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This paper aims to provide insights into the potential of digital technologies-based innovations for more inclusive healthcare by alleviating the affordability, accessibility and availability barriers to utilization of healthcare services. Also, it aims to provide insights into the potential of digital technologies-based innovations for more inclusive services, broadly.

A conceptual framework is inductively developed by analyzing real-world examples of digital technologies-based innovations for more inclusive healthcare through the lenses of economics of information in digital form and certain characteristics of services.

Concurrent implementation of digital technologies-based healthcare innovations with innovations and/or modifications in service processes can enable greater inclusivity by alleviating the affordability, accessibility and availability barriers to utilization of healthcare services.

Issues relating to inequities in healthcare, as a social problem, are the focus of research at multiple levels (e.g. global, national, regional and local) in several academic disciplines. In relation to the scope of the problems and challenges pertaining to providing quality healthcare to the unserved and underserved segments of society, worldwide, the contribution of the proposed framework to practice is modest. However, by highlighting the promise and potential of digital technologies-based innovations as solutions for alleviating barriers to affordability, accessibility and availability of healthcare services during various stages (prevention, detection, diagnosis, treatment and post-treatment follow-up) with illustrative vignettes and developing a framework, the article offers insights for future research. For instance, in reference to mission-driven social enterprises that operate in the product-market space for inclusive innovations under resource constraints, a resourcefulness-based view of the social enterprise constitutes a potential avenue for theory development and research.

Given the conceptual nature of the article, the implications for practice are limited to cognitive implications. Action implications (instrumental implications or implications for practice) are outside of the scope of the article.

Innovations that are economically viable, environmentally sustainable and socially impactful is one of the important issues of our times.

The proposed framework provides insights into the potential of digital technologies-based innovations for more inclusive healthcare by alleviating the affordability, accessibility and availability barriers in the context of emerging and less developed country markets and base of the pyramid segments of society in these markets.

The emergence of consumerism has led to regulatory measures being integrated into business practices, but the influence of consumers in developing countries remains limited, resulting in businesses being less responsive. The digital retail landscape is undergoing a transformative revolution, driven by Industrial Revolution (IR) 4.0 technological advancements such as artificial intelligence (AI), wearables, virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and blockchain technology. This development focuses on convenience, personalisation, and emotional connections. Companies are adapting to modern consumer behaviour through various strategies, including online shopping, mobile commerce, data analytics, technology integration, user reviews, and contactless payments. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated this seismic shift in the retail industry, and online retail is expected to continue to grow post-pandemic, driven by these technologies. AI enhances the customer experience, wearables provide interactive engagement, VR offers immersive shopping, AR merges online and physical shopping, and blockchain ensures secure transactions in the emerging metaverse. As retail converges with the metaverse, the potential for borderless and personalised shopping experiences is enormous. Advances in VR technology could lead to interconnected virtual spaces that seamlessly connect physical and digital retail, providing immersive and personalised shopping experiences. However, challenges such as cost, learning curves, digital security, legal ambiguity, data privacy, financial risk, and ethical considerations need to be addressed through vigilant and informed consumer engagement in this evolving digital landscape.

The purposes of this chapter are to propose definitions of innovation, product innovation, business model innovation, marketing innovation, innovation strategy, and strategic innovation, elaborate on their literature and conceptual underpinnings, and provide an overview of the conceptual domains of innovation, innovation strategy, and strategic innovation.

First, certain definitions of innovation, drawn from literature, are presented. Next, certain definitions that incorporate logically incremental refinements in them are presented. Building on these, definitions of innovation, product innovation, business model innovation, and marketing innovation are proposed.

Innovation is the creation of value by using relevant knowledge and resources for conversion of an idea into a new product, process, or practice, or improvements in an existing product, process, or practice. Innovation strategy is an organization’s relative emphasis on different types of innovations and the associated pattern of resource allocation, in alignment with its strategy at the corporate and business unit levels. Strategic innovation is the creation of value by using relevant knowledge and resources for conversion of an idea into a new product, process, or practice with the potential to have a major transformational effect on the evolution of markets and industries.

Over the past several decades, there has been a sustained and high level of interest in issues relating to innovation among academics in a number of disciplines, business and social entrepreneurs, business practitioners, and policy makers. Books, journal articles, and business magazine articles provide a number of definitions of innovation and specific types of innovation. Multiple definitions of a construct can be problematic in certain respects and beneficial in other respects. A potential upside of multiple definitions of innovation is the prospect of each being a source of ideas for one or more innovations that benefit society, and an impetus for research focusing on specific questions.

Implementation of an idea, value creation, and use of relevant knowledge and resources are used as constituent elements in the proposed definitions of innovation, product innovation, business model innovation, marketing innovation, and strategic innovation.

The use of various forms of cooperative sales promotions such as intracompany and intercompany multibrand promotions is on the ascendance, particularly among manufacturers and marketers of frequently purchased packaged consumer products. This article provides an overview of various forms of cooperative sales promotions, objectives that firms strive to realize through cooperative sales promotions, and other issues. In addition, from the standpoint of improving marketing productivity, the need for greater focus on the consumer franchise building potential of various sales promotion tools is highlighted.

The purpose of this paper is to present a conceptual framework that provides insights into major environmental and organizational forces underlying greater levels of organizational responsiveness to the environmental sustainability imperative by a growing number of firms, worldwide.

The paper is conceptual in its focus, and the proposed framework builds on extant literature from multiple literature streams.

Societal progress toward environmental sustainability is a shared responsibility of consumers, corporations, and the government at various levels. A potential avenue for societal progress toward environmental sustainability is fostering a macroenvironment that is conducive to the elimination of consumption certain products, reduction in consumption certain other products, and redirection of consumption of still other products from ecologically more harmful to ecologically less harmful substitute products (and relatedly, demand elimination, demand reduction, and demand redirection).

An implication for corporate sustainability responsibility is that firms while planning and formulating strategies for increasing their market footprint must also concurrently plan and formulate strategies for decreasing their environmental footprint. An implication for government sustainability responsibility is that even under conditions of high levels of commitment by a large and growing number of firms and consumers to engage in environmentally sustainable behaviors, in the absence of supporting infrastructure for engaging in such behavior, they may find it necessary to engage in environmentally unsustainable behaviors.

Issues relating to environmental sustainability have been the focus of a large body of recent research in a number of academic disciplines including marketing. A cursory examination of numerous articles published in scholarly journals on issues pertaining to environmental sustainability, and in the business press pertaining to the myriad environmental sustainability initiatives of firms worldwide is indicative of its growing importance.

A survey of consumer attitudes towards marketing practices, consumerism and government regulations in India, an industrialising country, revealed a high level of consumer discontent and support for the consumerism movement. A comparison of the results of the survey of consumers in India with the results of a prior study of consumers in six industrialised countries revealed certain similarities as well as differences, thus providing additional empirical insights into the validity of the consumerism life cycle concept.

The contingency approach and its relevance to theory building and research in marketing is described. The approach is delineated and its theoretical foundations traced. Several established contingency theories within the management discipline are outlined and the research they have stimulated on related topics in marketing are highlighted. An assessment of the current state of the contingency approach in marketing literature is then provided.