Relationship Building in IoT Platform Models: the Case of the Danfoss Group

Purpose: This paper investigates the implications for a manufacturer’s relationship building towards B2B customers and suppliers as a consequence of Internet-of-Things (IoT) platform models. Design/methodology/approach: Explorative single case study with embedded sub-cases. Qualitative research approach. Semi-structured interviews. Findings: The paper identifies two ways of doing relationship building when it comes to IoT platform models. Relationship building can take place through a Classic Relationship IoT platform model (characterized by low complexity) or a New Relationship IoT platform model (characterized by high complexity). In both models, the manufacturer aims for high stickiness towards the customers. In the New Relationship model, however, low stickiness towards suppliers is aimed for in order to enable the manufacturer to orchestrate the stakeholder constellation dynamically. In addition, a driver for the low stickiness aim towards suppliers can be found in a motive to outsource risks to suppliers in IoT markets characterized by high degrees of turbulence and growth. Research limitations/implications: The study points to the fact that a manufacturer should consider how the new technology IoT gives opportunities for different ways of relating to stakeholders, e.g. customers and suppliers, in the business model. Originality/value: Based on primary data collection the research shows how strategic relationship building can help a manufacturer create value with customers and suppliers within IoT platform models. The paper expands the business model literature by investigating consequences of a new technology, i.e. IoT. Keywords: IoT, IoT platform model; platform stickiness; manufacturer; relationship building, business models. Article Classification: Research pape

How Learning Evolved from Offline Classroom to Online Platforms with its Amplifier, Edu-KOLs: A Systematic Literature Review

Key Opinion Leaders (KOLs) gradually emerged on e-commerce platforms with their influencing power on global audience. E-learning platforms followed suit on drawing the influence of educational KOLs (Edu-KOLs) for perceived learning outcome, customer retention and branding. This paper presents a systematic literature review on the thematic of traditional learning and its transformation into e-learning platforms. We seek to achieve a preliminary analysis into current development and trend on educational digitalization and its effectiveness, particularly with its amplifier, Edu-KOLs who lead new waves of learning for Gen Alpha and beyond. This literature review summaries terminologies on Edu-KOLs, and prudently reviews the locus of past research on e-commerce platforms with extracted KOLs’ analysis. The findings indicate a wide research gap given few researches having been directly yielded into Edu-KOLs’ impact, as opposite to mounting empirical evidence for e-commerce platforms with perceived outcome through KOLs

Understanding eINVs through the lens of prior research in entrepreneurship, international business and international entrepreneurship

In this chapter we examine the growing phenomenon of internet-based international new ventures, which we label “eINVS,” through the lens of previous research in the fields of entre- preneurship, international business and international entrepreneurship. Our purpose is to iden- tify where these existing bodies of research help us to understand eINVs, and where there are gaps that constitute important questions for future research. We define an eINV by adapting a widely used definition of international new ventures (INV) (Oviatt and McDougall 2005: 5): an eINV is a venture whose business model is enabled by a digital platform and that, from incep- tion, seeks to derive significant competitive advantage from international growth. With a focus explicitly on how extant research helps us understand eINVs, this review differs from that of Reuber and Fischer (2011b), who focus on firm-level internet-related resources that are related to the internationalization of ventures in general; that of Pezderka and Sinkovics (2011), who focus on risk and the online foreign market entry decisions of small and medium-sized enter- prises (SMEs); and that of Chandra and Coviello (2010), who focus on consumers using the internet to pursue international opportunities

Influence Of Short Video Live Broadcast On Network User Behavior And Sales—From Meta-Analysis, Experimental Analysis To Empirical Analysis

Background: There are more than 1 billion users of short video media in China, and enterprises have long recognized that the influence of short video media has strong marketing achievements, such as short video community and information sharing platform participating in sales. Many enterprises have established active short video media so that they can directly interact with their customers. Among them, the content of webcasting can also stimulate and influence users' participation (like, comment or share) and users' stickiness (collection and attention). Research purposes and methods: In order to explore the underlying logical relationship between "media-content-goods-users-sales", firstly, it is necessary to find out the influence mechanism of short video live broadcast on network users' participation and sales. Therefore, in the first experiment, we conducted a meta-analysis on a large number of researches on webcasting media and short video media, and analyzed their differences along the content differences, background (industry, presentation, life cycle, demand and platform) and characteristics of webcasting media. Secondly, it is necessary for us to find out the differences in the influence of the level of webcasting and the behavior of network users (participation behavior and sticky behavior) on the sales level. Therefore, in Experiment 2, based on the data of 802 live events in Tik Tok, the internal relationship between the degree of webcasting and the degree of commodity sales was analyzed. Thirdly, it is necessary for us to understand the mechanism of the influence of webcasting marketing on consumer decision-making. Therefore, in Experiment 3, the psychological mechanism of webcasting affecting purchase intention was verified by structural equation model, and the adoption intention of webcasting users was determined and verified by three factors-webcasting, participation behavior and sticky behavior. Research results: This paper makes a comprehensive and in-depth analysis and verification through three experiments. The result of Experiment 1 supports some existing viewpoints, for example, webcasting media can promote the sales of new products more effectively, but it highlights some new insights. The webcasting media mainly promotes the sales of goods and hardly affects the stickiness of users. The average citation of webcasting media stickiness is 0.137, and the sales citation is 0.353. In addition, the research results also put forward a better way to adjust the content of webcasting media to meet the communication target. Experiment 2 found that it has a higher degree of webcasting (β1=.715, P < .01; β2=-.090, p<0.01) more effectively produces the degree of commodity sales, and further verifies the potential moderating effects of two kinds of user behaviors: user participation behavior and user stickiness behavior. Experiment 3 verified that webcasting (b = 0.247, t=3.317, p< 0.05) directly and significantly affected the degree of online sales, while the behavior of online users (participation of live users and live fans) adjusted the degree of online sales to a certain extent, which indirectly affected the degree of online goods sales. Research conclusion: With the rapid development of short video media today, enterprises can realize the online sales of goods more efficiently through a powerful short video live media based on media content and media users, and further realize the balanced operation between network users and fan users in a healthy and orderly manner. Keywords: Webcast, Meta-analysis, User behavior, Social media sales, Field experiment DOI: 10.7176/NMMC/104-13 Publication date: August 31st 202

The Adaptation of Social Media Marketing Activities in S-Commerce: TikTok Shop

The growing number of digital platforms nowadays has made the competition to gain users’ attention a challenging task for businesses. Clutter in advertising and sponsored brand posts have made the task even harder as consumers repel to avoid that clutter daily. In contrast with the past, consumers use social media to fulfill certain needs when they are aware of the needs such as hedonic needs, cognitive needs, and social needs. This is why the existence of social media marketing activities known as entertainment, interactivity, and electronic word-of-mouth (e-WOM) is crucial in the marketing planning of a business. Guided by a unique, diversified and preferences-tailored algorithm, TikTok social media app is showing significant growth over the few years since the year of its commencement in comparison to its competitors of social media providers like Facebook and Instagram. The short video app has included a new business model of social commerce called TikTok Shop to promote continuous use providing more than just entertainment. Therefore, to fulfill the objective of this paper in exploring the SMMAs impact on the s-commerce of TikTok Shop, secondary data was employed. The analysis concludes that social media marketing activities or also known as SMMAs in the newly added feature of TikTok Shop have a significant impact in influencing its users. The significant difference between traditional e-commerce and s-commerce was also highlighted to further outline the bright sides of s-commerce

BUILDING AND SUSTAINING COMMUNITIES IN ONLINE LABOUR PLATFORMS

Online labour platforms enable the trading of services by connecting buyers who need services with providers willing to deliver those services. One crucial element to a platform’s survival and success lies in creating and fostering a thriving community of users – otherwise, the platform is likely to perish. However, we know very little about how such communities can be built. Extant studies have overlooked different stakeholder groups’ roles in community building and how primarily online platforms utilize offline activities. In this paper, we study the community-building efforts of six online labour platforms that have succeeded to thrive longer than an average platform. Beyond the traditional stakeholder roles of providing a marketplace (platform), delivering services (providers) and purchasing services (buyers), we find novel unique and shared roles that foster a well-functioning community. We identify five levers of community building: facilitating trade, encouraging community participation, involving users, empowering providers, and empowering buyers