Randle D. Raggio

Gratitude in relationship marketing: Theoretical development and directions for future research

Purpose – For centuries, gratitude has represented an integral component of social relationships, yet it remains relatively overlooked by marketing scholars in the study of commercial relationships. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate how gratitude helps to build, maintain and transform commercial relationships and to suggest noteworthy areas of investigation for those researchers seeking to help companies understand the role of gratitude in relationship marketing. Design/methodology/approach – Gratitudes role in relational exchange is explored by a review of relevant literature and two qualitative studies. Questions developed from the literature and exploratory interviews are then investigated in a main study through in-depth interviews with buyers and sellers of goods and services in both B2B and B2C contexts, leading to a grounded theoretical foundation. Generalizations and directions for future research are presented. Findings – Gratitude is a fundamental component of buyer-seller relationshi...

Psychological ownership: a social marketing advertising message appeal?

The authors assessed psychological ownership as a potential persuasive advertising message appeal in social marketing efforts. Psychological ownership is a feeling of possession; it occurs when individuals feel that something is theirs even though they cannot hold legal title to it. Interestingly, the first study indicated advertising messages that generate psychological ownership yielded less favourable attitudes, word of mouth and willingness to pay price premiums among women. Women responded more negatively to messages that attempted to induce psychological ownership than to neutral messages. The adverse responses of women prompted the second study, in which both the psychological ownership message and cognitive capacity were manipulated. Results indicate that, in a limited cognitive capacity condition, women responded similarly towards higher psychological ownership and neutral advertising messages. Further, these effects were mediated by inferences of manipulative intent and not feelings of guilt. Theoretical and managerial implications are offered for marketers attempting to use psychological ownership as an advertising message strategy and gender as a segmentation strategy.

Expressions of Gratitude in Disaster Management: An Economic, Social Marketing, and Public Policy Perspective on Post-Katrina Campaigns

In this article, the authors argue that in the wake of a major disaster, it is not only appropriate but also beneficial for governments to spend public funds to support official gratitude campaigns in response to outside assistance. These assertions are based on results of multiple studies on gratitude from both psychology and marketing that show that expressions of gratitude can offer both economic and social marketing benefits. Evidence demonstrates increased consumer willingness to purchase products produced in the devastated area and intentions to continue prosocial support through volunteerism and financial donations after receiving expressions of gratitude. Evidence also shows that public expressions of gratitude encourage those who did not participate in prior relief/recovery activities to do so in the future. As such, the authors recommend the implementation of a disaster management policy that encourages and rewards private and public groups to partner in similar campaigns. Such a policy leads to both economic and social rewards for the devastated areas and its citizens—and, importantly, the broader society—that outweigh and outlast the expense of the campaign. Specifically, these benefits save those directly affected by a disaster from having to bear the full burden of disaster recovery and rebuilding efforts and could increase the amount of outside economic and social assistance provided.

Brand creation vs acquisition in portfolio expansion strategy

Purpose – This paper seeks to address the following question: What causes firms to choose brand creation vs brand acquisition for brand portfolio expansion?Design/methodology/approach – A multilevel interdisciplinary conceptual model is developed with nine factors at three levels of influence: the market, firm, and brand portfolio. Using 125 brand acquisitions and creations for 22 firms between 2001 and 2007, the model is tested using logistic regression to determine which factors significantly influence brand portfolio expansion strategy and whether they encourage acquisition or creation.Findings – Significant factors were found at the market and firm levels, with competitive intensity of the market having the strongest effect, followed by the firms financial leverage, market concentration, and market growth.Practical implications – Contrary to prior expectations, external factors at the market and firm levels have an impact on choice of acquisition vs creation. However, internal firm factors may serve ...

Beyond “halo”: the identification and implications of differential brand effects across global markets

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate whether brands impact consumer evaluations in ways other than a consistent halo and the degree to which consumers use both overall brand information along with detailed attribute-specific information to construct their evaluations. Design/methodology/approach – The authors decompose consumer evaluations of brand benefits into overall brand and detailed attribute-specific sources through a standard CFA approach. Data cover 55 brands in four product categories sold in nine global markets. Findings – Halo effects are rare in global CPG markets. The authors identify the presence of differential brand effects in eight of nine global markets tested. Application of an extended model to a market where several competing family brands are present demonstrates the ability of the model to identify relationships among brand offerings within a family brand and to differentiate between family brand sets. Research limitations/implications – The finding of differential...

How consumers’ use of brand vs attribute information evolves over time

Purpose – Prior research has identified that brands have a differential impact on consumer evaluations across various brand benefits. This paper investigates whether these effects are stable over time, or evolve in a consistent way. Design/methodology/approach – Consumer evaluations of brand benefits into overall brand and detailed attribute-specific sources through a standard confirmatory factor analysis approach have been decomposed. Two unique datasets have been analyzed; the first contains cross-sectional data from Kodak across four different consumer goods categories, and the other is a longitudinal dataset from the USA and Canada in the surface-cleaning category, covering seven brands over five years (2007-2011). Findings – A systematic evolution in brand effects has been demonstrated: a general trend is that over time and with experience, consumers rely more heavily on overall brand information to develop their evaluations. However, early in a brand’s life, or later when circumstances compel consum...

Technology-Based Self-Service (TBSS) Innovations in B2B Settings: An Abstract

Contemporary services innovations regularly come embedded in both information technology (IT) and organizational arrangements. (Ostrom et al., 2015, page 127) capture this current trend: “The context in which service is delivered and experienced has, in many respects, fundamentally changed. Advances in technology, especially information technology, are leading to a proliferation of revolutionary services and changing how customers serve themselves before, during, and after purchase.” Research that especially focuses on the integration of technology in the service system has been labeled self-service technology (SST) and technology-based self-service (TBSS). Breidback et al. (2012) did further add that most services will be a mix of technology and human-based interaction, what they label “technology-enabled value co-creation.” Following this research stream, less high-tech and service-oriented companies will meet challenges when introducing innovative services given that these services both require technical know-how and a market-oriented mindset. By acknowledging the socio-technical and social-material aspects of current service innovation, it is possible to unbundle activities from the physical restraints and open up innovation opportunities, facilitating a more customized rebundling of the service innovation to facilitate enhanced customer value. The vast majority of TBSS studies have focused on consumer markets which partly can be explained by the fact that business-to-business (B2B) companies have been late adopters. The main reason can be that B2B markets to a higher degree are few-to-few rather than many-to-many markets, the substantial cost of partner specific investments, as well as the overall complex linkages and process in B2B relationships. While prior studies have seen TBSS as an addition in firms’ value proposition portfolio, this study puts an emphasis on considering the TBSS as an innovation in a conservative B2B market context. It adopts a service-dominant (S-D) logic perspective on innovation and puts forth the research questions: (a) What capabilities do firms need when developing TBSS innovations and (b) what sort of institutional work they engage in. The study is carried out as an explorative and longitudinal field study of Humlegarden Fastigheter AB (a real estate firm that only have commercial tenants and that introduced a TBSS in 2012) and its suppliers and customers. Humlegarden Fastigheter AB is a “Prime Mover” as they developed a TBSS in the real estate and facility industry where new services are rare. The results show how such firms will need to acquire and develop several capacities when striving for new value propositions. The study offers an emergent theory on how a TBSS innovation engages actors in the service ecosystem and pinpoints the forms of institutional work a focal actor needs to carry out to change the service ecosystem’s actors’ cognitive framework, current norms, as well as comply with regulations.

Psychological ownership as a crisis management advertising appeal – antecedents, outcomes, and moderators

Abstract In a crisis communication context, this work examines the impact of Psychological Ownership (PO) appeals on Ad message recipients’ development of feelings of PO. It demonstrates that increased levels of PO influence the managerially relevant outcomes attitude toward the company and purchase intentions. In doing so, it finds new application for the construct. In order to better understand the factors that may contribute to or mitigate PO, this research also investigates environmental consciousness as an additional antecedent and gender, persuasion knowledge, and geographic distance as moderators of individuals’ response to such appeals. Managerial and theoretical implications are discussed.

VALUE PROPOSITION ALIGNMENT : ESTIMATING SUSTAINABLE SELF-SERVICE TECHNOLOGY INITIATIVES: AN EXTENDED ABSTRACT

The concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR) has become an umbrella concept for initiatives that aim at doing good. The concept of “triple-bottom-line thinking” indicates that sustainable business includes not only an economic dimension but also an environmental and a sustainable dimension (Elkinton 1997). Managers have come to consider CSR initiatives as appealing given the potential positive effects on relationship quality, brand, and firm performance (Homburg et al. 2013). However, research shows varying effects on financial performance and outcomes, and they vary from showing an impact on consumers that embrace the firm’s CSR initiative (i.e., where there is firm-consumer congruence) and where there is no effect (e.g., consumers without a CSR interest) (Leonidou et al. 2013; Sen and Bhattacharya 2001). The majority of these studies evaluated CSR initiatives based on consumer perceptions of a product or brand. Few studies have evaluated CSR in the context of business-to-business (B2B) services (cf. Ostrom et al. 2015). A major difference between consumer and business markets is that the later usually are made up of fewer actors; some business firms might even know all their customer firms by name which seldom is the case in consumer markets (Hakansson and Snehota 1995). This means that the cost for sustainable initiatives has to be divided into a smaller number of beneficiaries which makes the overhead cost per user viable.

Developing smart commercial real estate: Technology-based self-service (TBSS) in commercial real estate facilities

Real estate companies are central actors in the development of a smart city. However, most industry participants are conservative and prefer to utilize established, often un-integrated, technologies rather than deploy newer technologies that would help achieve the goals of the smart city. To evaluate the potential of smart commercial real-estate (CRE) we studied a Swedish commercial real estate firm that has developed and deployed a technology-based self-service (TBSS) to help tenants reduce energy consumption. The study was grounded in the theoretical service-dominant (S-D) logic lexicon and our results suggest that for commercial real estate firms to successfully implement TBSS they need to enhance their competence in three areas: management of information technology, within-organization and business-to-business networking skills. Further, these areas are inter-related and successful deployment of TBSS requires improvement in all three areas.