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Although the benefits of strategic alliances are well documented, whether strategic alliances can be a viable entry strategy option for small and medium‐size enterprises (SMEs) to successfully penetrate markets held by major incumbent suppliers is less clear. In this paper, strategic alliances are shown to be an effective entry‐cum‐deterrence strategy for SMEs to successfully penetrate markets that are well established and dominated by major corporations. In addition, the conditions under which SMEs can use strategic alliances as an entry strategy without restricting themselves to target only those markets ignored by bigger firms are identified. In terms of methodology, this paper follows a deductive approach – one based on game theory, to examine explicitly the reactions of bigger firms to the entry of SMEs into their markets, specifically taking into account the resource limitations faced by SMEs. To verify that the theoretical arguments presented are consistent with practice, two cases of the use of strategic alliances by SMEs as an entry strategy to penetrate markets dominated by major corporations are examined. The practices and experiences of these SMEs were found to be consistent with the theoretical arguments presented here.

This article focuses on the relevant demographics, attitudes, behaviours, and concerns of small‐medium sized exporting and non‐exporting firms in Singapore in an attempt to determine whether measures can be developed to nurture non‐exporters into exporters. The findings suggest that while basic differences in demographics exist between the two groups, the attitudinal and behavioural differences are acquired. Therefore, programmes may be developed to nurture non‐exporting firms to be export‐oriented.

Respondents from five Asian countries were surveyed in terms of their consumer ethnocentrism, animosity, and attribution towards the USA and Japan in the context of the Asian economic crisis. The results indicated that the more severely hit a country was, the more ethnocentric respondents were. In general, animosity towards the USA was higher than towards Japan with regard to the Asian crisis. Koreans held the greatest stable animosity towards the Japanese because of the atrocities experienced during the Second World War. Respondents attributed the blame of the Asian crisis more to themselves. They also felt that they and the Japanese could have controlled the turn of events during the crisis. Implications arising from the findings are discussed.

This paper investigates the impact of framing through the use of a vague scarcity restriction (“while stocks last”) on consumers' perception of promotional offers involving different claim formats (tensile price claim such as “save up to 60 percent” versus non‐tensile price claim such as “save 60 percent”) and different amount of price discounts. The findings show that framing the sales offer with such a vague scarcity restriction and using a tensile claims format improve the consumers' perceived informational value of the offer, only if exaggerated price discounts are involved. This study also confirms earlier studies' findings on the effects of exaggerated price discounts and tensile claims on consumers' perceived savings and information value of sales promotional offers. Managerial implications are discussed.

Using experimental design and conjoint analysis, this paper studies the risk perception of Singaporean consumers on Internet shopping, and tests the effectiveness of several risk‐reducing strategies that Internet marketers could use in promoting online shopping among consumers. The results show that Singaporean consumers with a higher degree of risk aversion than others tend to perceive Internet shopping to be a risky activity. However, Internet marketers could rely on using reference group appeal as the most preferred risk relievers for this group of consumers, particularly by getting expert users to endorse the products involved. In addition, the marketer’s reputation, the brand’s image, and specific warranty strategies are also effective risk relievers for the potential Internet shoppers.

Using an experimental design setting, this study investigates how global firms can make use of warranty strategies to influence consumers’ evaluations of hybrid products that are designed in one country and manufactured in another. The results confirm that consumers tend to perceive lower quality and higher purchase risk when evaluating products manufactured in a country perceived to be of lesser capability than its country of design (i.e., negative hybrid effects). However, global firms with products that carry such negative hybrid effects can develop appropriate warranty strategy to overcome such biases. For instance, the results show that consumers improve their assessment of the quality and purchase risk of the negative hybrid products when these products carry warranty with wider coverage and longer duration than the standard package, and when the firm providing the warranty has good warrantor reputation. Implications of these findings for international marketing and research are also discussed.