers use reviews to provide negative feedback, however, with some tempering nuances.

Monetizing Student Projects: Advice For Marketing Educators, Zach Moore

AMTP Proceedings 2022

As resources become more scarce in colleges of business, it is increasingly important for faculty members to be creative to generate revenue for their programs. This paper provides several tips for using student projects to raise funds for student development.

The Effects Of Shape-Taste Congruence On Product Evaluations, Jurui Zhang, Raymond Liu, Yufang Jin, Menglin Li

AMTP Proceedings 2022

The background design of a product presented online is important to attract consumers’ attention and further help them make proper judgments about the product. Although many studies have investigated factors of advertising background design, few focus on the effect of shape feature in the background on product evaluations. The present research investigates the influence of congruency between the shape in the background design and product taste perception on consumer product evaluations by using a pretest and three experiments. The results show that shape-taste congruency intensifies product evaluations with an increase evaluation of sweet-taste products and a decreases evaluation of sour-taste …

Nostalgia As A Tactic For Marketers: The Use Of Retro Marketing To Entice Consumer Purchase, Cortnee Y. Bunch

AMTP Proceedings 2022

In marketing, nostalgia involves linking a product, service, or brand to the past to create an emotional connection. While it has existed in marketing positioning for some time, it has become a strategy that marketers can take advantage of through retro marketing. Retro marketing involves relaunching a product or service brand from an earlier period, by using familiar packaging or product designs, to evoke a nostalgic connection among consumers (Brown et al., 2003). Through the effective use of brand attitude, product experience, and brand preference, companies small and large can use retro marketing to create a competitive advantage and entice …

Rainbow-Washing Away Customers: Does The Consumer’S Perception Of Rainbow-Washing Affect Purchasing Behavior?, Ashley N. Johns, Sindy Chapa, Nakima Brooks, Holly Coleman, Maya Dubois

AMTP Proceedings 2022

In this study, researchers will test to see the effects rainbow-washing has on consumers’ intent to purchase. Rainbow-washing is a new marketing technique in which companies implement different initiatives to appeal to the LGBTQ+ community while not genuinely investing in the community itself. To test if rainbow-washing is correlated to a consumer’s desire to purchase, a survey was distributed using nonprobability sampling to 38 participants. Of the sample, less than half identified as members of the target community (LGBTQ+). As a result, it was concluded there is no significance between consumer attitudes towards rainbow-washing and their intention to purchase. However, …

You Don't Belong: Exploring Luxury Branding Strategy, Lauren E. Beverly, Jamye Foster

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Luxury branding strategies create impressions of exclusivity which is transmitted into the brand’s products and retail spaces. Exclusivity is a necessary component to create consumer desire despite limitations of accessibility, time, effort, and pricing. A new population of aspirational shoppers, known as Chandlers, highly value exclusive brands as they increase perceptions of social status. This study will examine the impact of loud vs. discrete luxury branding on perceptions of brand status and browsing intentions, and the moderating impact of the Chandler effect.

Empathy, Altruism, Csr, And Consumer Buycott Behavior During Covid 19: Lessons Learned, Ania Izabela Rynerzewska, Eliza Hetrick

AMTP Proceedings 2022

As Covid-19 became a global pandemic, life as businesses and consumers know it changed dramatically. Suddenly, in-person shopping became rare while social distancing and working remotely became common practice. The impact of Covid-19 reached beyond the obvious death toll and economic recession and contributed to a shift in what is considered relevant and what is secondary. This study analyzed the impact of consumer levels of altruism and empathy on interest in Covid-19 exacerbated topics like employee treatment, social justice, and the environment. Further, this study emphasized the importance of CSR efforts supporting current topics, which have been found to contribute …

Money, Medals, And Championships: Politically Driven Conspiracy Of Silence, Model Development; Implications To Diversity And Inclusion., Ania Izabela Rynerzewska

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Athletic organizational image and reputation management often require careful consideration of values shared and enacted to create a flawless image with which many fans identify and often admire. However, under the cover of perfect brand image covered with medals, championship and glory, there is often a hidden world of abuse and active participation in silencing the victims to protect the image. This paper analyzes relatively recent cases of two sex scandals in sports: Jerry Sandusky case and Larry Nassar case. Both individuals held higher positions within their organizations’ network of supporters who participated in a conspiracy of silence. This paper …

Supply Chain Resilience And Agility During Covid19: The Case Of Automobile Manufacturing, Leor Ben-Meir, Steve Lemay, Dave Mcmahon

AMTP Proceedings 2022

In this paper, we examine disruptions in the automobile manufacturing supply chain that resulted from the COVID19 pandemic. We explore the relationships between organizational resilience and agility and supply chain resilience and agility. We frame this exploration in terms of rare earth elements (REEs) and microchips, supplies that come from Tier 3 and Tier 4 in the automobile supply chain. We look at some adaptations made by Volkswagen to adapt to these disruptions but note that organizational resilience and adaptation does not always result in supply chain adaptation.

The Application Of Kahneman’S Concepts To Marketing Police In Ontario, Canada, Pritpal Thind, Steve Lemay, Dave Mcmahon

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Marketing concepts are rarely applied to policing, although for most modern societies it is an essential function and part of the social contract between governments at all levels and the publics they serve. In this paper, we look specifically at how marketing concepts apply to policing in Ontario, Canada. We frame our examination with concepts like the halo effect, the availability effect, and other ideas outlined by Kahneman (2013).

Love At First Touch: How Swiping Vs. Typing Changes Online Dating Decision-Making, Farhana Nusrat, Yaniu Huang, Cait Lamberton

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Online dating is one of the fastest-growing industries in the United States. Due to its increasing popularity, various dimensions of online dating have been studied in recent years. However, no research has explored how the type of digital platforms used impacts online dating. In this research, we investigate how the use of different platforms (computers vs. smartphones) can influence customers’ decision-making process in the context of online dating. Through multiple studies, we demonstrate that while using their computers (vs. smartphones) to evaluate dating profiles, customers will prioritize the inner attributes of the person (e.g., personality and compatibility). Moreover, the effect …

Investigating How Tacit Knowledge Management Inclination And Explicit Marketing Agendas Impact Business Success., Christine A. Makama

AMTP Proceedings 2022

The purpose of this paper is to develop and propose a framework that illustrates the relationship that exist between tacit knowledge management inclination, internal explicit marketing agendas and external explicit marketing agendas. Furthermore, the paper will also show how these variables act together to enhance business outcomes such as competitive advantage, growth and development, employee’s satisfaction, customers retention, loyalty, and satisfaction. Similarly, the conceptual framework would demonstrate how the assimilation between the variables extends and fill in the gap on conceptual and operational boundaries of existing models on explicit marketing agendas and how they help organizations attain success. And standing …

Determining Patient Satisfaction And Well-Being In Dental Healthcare: Expanding Theoretical Models Through Grounded-Theory Methods, Kristina M. Harrison

AMTP Proceedings 2022

This research involves examining the antecedents of patient satisfaction in dental healthcare while utilizing a grounded theory approach. We created a model of dental care patient satisfaction and well-being and found that past experiences, expectations, desires, emotions, sensations, co-creation behaviors, relational factors, level of involvement, and level of patient engagement impacts patient satisfaction, which subsequently impacts patient well-being. These findings contribute a theoretical model incorporating extant research on customer and healthcare satisfaction while also providing practical implications for dental service providers to implement in their practices. Future research can expand this study to include the point of view of dental …

Examining The Relationships Between Branding Factors And Likelihood Of Recommending: Determinants Of Net Promoter Score, Musa Pinar, Tulay Girard

AMTP Proceedings 2022

The study identifies the branding factors related to Net Promoter Score (NPS) that would predict the likelihood of recommending the two strategic business units of the company--convenience store and fuel. It investigates customer perceptions of branding factors of a convenience store/fuel station corporate chain and the relationships among them. The data were collected from the members of the company’s loyalty program. The results reveal that the company has been performing well in branding factors, where the loyalty program is perceived the highest, followed by friendly employees, likelihood to recommend fuel, satisfaction with fuel, and helpful employees. The correlation and regression …

Investigating Consumer Choice Criteria For Free Services, Samer Elhajjar, Shaheen Borna, Russ Wahlers

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Behavioral sciences recognize the following steps in the consumer purchase decision process: recognition of a problem or a need, search for information, alternative evaluation, purchase decision, and post-purchase evaluation. There is a plethora of research related to the aforementioned consumer decision-making process. The unanswered question in the marketing literature is: what changes, if any, in the consumer's decision process will be observed if they can obtain the product free of charge. Results of our study indicate that when consumers are spending their money on themselves, they are very careful and want to get the most for their money. On the …

Event-Related Potentials Differentiate Gender-Based Responses To Brands, William J. Jones, Kelene A. Fercho, Lee A. Baugh

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Despite significant advances in scholarship at the intersection of gender and neuroscience, marketing scholars have failed to capitalize on these developments. This research seeks to fill a gap in the literature by examining brain-related responses to brands as a function of gender using event-related potentials (ERPs), which employs time-locked electroencephalographic (EEG) data. Thirty-three participants (17 female) made evaluations of clothing brands and clothing articles, individually and combined, while their preferences and brain-related data were recorded. Results reveal a gender-based dissociation in the time course of product-brand evaluations and offer new insights for gender selectivity theory.

“Just Hanging With My Friends”: U.S. Latina/O/X’S Perspectives On Parasocial Relationships In Podcast Listening During Covid-19, Arthur D. Soto-Vasquez, Olga Vilceanu, Kristine Johnson

AMTP Proceedings 2022

There is a need to delve into major subgroups among Latina/o/xs and identify emerging patterns in their understanding and consumption of new media. This study used six small-group interviews to explore the fluidity of parasocial dynamics with podcasts in the context of young Latina/o/x podcast listeners experiencing the COVID-19 lockdown. The conceptual acronym EASY (Engaged Experience, Accessible Authenticity, Socialization in Solitude, and Youth and YouTube) was developed to interpret pandemic listening amount Latina/o/x podcast users.

Brand Love And Purchase Intention: Does A Sports Team Name Matter?, Kristy C. Grayson Dba, Katie Kamachi Phd, David Olsen Phd

AMTP Proceedings 2022

This study aims to explore the relationship between the construct of brand love, the strength of fan allegiance to a sport team brand name, fan past purchase behavior, and future purchase intention should a team change its controversial name. The overall research question that bounds this study is: How does consumer brand love and a change to a sport team name impact fan purchase behavior?

The Patient-Centric Blockchain, Sunil Erevelles, Maanasi Bulusu, Timea Honeycutt, Stephanie Seligman, Padma Bulusu

AMTP Proceedings 2022

A revolution is brewing in the healthcare marketplace. In the early nineties, the World Wide Web initiated a new era for the use of the Internet in the consumption of healthcare services. This eventually led to the Big Data movement (Erevelles et al. 2016), which initiated a non-linear transformation in healthcare analytics and developed into a dominant paradigm in the healthcare marketplace. However, the World Wide Web architecture was never designed to support a marketplace in healthcare or, for that matter, a marketplace of any other kind. It was primarily designed for the sharing of information and was even referred …

How Cultural Factors Affect Chinese Americans’ Attitudes Towards Seeking Mental Health Services, Arlene Q. Chen, Xinji Xiao, Yueting Wu, Xuan Zhang, Sindy Chapa

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Chinese Americans are the largest ethnic group among Asian Americans. However, the treatment rate for mental illness among Chinese Americans is much lower compared to other ethnic groups. Studies have been conducted on cultural barriers that prevent Asian Americans from seeking mental health treatment, but there is a lack of research on specific ethnic groups, such as Chinese Americans or Korean Americans because they are frequently grouped into homogenous clusters. This study will identify the cultural factors that influence Chinese Americans’ attitudes towards seeking mental health treatment and analyze how these factors affect their behaviors in seeking mental health treatment.

Facilitating The Choice Of College Major Using The Consumer Decision Process, Content Marketing, And Social Media, Julie M. Pharr

AMTP Proceedings 2022

This paper demonstrates how digital content and patterns of online engagement may be used at every stage of the consumer decision process to influence and inform the choice of college major. Implications and recommendations for college and departmental websites concerning how they can best assist prospective students in choosing a college major are highlighted throughout the paper. With its focus on process, this paper concretely shows how colleges and their academic departments can effectively leverage digital marketing and the consumer decision process to facilitate the college major choice process.

Chamber Of Commerce Membership: An Explanatory Model Of Member Organizations’ Normative, Continuance And Affective Commitment, Shawn Clouse, Simona Stan, Nader Shooshtari

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Organizations of different types (large or small, for profit or not) associate in order to gain benefits from working together such as advocacy in the local business community, business expertise, access to markets, and more efficient operations through better communication and collaboration that drive the effectiveness of their leadership and innovation. The purpose of this study is to contribute to a better understanding of the factors that drive member organizations’ commitment to membership in a local Chamber of Commerce. The research hypotheses look at how membership commitment is impacted by the chamber’s role in the community, member satisfaction, member organization …

Is Sales Competition A Good Motivator Or A Bad Idea? The Underlying Mechanism Of Threat Appraisals, William J. Zahn Ph.D., Yi Peng, Willy Bolander, Bryan Hochstein, David Mathis

AMTP Proceedings 2022

The common logic for competition in sales organizations is simple: as salespeople compete with one another, the sales performance of the entire group should increase. Some prior research has supported this notion, while other studies suggested that competition may adversely affect employees. Our research finds both positions have merit, as a salesperson's perceptions of a competitive psychological climate (CPC) increase sales performance and turnover intentions. To explain this countervailing effect, we turn to cognitive appraisal theory to demonstrate that salesperson appraisal of the environment motivates their behavior. Specifically, salesperson threat appraisals act as a mediator between CPC to performance and …

Flipping The Online Classroom – Comparing The Effectiveness Of Two Teaching Modalities For Online Experiential Learning Activities, William J. Zahn Ph.D.

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Marketing educators recognize the importance of imparting theoretical marketing knowledge while also helping students acquire marketable skills through experiential learning. Experiential learning is active, reflective learning that encourages linking abstract lessons with concrete activities. Experiential education is learning by doing (Cowley, 2020; Frontczak, 1998),

Courses have shifted away from in-person lectures and moved online due to the Covid-19 epidemic (Thomason 2020). This shift has left an open question of the best way to include experiential learning in an online learning environment. In short, how can students best prepare for and learn from experiential learning without having face-to-face meetings with their …

Building A Personal Brand Using Impression Management In Social Networks, Carlos Valdez, Jorge Villegas

AMTP Proceedings 2022

As digital social networks become an integral part of career placement, advancement, and professional networks, young professionals are required to find ways to compete for the attention of potential and current employers. One of the theories that have been used across diverse areas from marketing scholars (Zamudio et al., 2013, Close et al., 2011; Noble et al., 2010) to fashion models (Parmentier et al., 2013) to understand self-promotion for professionals is personal branding. Recent articles like Swaminathan et al. (2020) have expressed the need to understand better how consumers are branding themselves in the hyperconnected world and what psychological consequences …

The Perceptions And Experiences Of Human Resources Recruiters Regarding Linkedin As An Online Personal Branding Representation Of Recent Business Graduates, Carlos Valdez, Carole Ann Creque, David Penn, James Gallo

AMTP Proceedings 2022

This study aimed to explore the perceptions and experiences of Human Resource Recruiters regarding LinkedIn as an online personal branding representation of recent business program graduates by using a phenomenological approach. The population of interest comprises Human Resource Recruiters that use LinkedIn and hire recent business graduates.The recordings and or transcripts of the interviews were utilized to conduct an interpretative phenomenological analysis to identify broader themes across the data set. The identified themes follow the same order as the questions conducted during the sessions. The five themes that emerged are (1) Social platforms utilized by HR recruiters, (2) HR recruiters' …

Intention To Pursue A Sales Career: A Dyadic Study Of Students And Parents Extended Abstract, Joseph Little, Mark Kubik, Alexander King, Grant Weidman

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Typical career choice selection studies generally have been one sided focusing on students or parents independently. This dyadic study aims to analyze student and their parent influencers to determine what will be the strongest influencer of a student to pursue a career in sales. “Because the dyad is arguable the fundamental unit of interpersonal interaction and relations, family relations such as a parent and their child/student have a powerful dyadic component” (Kenny et al., 2006, p1). Therefore, understanding the influencers of this career choice selection may lead to interventions for increasing the number of students to pursue a career in …

Exploring Stakeholders’ Perceptions Toward Event Innovations, Sophie Unson, Wei Wang Dr.

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Although the impacts of COVID-19 have been negative and long-lasting, the hospitality and tourism industry has seen the creation of new processes and ideas as a result. The events industry in particular, has a lack of research on innovative practices; therefore, this study will examine new innovations that emerged from the global pandemic. This study utilizes a multi-method research style, in which it qualitatively examines industry professional’s strategies to combat the pandemic and quantitatively measures consumers responses. The current results of the study show six major qualitative themes that will used to measure the consumer’s perceptions of events during the …

Human Chefs Cook More Calories: The Impact Of Human (Vs. Robotic) Food Producer On Calorie Estimation, Wenyan Yin, Yanliu Huang, Cait Lamberton

AMTP Proceedings 2022

This research explores how the production mode (human-made vs. robot-made) has an impact on calorie estimation for vice and virtue food. Across 3 studies, we find that healthy food is inferred to have more calories when it is produced by a robot than by a human whereas the effect is reversed for unhealthy food. Unhealthy food produced by a human is estimated to have more calories than the counterpart.

From Customizing Products To Possessive Bonds: The Role Of Consumer Involvement And Consumer Privacy Concern, Hua Chang, Lingling Zhang

AMTP Proceedings 2022

Despite the prevalence of customized products and service in the marketplace, little research has examined the impact of customization on consumers. The current research investigates the role of brand customization on consumers’ brand relationship and brand attitude. The findings from two experiments demonstrate that consumers with high involvement (vs. low) will have more positive brand relationship and brand attitude. In addition, consumer’s privacy concern moderates this relationship such that the identified positive effect exists only for those with a low privacy concern.