Marketing Commons^™

Don't Be Undersold!, Jan-Benedict E.M. Steenkamp, Nirmalya Kumar

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

"Aldi" is a word that strikes fear in the hearts of brand managers across Europe. A chain of low-budget retail stores with sales of $73.5 billion in 2008, Aldi invented what is commonly referred to as the hard-discount store, a format that is destroying between a quarter and a half trillion dollars in brand sales annually.Brand executives at major consumer packaged goods companies have mostly been caught off guard by this success, The authors' research identified four key misconceptions that explain why: (1) Hard discounters can succeed only in Europe; (2) they attract only the poor; (3) they offer inferior …

The Sacred And The Secular: Blending Borders To Maximize Product Success, Karen R. Deross

Journalism

In a society where a person can choose anything he wants from a vast literary buffet, the products that appeal to varied audiences with differing values and interests stand out among the masses. The Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren is a prominent example of a product that became explosively successful in two starkly differing markets: the secular and the religious.

This research paper explores the history and controversy surrounding the combination of these two markets and the implications they have for each. The triumph of The Purpose Driven Life, as well as other prominent Christian titles, is focused on …

Seeking Emotion Enhancement Or Uncertainty Resolution? A Dual-System Approach To Examining Post-Purchase Information Search, Hanwen Hannah Chang, Cecile Cho, Leonard Lee

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Product information search is typically assumed to follow the recognition of a purchase need and to occur before decision making. Once a sale transaction is completed, searching for information (e.g. price) on the purchased product seems futile and even irrational. Real-life observation and prior research (e.g. Russo and Leclerc 1994), however, suggest that such post-purchase search behavior is pervasive among consumers despite having no apparent consequence.

Retaining Customers With Shopping Convenience, Sabine Moeller, Martin Fassnacht, Andreas Ettinger

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Our empirical research investigates the impact of dimensions of shopping convenience (decision, access, search, transaction, and after-sales convenience) on customer retention, including customer behavioral loyalty (shares of wallet and visits) and attitudinal loyalty (exit intention). Our findings show that for utilitarian shopping, behavioral and attitudinal loyalty are partly affected by different dimensions. Decision and access convenience, dimensions that come into play prior to the purchase, are most important for share of visits and share of wallet. Apart from decision convenience, exit intention is very much affected by transaction convenience, which is an in-store dimension. Furthermore, comparing our results with results …

Differential Reliance On Feelings In The Present Vs. The Future (Or Past): Affect As A Decision Making System Of The Present, Hanwen Hannah Chang, Michel Tuan Pham

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

We posit that compared to the cognitive system, the affective system of judgment and decision making is relatively more engaged in the present. Specifically, we hypothesize that even if their accessibility is held constant, affective feelings are weighted more heavily in consumer judgments and decisions set in the present than in equivalent judgments and decisions set in the future or in the past. Consistent with this proposition, results from six experiments show that (a) compared to a more distant future, a nearer future increases consumers’ relative preferences for options that are superior in terms of integral affect over options that …

Technology Adoption: Influence Of Availability And Accessibility, William S. Mcconnell

All Faculty and Staff Scholarship

Farmers are small business leaders using available technology to remain competitive. The availability of technology is dependent on the suppliers' use of the marketing mix 4Ps theory--product, price, placement, and promotion. The purpose of this study was to determine how the relation between availability and accessibility influences the adoption by rural farmers of new technological innovations, specifically internet services. Results indicated availability factors (product, price, placement, and promotion) positively correlated to accessibility factors (perceived usefulness, ease of use, and behavioral intention). The study provides empirical support for an extended technology acceptance model (TAM) that includes availability factors as external variables.

Who I Am And How I Think: The Impact Of Self-Construal On The Roles Of Internal And External Reference Prices In Price Evaluations, Yi, Cathy Chen

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Drawing from self-construal studies on cognitive styles as well as reference price literature, this research investigates the impact of independent versus interdependent self-construal on consumers' use of internal reference prices (IRPs) and external reference prices (ERPs) during price evaluations. Three experiments reveal that IRPs have a larger impact on price evaluations for participants who are primed with an independent (vs. interdependent) self-construal, whereas ERPs have a larger impact for participants who are primed with an interdependent (vs. independent) self-construal. The differential impact of self-construal on the use of IRPs and ERPs seems to be mediated by a generalized, perceived sense …

Exploring Marketing And Sales Opportunities: How Companies Reach Their Target Market Using Hospitality And Tourism Venues For Distribution Of The Product Or Services, Ricardo J. Rodriguez-Canales

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Many companies unrelated or semi-related to travel and tourism have found their niche within the hospitality and tourism industry. Companies who primarily focus on fashion, retail, weddings, outdoor adventure, real estate, sports and entertainment have successfully negotiated space to promote their products and services to hospitality and tourism clientele. This can be seen at the many resorts and casinos that have retail shops in their facilities as well as golf courses, restaurants and clubs that market directly to and make their profits from hospitality patrons. This complimentary mix makes up the diverse experience travelers encounter. To narrow the focus of …

Consumer Generated Media: Evolving Marketing Opportunity For Consumer Engagement, Irene J. Dickey, William F. Lewis

Management and Marketing Faculty Publications

This paper examines consumer-generated media (CGM), also called user-generated Web sites or social media, and the evolving and broad consumer behaviors associated with it. CGM websites have evolved rapidly during the last few years, but so have consumer behaviors and subsequently marketing tactics and future potential opportunities. Marketers should be aware of the characteristics of this type of website and understand how they are being used by consumers and other practitioners. CGM sites are primarily used by consumers to connect with others for many reasons. This connectivity, also called engagement, appears to be an opportunity for marketers to connect with …

Gender Differences In Communication:Implications For Salespeople, Daniel H. Mcquiston, Kathryn A. Morris

Scholarship and Professional Work - Business

As more women enter into the traditionally male-dominated occupations of sales and purchasing, an understanding of gender differences in communication can provide salespeople with added information to increase their effectiveness. 1his paper begins with a review of the research on gender differences in verbal and non-verbal communication and then applies these findings to the field of sales. The paper concludes with managerial implications and recommendations for how salespeople might account for gendered aspects of their communications and by so doing potentially increase the effectiveness of their sales process.

Postscript: Preserving (And Growing) Brand Value In A Downturn, Randle D. Raggio, Robert P. Leone

Marketing Faculty Publications

We have taken the opportunity provided by the current worldwide recession to further explore the implications of the relationship between brand equity and brand value that we proposed previously,^1,2 and our analysis reveals that companies have one of two strategic options for surviving. The “Just Good Enough” strategy maximizes current value, potentially hurting brand equity and appropriable value (or potential future value) in the process, while the “Altered Amortization” strategy offers an opportunity to chase current value while maintaining brand equity with current prospects and activating latent equity with potential prospects, which may increase appropriable value. Anything between these …

Defensive Relationship Marketing: Avoiding Decreasing Sales From Customers In Consumer Goods Mass Markets, Sabine Moeller, Martin Fassnacht, Sonja Klose

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Enhancing customers' positive attitude towards a company does not exploit the whole potential of what can be done to increase sales. A more defensive approach focuses on the avoidance of customers' negative attitudes and behavior of withdrawal. Since research on this approach is scarce we aim to contribute by developing a model of how retailers can avoid decreasing sales in consumer goods mass markets. According to our aim we focus on customers who have already begun to decrease their sales. Our results show that core performance and trust in the future performance are the silver bullets to avoid decreasing sales.

Cross-Functional Integration And New Product Performance: An Empirical Analysis And Findings, Lisa C. Troy, Tanawat Hirunyawipada, Audhesh K. Paswan

Management and Marketing Faculty Publications

Although cross-functional integration is often considered an important element in a successful new product development program, a great deal of variance exists in extant literature regarding how integration is defined and implemented and how relevant studies are conducted.

The authors attempt to bring clarity to a diverse set of 25 studies that investigate cross-functional integration by empirically analyzing 146 correlations between integration and aspects of new product success. The authors examine the impact of 12 potential moderators that affect the integration–success link using meta-analysis techniques.

The findings indicate that though cross-functional integration may indeed have a direct impact on success, …

Customer Integration: A Key To An Implementation Perspective Of Service Provision, Sabine Moeller

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

A paradigm shift in marketing seems to be underway. Inspired by Vargo and Lusch's (2004a) proposal of service dominant logic, customer integration is proposed as a key component of marketing. Three stages of service provision are identified: facilities, transformation. and usage. The stages differ in terms of resource origin (company or customer), autonomy of decision-making (integrative or autonomous), and value (potential value, value-in-transformation. and value-in-use). These perspectives, which are synthesized in the study framework, shed light on the process of service provision and direct or indirect knowledge application (Vargo and Lusch 2004a). The author aims to show that in the …

The Logic Of Movement: Consumption Logistics On The Las Vegas Strip, Robert Dean

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The omnipresence of consumption in advanced societies is indisputable; spaces designed to facilitate consumption (or means of consumption) are one aspect of that presence. On the surface, these spaces appear to be quite harmless dreamworlds full of possibilities, but at another level they are highly instrumental, composed of various mechanisms that work to sell commodities through the manipulation of consumer behavior. I argue that consumption spaces express a logic of movement, and a consumption logistics, that is based on the commodity form and relatable to warfare that works to domesticate consumers into the commodity system. I engage in an exploratory …

Become A Value Merchant, James Anderson, Nirmalya Kumar, James A. Narus

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Increasingly held accountable for reducing costs, purchasing and other customer managers don't have the luxury of simply believing suppliers' claims of cost savings. A relatively easy and quick way to obtain savings is for purchasing managers to focus on price and obtain price concessions from suppliers. To enhance their negotiating power, purchasing managers attempt to convince suppliers that their offerings are the same as their competitors, so that they could be easily replaced. In the face of such pressure, suppliers cave in and match competitor prices. Doing business based on demonstrating and documenting superior value is, indeed, a rare commodity. …

Certified Value Sellers, James Anderson, Nirmalya Kumar, James A. Narus

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Some companies think that offering deep discounts to buyers is the only way to sell their products in business markets. The authors propose a better way.

Business Market Value Merchants, James Anderson, Nirmalya Kumar, James A. Narus

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

To get a fair return on the superior value that their offerings deliver to customers, progressive B-to-B companies transform their sales forces from value spendthrifts into value merchants. These companies foster value merchants in more ways than simply compensating salespeople on profitability. As a result, their salespeople become value merchants, making business with customers more profitable by finding value drains and value leaks--rather than by seeking price cuts to retain or gain business.

How Does Advertising Articulate The Tropes Of The Posthuman That Exist In Contemporary Culture?, Norah Campbell

Doctoral

The posthuman is a concept that has accrued much currency in disciplines as diverse as legal theory, artificial life science and philosophy. This thesis explores the meaning of the concept by initially examining what it means to be human, finding that art and science have so far failed to provide a long-lasting definition of humanness. Instead of a temporal “coming-after” stage of humanity, posthumanism might be more usefully seen as a concept that draws attention to the cracks that have always existed in the apparently water-tight description of the human- how the “human” has changed radically and continues to change …

The Perceived Effects Of Increased Fuel Prices, Sean O'Roark

Undergraduate Theses and Capstone Projects

This project, “Perceptions About the Causes and Effects of Increasing Fuel Prices,” seeks to understand the attitudes of major newspaper editorials concerning the increase of fuel prices. A content analysis of various newspaper editorials from the New York Times, Washington Times, Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post was conducted to gain an understanding of the attitudes and predictions these writers put forth concerning the increase in the price of fuel. Some of the areas this study focused on included what the writer’s attitude was, what were the attributions of and consequences of increased prices, and what was the main …

Consumer-Generated Media (Cgm): An Exploratory Study Of Various Forms, Value To Consumers, And Marketing Practitioners, And Global Implications, Irene J. Dickey, William F. Lewis

Management and Marketing Faculty Publications

This paper examines consumer-generated media (CGM), also called user-generated Web sites or social media. The Internet is clearly dynamic in nature, and CGM will be of interest to marketers as e-commerce races ahead. The basis for the growth and the importance of such sites will be explored to improve our understanding of their development and use by marketers. Our research will consider the domestic and global behaviors, and findings will be useful for both researchers and marketing practitioners who seek to understand issues relevant to CGM and associated marketing tactics and their ability to accomplish marketing objectives, particularly related to …

Perceived Importance And Future Use Of Online Channels Of Distribution By Small Businesses In The United States And Australia: An Exploratory Study, Irene J. Dickey, William F. Lewis, John Vanbeveren

Management and Marketing Faculty Publications

Online marketing is important to small-business owners and operators because they are typically faced with limited budgets to design and implement traditional marketing programs. This paper compares the perceived importance of specific online marketing tactics and their anticipated future use of online marketing tactics by small businesses in the United States and Australia. Results of the study reveal that both in the United States and in Australia, there is a growing use of online marketing tactics to accomplish marketing objectives. While most online marketing tactics were effective in both the United States and Australia, there were some statistically significant differences.

The National Game And Irish Society: The Gaa As A Cultural Brand, Aine Carroll

Masters

The link between brands and culture is well documented (McCracken, 1986; Ritson and Elliott, 1999). However the purposeful creation of brands related to culture is less evident (Vincent, 2002; Holt, 2004). It is this lack of theoretical understanding of cultural brands that drives this study. The objective of this study is to investigate the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) as an iconic brand within the socio-economic context of Ireland. The literature has been divided into two chapters, the first is an overview of consumer culture as the context within which brands have taken on great importance, in the construction of self …

An Analysis Of Lean Management Procedures In The Irish Audi And Volkswagen Dealer Network, Clive Atkinson

Theses

This study provides an analysis of lean management procedures within Irish motor retailers from the perspective of senior managers working in franchised Audi and Volkswagen dealerships. Richardson (2007) suggests the danger for some organisations operating in good economic conditions is the ability of poor performers to earn healthy profits through little effort, thereby creating a lack of urgency to improve processes within the business. This may be applicable to motor dealerships in Ireland since the advent of the “Celtic Tiger”. Advocates of lean management contend the implementation of lean techniques can increase efficiency within an organisation and create a sustainable …

Nation Equity: Incidental Emotions In Country-Of-Origin Effects, Durairaj Maheswaran, Cathy Yi Chen

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Different from past research on country-of-origin effects that has focused on cognitive factors, this article examines the impact of incidental emotions and cognitive appraisals associated with these emotions on country-of-origin effects. Experiment 1 compared anger and sadness and demonstrated that country of origin influenced evaluations only in the angry (vs. sad) condition where human (vs. situation) control was high. Experiment 2 further identified the effects of agency control using a different emotion, frustration. Based on these observations, this article suggests that, like brands, countries also have equity associated with them, termed nation equity, that has both performance and emotional components. …

Lagu And Belu: The Semiotics Of Bottled Water Packaging, Daniel Fusch

Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture

There has been considerable recent criticism of the bottled water industry from professional and popular as well as scholarly sources. This criticism disputes the veracity of a brand's claim to a pure and natural source, as well as the standards for regulation. This paper adds another factor to the criticism of bottled "natural springs" water, emphasizing the magical operation implicit in the rhetoric for the packaging of bottled water. The paper examines the natural and supernatural semiotics of the commercial packaging for bottled "natural springs" water, and identifies a correlation between the semiotic function of the ancient Germanic rune lagu …

Fashion Sense, Nirmalya Kumar, Sophie Linguri

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

The article focuses on Zara store, which was opened in La Coruña, in Northwest Spain. The stores of Zara had a selling area of 811,100 square meters in 56 countries. Zara had become the best-known fashion brand in Spain and the flagship brand of 5.7 billion euros holding group Inditex, with sales of 3.8 billion euros in the financial year 2004. Among the keys to the success of Zara is its approach to the supply chain. Half of the garments of Zara is sourced around from third parties in low-cost manufacturing locations, including Asia. Basic collection items or wardrobe "staples," …

Multi-Brand Hospitality Operations Branding Strategies, Rikki Tanenbaum

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The purpose of this professional paper is to identify the optimal brand architecture for MGM MIRAGE’s Project CityCenter through synthesis of a review of branding strategies throughout the hospitality industry and a review of Project CityCenter’s goals. As Project CityCenter represents such a massive undertaking from both a financial and marketing perspective, a review of strategies external to MGM MIRAGE is critical; this paper endeavors to highlight branding strategies for potential adoption at Project CityCenter. The project’s significance is affirmed by Terri Lanni, Chairman and CEO of MGM MIRAGE, “Project CityCenter confirms a cultural and lifestyle revival of city living, …

The Impact Of Certain And Uncertain Store Promotions On The Decision-Making Process In Product Choices, Cathy Yi Chen

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Various store promotions ranging from dollar-off discounts to sweepstakes can induce different affects among consumers. Built on recent studies on the uncertainty of incidental affect, this research examines how promotions differ in the feeling of uncertainty elicited, which, in turn, influence the decision-making process of product choices. Specifically, we demonstrate that “uncertain” promotions (e.g., sweepstakes) can increase the extent of systematic decision-making in a subsequent product choice relative to “certain” promotions (e.g., discount) when the choice is easy. But the pattern is reversed when the choice is difficult. The implications to the incidental affect and promotion research are discussed.

Microeconomics Of Brand Loyalty: Learning, Switching, And Uncertainty, Ronia Ahmed Moustafa Hawash

Archived Theses and Dissertations

In a world of competition, loyalty to a particular brand has a significant role in the behaviour of economic agents and the outcome of markets. The objective of this thesis is to examine the microeconomics of brand loyalty from three dimensions: consumer learning by using markets with switching costs, and uncertainty in product quality. The various methodologies used are based on extensions, modeling, and integrative analysis of some works in the literature, most notably those of Klemperer, Pepall, Thisse, Gabszewicz, Schwartz and Wilde, and Tirole. Brand loyalty arising from the above mentioned perspectives is tackled via three models. The first …