An argument for the importance of unconscious processes is emerging across social science literatures (Petty et al.; Uleman). The purpose of this study is to investigate the role…
Abstract
Purpose
An argument for the importance of unconscious processes is emerging across social science literatures (Petty et al.; Uleman). The purpose of this study is to investigate the role of implicit attitudes on the formation of digital piracy desires and behavioral intentions. If implicit attitudes are found to contribute to consumer digital piracy intentions, then marketers face an additional challenge in developing effective strategies and appeals designed to attenuate the practice.
Design/methodology/approach
The study captures both indirect and direct measures of implicit attitudes to test the research model. A total of 285 respondents provided data in a controlled lab setting for purposes of structural equation analyses.
Findings
The results first contribute to growing evidence generally supporting the importance of attitudinal influences in the formation of digital piracy intentions. The reported study further suggests the necessity of including implicit attitudinal considerations in explanatory models of these behaviors, particularly attitudinal explanatory models. Specifically, marketers attempting to manage DP should consider implicit attitudes in explanatory models of DP intention formation in addition to traditional self‐report measures of attitudes.
Originality/value
The study presents the first known empirical evidence supporting the contribution of implicit attitudes to digital piracy desires. Considering implicit influences in this process offers the promise of increasing our understanding of how digital piracy behaviors form, which can offer insights into how to more effectively attenuate the practice.
Details
Keywords
Gary L. Hunter and Steven A. Taylor
This paper aims to investigate whether preferences for certain types of privacy predict the frequency and duration of social media usage as well as the moderating role of gender…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to investigate whether preferences for certain types of privacy predict the frequency and duration of social media usage as well as the moderating role of gender on these relationships.
Design/methodology/approach
An e-mail-based survey among the faculty, staff and students of a medium-sized mid-western university is used to gather data regarding preferences for privacy and social media usage. Using 530 respondents, structural equation modeling explores the relationship between the various privacy types, gender and social media usage.
Findings
Evidence supports a relationship between four types of privacy preferences and social media usage. A positive relationship exists between frequency of social media usage and a preference for not neighboring. Duration of social media usage shows a negative relationship with preferences for seclusion and reserve, and surprisingly, a positive relationship with a preference for anonymity. Gender moderates the relationship between preference for privacy and social media usage, offering evidence that intimacy, seclusion and reserve predict social media usage for males, while not neighboring and anonymity predict usage for females.
Originality/value
The study extends the privacy literature through investigating differential impacts of privacy preferences. The marketing literature examines privacy as a general concept, without allowing for differences in consumers' preferences for types of privacy. Additionally, the study shows that gender moderates the relationship between preferences for privacy and social media usage. A second contribution is investigating the relevance of a scale, developed in an age without social media, to an era permeated in social media.
Details
Keywords
The purpose of this paper is to assess how well digital piracy self‐report intentions predict actual digital piracy behaviors in service marketing research.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to assess how well digital piracy self‐report intentions predict actual digital piracy behaviors in service marketing research.
Design/methodology/approach
Study 1 collects 321 surveys to investigate potential measurement issues related to digital piracy intention formation. Study 2 replicates Study 1 based on a separate sample of 267 respondents, and additionally links digital piracy intentions to directly observed digital piracy behaviors across a peer‐to‐peer network.
Findings
The results first validate a strong predictive relationship between self‐report intentions and observed digital piracy behaviors (R2=0.36). Second, common method bias and measurement error do not appear to threaten the veracity of reported results. Third, a social psychological model of how digital piracy behaviors emerge is validated based upon the folk theory of the mind. Finally, a two‐dimensional conceptualization of frequency of past behaviors is identified based upon exploratory factor analysis using structural equation modeling.
Research limitations/implications
The research reported here relies on experimental methods of measuring peer‐to‐peer network activity. Future research might consider the motivational and attitudinal antecedents to digital piracy intention formation.
Practical implications
The results afford service marketers assurance that self‐report measures of digital piracy behavioral intentions can serve as predictive measures of future behaviors. This helps make the collection of data in this context both achievable and practical. Also, a methodological framework is identified to strengthen measurement models associated with this type of research.
Originality/value
The research provides a first effort to empirically relate behavioral intention data to unobtrusively observed digital piracy behaviors across peer‐to‐peer networks.
Details
Keywords
Steven A. Taylor, Alex Sharland, J. Joseph Cronin and William Bullard
The following study suggests that the recrational services sector represents a growing, yet currently understudied, opportunity in the area of international services marketing…
Abstract
The following study suggests that the recrational services sector represents a growing, yet currently understudied, opportunity in the area of international services marketing. For example, personal consumption expenditures in the United States have increased from $50 billion in 1985 to $246.8 billion in 1988. Parry suggests that European consumers have also been presented with an increasingly eclectic array of recreational alternatives during the last decade.
Details
Keywords
Steven A. Taylor and Gary L. Hunter
E‐service is a critical strategic marketing consideration today for many firms, based largely on the promise of more cost‐effective models of self‐service relative to large (and…
Abstract
E‐service is a critical strategic marketing consideration today for many firms, based largely on the promise of more cost‐effective models of self‐service relative to large (and expensive) call centers for technical support and customer service. The rapidly emerging electronic customer relationship management (e‐CRM) industry provides the primary tools for implementing e‐service. Interestingly, the e‐CRM industry faces the same challenges and strategic marketing considerations as their organizational customers, in that they must deliver exceptional service and support to the companies purchasing/using e‐CRM software. A review of organizational mission/vision statements suggests that e‐CRM companies are generally positioning themselves as exemplars of customer satisfaction provision and relationship management. However, recent industry analysis suggests that their organizational customers generally report low to ambivalent ratings on customer satisfaction measures (our study also supports these findings). This discrepancy could be partly attributed to very little empirical inquiry having appeared to date to assess the efficacy of existing relationship marketing theories within this fast‐moving industry. The current study provides an exploratory investigation that looks at the well‐established (in other marketing settings) relative influences of quality, customer satisfaction, and loyalty in the formation of future purchase intentions and word‐of‐mouth behaviors within the e‐CRM industry. Concludes that e‐CRM marketers must first identify means of increasing the overall level of customer satisfaction within their industry, and then begin to consider moving beyond customer satisfaction toward broader loyalty‐based strategic marketing objectives to support their relationship marketing practices. Practitioner and research implications of the reported study are discussed.
Details
Keywords
Chiharu Ishida and Steven A. Taylor
This paper aims to report two studies with the purpose of demonstrating and establishing the efficacy of using an alternative method of operationalizing relative brand attitudes…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to report two studies with the purpose of demonstrating and establishing the efficacy of using an alternative method of operationalizing relative brand attitudes based on Cheung's latent congruence model (LCM).
Design/methodology/approach
Data are collected concerning brand attitudes related to their product (study 1) and retailer (study 2) preferred and best alternative brands. Structural equation modeling is used to demonstrate and validate the LCM model, as well as to relate relative brand attitudes to satisfaction judgments and loyalty behaviors.
Findings
Two separate samples of respondents across two unique marketing settings (product and retailer brands) support the LCM‐based view of relative brand attitude proposed herein. In addition, results suggest that preferred brands are most strongly related to satisfaction with the preferred brand, however, relative brand attitudes are alternatively related to preferred brand loyalty. Thus, relative brand attitudes appear to have both direct and indirect (through satisfaction) influences on brand loyalty.
Practical implications
Practical implications include the availability of a usable method of operationalizing relative brand attitudes in a way that fully utilizes hedonic/utilitarian attitude scale for absolute and relative brand attitudes measures and can control for measurement error. The proposed method thus provides a means to strengthen measurement models associated with relative brand concepts.
Originality/value
The reported studies offer an alternative and practical method of measuring relative brand attitudes in a way that results in practical insights about consumer satisfaction and brand loyalty.
Details
Keywords
Steven A. Taylor, Gary L. Hunter and Deborah L. Lindberg
The purpose of this study is to advance marketers' understanding of customer‐based brand equity (CBBE) within the context of a B2B financial service marketing setting.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to advance marketers' understanding of customer‐based brand equity (CBBE) within the context of a B2B financial service marketing setting.
Design/methodology/approach
Two nation‐wide studies were used to investigate whether brands are in fact differentiated in the minds of the target audience; test two competing explanations of the formation of CBBE using structural equation analyses; and reconcile satisfaction and CBBE theories within a single theoretical model.
Findings
The results suggest that these customers do differentiate brands, and that Netemeyer et al.'s model of CBBE is generally supported. In addition, the extended model of CBBE proposed herein explains more variance in loyalty intentions, while simultaneously demonstrating the importance of customer satisfaction in CBBE models, and incorporates customer attitudes into conceptualization of CBBE.
Research limitations/implications
First, the current research focuses specifically on CBBE. Second, the reported MDS results are exploratory in nature and must be interpreted with caution.
Practical implications
The results will help financial service marketers measure CBBE as well as relate brand power to customer satisfaction and customer attitude measurement through implementing the proposed framework in their own competitive setting.
Originality/value
The two nation‐wide studies reported herein enhance our understanding of CBBE and its relationship to customer attitudes and satisfaction research within a single theoretical model, as well as identifying the influential roles of both hedonic and utilitarian forms of brand attitudes in the formation of CBBE.
Details
Keywords
Steven A. Taylor, Kevin Celuch and Stephen Goodwin
This study involved a nation‐wide sample of industrial customers of heavy equipment manufacturers. The results suggest that brand equity and trust are consistently the most…
Abstract
This study involved a nation‐wide sample of industrial customers of heavy equipment manufacturers. The results suggest that brand equity and trust are consistently the most important antecedents to both behavioral and attitudinal forms of customer loyalty. There is also evidence that the models underlying the formation of behavioral versus attitudinal forms of customer loyalty may vary across research settings. The results suggest that industrial equipment marketers may consider moving beyond a focus on satisfaction in relationship marketing strategies toward integrated strategies that foster brand equity and trust in their customer base as well.
Details
Keywords
Customer satisfaction is a significant issue for most marketers. Previous research has identified various factors that determine customer satisfaction in retail banking sector in…
Abstract
Customer satisfaction is a significant issue for most marketers. Previous research has identified various factors that determine customer satisfaction in retail banking sector in Western countries. The current paper reports findings from a survey, which looked into determinants of customer satisfaction in the retail banking in Pakistan. A total of 300 questionnaires were randomly distributed to customers of a specific bank in Pakistan. Results indicate that there was a strong relationship between service quality and customer satisfaction. There was, however, no relationship between customer satisfaction and tangible aspects of the service environment. The paper discusses implications for bank management.
It can be argued that toleration is an essential component of an ethnographic orientation. But is this a matter of principled commitment, or simply a practical requirement for…
Abstract
It can be argued that toleration is an essential component of an ethnographic orientation. But is this a matter of principled commitment, or simply a practical requirement for doing ethnographic work? And what does it entail? In its standard sense ‘toleration’ means not challenging – perhaps not even openly evaluating – actions or attitudes of which one disapproves, or views with which one disagrees. It is important to underline that this is very different from celebrating diversity or difference. Even so, it might be argued that ethnographers should not need to be tolerant, since as a matter of principle they ought to be open to the other, rather than disapproving of it. I will argue that this is false, that they do often need to be tolerant, both in the course of fieldwork and when analysing data and writing up their research. During data collection, toleration may be required when witnessing things that one believes to be morally wrong, finds physically disgusting, or judges culturally damaging; or when hearing views with which one fundamentally disagrees. In analysis and writing up, toleration means portraying beliefs or activities in a way that is unaffected by one's own attitude towards them, and writing about them in a manner that does not communicate any evaluation (and thereby necessarily runs the risk that readers will infer one approves of them when one does not). I will argue that the particular grounds on which the requirement of toleration can be based have implications for decisions about what should be its limits, but that a commitment to ethnography demands that those limits be broad. Finally, I consider what the implications of adherence to the principle of tolerance are for the ethnographer as a person. Does it condemn one to ethical inauthenticity? Or is research an ethical way of life that is of value in itself?