Bidit Lal Dey, Sharifah Alwi, Fred Yamoah, Stephanie Agyepongmaa Agyepong, Hatice Kizgin and Meera Sarma
While it is essential to further research the growing diversity in western metropolitan cities, little is currently known about how the members of various ethnic communities…
Abstract
Purpose
While it is essential to further research the growing diversity in western metropolitan cities, little is currently known about how the members of various ethnic communities acculturate to multicultural societies. The purpose of this paper is to explore immigrants’ cosmopolitanism and acculturation strategies through an analysis of the food consumption behaviour of ethnic consumers in multicultural London.
Design/methodology/approach
The study was set within the socio-cultural context of London. A number of qualitative methods such as in-depth interviews, observation and photographs were used to assess consumers’ acculturation strategies in a multicultural environment and how that is influenced by consumer cosmopolitanism.
Findings
Ethnic consumers’ food consumption behaviour reflects their acculturation strategies, which can be classified into four groups: rebellion, rarefaction, resonance and refrainment. This classification demonstrates ethnic consumers’ multi-directional acculturation strategies, which are also determined by their level of cosmopolitanism.
Research limitations/implications
The taxonomy presented in this paper advances current acculturation scholarship by suggesting a multi-directional model for acculturation strategies as opposed to the existing uni-directional and bi-directional perspectives and explicates the role of consumer cosmopolitanism in consumer acculturation. The paper did not engage host communities and there is hence a need for future research on how and to what extent host communities are acculturated to the multicultural environment.
Practical implications
The findings have direct implications for the choice of standardisation vs adaptation as a marketing strategy within multicultural cities. Whilst the rebellion group are more likely to respond to standardisation, increasing adaptation of goods and service can ideally target members of the resistance and resonance groups and more fusion products should be exclusively earmarked for the resonance group.
Originality/value
The paper makes original contribution by introducing a multi-directional perspective to acculturation by delineating four-group taxonomy (rebellion, rarefaction, resonance and refrainment). This paper also presents a dynamic model that captures how consumer cosmopolitanism impinges upon the process and outcome of multi-directional acculturation strategies.
Details
Keywords
Cathy Parker, Nikos Ntounis, Steve Millington, Simon Quin and Fernando Rey Castillo-Villar
The purpose of this paper is to document the results and the impact of the ESRC-funded High Street UK 2020 (HSUK2020), a project designed to take the existing academic knowledge…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to document the results and the impact of the ESRC-funded High Street UK 2020 (HSUK2020), a project designed to take the existing academic knowledge relating to retail and high street change directly to UK High Streets, to improve local decision-making and, ultimately, their vitality and viability.
Design/methodology/approach
Through a systematic literature review, and by following the tenets of engaged scholarship, the authors identified 201 factors that influence the vitality and viability of town centres. Through the consensus-building Delphi technique, a panel of 20 retail experts identified the top 25 priorities for action.
Findings
Taking a place management approach led to the development of a more strategic framework for regeneration, which consisted of repositioning, reinventing, rebranding and restructuring strategies (4R’s of regeneration). Collaboration with the project towns resulted in identification of the strategy area that would add the most value, and the impact of the 4R’s and the top 25 priorities is demonstrated via numerous town examples.
Originality/value
Knowledge exchange projects, such as High Street UK2020, have an important contribution to make, not by developing even more theory that is unlikely to get utilised, instead their contribution is to bring existing theory into practical use.
Details
Keywords
Manuel Leiria, Efigénio Rebelo and Nelson deMatos
The insurance industry has not been able to effectively retain its customers and struggles to establish and maintain long-lasting relationships with them. The purpose of this…
Abstract
Purpose
The insurance industry has not been able to effectively retain its customers and struggles to establish and maintain long-lasting relationships with them. The purpose of this paper is thus to identify the main factors that explain the cancellation of motor insurance policies by individual customers, considering the influence of intermediaries on their decisions.
Design/methodology/approach
The data used in this research is based on a sample of 3,500 insurance policies that lapsed during the period of analysis between January and July 2017, against another sample of 3,500 policies that did not lapse, from a major insurance company in Portugal. Binary logistic regression was used for data analysis, using IBM SPSS software.
Findings
Aggressive tactics by insurance companies for customer acquisition may induce the cancellation of insurance policies. More valuable customers, the policies with higher premiums and recent claims, as well as the ancillary intermediaries and agents, are determinants of insurance cancellation. Conversely, the payment of policies by direct debit and without instalments reduces the probability of cancellations.
Research limitations/implications
The main limitation of this study is the restriction on data access. Insurance companies are significantly resistant to sharing their customer data – including with academic researchers – even in an anonymised form.
Practical implications
The paper highlights internal and external practices of insurance companies that should be reformulated to significantly improve their performance regarding product cancellation, related to customer information management, mistrust behaviours related to stakeholders and new value propositions that deepen the relationships with intermediaries.
Originality/value
This research developed a framework with which to identify the factors that are mainly associated with motor insurance cancellation and to predict its likelihood.
研究目的
保險業一向未能有效地留住客戶,故業內不斷努力建立並維繫與客戶長久的關係。因此、本文擬確定個人客戶終止其汽車保單的因素;研究過程中、會考慮中介人對客戶作有關決定的影響 。
研究的設計/方法/理念
本研究所使用的數據、為基於一個涵蓋3500份期滿終止保單的樣本、並以之與另一涵蓋3500份沒有終止保單的樣本相比,樣本均來自葡萄牙一家大型保險公司。期滿終止保單之樣本、乃於2017年1月至同年7月這個研究進行期間内期滿終止的。研究使用了二元羅吉斯迴歸來分析數據,並應用了IBM SPSS 數據分析軟件。
研究結果
保險公司為贏得客戶所採用的積極進取策略可能導致客戶終止其保單。保單終止的決定因素包括更多有價值的客戶、保險費較高的保單、最近的索賠和輔助的中介及代理。反之,以自動扣帳方式及以非分期付款形式繳付保單則會減低終止保單的機會。
研究的原創性/價值
本研究發展了一個框架、以確定與客戶終止其保單有關聯的主要因素,並預計客戶終止保單的可能性。本文亦強調了保險公司須重新制定其內部與外部的做法,以能大幅改善其與產品取消有關的績效,而這些產品取消涉及客戶信息管理、與持份者有關的不信任行為、以及能深化與中介人之關係的新價值主張。