Revisiting international marketing strategy in a digital era: Opportunities, challenges, and research directions

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to explore the opportunities and challenges facing firms in this new digital era concerning their international marketing strategy and examine how international marketing practices can be revisited in the light of these developments. Consideration is given to a range of relevant issues involved in the design and deployment of effective international marketing strategies using internet-enabled technologies. Such factors relate to internal company requirements, the external environmental situation, foreign market selection and entry, international marketing mix programs, and strategy implementation and control aspects. Design/methodology/approach: A conceptual paper identifies, structures and presents systematically factors influencing international marketing strategy, implementation and control using digital technologies. Findings: The authors point to the relevance and potentially important role that the deployment of online organizational resources and capabilities play in influencing foreign market selection and entry decisions and international marketing strategy choices, implementation and control. The authors thus explain how the use of digital technologies can facilitate the firm’s foreign market choices and the adoption of effective marketing programs, and offer insights into the adoption of digital tools in more effectively implementing and controlling the firm’s international marketing strategy. Originality/value: The originality and value of this conceptual study is reflected in the identification and discussion of factors comprising the organizing framework of an international marketing strategy using internet-enabled technologies and in the examination of fruitful avenues of future investigation as a result of the need to redesign international marketing strategies in a new digital era

The relational value of loyalty programs in luxury retailing

In the last decade loyalty programs have gained popularity across various industries. However and until recently, it was debatable if loyalty programs can be effective and appropriate in luxury retailing. If loyalty programs were to succeed in the luxury sector they had to deliver the kind of recognition and rewards that make luxury shoppers feel remarkable. Thus, this study examines how the utilitarian, hedonic and symbolic perceived benefits from loyalty programs can influence the satisfaction and trust with the program and consequently store loyalty. These relationships are compared between luxury and low-end retailers through data collected form a sample of 984 consumers from an online panel in US, using a structured questionnaire. Findings support that the effectiveness of loyalty programs is important to both settings but the strength of this effectiveness varies across the two settings. Specifically, hedonic and symbolic benefits found to be more important in the luxury context and utilitarian benefits in the low-end retailing setting. The results of this research address an important research gap and help to better understand customers' perceptions of loyalty program benefits. Finally, findings provide clear guidelines for managers in luxury retailing on how to design effectively their loyalty program rewards

Linking identity and heritage with image and a reputation for competition

Our study investigates the role of identity and heritage of a place in creating competitiveness of the place and its retailers by utilizing its image and reputation to improve its attraction to tourists. We explored the perceptions of tourists to test a conceptual model which was developed using concepts available in current academic literature. Data were collected relating to a famous retail store in London which is a popular destination. Findings from a survey of 294 store tourists visiting the store suggest that place heritage is the key to driver of competitiveness of both the retailer and place, through their image and reputation. The study has important implications for the expansion of current literature, theory development and business practices. Limitations of the study are outlined and directions for future research are considered

An assessment of the Literature on Cause-Related Marketing: Implications for International Competitiveness and Marketing Research

Purpose: A substantial, albeit scattered, body of research evidence is accumulating in the cause-related marketing (CRM) research stream. Thus, there is a need of a systematic overview of extant literature to map and holistically understand the CRM domain. Design/methodology/approach: To address this issue and make progress in this important area, the authors systematically review and critically examine the state of academic research on CRM. Findings: Based on a systematic review of 105 journal articles published over the past 30 years, the results reveal that CRM research is a vibrant and rapidly growing domain in the broader marketing field. This assessment exercise also shows that the current state of knowledge about CRM is characterized by persisting knowledge gaps, conflicting empirical results, theoretical inconsistencies, as well as by the absence of international marketing research on the CRM domain. Originality/value: Therefore, the authors critically evaluate the extant CRM research with the aim of increasing its coherence, quality, scope, impact and international dimension. Based on this evaluation, the authors develop an ambitious research agenda that addresses a number of promising research paths embracing different international perspectives. Finally, the authors discuss the contributions to the literature and the implications for both academics and practitioners

Why consumer animosity reduces product quality perceptions: The role of extreme emotions in international crises

School of Business and Management, Queen Mary University of Londo

How nostalgic brand positioning shapes brand equity: differences between emerging and developed markets

Extant research has established the effects of nostalgic brand positioning on brand equity, but studies have only examined individual nostalgic brand relationship dimensions separately. Combining these strands, we offer a holistic perspective of the mediating processes and identify contextual and firm-related moderators that affect the individual linkages. We draw on construal level theory and develop a multilevel model in which emotional attachment, brand local iconness, and brand authenticity explain how nostalgic brand positioning creates brand equity. We posit that country differences between emerging and developed markets and brand innovativeness moderate these mediating effects. The results from large consumer samples suggest that emotional attachment and brand local iconness play a weaker role in mediating the connection of nostalgic brand positioning and brand equity in emerging markets. However, this disadvantage in creating brand equity through nostalgic brand positioning in emerging markets can be attenuated with increasing levels of brand innovativeness

The influence of desire for control on monitoring decisions and performance outcomes in strategic alliances

Strategic alliances are fraught with risks, such as the uncontrolled disclosure of core knowledge via opportunistic learning. The usefulness of monitoring in policing opportunism notwithstanding, a contrasting view is that monitoring mechanisms can themselves manifest the dark side of strategic alliances. The present study argues that a novel dark personality trait—the focal firm's desire for control—may influence key decisions pertaining to how to monitor strategic alliances, which in turn can negatively impact performance outcomes. Our conceptual model was developed and tested, based on a survey of 404 strategic alliances. The results demonstrate that a focal firm's desire for control is positively associated with process monitoring as well as output monitoring. The firm's use of process monitoring to oversee the counterpart drives its performance outcomes only if there is a low level of information exchange between the alliance partners; as such, information exchange norms substitute for process monitoring. By contrast, the focal firm's use of outcome monitoring is negatively linked to performance unless complemented by a high level of information exchange. Key implications for alliance management and future research are derived from the findings

Machiavellianism in alliance partnerships

Against a backdrop of limited research focusing on dark-side characteristics in alliances, the authors argue that Machiavellianism in the alliance influences strategies pertaining to learning new knowledge and using power to achieve better performance effectiveness. They develop a model using theories-in-use procedures and drawing from both Machiavellian intelligence and achievement goal perspectives, which they test in a quasi-longitudinal study of 199 marketing alliances. The results suggest that Machiavellianism relates negatively to collaborative learning and positively to learning anxiety and use of power. The findings also indicate that collaborative learning enhances performance while learning anxiety and use of power result in underperformance. Collaborative learning, learning anxiety, and use of power fully mediate Machiavellianism’s impact on performance. Finally, Machiavellianism’s relationships with collaborative learning and learning anxiety are moderated positively and negatively, respectively, by partners’ collaborative history. This evidence provides managers with a more in-depth understanding about the nature, functioning, and performance relevance of Machiavellianism in alliance partnerships

Power source drivers and performance outcomes of functional and dysfunctional conflict in exporter–importer relationships

Although conflict is natural in buyer–seller relations, the issue has largely been studied in domestic market settings despite increasing globalization and the surge of cross-border inter-firm relationships. This research focuses on two different types of conflict, functional and dysfunctional, and examines how these are linked to coercive and non-coercive power bases and performance outcomes in exporter–importer relationships. Using survey data from 105 pairs of exporters and their foreign distributors, we find that only in the exporter group the use of coercive power by the foreign distributor lowers functional conflict. However, the use of coercive power by the overseas partner increases dysfunctional conflict and the use of non-coercive power reduces such conflict across both exporters and importers, although in the importer group this link is not significant. The results also suggest that functional conflict enhances performance only among importers. The use of problem solving conflict resolution boosts functional conflict's impact on performance among exporters, but adversely affects the performance effect of such conflict in the importer group. Nonetheless, problem solving resolution negatively affects the impact of dysfunctional conflict on performance in both the exporter and importer groups. Moreover, we find that power distance boosts the impact of dysfunctional conflict on performance in the relationship across the groups of exporters and importers. Implications of the findings for international marketing theory and practice are discussed, and limitations of the study considered along with future research directions