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The implementation of AI-powered chatbots in the frontline may enhance efficiency, yet failures are still common. This paper aims to explore users' attribution of responsibility for service failures when using AI–chatbots and to examine how contextual factors influence perceptions of blame.

This work utilizes a mixed-methods approach, leveraging the findings from 39 exploratory interviews to develop the research framework and hypotheses. Subsequently, two experimental studies evaluated the type of interaction, failure type and failure severity.

The qualitative study identified voluntary and forced interaction types perceived by users based on contextual factors and demonstrated how these types impact expectations and responsibility attribution post-failure. The experimental studies showed that forced interactions intensify responsibility attributions toward the company and that disconfirmation of expectations mediates the relationship between forced interactions and responsibility attribution. Furthermore, failure type and severity level have a moderating influence on responsibility attribution.

This paper contributes to the theoretical understanding of user interactions with AI-powered frontline technology, by revealing the nuanced ways in which users perceive and react to failures.

Businesses are increasingly called upon to support the improvement of society and the environment, and one way to do so is by expanding into international markets, particularly through exports. Despite the importance and recognised challenges of a global approach to sustainable value creation, sustainability research tends to focus on domestic contexts. This paper aims to identify the boundary conditions linking sustainable value creation practices with firm performance in the international context.

The authors merge the sustainable value creation and the international marketing literature to develop two propositions that capture the emerging nature of the field and the lack of concluding evidence regarding the link between international sustainable value creation practices and firm performance. The authors test these propositions empirically by analysing 519 responses to a survey of exporting firms in Portugal, using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis.

The authors identify seven configurations that support sustainable value creation in an international context. These consist of varying levels of standardised and tailored offers, management experience and competitive intensity.

The identification of seven different configurations helps managers decide whether and how to innovate when pursuing sustainable value creation opportunities in international markets.

The authors propose that an effective way for governments to achieve national and transnational social and environmental agendas is to help businesses that pursue sustainable value creation to succeed in international markets. Given that four of the seven pathways to improve export performance that the authors identified require international management experience, the authors posit that an effective way to support the internationalisation of those businesses is through targeted training programmes and knowledge-sharing initiatives.

The authors respond to calls for research to integrate the sustainable value creation and the international marketing literatures, to identify how and when firms can create sustainable value creation in an international context and thus support the resolution of global, social and environmental problems. The finding that there are multiple configurations that support this goal explains why empirical evidence collected thus far is inconclusive and helps identify the boundary conditions of existing theory.

The advent of the smart technology era has brought forth unprecedented opportunities and challenging risks, extending beyond individual, organisational and societal boundaries. These vulnerabilities are deeply interconnected with contextual factors such as technology accessibility, user competence and the wide-ranging consequences of technology utilisation that necessitates context-aware solutions. In this policy recommendation that was presented to the UK policymakers, we specified that to pave the way for socially responsible smart technologies, companies must explore and address risks stemming from the connectivity and cognitive capabilities of smart systems throughout their lifecycle stages, encompassing data input, processing and output. We emphasised that effective risk management demands a multifaceted orchestration of proactive (push) and reactive (pull) measures to mitigate harm. Furthermore, we indicate that smart technology's transformative potential has the capacity to revolutionise competition across industries, redefining innovation. However, this transformation introduces substantial risks that extend beyond corporate boundaries, affecting individual well-being and safety. Consequently, responsible innovation and mitigation strategies are imperative. Finally, we highlighted that global consumer decisions about smart technology adoption tend to be influenced less by geopolitical factors and more by complex motivations that weigh technological promises against perceived risks. The pursuit of socially responsible smart technology represents a multilayered effort tackling challenges that transcend conventional boundaries while empowering technology developers to embrace innovation.

Privacy is a topic of major interest to the marketing community that has fuelled the development of legal and technical mechanisms to protect customers' anonymity and to prevent the misuse of customer data. Nevertheless, data breaches continue to occur. The purpose of this paper is to offer new insight into the causes of such breaches, thus paving the way for novel approaches to privacy protection.

The paper presents a semiotic framework identifying the data, task related and normative factors that influence behaviour. A qualitative study with branch and back office employees in a British financial institution illustrates the explanatory value of the framework.

The results show that the legal tools provide guidance only when they are clear, relevant and enforceable, that technology reduces idiosyncrasy but has limited application and, crucially, that employees' attitudes, group norms, preconceptions and mental processes dramatically condition behaviour.

The study integrates the limited marketing literature available on the reasons for privacy breaches, and advances the understanding of the role of employees in safeguarding customer data. It is an exploratory, small‐scale study that simultaneously offers new insight and identifies areas where further research is needed.

The paper presents practical contributions to marketing managers concerning policy wording, job design and reward schemes.

The study delivers a holistic framework to assess how the various privacy related initiatives may interact with each other, and specifically focusing the researcher's attention on what is often the weakest link in privacy protection: staff.

The paper aims to study the outreach and performance of business correspondent (BC) models, which are implemented as a subsidiary agent of banks to accelerate the financial inclusion (FI) mission in India. In this regard, the study illustrates BC's products and services rendered to customers, forms of delivery channels and BC's view on banking services and Kiosk-based BC programs.

The current paper is an empirical study based on surveying 200 Kiosk-based BCs working in the state of Kerala. After the preliminary screening analysis of the data with outlier deletion, removal of missing values and normality test, both exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) were executed followed by reliability test, convergent and discriminant validity tests. Covariance-based structural equation modeling (CBSEM) was performed for CFA and inferential tests were carried out by using statistical package for the social sciences (SPSS) and analysis of a moment structures (AMOS) and Eviews.

Chiefly, eight operational forms of BCs were found from the field survey. Hypothetical tests show the significant impact of the serviceability of banks on BC's profitability. Validity tests such as average variance extracted (AVE), composite reliability (CR), maximum shared variance (MSV) and average shared variance (ASV) were established after the removal of the cross-loaded items of the questionnaire from the rotated component matrix. BCs perform main banking services especially bank account opening facility and Akshaya E-Centers are widely used for this model as Kiosk banking in the surveyed state.

So far, no study has encompassed empirical research on performance analysis and outreach of the BC model in the state of Kerala where this BC model well functions. Since the study is a novel form of banking channelization for FI, the study can contribute to understanding the further feasibility and future dimension of the model based on experimental views of BCs.