Can Retail Liminal Space/Places Transcend Gender Segmentation?

Transcendent Customer Experiences (TCEs) transform a customer’s self-identity and imbues them with quintessence: a sacred feeling toward the brand, product and experience. Although TCEs need not happen in a sacred place, they occur in spaces of non-geographical liminality. The ordinary world seems to falls away, replaced by an authentic connection between actors in a communitas, or community of sacred feeling. In the last thirty years, marketers have been further developing consumer religiosity as a sales strategy. This paper explores questions regarding the affect on gender and gender neutrality in consumer religiosity, especially as it applies to liminal space/places in retail environments, ad proposes questions for further investigation

The road to Damascus leads to one infinite loop: An introspective adventure into Apple computer customer evangelism

This paper draws on a literature review, conceptual development and an introspective narrative to explore “quintessence” and Customer Evangelism (CE). Quintessence, a mystical connection between the customer and a product, elevates a profane product experience to the sacred. This paper argues that the quintessential moment, the root of the Customer Evangelism conversion experience, awakens or redirects a propensity toward evangelistic behaviour. As the moment of conversion, quintessence is as pivotal as it is mystical. Tourism entities can attempt to nurture a seemingly religious experience, and for some entities quintessence is an unexpected by-product. An introspective narrative, through one of the author’s experiences with Apple Computer products, commences exploration into quintessence and its relationship to Customer Evangelism. After a literature review, this paper outlines a Customer Evangelism model with quintessence, and then triangulates that model with the narrative data

Smells like university spirit: Predicting the propensity for student engagement using a customer evangelism model

Engaging students outside the classroom tends to be a hit and miss affair, with exceptional, vocal or troublesome students garnering most of the attention, support and opportunity. The authors of this paper proposes a targeted approach to cultivating highly engaged students and student leadership based on their consumer behaviour rather than their academic merit or self-identification. The theoretical basis for the model employed uses Consumer Culture Theory, in particular Subcultures of Consumption and Customer Evangelism. The goal is to employ a more equitable, coordinated approach to identifying students who are inclined to be highly engaged with university life during and after their academic careers and afterwards, and encourage them to self develop into organic, authentic social networks within the university community which encourage engagement with the university and peer support

Speed Dating: a Process of Forming Undergraduate Student Groups

First year undergraduate students working on semester-long group assessments may lack the skills and knowledge to make sound choices in selecting other group members. This paper is an instructor’s guide to using speed-dating techniques in a classroom environment to create student groups. The paper also outlines suggestions for lecturers on how to support their students in the experience, based on theoretical constructs around the psychology of choice and work teams

Towards a folk taxonomy of popular new media marketing terms

Word of Mouth and Brand Community Marketing terms have emerged to describe particular people and their effectiveness in promoting messages, particularly with the emergence of social media. The development of the terms and their use are concurrent in academic literature, industry literature and popular culture. Furthermore, it is common for these terms to converge, borrowing meanings, connotations and subtexts. This paper explores five key community marketing terms−Geek, Maven, Alpha User, Evangelist and Fanboy−and develops term classifications and relationships into a folk taxonomy. Tourism and hospitality practitioners and academics can use the taxonomy for word of mouth activities and research

A Taylor Function Calculus for Hybrid System Analysis: Validation in Coq

International audienceWe present a framework for the verification of the numerical algorithms used in Ariadne, a tool for analysis of nonlinear hybrid system. In particular, in Ariadne, smooth functions are approximated by Taylor models based on sparse polynomials. We use the Coq theorem prover for developing Taylor models as sparse polynomials with floating-point coefficients. This development is based on the formalisation of an abstract data type of basic floating-point arithmetic . We show how to devise a type of continuous function models and thereby parametrise the framework with respect to the used approximation, which will allow us to plug in alternatives to Taylor models

Relationships between Quintessence and Strong Word of Mouth Behaviour

Theory suggests that Quintessence (Q), an emotional/spiritual connection to a product, relates positively to Word of Mouth marketing (WOM). This paper investigates if consumers who experience Quintessence (Q+) share the same behavioural indicators as consumers who participate in strong Word of Mouth behavior (WOM+). Survey data from subscribers to an online entertainment service demonstrated that Q+ and WOM+ consumers shared similar characteristics, those who experienced Quintessence (Q+) spread significantly more WOM than those without Quintessence

Keeping It Real: Applying 360 Degrees of Authenticity

Marketers tout authenticity as the new reality, a means by which consumers in markets of abundance determine value and, at times, prestige. Approaching consumption from a Service- Dominant perspective, where every product has a unique experiential component within which the consumer and producer co-create value, means authenticity is problematic. How can a marketer represent authentically the infinite possibilities of the experiential component of a product? This paper builds on emerging research and a qualitative example to explore the meaning and application of an authenticity framework: the 360 degree model of authenticity

Paramedicine and Social Work: Case Studies in Authentic Student Recruitment

Selling the course experience to future students has been corporatised across the Higher Education sector. At many universities marketing and sales specialists, such as ECU’s Student Recruitment Team, rather than academic staff, field prospective student enquiries. Representing courses authentically is crucial to matching future students with an appropriate course experience and career, as well is managing future students’ expectations. A challenge for academics is communicating the course/career experience to university sales agents (recruiters). A challenge for recruiters is conveying an authentic course experience to future students when they have not taken a course themselves. This paper selects two ECU courses, Social Work and Paramedicine, and examines the relationship between academics and recruiters. Particular emphasis is placed on authentic representation of the course experience to future students. The 360 Degree Authenticity (360da) framework was used to examine the quality of authenticity in communication and sales techniques through convergent interviewing. Findings indicated that authentic representation of the course experience depended on a professional trust between individual academics and individual recruiters. Findings also indicated that academics and sales agents emphasised different aspects of the University to future students; but both used credibility markers such as accreditation. Academics were more focused on the career experience, recruiters were more focused on the university and course experienc

Paramedicine and Social Work: Case Studies in Authentic Student Recruitment

Selling the course experience to future students has been corporatised across the Higher Education sector. At many universities marketing and sales specialists, such as ECU’s Student Recruitment Team, rather than academic staff, field prospective student enquiries. Representing courses authentically is crucial to matching future students with an appropriate course experience and career, as well is managing future students’ expectations. A challenge for academics is communicating the course/career experience to university sales agents (recruiters). A challenge for recruiters is conveying an authentic course experience to future students when they have not taken a course themselves. This paper selects two ECU courses, Social Work and Paramedicine, and examines the relationship between academics and recruiters. Particular emphasis is placed on authentic representation of the course experience to future students. The 360 Degree Authenticity (360da) framework was used to examine the quality of authenticity in communication and sales techniques through convergent interviewing. Findings indicated that authentic representation of the course experience depended on a professional trust between individual academics and individual recruiters. Findings also indicated that academics and sales agents emphasised different aspects of the University to future students; but both used credibility markers such as accreditation. Academics were more focused on the career experience, recruiters were more focused on the university and course experienc