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The purpose of this paper is to better understand the voice of the internal stakeholder in a way that emphasizes the internal stakeholder as an active force and decision maker in brand co-creation, as part of the new emerging paradigm of internal branding. The main aim is to understand the active role of volunteers in internal branding that is in the co-creation of value. A subsidiary aim is to understand why some volunteers engage deeply and seriously in a nonprofit organization while other volunteers seem less connected?

A conceptual framework incorporates several motivators to volunteer-led co-creation. A quantitative, co-variance-based structural equation modelling approach is used on survey data of a sample of 357 volunteers from 14 organizations in the Australian nonprofit sector.

The research findings contribute to the newly emerging internal branding literature focusing on the active co-creation role of internal stakeholders. The main drivers of volunteer co-creation are volunteer engagement, commitment, altruism, values-congruency and brand reputation. Different explanatory mechanisms/motivators apply to each type of volunteer-led co-creation. In a major initiative, the paper demonstrates linkages across the different types of co-creation, with a foundation/pivotal role for one particular type of co-creation, namely, enhanced client-based solutions.

The research is restricted to the public sector and further research is needed to test applicability to the private sector. Future studies could continue the initiative in the current study to explore the linkages across co-creation types.

Implications depend on which type of co-creation is targeted. Enhancing client-based solutions co-creation requires a very strong role for engaged volunteers. Innovation co-creation requires both engaged volunteers and a propensity to co-create by enhancing client-based solutions. Brand advocacy co-creation is driven by volunteer commitment, altruism and a propensity to co-create innovation.

A non-profit context ensures major social implications.

The study operationalizes the Saleem and Iglesias (2016) new internal branding paradigm framework by demonstrating that brands are built organically by interacting and engaging with internal stakeholders (volunteers in this instance), which, in turn, inter alia, motivates co-creation by such internal stakeholders.

This study aims to examine the relationship between brand orientation and financial performance in business-to-business (B2B) small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). It examines the impact of brand-oriented strategy on financial performance through four branding constructs, namely, internal branding, brand communication, brand awareness and brand credibility.

A questionnaire-based survey was conducted to collect data from 250 Finnish B2B SMEs. Confirmatory factor analysis was performed to examine the validity of the constructs, whereas structural equation modeling was used to test proposed hypotheses of the study.

The results suggest that brand orientation improves the effectiveness of brand communication and internal branding in building brand awareness and credibility. Brand awareness emphasizes an external route through brand communication, whereas brand credibility emphasizes an internal route through internal branding. Brand awareness has a positive impact on brand credibility, and brand credibility has a positive impact on financial performance, highlighting the importance of both brand performance components for financial performance.

This study addresses the research gap in the B2B branding literature regarding the role of branding in enhancing financial performance. The results suggest that brand-oriented strategy can contribute to financial performance through brand awareness and brand credibility in the context of B2B SMEs.

This paper aims to examine mall consumer brand meaning through understanding consumer brand associations of shopping malls.

Building on the literature, a quantitative methodology is applied. A large sample (n = 755) of an Australian shopping mall is surveyed, and the data are analysed using structural equation modelling.

The first set of findings is that mall atmosphere and mall merchandise are the main determinants of consumer mall satisfaction. In turn, consumer mall satisfaction and mall merchandise are the main determinants of consumer mall brand attitudes.

The study is the first known study to measure consumer-based mall brand meaning quantitatively. This discovery gives a more holistic understanding of the mall brand. Additionally, the study highlights that mall branding is essentially experiential branding.

The study provides sound guidance for mall managers by suggesting priorities in shaping the mall brand, the emphasis on mall atmosphere and the criticality of tenant mix. Some malls spend hundreds of millions of dollars on refurbishments, enhancing mall atmosphere, consistent with the emphasis of this paper.

More effective experiential branding could influence community well-being.

This original research pioneers the discovery of customer-based mall brand meaning. Additionally, the study adds to the experiential branding literature. Sensory experiences are not sufficient to examine brand experiences; additionally, the core product (mall merchandise in our context) enhances the total (mall) brand experience.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the influence of a shopping companion on mall brand experience.

The quantitative multi-group structural equation model study contrasts three shopper types: those shopping alone; those shopping with friends; and those shopping with family. Two categories are shoppers in a group. Nine hypotheses evaluate the impact of shopping with a companion.

The results show that companions enhance the emotional brand experience. Further, shoppers with family companions are most able to enhance brand evaluation from mall brand experience. Shopping companions help co-create the shopping brand experience.

The findings are limited to Australian shoppers and contrast with Canadian studies, emphasizing friends. Alone shoppers place priority on price and only the alone shoppers are price-sensitive. The findings help address the gap in the literature, namely, understanding focal retail consumers in a group situation.

Retailers and mall managers in planned shopping centers could consider developing different retail strategies and brand experiences, which address the specific types of customer groups or alone shoppers.

The paper is explicitly about social influences.

This original research contributes new perspectives to understanding the role of companion shoppers as co-creators of the focal shopper’s mall brand experience.

The purpose of this paper is to expand on existing co-creation knowledge in order to accurately conceptualize, operationalize and contextualize the customer brand co-creation behavior concept from a customer perspective.

A quantitative approach is adopted in this study, using structural equation modeling to verify the co-creation of brand value for those customers who co-create.

A new four-dimensional co-creation behavior concept is supported, highlighting the role of development, feedback, advocacy and helping, in the co-creation of brand value. Furthermore, a range of customer-level and brand-level antecedents are empirically verified.

The research takes a customer-centric view of co-creation and in doing so provides new insight into the effect on the co-creator. Additionally, the research offers an improved level of specificity in the co-creation domain by conceptualizing, operationalizing and contextualizing customer co-creation in a comprehensive research study.

The findings offer new insight to brand managers, identifying avenues for increasing customer participation in co-creation programs and critically highlighting that co-creation behavior has positive effects on the co-creator’s perception of brand value.

The customer-centric approach offers an original perspective from which to explore co-creation, demonstrating the positive potential of co-creation in brand management strategies.

The study extends customer-led co-creation research to the related staff-led value co-creation domain. In particular, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of staff engagement as a facilitator of staff-led value co-creation.

A new conceptual framework develops a model of staff-led value-creation, using three types of staff-led co-creation. A quantitative approach is used. Survey collection yielded a sample of 1,165 employees in an Australian not-for-profit context across 19 organizations. AMOS structural equation modeling analyzes the data.

A major finding is the nexus between staff engagement and staff-led value co-creation. The nexus applies for three types of staff-led co-creation and three staff categories. Different explanatory mechanisms apply to each type of staff-led value co-creation.

The not-for-profit context may not generalize to the for-profit sector, but future research could clarify this matter.

The results can inform organizations wishing to create greater service contributions through greater staff participation, which can include a staff-initiating (staff-led) role. Different value co-creation targets require different corporate triggers, reflecting the different explanatory mechanisms of each co-creation type.

Not-for-profit context ensures major social implications.

The emphasis on staff-led value co-creation augments the customer-led co-creation literature. Additionally, exploring the (staff) engagement to (staff) value co-creation nexus is a novel contribution.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the historical contributions of complex innovations (both creative and tactical components) in a formative period in a major Australian department store, David Jones Ltd.

The study uses a context-specific lens to examine complex retail innovation. The study adopts a longitudinal design with the focus on a single firm, which met the inclusion criteria. Data collection was predominately from company archival materials and publicly available documents, including newspapers.

An in-depth analysis of two complex innovations demonstrates the retailer’s successful management of both marketing exploration (innovation) and marketing exploitation of that innovation. Effective marketing requires operational, tactical marketing exploitation to dovetail marketing exploration.

The study is limited to one successful department store. Notwithstanding, there are expectations that the lessons extend to many other retailing organizations.

The practical relevance is clear, with the emphasis on retail innovation (and especially complex innovation) as a basis for both surviving and thriving in an ever-changing marketing environment.

The use of a complex innovation approach is a novel way of examining marketing history. The study concludes that both marketing exploration and marketing exploitation are essential for retail longevity.

The nature of retail service varies from personal service to the provision of greater ambience. Indeed, anything that adds value to the merchandise itself can be considered part of the service provided by the retailer. The focus of this paper is on that part of retail service that involves direct interactivity between the store and the customer. There are two main types of physical interactivity, namely personal service and store design and atmosphere. This paper aims to develop constructs of these two types of interactivity and analyse their impact on store loyalty. An extra dimension is added to this study by contrasting the role of service between superstores and traditional specialist stores in two retail categories. A key finding was that the major difference between the service provided by superstores compared to traditional specialist stores relates to store design and atmosphere. This leads to the suggestion that the recent wave of superstores has ushered in a new paradigm of retail service, one with elevated emphasis on self‐service principles. A further finding was that store design and atmosphere was one of the more important determinants of store loyalty. The paper shows that superstores have revolutionised the nature of retail service, mainly by more effective configuration of self‐service, mediated through store design.

The paper aims to address a question posed by Ruth Bolton (2011):“What kinds of interactive experiences lead to favourable customer engagement rates”?

Building on the literature, the paper develops different interactive experience pathways for both functional and hedonic brands.

The different pathways are developed formally for both brand types. Different facets of brand experience and different facets of interactivity are entailed for each brand type. The models are illustrated with actual brands.

The study is primarily conceptual and requires empirical testing. The purpose of the paper is to motivate academics to explore the nature of interactive experiences in whatever way they choose.

The different interactive experience pathways between functional and hedonic brands imply different engagement and co-creation strategies by firms. Generally, a richer set of engagement options are relevant to the hedonic brand. However, using the Domino’s Pizza example, the paper suggests that functional brands can extend their repertoire of engagement tools by borrowing inspiration from the hedonic brands.

There is a major social or community aspect to interactive experiences. Moreover, some of the brands used as examples in the paper, such as Patagonia, have major social or environmental impacts.

This original research pioneers the discovery and coding of the nature of interactive brand experiences. Hitherto, the domain can be construed as the idiomatic, “elephant in the room”, an important topic but not discussed. The conversation has now begun.