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Realizing the importance of personal interaction in business relationships between manufacturers and distributors, this study aims to explore the role of personal interaction in relationship value, and subsequently in distributor performance, in a transition market, Vietnam.

A sample of 472 distributors in the south of Vietnam was surveyed to test the theoretical model. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the data.

It was found that personal interaction drives product support, information support, and delivery performance perceived by distributors. In addition, product support, information support, and delivery performance are key factors that nurture the value of relationships between manufacturers and distributors. Finally, relationship value is a determinant of distributor performance.

A key limitation of this study is the heavy reliance on the hypothetico‐deductive approach. Business relationships of firms in transitional economies, due to differences in cultures and economies, might exhibit some differences in value drivers. An inductive approach may be a suitable alternative method to explore relationship value and its determinants in transition economies like Vietnam.

The results of this study suggest that manufacturers should invest more time and efforts in personal interaction with their key distributors to enhance the value of their relationships with those distributors.

This study is the first of its kind in Vietnam, which explores the role of personal interaction in relationship value in Vietnam.

This study aims to explore the impact of Vietnamese firms' expectations of opportunities provided by the World Trade Organization (WTO) – expected WTO opportunities – on their marketing and innovativeness capabilities, and subsequently, on business performance.

Using a sample of 323 Vietnamese firms in Ho Chi Minh City, a model incorporating expected WTO opportunities, marketing and innovativeness capabilities, and business performance by means of structural equation modeling was tested.

It was found that expected WTO opportunities had positive impacts on both marketing and innovativeness capabilities. Further, marketing and innovativeness capabilities underlie business performance of Vietnamese firms.

A key limitation of this study is the examination of the impact of expected WTO on only two firm capabilities: marketing and innovativeness. There might be several other firm capabilities that may be affected by expected WTO such as entrepreneurial orientation and learning orientation.

The results of this study suggest that firms should be prepared to take advantage of the WTO: to evaluate its opportunities, as well as threats, in order to design and implement appropriate strategies for doing business in a new and challenging environment.

This is the first study of this type on Vietnam's entry into the WTO as an important event for Vietnamese firms. The findings of this study suggest expected WTO opportunities play an important role in strengthening marketing and innovativeness capabilities, and subsequently, on business performance.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the impacts of instructor capability and learning motivation on learning performance of business students in Vietnam. It also explores the moderating effect of personal development competitiveness on the roles of instructor capability in both learning motivation and learning performance.

Two phases of study were undertaken. A pilot phase was used to preliminary assess the measures and a main survey with a sample of 1,278 undergraduate business students was conducted to validate the measures and to test the models.

Instructor capability was found to have a positive impact on learning motivation and, subsequently, on learning performance. The results further show that the impacts of instructor capability on both learning motivation and learning performance are greater in the group of students which has a higher level of personal development competitiveness.

A key limitation of this study is the examination of the roles of instructor capability and learning motivation in learning performance. There can be several other antecedents of learning performance of business students.

The results of this study suggest that university administrators should design suitable recruitment and training policies in order to have instructors with appropriate knowledge and teaching skills. Also, students' personal development competitiveness in learning should be encouraged.

The findings enhance one's understanding of key antecedents of learning performance, as well as the moderating role of personal development competitiveness in the learning of business students in a transition market, Vietnam.

Based on the resource‐based view of the firm, this study aims to examine antecedents and outcomes of firm‐specific marketing capital pool invested by marketers in a transition market, Vietnam.

A sample of 528 marketers in Ho Chi Minh City was surveyed to test the theoretical model. Structural equation modelling was used to analyze the data.

It was found that firm‐specific marketing capital pool had positive impacts on both job attractiveness and job satisfaction. The impacts of human marketing capital and relational marketing capital pools on firm‐specific marketing capital were significant. Finally, the relationship between job attractiveness and job satisfaction, and the relationship between human marketing capital pool and relational marketing capital pool were also significant.

A key limitation of this study is the examination of only two antecedents of firm‐specific marketing capital pool: human and relational marketing capital pools.

The results of this study suggest that firms should establish people management policies and practices that motivate marketers to invest more in firm‐specific marketing capital to enhance job attractiveness and job satisfaction of marketers. Also, in order to improve firm‐specific marketing capital, recruiting marketers with high levels of human and relational marketing capital pools is a priority.

The study investigates the role of human resources at the marketing professional level in job attractiveness and job satisfaction in a transition market.

This study investigates key factors that influence the utilization of the internet by internationalizing firms in one transition market, Vietnam.

A systematic sample of 306 internationalizing firms in Ho Chi Minh City was surveyed to test the theoretical model. Structural equation modelling was used to analyze the data.

This study finds that the two key concepts in the technology acceptance model (TAM), perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of the internet, can be used to predict internet utilization by organizations. Market orientation is also a predictor of internet utilization. Learning orientation facilitates perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of the internet by internationalizing firms, and hence its utilization.

Further research is needed to investigate other antecedents as well as outcomes of internet utilization by internationalizing firms.

This study suggests that programmes for the assistance and training of internationalizing firms should promote the usefulness and ease of use of the internet, and foster market orientation and learning orientation, in order to stimulate them to use the Internet effectively in the pursuit of marketing success in international markets.

This study expands the explanatory power of the TAM in predicting the utilization of the Internet by internationalizing firms.

This study aims to explore the impact of hedonic shopping motivations (HSM) and supermarket attributes (SMA) on shopper loyalty (SLO).

A sample of 608 supermarket shoppers in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam was surveyed to test the model. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the data.

It was found that SMA and HSM had positive effects on SLO. It was also found that the impact of hedonic motivations on SLO was different between the younger and older, as well as lower and higher income groups of customers. However, no such difference was found between female and male shoppers.

A major limitation of this study was the use of a sample drawn from one transitional market. Cross‐national samples will be a direction for further research. Also, the study focuses on attitudinal loyalty. Behavioral loyalty should be taken into account in future research.

The findings suggest that the supermarket managers showed concentrate their positioning strategies not only on the utilitarian dimension but also on the hedonic motivations to stimulate SLO, especially for older and higher income segments of customers.

The major contribution of the study is to empirically examine the role of hedonic motivations in SLO in Vietnam, a transitional market.

This paper seeks to compare some key antecedents of brand loyalty between two emerging markets: Thailand and Vietnam.

Using a sample of 603 female consumers of international shampoo brands, including 304 consumers in Bangkok, Thailand and 299 users in Hanoi, Vietnam, a model was tested that incorporates key determinants of brand loyalty – perceived quality, brand awareness, advertising attitudes, and distribution intensity – by means of structural equation modeling.

The paper found that there are positive relationships between perceived quality and brand loyalty, between brand awareness and perceived quality, between advertising attitudes and brand awareness, and between distribution intensity and brand awareness in both markets. However, the relationship between brand awareness and brand loyalty was found only in the Vietnamese market, and the relationship between advertising attitudes and perceived quality was only found in the Thai market. Finally, no relationship between distribution intensity and perceived quality was found in either market.

A major limitation of this study is the examination of only one concept that stands for strong brands, i.e. brand loyalty. Several other concepts, such as brand relationship quality and brand impressions, should be investigated in future research in order to compare and contrast with those found in advanced economies.

The results of this study suggest that managers of international brands in emerging markets should recognize the differences between markets in order to design effective loyalty programs for each market.

A major contribution of this study is to empirically compare the impacts of perceived quality, brand awareness, advertising attitudes, and store image on brand loyalty in two emerging markets: Thailand and Vietnam.

Realizing that the Internet is a source of information and the possibility to transform it into knowledge, this study develops an IBK-Internalization process in which internationalizing firms in transition markets utilize the Internet to search for information about foreign markets, to assess its relevance, and then, to internalize it for their internationalization. It is found that IBK-Internalization underlies international orientation and foreign sales intensity, which in turn, has a reciprocal effect on IBK-Internalization. Further, learning orientation facilitates the IBK-Internalization process. These findings suggest that internationalizing firms should promote and value the IBK-Internalization process in order to mitigate their lack of foreign market knowledge.

This study aims to investigate the factors that affect the intention to adopt the internet by export firms in transitional markets.

A sample of 144 export firms in Vietnam was surveyed to test the model. Structural equation modelling was used to analyse the data.

It was found that perceived usefulness, but not perceived ease of use, of the internet is a potential predictor of the intention to adopt the internet by firms for their export activities. It was also found that market orientation has both direct and indirect (mediated by perceived usefulness) impacts on intention to adopt the internet, and that learning orientation has a direct effect on both perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of the internet.

A major limitation of this study is the use of a sample drawn from one transitional market. Cross‐national samples will be a direction for further research.

The findings of this study suggest that export promotion programs should promote the usefulness of the internet as well as market and learning orientations to stimulate export firms to adopt the internet for their export activities.

The major contribution of the study is to incorporate market and learning orientations in the technology adoption model to explain the intention to adopt the internet by export firms.

This study examines the roles of market and learning orientations in relationship quality between exporters in transition economies and their foreign importers and subsequently, export performance. A random sample of 283 export firms in Vietnam provides evidence to support the hypothesized main effects. The results further indicate that learning orientation plays a role in building high-quality relationships for both new and mature relationships. However, the impact of market orientation on relationship quality is found only in the new relationship. In addition, firm-ownership structure does not moderate the relationships between learning orientation, market orientation, relationship quality, and export performance.