Leveraging sponsorship to achieve consumer relationship objectives through the creation of ‘marketing spaces’: An exploratory study

This paper explores the emergence of sponsorship-linked events as a strategy to leverage relational outcomes through sponsorship investment. The growing use of sponsorship-linked events reinforces the need to understand the potential of such leverage strategies, thus the findings contribute to the body of literature on effective sponsorship practices. Findings from semi-structured interviews with Sponsorship and Marketing Managers suggest a shifting orientation among sponsors towards the pursuit of relational objectives. The privileged access to consumers afforded through sponsorship allows sponsors to manufacture opportunities to create intimacy with customers through sponsorship-linked events in relaxed, comfortable environments; thus sponsorship-linked events are positioned as a rich environment to add value to consumer–brand interactions and achieve relational objectives. Hosting specifically designed events affords sponsors an increased modicum of control over consumer–brand experiences in sponsorship environments characterised by a lack of control over sponsored property actions. However, this control may be eroded by social media technologies, which facilitate consumer–consumer communication around sponsorship-linked events. Social media, however, is proposed as a useful tool to elicit consumer feedback, addressing the misalignment between current sponsorship evaluation practices and emergent relational objectives revealed in the empirical findings. Therefore, successfully activating the sponsorship-linked marketing space demands an integrated and strategic approach

Perceived environmental uncertainty; PEU; REF 2014

NoAn important contribution to the literature on perceived environmental uncertainty (PEU) is Milliken’s distinction between state uncertainty, effect uncertainty, and response uncertainty. However, despite its appealing logic in capturing the types of uncertainty managers may experience as they seek to understand and respond to changes in an organization’s environment, there has been no full and rigorous psychometric development and testing of scales to measure the three constructs. Using a two-phase empirical study, this research seeks to develop and test such scales in terms of dimensionality, reliability, and validity (including nomological validity). The results suggest that managers do make a meaningful distinction between different types of uncertainty, that it is worthwhile measuring all three constructs (as they have differential impacts on outcome variables), and that there are linkages between them. Managerial contributions and implications for future research are also discussed

The impact of call centre stressors on inbound and outbound call-centre agent burnout

Purpose: The aim of this study is to draw on various models of burnout and test hypotheses relating to anticipated differences in the burnout process between inbound versus outbound call centre agents. This is achieved by comparing the magnitude of the relationships in the

Management commitment to service quality and service recovery performance: A study of frontline employees in public and private hospitals

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate a model of management commitment to service quality (MCSQ) and service recovery performance in the context of public and private hospitals in New Zealand. Design/methodology/approach: In a cross-sectional survey grounded in Bagozzi's reformulation of attitude theory, frontline hospital employees (FHEs) were asked about how MCSQ impacted on their service recovery performance in both the public and private sectors. Findings: The results of the study suggest that the relationship between MCSQ and service recovery performance is mediated by organizational commitment. With the exception of the relationship between MCSQ and organizational commitment, there are no differences between FHEs in the private and public sectors. Originality/value: Very little attention has been given to a comparative examination of those managerial practices critical for improving frontline employee service recovery efforts in a public and private healthcare context. Our research addresses this paucity

Transferring knowledge for organisational customers by knowledge intensive business service marketing firms: An exploratory study

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the knowledge transfer processes of knowledge intensive business service firms by focusing on the knowledge for customer, which is the knowledge about the service provider's products and services, specifically "before-sale" knowledge, and the transfer of this knowledge in order to develop customers. Design/methodology/approach: The authors conducted an in-depth qualitative study of the knowledge transfer process undertaken by a sample of six global knowledge intensive service firms, to use knowledge transfer as a means of customer development. Findings: The results of this study suggest that customer absorptive capacity influences the role that knowledge for customers has in ultimately determining whether customer development will occur. Where tacit knowledge transfer occurs, it is restricted to loyal, high share customers. With respect to methods of transfer, the findings reveal that knowledge-intensive business service firms transferring explicit knowledge utilise both formal and informal methods. Research limitations/implications: Data collection was cross-sectional and longitudinal research would have the benefit of examining how customer knowledge transfer changes over time during the customer development process (pre-sale, during sale and post-sale customer development). Future research studying other types of knowledge transfer, such as during-sale and after-sale knowledge transfer, are also encouraged. Practical implications: Managers should be open to employing numerous types of media in transferring both explicit and tacit knowledge rather than restricting themselves to the normative "explicit-formal-media lean" versus "tacit-informal-media rich" categorisations in the literature. Originality/value: Understanding the role of customer knowledge transfer in the development of existing organisational customers is particularly important in the context of knowledge intensive business service firms. The extant literature recognises that customer development efforts are critically important in increasing service adoption and firm performance but there exists a dearth of research on customer knowledge transfer in the context of professional service organisations

An empirical investigation of the factors affecting the scope of information needs in a MkIS

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre-DSC:9350.8326(no 02/14) / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Customer perceptions of frontline employee service delivery: A study of Russian bank customer satisfaction and behavioural intentions

This study examines the nature of relationships between customer perceptions of frontline employee service delivery (core and relational), satisfaction and selected behavioural intentions by using customers of a commercial retail bank in Russia as its setting. Contrary to findings from North American-Western research, the study findings show that relational service delivery only significantly impacts customer satisfaction for Russian males whereas core service delivery only impacts this affective outcome for Russian female customers. Implications of the results are discussed and future research avenues are offered