On-line Commerce and Town Centre Retailers’ Experience

This paper is an attempt to develop a new way to sell products or services for retailers within town centres. An analysis of the literature revealed that the use of the Internet and digital commerce strategies are rarely used as tools to revitalize urban retail and develop a multidimensional experience of place. Thus, this paper aims to highlight which new modes of online commerce—e-commerce, s-commerce and m-commerce—are more suitable than others to help town centre retailers revitalize the place where they work. The research questions are as follows: 1) What are the origins of the growth and development of new forms of selling? and 2) How might town centre retailers integrate new forms of selling with traditional retailing? In answering the previously stated questions, this paper provides a proposed model that, by combining physical and virtual means to sell products and services, can provide specific strengths in revitalizing town centres

The Evolution of Social Commerce: The People, Management, Technology, and Information Dimensions

Social commerce is a form of commerce mediated by social media and is converging both online and offline environments. As a relatively new phenomenon, social commerce has evolved quickly in practice, yet has gained little attention in the IS discipline. With its pervasiveness in businesses and people’s lives, social commerce presents ample research opportunities that can have both theoretical and practical significance and implications. This article aims to capture researchers’ attention by describing the characteristics of social commerce and its potential future directions. We trace the evolutionary patterns of social commerce chronologically, based on trade articles and academic publications from 2005 to 2011. A framework that combines people, management, technology, and information dimensions is used to provide a systematic analysis of social commerce development. Our examination shows that since 2005, the year the term social commerce was incepted, assumptions and understanding of people in social commerce move from a simple and general description of human social nature to a rich exploration with different angles from social psychology, social heuristics, national culture, and economic situations. On the management dimension, business strategies and models evolve from the short-tail to long-tail thinking, with invented concepts such as branded social networks/communities, niche social networks/communities, niche brands, co-creating, team-buying, and multichannel social networks. Technologically, IT platforms and capabilities for social commerce evolve from blogs, to social networking sites, to media-sharing sites, and to smartphones. While Facebook becomes a profit-generating platform, creating the notion of f-commerce, Google and Twitter become strong competitors with great potentials. Information in social commerce evolves from peer-generated, to community-generated (crowdsourcing), to consumer and marketer co-created, and to global crowdsourced. Our examination identifies various conceptualizations, terminologies, views, and perspectives about social commerce and its relation to other well-known concepts such as e-commerce. In light of the evolution of social commerce, we provide possible future directions for research and practice

The mediating role of religious orientation on the relationship between luxury values, ethical values and buying behavior

Consumer behavior issues have become more heterogeneous because of cultural differences. This phenomenon makes it progressively important to understand factors impacting it. As such, this study examined the determinants of consumer buying behavior among Saudis and expatriates living in Riyadh, the capital city of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Initially, this study discovered the role of religious orientation as a mediator between the relationships of luxury values, ethical value, media, word of mouth, price, motivation, and perceived cultural importance taken with consumer buying behavior. Partial Least Squares Method algorithm and bootstrap techniques were used to test the study hypotheses. The results provided support for most of the hypothesized relationships of the study. Specifically, ethical value, luxury values, motivation, price, and religious orientation were found significantly/positively related to consumer buying behavior which benefits the consumers. Also, creating value for the community was significantly/positively related to forms of consumer buying behavior. Additionally, religious orientation mediated between the relationships of ethical values, and perceived cultural importance taken with consumer buying behavior which showed consumers’ strong inclinations towards their ethical values and cultural perceptions. However, while creating value for the word of mouth, and price, a lack of significant relationship with religious orientation was found. As a whole, the results of mediation and other variables indicated that most of them were significant. The outcomes of this research seek to support industry and business practitioners in understanding the behavior of Saudis and expatriate consumers, and in using the findings to formulate strategies that enhance their competitiveness in the market. Finally, this research attempts to enrich marketing literature by providing empirical evidence on Saudis’ consumption behavior from the perspective of the Muslim populatio

On-line Commerce and Town Centre Retailers' Experience

This paper is an attempt to develop a new way to sell products or services for retailers within town centres. An analysis of the literature revealed that the use of the Internet and digital commerce strategies are rarely used as tools to revitalize urban retail and develop a multidimensional experience of place. Thus, this paper aims to highlight which new modes of online commerce—e-commerce, s-commerce and m-commerce—are more suitable than others to help town centre retailers revitalize the place where they work. The research questions are as follows: 1) What are the origins of the growth and development of new forms of selling? and 2) How might town centre retailers integrate new forms of selling with traditional retailing? In answering the previously stated questions, this paper provides a proposed model that, by combining physical and virtual means to sell products and services, can provide specific strengths in revitalizing town centres.</p

Town centre management: developing new strategies based on the e-technology challenge

Over time, the Town Centre has always had an important role in the development of local economies (McAteer and Stephens, 2011), experiencing periods of growth and decline that influenced its physiognomy. The Town Centre’s decline was caused by several different factors, such as the decentralization of retail activities away from, and on the edge of, the Town Centre (Schiller, 1986; 1988), and the development of new forms of selling over the Internet (Bhatti, 2007; Ickler, et al., 2011). All in all, this has led to a crisis for Town Centre’s retailers, prejudicing their development and enhancement (Alzubaidi et al., 1997; Thomas and Bromley, 2003). In order to contrast the pauperization of the Town Centre and to improve its growth, during the last decades in several European Cities was created the Town Centre Management (TCM) schemes, to find practical responses to the emerging complexities of urban revitalisation (Coca- Stefaniak et al., 2009). Taking into consideration this scenario, the aim of this work is to further the understanding of the role-played by TCM’s over time in revitalizing the commercial activities in the Town Centre. Studying TCM programs and activities carried out in different European cities will work towards that better understanding of their effectiveness. By investigating the TCM programs in some Swedish and Italian cities, this study aims at identifying the core elements in the TCM strategies related to improving and developing the Town Centre. This thesis is organized in three autonomous papers, where each of them constitutes a specification of one general topic. The first paper aims to analyse the existing literature to highlight scholars’ point of view and, to verify whether the retail activity maintains the central role in the perspective of the Town Centre revitalization, or if the attention has shifted to other activities. One question of this analysis is: What are the research lines that emerge as attracting interest for future development regarding the Town Centre revitalization? This paper built the review of the literature (Roley and Slack, 2004) by using a retrieval procedure based on the combination of several keywords in order to identify the journals where the considered topic assumes relevance. The purpose of the second paper is to understand the way in which the TCM, through the adoption of practical strategies, tackles problems related to the decentralization of retail activities away from the Town Centre. More precisely, the research questions are: what are the answers that Cities gave to the development of Town Centre problems? In the European context what kind of organizations has been created to pursue the goal to revitalize the Town Centre? Does an accord exist between scholars to the most effective initiatives that Cities have to adopt? To answer these questions a qualitative method based on multiple case study methodology was adopted (Eisenhardt, 1989; 1991; Yin, 1994; 2009). The multiple, case study permitted to make a comparison between different realities, providing a stronger base to clarify the several multifaceted aspects of the same phenomenon. From the analysis of the literature and empirical cases, studied in the first two papers, it emerged that the use of Internet and ways to sell through it (Bhatti, 2007; Ickler et al., 2009; Curty, and Zhang, 2011) are rarely adopted as tools able to revitalize the Town Centre. Inasmuch, the third paper aims to highlight what kind of e-technologies - after a specific analysis of each of ecommerce, s-commerce and m-commerce - are more suitable than others to help Town Centres retail activities to regain their past glory. The research questions are: What are the reasons for the development of new forms of selling? What are the new forms of sale over the Internet developed in the last decades? And, in what way is it possible to connect old and new forms of selling in order to improve the retail attractiveness of Town Centres? To find a way by which it is possible to connect old and new forms of selling that could improve the retail experience in Town Centres, a model has been proposed. The implications of this thesis are both theoretical, since it contributes to a better understanding of the relationship between TCM and the renaissance of the retailing activities (in order to support the urban revitalization), and practical, as it emphasizes the role of the internet and new forms of selling over it that could be integrated within traditional forms of selling within fixed location stores in the Town Centre

The ethical nature of critical research in information systems.

Critical research in information systems is based on and inspired by ethics and morality. In order to support this proposition, this paper will suggest a way of classifying critical research that differs from definitions common IS research. According to the current definition, research is critical when it is motivated by the intention to change social realities and promote emancipation. Based on this critical intention, critical research is furthermore characterized by critical topics, critical theories, and critical methodologies. Using these criteria of critical research, the paper argues that critical research is ethical in nature. To support this view, the paper introduces the concepts of ethics and morality by analysing two traditions of moral philosophy, here called the ‘German tradition’ and the ‘French tradition’. Using three examples of current critical research in information systems, the paper will show that ethics and morality strongly influence critical intention, topics and theories. Having thus established the ethical nature of critical research, the paper concludes by discussing the weaknesses of critical research from the point of view of ethics and morality

E-Business assimilation in the context of Saudi Arabia : utilising Habermas' lifeworld and system theory

E-business assimilation in Saudi Arabia becomes critical due to the overarching social issues that the stakeholders encounter. Grounded in Habermas‘ Critical Social Theory (CST), this study applies the theory of lifeworld and system to understand the relevance of the Islamic faith as well as the Arab culture in the conduct of businesses in Saudi Arabia, which in turn, would make e-business assimilation a success. This study seeks to contribute to the IS literature‘s lack of research in which the aim is to emphasise social factors as the main determinants of e-business assimilation. We point out that inherent to the other important factors (e.g., technological, organisational, and cultural), people‘s actions (emancipated or regulated) are most critical to realising business‘ innovation and growth through utilising e-business technology. The sample of the study was composed of 1071 SAP end-users from the three leading Saudi companies, namely, Saudi Aramco, Saudi Basic Industries Corporation (SABIC), and Saudi Iron and Steel Company (Hadeed), an affiliate of SABIC. Also, seven consultants contributed their knowledge and expertise regarding e-business adoption, on which they have been working for many years. The necessary data were collected through two methods: (1) distributed survey questionnaire for the SAP end-users; and (2) face – to - face (semi-structured) interview for the consultants. The value of Habermas‘ theory of lifeworld and system is shown by the development of a business model that can be used to achieve e-business assimilation success in the context of Saudi Arabia because it has the ability to distinguish the actions in various social situations – whether the actions reflect emancipation or restriction of the actors‘ way of living; and consequently, whether the actors‘ way of living should remain as it is or should undergo necessary changes. The newly developed ―E-Business Assimilation Model‖ (EAM) includes as its constructs the most important factors relevant to e-business success as well as the concepts of lifeworld and system: that is, all factors are subject to be ―filtered‖ through both the lifeworld and the system constructs. Through EAM, it was found that it could be easy for the project team to execute an e-business project if they will give critical consideration II to the people‘s social and cultural beliefs, aspirations, perspectives and preferences. Understanding the people‘s social and cultural means allows the project team to customise the e-business systems to be installed, and to make sure that the new system really fits the organisational setting. For every challenging lifeworld and system situation, the top management can provide improved solutions to be applied. The findings show how SAP implementation in the selected companies was affected by social factors such as age and gender; cultural factors such as religion; organisational factors such as performance motivating, management support and consultancy; and technological factors. The companies‘ change management programmes had enabled resolution of problems by the adoption of measures suited to each company‘s holistic characteristics and needs. Evidence of system-lifeworld interactions was demonstrated in each of these cases. Saudi society was shown to be strongly lifeworld oriented, such that ‗system‘ comes into conflict with a member of lifeworld and there are some lifeworld elements (such as gender roles and constraints) that system cannot change but must work within. The findings demonstrate the value of a system – lifeworld perspective in analysing factors influencing a change such as e-business assimilation and result in development of an elaborated model for holistic analysis of pertinent factors

Strategies for Real Estate Professionals to Compete With Internet Organizations

There has been slow growth among traditional residential real estate organization managers to communicate among the real estate industry successful e-commerce strategies. Grounded in diffusion of innovation theory, the purpose of this descriptive case study was to explore strategies traditional residential real estate managers use to compete with e-commerce real estate managers. The study population comprised traditional real estate office managers in western Nebraska who had at least 5 years\u27 experience in developing successful e-commerce strategies and had sold a home in the past 5 years. I conducted a thematic analysis on the data collected via semistructured interviews and company documents. Four themes emerged from the analysis, including establishing and maintaining multiple e-commerce websites, regularly monitoring websites, establishing a visible presence on multiple e-commerce websites, and preparation to evolve as technology evolves. The study\u27s implications for positive social change include the potential for traditional residential real estate organization managers\u27 to develop and use new and useful strategies for overcoming barriers and effectively competing with e-commerce real estate organizations to remain competitive in the local economy through job creation, innovation, and competitiveness to sustain their businesses

Making sense of e-commerce as social action

Purpose – To provide a social-theoretic framework which explains how e-commerce affects social conditions, such as availability of information and equality of access to information, influences actors’ behavior, shapes e-commerce business models, and in turn impacts industry structure.Design/methodology/approach – Empirical investigation based on one-hour interviews with owners/managers of nine vehicle dealerships and six vehicle buyers in a large US metropolitan region. The hermeneutic method of understanding was used, involving a circular process from research design and attentiveness to data, to data collection and interpretation. This circular process exemplified the dialectic relationship between the theoretical framework (derived from Habermas’s Theory of Communicative Action) and empirical data, through which interpretation and theoretical explanations grounded in the data emerged.Findings – Demonstrates that e-commerce gives rise to increasing competition among the dealers, decreasing prices and migration of competition to price, decreasing profitability of the average dealer, and erosion of traditional sources of competitive advantage. Moreover, e-commerce emancipates and empowers vehicle purchasers while reducing the power of automobile dealers.Research limitations/implications – The research findings focus on the effects of e-commerce on the automobile distribution industry. However, one could argue that a number of the findings extend to other retailing-based industries.Practical implications – The paper illustrates a research methodology that may be useful to study other e-commerce applications.Originality/value – This paper illustrates the application of Habermas’s Theory of Communicative Action to studying the effect of e-commerce