Lisa O’Malley

Retailing applications of geodemographics

The term geodemographics is derived from the combination of both geographic and demographic information on populations. The concept of geo‐demographic data is relatively new, and much confusion exists as to the extent to which such information is actually being used by both the public and private sector in the UK. One industry for which geodemographic information is particularly important is retailing. This is because retail location decisions are extremely capital‐intensive and locations themselves, once chosen, are (in the short term at least) fixed. Given the current economic climate and increased competition, it is becoming ever more important for retailers to monitor their trade areas, assess the impact of competition, and choose new store locations strategically. Discusses the use of geodemographics by retailers in their site modelling and trade area decision making and use is made of exploratory interviews in this respect.

Direct marketing: rise and rise or rise and fall?

Focuses on the growth and future direction of direct marketing from the point of view of “user” companies. Describes the most significant findings from a recent empirical study of consumer reactions to being directly targeted. Highlights important consumer concerns with regard to privacy and ethical issues. Given that the long‐term success and prosperity of the industry will be closely related to its image among consumers, guidelines are developed for companies using direct marketing as to how they can positively promote industry growth and reduce consumer concerns in the future. Briefly describes the self‐regulatory bodies and codes of practice relevant to direct marketers within the UK.

On the marketing implications of place narratives

Abstract Acknowledging that ‘locals’ are recognised as an important (yet neglected) dimension of place marketing and following critiques of places as ‘products’, the purpose of this paper is to give voice to ‘local people’. Drawing on local narratives of Santorini, Greece, we call attention to places as culturally significant and discursively produced and consumed. Local narratives provide multiple meanings constructed around the diverse and contested experiences of living and making a living in a place. Our analysis employs the metaphors of ‘harsh beauty’, ‘service business’ and ‘home’ to capture these perspectives. The paper has implications for the development of generative metaphors of ‘place’ and ‘local’ within place marketing and contributes to the dialogue over the continued relevance of our discipline to the public sphere.

Relational marketing: development, debates and directions

Abstract Relationship marketing (RM) is an umbrella term for a loose collection of ideas and concepts that emerged in different empirical contexts from the late 1970s. Informed by diverse research traditions, it represented at one and the same time an extension of existing ideas within marketing management and a very different way of thinking about marketing. Though cooperation has not been a core element of the marketing management lexicon, debates about cooperation and competition predate the 1970s. Moreover, re-engaging with relational perspectives raises important questions about managerial autonomy and about the utility of the market as a regulating force. The paper calls for the development of a more realistic theory of networks with inputs from both business and consumer marketing contexts.

Beating, ditching and hiding: consumers’ everyday resistance to marketing

ABSTRACT This article illuminates consumers’ views of marketing in light of theories of resistance. It argues that consumers engage in resistance to the power of marketing through their everyday actions and also through the ways they construct their accounts of these actions. It identifies three theoretical approaches to resistance (hegemonic, relational and autonomous). These are used to discuss consumers’ accounts of marketing collected through 78 personal interviews in which participants were asked to describe marketing and provide examples of their experiences with marketing as they defined it. Through this, the study uncovers various forms of consumer resistance, which can often go unnoticed. These are conceptualised through the notion of everyday resistance to marketing and are used to challenge existing marketing theory and develop paths for future research.

Unveiling everyday reflexivity tactics in a sustainable community

Approaches to enhancing sustainability have largely focused on altering individual consumption behaviors. However, this focus on the individual consumer has been recently critiqued because the behavior of individuals is situated within wider socio-cultural contexts. Thus, the sustainability research agenda is shifting away from individual consumers towards understanding consumption practices, social networks, material infrastructures and organisations of various forms in which consumption is problematized and consumption choices are reflected upon and negotiated. These social spaces need to be understood if change is to be truly achieved. Drawing on ethnographic research conducted in an Irish ecovillage, we examine how ecovillage members negotiate sustainable consumption at the everyday level. Analysis reveals how members of the ecovillage employ tactics that encourage reflexivity in the everyday. Specifically, these reflexive tactics work together to confront routine consumption, create alternative infrastructures that support sustainability, and foster critical engagement.

Making Santorini: reflecting on the past, imagining the future

Purpose Strategic analyses of Mediterranean destinations have well documented the impacts of mass tourism, including high levels of seasonality and landscape degradation as a result of the “anarchic” nature of tourism development in these destinations. The lack of a strategic framework is widely recognised in academic and popular discourse. What is often missing, however, is local voice and attention to the local particularities that have shaped the course of tourism development in these places. Focusing on narratives of people living and working in Santorini, Greece, this paper aims to examine tourism development as a particular cultural experience of development. Design/methodology/approach The authors conducted narrative interviews with 22 local residents and entrepreneurs. Participants belonged to different occupational sectors and age groups. These are supplemented with secondary data, consisting of books, guides, documentaries and online news articles on Santorini. Findings The analysis and interpretation by the authors identify remembered, experienced and imagined phases of tourism development, which we label as romancing tourism, disenchantment and reimagining tourism. Research limitations/implications Professionalisation has certainly allowed the improvement of quality standards, but in transforming hosts into service providers, a distance and objectivity is created that results in a loss of authenticity. Authenticity is not just about what the tourists seek but also about what a place is or can be, and the “sense of place” that residents have and use in their everyday lives. Social implications Local narratives offer insights into the particularities of tourism development and the varied, contested and dynamic meanings of places. Place narratives can therefore be a useful tool in developing a reflexive and participative place-making process. Originality/value The study serves the understanding of how tourism, subject to the global-local relations, is a particular experience of development that shapes a place’s identity. The case of Santorini shows how place-making involves changing, multilayered desires and contradictory visions of tourism and development. This makes socio-cultural and environmental challenges hard to resolve. It is thus challenging to change the course of development, as various actors at the local level and beyond have diverse interests and interpretations of what is desirable for the place.

Liminal consumption of “the cosmic ballet”: an autoethnography

ABSTRACT This study explores the consumption of dance during the identity transition of a homosexual man as a means of appreciating the role of dance in identity management. The account explicates how consumption of a transcendental and paradoxical form of dance called Tandava, or “the cosmic ballet,” empowers an individual to deal with his homosexual identity issues at key liminal junctures. Specifically, the study explores how the homosexual body mobilizes the movements and symbolism in the dance to negotiate identity issues. The study employs the first author’s lived experiences as the research material and depicts his Tandava against the backdrop of his “moments of marginalization.” In particular, autoethnographic writing is fused with the first author’s dance performance to serve as a method of inquiry into his homosexual identity formation. The study shows how dance facilitated the first author’s identity transition from a state of confusion to acceptance. In so doing the study contributes both to the literature on homosexual identity formation and on dance in consumer research.

Place branding and place narratives

This chapter discusses the potential of narratives in facilitating community engagement through a participative place branding process. Narrative is an important mode through which people construct reality and as such narrative is also implicated in the formation of place. As means through which we can make sense of people’s experiences of place and their desires and aspirations, narratives are also relevant to the aims of bottom-up, participative place branding programmes. These approaches are gaining popularity, following criticisms of top-down place branding for failing to resonate with place realities and the disenchantment of different communities with place brands. Finally, addressing methodological considerations of the narrative inquiry approach, the chapter examines ways to access, elicit and make sense of place narratives. The narrative perspective advocated here puts emphasis on branding as a reflexive, dynamic and collaborative process that embraces and works with the inherent tensions and contradictions of places.

Authenticity and Transparency in the Teaching of Leadership Readiness

This chapter presents and explores the personal insights we have gained about the teaching of leadership. Generated through a process of critical reflection, these insights focused on the motives and assumptions we brought to our teaching of leadership to a cohort of marketing students. The process of reflection occurred through a series of conversations in which we grappled with a number of questions about leadership. In particular, we consider whether and how leadership can be taught, and whether and how it can be taught in the absence of a clear definition of leadership. We interrogate how the design and teaching of this course enabled participants to learn about leadership and we explore what this might imply about the limits, requirements and values of leadership education in formal settings. And we conclude that by confronting and changing some dominant practices and assumptions about teaching leadership, we can achieve the goals of leadership education in more transparent and authentic ways.