Oliver Emrich

Situation-related tasks for mobile services in retailing

This research investigates the opportunities in multichannel retailing that may enable firms to integrate mobile services in accordance with their overall marketing objectives. Using a multiple case study method, the authors conduct an exploratory study, followed by survey research to verify the qualitative findings through confirmatory factor analysis. When they add mobile services, retailers can influence the situational prerequisites of consumption during the buying process, particularly in three identified fields of application. With occasion-based services, retailers create a situation that fosters immediate purchase in a specific time frame. Location-based services affect the spatial dimension of a consumers decision process and thus the choice of retailer. Using target group-based services, the retailer can extend control over customers and attain additional opportunities for information and consumption that match typical routines of predefined customer segments. To analyze the roles of these mobile services in retail marketing planning, this study compares the three fields in terms of their market potentials, key tasks, and required competences.

Kundeninteraktion über mobile Services im Handel

Mobile Services beeinflussen im Handel langfristig das Management der Kundenbeziehungen mithilfe eines Gerats, das fur jungere Generationen von Konsumenten bereits heute in die Rolle des wichtigsten Begleiters gekommen ist. Der emotionale Bezug des Konsumenten sowie der mobile Zugriff auf die Informationsmoglichkeiten im Internet machen das Mobiltelefon zu einem einflussreichen Instrument fur seine Kaufentscheidungen im stationaren Handel. Handler mussen daher ihren Wettbewerbsvorteil vernetzt uber mehrere Kanale konsequent kommunizieren. Mobile Services lassen sich dabei drei explorativen Anwendungsfeldern im Handel zuordnen, die sich hinsichtlich ihres Informationsmechanismus unterscheiden. Anlass-, zielgruppen- und ortsbasierte Services unterstutzen jeweils unterschiedliche Aufgaben der Marketingplanung und fuhren die Kundeninteraktion in differenzierter Weise fort.

Websites as Information Hubs: How Informational Channel Integration and Shopping Benefit Density Interact in Steering Customers to the Physical Store

Multichannel retailers aim to steer customers to physical stores in order to increase cross-selling, benefit from higher margins, and offer multisensory experiences. The question of how retailers can steer customers to strategically important channels remains. We propose that retailers may induce customers to switch to physical stores by communicating information about channel integration on their websites and that this explicit communication is influenced by the implicit communication of shopping benefits of which customers and retailers may not be aware. Using a multilevel and multisource approach with field data on 1,479 customers and 104 firms, we find that informational online-to-physical channel integration on a retailer’s website influences customers’ online-to-physical store switching and that the density of concurrently communicated shopping benefits moderates this effect. Our results extend the literature on channel choice and provide implications for retailers regarding how to design websites as information hubs to steer customers to physical stores.

Linking Service and Innovation Processes on the Internet: A Framework for Customer-Firm Constellations in Electronic Networks

Co-creation on the Internet mainly refers to product development tasks undertaken in collaboration with customers, though customers participate even more closely in service creation. As the relational potential of customer-firm interactions becomes increasingly important, this article attempts to foster a deeper understanding of the role of the Internet in different types of service and innovation processes, capable of both generating implicit knowledge in a value network of collaborating actors and bringing ideas to the market. A cross-case study reveals that operant resources on the Internet build around the buying process of the customer while also drawing a circle through the value chain. The architecture of the value chain changes from a single-directed stream to a loop of knowledge exchange that includes almost every vertical stage. When exploiting the relational capacity of customer-firm interactions on the Internet, firms therefore cannot assign customer input to a certain functionality but rather must decipher it through interdisciplinary approaches that involve the cooperation of multiple areas.

Kundenansprache über Interaktionsplattformen im Internet

Das Internet gewinnt fur Unternehmen als Kommunikationskanal immer starker an Bedeutung. Alleine die deutschen Online-Werbeausgaben stiegen von 418,7 Mio. EUR in 2005 auf 692,7 Mio. EUR in 2006 (vgl. Nielsen Netratings 2007). Dennoch zeigt sich eine Diskrepanz zwischen der Gewichtung von Werbebudgets und der Wahrnehmung der Konsumenten. So unterschatzen Unternehmen die Werbewirkung von Online-Plattformen (vgl. Capgemini 2006, S. 8). Im sogenannten Web 2.0, das durch die aktive Teilnahme des Konsumenten an WertschOpfungsprozessen im Internet gekennzeichnet ist, ermOglicht die Kooperation mit dem Kunden eine hOhere Akzeptanz von Informationen. Dieser Artikel soll daher neue Formen der Kundenansprache beleuchten, die auf eine starkere Interaktion mit dem Kunden uber das Internet setzen.