Ana B. Casado-Díaz, Juan L. Nicolau, Felipe Ruiz-Moreno and Ricardo Sellers
This study aims to examine the relationships between a firm's corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities and its performance and risk. The authors hypothesize that…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to examine the relationships between a firm's corporate social responsibility (CSR) activities and its performance and risk. The authors hypothesize that industry-level effects are highly determinant of the sign and magnitude of these relationships to establish a ranking of industries to identify the position of the most prominent tourism-related industries: hotels and airlines. Based on the cybernetic model of decision making and the heuristics thereof, shareholders base their investment decisions derived from CSR announcements on the idea that the industries behave differently; their fixed costs being a relevant factor.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors estimate the industry-specific effects of CSR initiatives on firms' performance and risk using a sample of 583 announcements from the Spanish Stock Market.
Findings
The results show that while CSR announcements have a positive effect on performance when the authors do not account for industry-specific factors, once the authors incorporate these factors into the analysis, the authors find that firm performance and risk vary quite substantially as a function of the industry to which the firm belongs. Interestingly, while the hotel industry presents an average behavior (standing at 9th position in returns, 15th in terms of risk, and 8th according to the ratio returns/volatility), the airline industry presents the worst situation of all industries: last in performance and last in risk.
Practical implications
The results help managers assess their decisions and allocate CSR resources optimally.
Originality/value
This article is the first attempt to empirically test and comprehensively detect the different relationships between CSR and firm performance across industries.
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Ana B. Casado-Díaz, Juan L. Nicolau-Gonzálbez, Felipe Ruiz-Moreno and Ricardo Sellers-Rubio
The purpose of this study is to attempt to explain why the impact of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives may be different and/or more important in service firms…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to attempt to explain why the impact of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives may be different and/or more important in service firms compared to manufacturing firms. CSR is becoming a common strategy, hence its extensive research. Central to it is the analysis of the effect of CSR on a firm’s performance, whose outcome depends on firm-specific and industry-related factors.
Design/methodology/approach
The event study methodology is applied to all the 248 companies that have ever traded on the Spanish Stock Market between 1990 and 2007. A regression analysis examines potential different effects of CSR on service and goods firms.
Findings
The results show that CSR activities have a positive impact on firm performance that is higher for service firms than for manufacturing firms. Actions related to the environment, responsible labor relationships and good corporate governance are especially important in the service context.
Research limitations/implications
This research is focused on shareholders’ performance, but it does not consider other stakeholders, such as real consumer behavior or employees’ commitment and productivity.
Practical implications
Service firms are likely to gain from focusing on some CSR activities (environment, employees and good corporate governance) and should use their responsible behavior as a valuable tool for public relations and differentiation in the market.
Originality/value
This article is the first attempt to empirically test and explain why the relationship between CSR and firm performance may be different (more positive) for service vs manufacturing firms.
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This article aims to investigate whether intermediaries reduce loss aversion in the context of a high‐involvement non‐frequently purchased hedonic product (tourism packages).
Abstract
Purpose
This article aims to investigate whether intermediaries reduce loss aversion in the context of a high‐involvement non‐frequently purchased hedonic product (tourism packages).
Design/methodology/approach
The study incorporates the reference‐dependent model into a multinomial logit model with random parameters, which controls for heterogeneity and allows representation of different correlation patterns between non‐independent alternatives.
Findings
Differentiated loss aversion is found: consumers buying high‐involvement non‐frequently purchased hedonic products are less loss averse when using an intermediary than when dealing with each provider separately and booking their services independently. This result can be taken as identifying consumer‐based added value provided by the intermediaries.
Practical implications
Knowing the effect of an increase in their prices is crucial for tourism collective brands (e.g. “sun and sea”, “inland”, “green destinations”, “World Heritage destinations”). This is especially applicable nowadays on account of the fact that many destinations have lowered prices to attract tourists (although, in the future, they will have to put prices back up to their normal levels). The negative effect of raising prices can be absorbed more easily via indirect channels when compared to individual providers, as the influence of loss aversion is lower for the former than the latter. The key implication is that intermediaries can – and should – add value in competition with direct e‐tailing.
Originality/value
Research on loss aversion in retailing has been prolific, exclusively focused on low‐involvement and frequently purchased products without distinguishing the direct or indirect character of the distribution channel. However, less is known about other types of products such as high‐involvement non‐frequently purchased hedonic products. This article focuses on the latter and analyzes different patterns of loss aversion in direct and indirect channels.
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Ana B. Casado, Juan L. Nicolau and Francisco J. Mas
This paper aims to examine which behaviour or set of behaviours customers are prone to follow in double deviation scenarios (i.e. consumption experiences in which customers face…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine which behaviour or set of behaviours customers are prone to follow in double deviation scenarios (i.e. consumption experiences in which customers face both the initial service failure and a failed service recovery), as well as how customers' perceptions of the problem and the firm's recovery efforts may influence these behaviours.
Design/methodology/approach
The paper uses multinomial logit models with random coefficients to test the proposed model.
Findings
Magnitude of service failure, explanations, apologies, perceived justice, anger and frustration felt by the customer, and satisfaction with the service recovery have significant and different effects on customers' choice of a type of response.
Research limitations/implications
Additional research should try to determine the effects of different variables and their potential interactions. Further work incorporating different subjects, service settings or additional combinations of complaining behaviours is needed to validate the results of this investigation.
Practical implications
This study highlights the importance of effective management of consumer responses to double deviations. Even when it is not possible to respond to customer complaints the first time, firms can learn from double deviations. Furthermore, new market entrants and competitors who want to capture consumer switchers should recognise what happened and try to avoid making the same mistakes.
Originality/value
This study is the first to examine the consequences of double deviations by considering the multi‐dimensional nature of complaint behaviour and the existence of simultaneous responses. This study is based on analyses of real service failures and recovery strategies and actual customer behaviour.
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Juan L. Nicolau and Francisco J. Más
This study intends to decompose the tourist choice process into two stages (decision to take a holiday and tourist expenditure), and to propose and test various expectations on…
Abstract
Purpose
This study intends to decompose the tourist choice process into two stages (decision to take a holiday and tourist expenditure), and to propose and test various expectations on the dimensions which explain the above decisions.
Design/methodology/approach
In order to simultaneously model the two decisions, we use a system of equations based on the Heckit model.
Findings
The dimensions affecting the decision to go on holiday are income, household size, education, size of the city of origin and opinion of going on holiday. The determinant factors influencing the level of expenditure are distance between origin and destination, type of accommodation, income, household size, age, marital status and length of stay. An important finding of this analysis is the differentiated effect of a given dimension on each decision.
Research limitations/implications
The lack of information on some explanatory dimensions. Joint modelling. The spending decision should be modelled jointly with the decision to go on holiday due to the dependency between them.
Practical implications
The promotion of destinations should be developed with special attention paid to some faraway markets of origin, due to the expected propensity for these tourists to spend longer periods at the destination. The specialisation of destinations in terms of accommodation type and length of stay. The design of holiday packages should be adapted to the needs of the tourists identified, as they represent the most profitable tourist profiles.
Originality/value
The particular findings, and the research and practical implications proposed show the relevance of the topic analysed. Also, these aspects are backed by a sample of 3,781 individuals, which assures the robustness of the results.
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Francisco J. Mas, Juan L. Nicolau and Felipe Ruiz
The purpose of this study is to examine the impact on firm performance of foreign concentration vs diversification strategies, as well as the moderating role played by market…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to examine the impact on firm performance of foreign concentration vs diversification strategies, as well as the moderating role played by market, product and firm characteristics.
Design/methodology/approach
Moderated regression analysis is used.
Findings
Distribution and cultural distance (CU) moderate the relationship between foreign concentration‐diversification and stock market performance; while the non‐repetitive character of product purchase moderates the relationship at an accounting performance level.
Research limitations/implications
First, the lack of information prevented us from examining other groups of determining factors. Second, the possible existence of bias in the results due to the selection of stock market quoted firms.
Practical implications
Managers must realise that CU, distribution channel, and the product factor of non‐repeat purchase, play an important role in the choice of a concentration vs diversification strategy when explaining business results. Government authorities should develop training programmes for firms located in middle‐income countries in order to detect the CU with target markets, as well as the development of effective distribution channels and of product strategy in these markets.
Originality/value
The findings of this study and the implications proposed show the relevance of this topic. The paper focuses on a middle‐income country (Spain) and uses two measurements of firm performance: an accounting rate and a market measure based on the event‐study (excess returns on the stock market generated by the announcement of a foreign expansion).
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Ricardo Sellers‐Rubio, Juan L. Nicolau‐Gonzálbez and Francisco Mas‐Ruiz
The purpose of this paper is to estimate the economic value of patent protection and the resulting rivalry.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to estimate the economic value of patent protection and the resulting rivalry.
Design/methodology/approach
An event‐study is applied which uses the daily returns of shares on the stock market as an output; and a model is estimated which bases its output on Tobin's q with annual observations.
Findings
The results are determined by the methodology used and the measurement of the output dimensions of company performance. Both methodologies conclude that the patent application date is the determiner of the value of an innovation. The event study methodology reflects the positive value of patent protection.
Research limitations/implications
The generalisation of the conclusions of the study to other economic sectors should be made with caution, given the fact that only the electrical sector was analysed.
Originality/value
The literature available on this subject suggests that empirical evidence can be affected by operational problems related to the measurement of inventive input and output. As a new contribution to the field, the paper discovers the date of input (application or grant of the patent or both) on which the company manifests innovation.
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Xiaoxian Ji, Juan Luis Nicolau and Xianwei Liu
Repeat customers play an important role in the restaurant sector. Previous studies have confirmed the positive effect of managerial responses on customer relationship management…
Abstract
Purpose
Repeat customers play an important role in the restaurant sector. Previous studies have confirmed the positive effect of managerial responses on customer relationship management. However, the practice of managerial response strategies toward repeat customers in the restaurant sector remains unclear. This study aims to explore how social influence and the revisit intention of customers affect the responding behavior of restaurant managers.
Design/methodology/approach
This study collects information of 251,944 customer reviews and managerial responses from 1,272 restaurants on Yelp (a leading restaurant review website around the world) and builds four econometric models (with restaurant and month fixed effects) to test the hypotheses empirically.
Findings
The empirical results show that restaurant managers are less likely to respond to reviews posted by repeat customers (10% lower than that of new customers). This effect is moderated by customer social influence, which entails that repeat customers with great social influence are more likely to receive managerial responses. Moreover, reviews from repeat customers who have had a longer time since their last consumption are also more likely to receive managerial responses.
Practical implications
The results present implications for restaurant managers in business practice regarding managerial response. Managers should take advantage of platform designs and tools (i.e. customer relationship management programs to keep track of repeat customers) to locate repeat customers and avoid the potential negative effects caused by their selected response strategies.
Originality/value
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is among the first attempts to examine empirically how restaurant managers respond to reviews generated by repeat customers in real business practice and reveals what drives such activities from the perspectives of social influence and revisit intention.
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Juan Luis Nicolau, Zheng Xiang and Dan Wang
This paper aims to investigate the links between daily review sentiment and the hotel performance measures of occupancy rate (OR), average daily rate (ADR) and revenue per…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate the links between daily review sentiment and the hotel performance measures of occupancy rate (OR), average daily rate (ADR) and revenue per available room (RevPAR).
Design/methodology/approach
The authors conducted review sentiment analyses in three moments (−1, −7 and −14 days) before arrival time using a data set of budget hotel performance and online reviews. The aim was to identify the effect of review sentiment in the budget hotel market on the three performance metrics.
Findings
Daily sentiment positively affects ADR and negatively affects OR and RevPAR, but only up to a certain threshold, after which the trend reverses. Prices increase with the level of sentiment, and high prices lead to low OR and RevPAR only when the sentiment scores are low. When they are high, they are associated with low rates, which lead to high OR and RevPAR.
Research limitations/implications
Daily review sentiment can be viewed as a valuable “barometer” indicating a hotel’s daily operational effectiveness. Daily sentiment can thus allow hotel managers to adjust their dynamic pricing strategies more accurately.
Originality/value
This study identifies daily sentiment as an alternative predictor of hotel performance. In addition to the roles of valence and volume in the decision-making process, the authors found that daily review sentiment can be an “in-the-moment” factor with a high impact, encouraging consumers to complete their transactions. This study suggests that aggregated measures such as the total number of reviews and overall ratings of the hotel should not be the sole consideration in reputation management.