• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.13 no.1
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• pp.35-46
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• 2022

Purpose: With the rapid changes in the technical development and the trend of consumption trend, the convenience store industry is facing an unprecedented competitive situation in the consumption environment where the boundary between online and offline is broken due to the stagnation of offline distribution channels and the spread of online shopping. The biggest innovation strategy of the major convenience store brands in recent years are introducing the O2O (Online to Offline) platform and presenting new products and services beyond the boundaries of online and offline to transform themselves into Omni Channel stores. The study is designed to analyze the effect of innovativeness of convenience store as a stimulus in O2O platform which customers perceive on store loyalty, the final response to external stimuli, through customer engagement with convenience store brands. Specifically, the innovativeness of convenience stores was divided into types of core activities in corporate marketing and focused on innovations in services, products(proposals), promotions and experiences. Research design, data, and methodology: Various hypotheses have been developed to achieve this research purpose. The data were collected from 1,128 questionnaires the age between 15 and 60 who had experience using retail store apps and delivery apps and were analyzed using SPSS 22.0 and SmartPLS 3.3.7 program. Measurement model analysis was carried out to assess convergent and discriminant validity. Also, common method bias was tested using the values of VIF (variance inflation factor). The hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling with SmartPLS 3.3.7 program. Results: First, service innovation has a positive effect on cognitive engagement. Second, product, promotion and experience innovation have a positive effect on cognitive and affective engagement. Third, cognitive influences affective engagement. Finally, both cognitive and affective engagement affect store loyalty, but affective engagement has a stronger effect on store loyalty than cognitive engagement. Conclusions: All four types of innovation and cognitive engagement have a positive effect on emotional engagement, which has a stronger effect on store loyalty than cognitive engagement. Thus, while innovation can build loyalty through emotional engagement, innovation strategies must be designed and pursued with caution in terms of impact through cognitive engagement may not achieve the planned goals.

• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.8 no.4
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• pp.33-43
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• 2017

Purpose - Previous studies about corporate image generally explore how corporate image affects a company's effectiveness from the consumer view. However this study attempts to explore the impacts of corporate image (reliability, friendly, corporate social responsibility, and innovation) on employees' altruistic behaviors in the franchise industry context. This study also examine whether organizational trust and affective commitment play a mediating role in the relationship between corporate image and employees' altruistic behaviors. The authors developed several hypotheses to achieve these purposes. Research design, data, and methodology - The data were collected from employees in food-service franchise companies located in Seoul, Korea. Among a total of 363 questionnaires distributed, 294(response rate of 81%) questionnaires were returned. After excluding 18 invalid respondent questionnaires, 276 valid questionnaires(response rate of 76%) were coded and analyzed using frequency, confirmatory factor analysis, correlations analysis, and structural equation modeling with SPSS 21 and SmartPLS 3.0. Result - The findings of the study are as follows: First, friendly, CSR, and innovation had positive effects on organizational trust, but reliability did not have a significant effect on organizational trust. Second, reliability and friendly of corporate image had positive effects on affective commitment, but CSR and innovation did have a significant effect on affective commitment. Third, organizational trust and affective commitment had positive effects on employees' altruistic behaviors. Conclusions - The aim of this study is to investigate the franchise corporate image as a significant influencing factor of employees' altruistic behaviors. The data were collected from only employees from franchising companies. The findings might vary from position to position. Future studies need to collect and compare data from managers. Future studies need to consider other variables that affect employees' altruistic behaviors. For example, leadership and market orientation might influence employees' attitude and behaviors. Also, future research should include other variables and it may have limitations in sample representative because of sampling franchise corporate in Seoul. Future studies will include franchise corporate all over the country. Future studies can also consider other variables (e.g., job performance and turnover intentions) to measure employee performance at the level of individuals and identify the impact of employee performance on business performance at the level of corporate.

• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.31-43
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• 2018

Purpose - This study examines the role of foodservice franchisee's perceived justice(distributive, procedural, and interactional) in developing long-term orientation to franchisor and investigate the mediating role of cohesiveness and relationship satisfaction in the relationship between franchisee's perceived justice and long-term orientation to franchisor. Research design, data, and methodology - We collected data from managers and owners in foodservice franchisees located in Seoul, Korea. Among a total of 500 questionnaires, 500 questionnaires were returned. After excluding 36 invalid respondent questionnaires, 496 valid questionnaires(response rate of 99.2%) were analyzed using frequency, confirmatory factor analysis, correlations analysis, and structural equation modeling with SPSS 21 and SmartPLS 3.0. Result - The findings of this study are as follows: First, distributive justice and interactional justice had positive effects on cohesiveness, but procedural justice did not. Second, distributive justice and interactional justice had positive effects on relationship satisfaction, but procedural justice did not. Third, cohesiveness and relationship satisfaction had positive effects on franchisee's long-term orientation to franchisor. Conclusions - The implications of this study are as follows. First, this study found that procedural justice can create a high cohesiveness and identification of franchisee and also maintain a cooperative relationship with the franchisor. Second, this findings suggest that the perceived distributional and interactional justice can improve the satisfaction with the franchisor and thus positively influence the intention to maintain the relationship and the intention to recontract. Third, the results of this study indicate that the cohesiveness of franchisees can play a pivotal role to improve their satisfaction with the franchisor and pursue mutual development by continuously maintaining stable business relationship with franchisor. The findings of this study are subject to at least three limitations. First, the research subject is limited to the food service franchise shops in Seoul area, so the sample was not nationally representative of the franchise stores. Second, the perceived fairness is measured only from the point of view of the franchisee, and this study has a limitation to examine the difference between the perceived franchisee's and franchisor's justice. Third, Future research needs to identify more closely the relationships between perceived fairness and long-term orientation by gathering specific quantitative data such as the renewal rate and the business performance.

• The Korean Journal of Franchise Management
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.21-31
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• 2018

Purpose - Recently, the franchise business has made remarkable progress, but many conflicts have occurred. From this perspective, this paper explains how to improve the long - term relationship between franchisor and franchisee by integrating the relationship between franchisor of franchise business and franchisee. This study aims to identify the franchisee's economic and social satisfaction and to examine their influences on calculative and affective commitment, and loyalty. At the end of this paper, theoretical and managerial implication were suggested. Research design, data, and methodology - The data were collected from owners and store managers in franchisees located in Seoul, Korea. The trained researchers contacted owners and managers of the franchise stores. The questionaires were distributed to owners and managers consented to respond. The collected questionnaires were used for the final analysis of 324 copies(243 store owners and 81 store managers), except for 26 copies of the untrustworthy response out of 350 copies. The data were analyzed with SPSS, 21.0 and SmartPls 3.0 Result - The results of the study are as follows. First, economic satisfaction effects both calculative and affective commitment, but social satisfaction does not. Second, both calculative and affective commitment have positive effects on loyalty. Third, economic satisfaction has a positive impact on loyalty, but social satisfaction does not. Conclusions - The implications of this study are following as: From the theoretical perspective, this study analyze the satisfaction and commitment of the franchisee from the multidimensional perspective by analyzing the effects of the franchisee on two dimensions of economic and social satisfaction and on calculative and affective commitment. That is, this study explains the trade-off between economica and social satisfaction, and between calculative and affective commitment. From the managerial perspective, the results of this study suggest that the economic satisfaction of the franchise headquarters felt by franchisees should be prioritized over social satisfaction. Especially at the early stage of the contract, economic satisfaction should be given priority over social satisfaction. However, since affective and calculative commitment have a significant effect on loyalty, social satisfaction factors should not be excluded by focusing on only economic ones. In other words, the franchisors should not only think of franchisees as a source of sales and profits, but should respect franchisees and maintain loyal relationships with friends.

• Journal of the Korea Society of Computer and Information
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• v.18 no.9
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• pp.139-152
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• 2013

Although a series of studies shows the fact that a company's reputation could affect its sales rate and stock price, due to the increased use of SNS, the research related to the online measurement method for the corporate reputation has been relatively insufficient. This study explores a design for a method to quantify the corporate reputation value by reconstructing the discussions in literature review. Concretely, this study divides the corporate reputation value into the corporate identity information and the corporate awareness information, which includes the following five sub-categories: (1) the quality of product and service; (2) the employment environment; (3) the corporate vision; (4) the social responsibility; and (5) the business achievement. Additionally, for the corporate identity assessment, this study considers the following six factors: (1) Agreeableness (Goodness), (2)Capability (Ability), (3)Enterprise (Rise), (4)Chic (Class), (5) Ruthlessness (Authority), and (6)Informality. Based on these categories and factors, this study develops a technique quantifying the corporate reputation value by selecting 'word items' for the reputation search, and after conducting a frequency analysis in a survey. Also, to verify the result, this study exemplifies the reputation of three SI companies in Korea which could be utilized by using the commercialized reputation service. This study firstly attempts the corporate reputation measurement by classifying the identity and the awareness (corporate image and communication) upon a company in detail and enables its real applicabilities by proposing a formula to measure the reputation scores which can be utilized by verified word items from a frequency analysis.

• The Journal of Industrial Distribution & Business
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.41-48
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• 2020

Purpose: This study is to examine the intention of the elderly who live alone in the customized AI speaker for the elderly living alone to improve the quality of life service for the elderly living alone in the smart city environment. Based on the quality of life model of the elderly, this study is applied to the technology acceptance model to investigate the relationship between perceived usefulness and ease of use on the sustained use intention. Research design, data and methodology: Residents in Suwon, Gyeonggi-do, selected as candidate local governments for the Smart City Challenge Project of the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport in June 2019 to measure the perceived technology acceptance of potential users for the AI technology for the elderly living alone as part of the smart city technology. In order to evaluate the intention of using AI speaker, which is the target system of this study, a video of a chatbot using experience of elderly people living alone was produced. Results: First of all, in order for the elderly living alone to have an attitude to use AI-based speakers, there should be a perceived usefulness of the quality of life of the elderly. However, ease of use did not show any significant causal relationship to attitude toward use. In addition, the attitude toward use weakly influenced the intention to use. In other words, elderly people living alone were not likely to have a significant effect on their attitude toward use. However, feeling that AI speakers are easy to use will help to improve the quality of life, which in turn led to the attitude toward using AI speakers, which could lead to indirect effects. Finally, the perceived usefulness of quality of life was found to have a weak effect on direct use intentions. Conclusions: This study conducted a study on the technology acceptance of service environment to improve the quality of life for the specific user group who live alone in the smart seat environment. In this study, we examined the effects of AI speaker on the elderly living alone to improve the quality of life for the elderly living alone.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.12 no.4
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• pp.11-22
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• 2014

Purpose - The domestic franchise industry has made significant contributions to industry such as investment, employment, and community economy development, facilitating growth potential. The franchise industry provides management knowhow transfer between parent companies and franchisees as per contracts addressing use of business signs, franchisees' independent position, franchisor support, and royalties to be paid to the franchisors. However, many franchisors lack management knowhow and provide insufficient support because of poor control of franchisees and not having a systematic approach to support. This results in dissatisfied franchisees and failure to establish long-term relationships. Few studies have examined relational commitment and/or re-contract intention by support resources between franchisors and franchisees, despite a considerable output of theories and studies of the growth of the franchise industry. The purpose of this study, therefore, was to examine the effects of the ability to provide resources on relational commitments and re-contract intention, and to suggest causal relationships and implications. Research design, data, and methodology - The subject was domestic franchisors registered with the Association of Franchise with more than 50 franchisees. Franchisees under contract for 2 years and considering re-contract of their franchise 2 years later were used. The subjects totaled 300 franchisees in Seoul. A questionnaire survey was used to investigate the subject of franchisees' concessions during the 10 days from November 21, 2013 to November 30, 2013. After excluding 16 surveys with poor answers, 284 responses were finally used. Four areas and 44 questions were used. A nominal scale was used for four common characteristics questions including gender, ages, educational background, and franchise managing time. Questions regarding ability, relational commitment, and re-contract intention made use of a Likert 5-point scale. Data coding and data cleaning were used. SPSS 18.0 was used as follows. First, frequency analysis was done to investigate demographic characteristics. Second, exploratory factor analysis was done to verify validity of testing tools, and Cronbach's α coefficient was used to verify reliability. Third, correlation analysis and multiple regression analysis were done. An exploratory factor analysis was done to verify validity of concepts. A correlation analysis was done to test relationships between the variables, and multiple regression analysis was done to verify franchisor's ability, franchisees' relational commitment, and re-contract intention. Results - The following were the outcomes. First, store operation management, finance operation management, and human resource management affected the calculated bond. Second, store operation management and finance operation management affected the emotional bond. Third, store operation management, finance operation management, human resource management, and marketing management affected the prescriptive bond. Fourth, calculated bond and prescriptive bond had an effect on re-contract intention. Conclusions - As stated above, in franchise management, parent companies' offer and instruction of core competence to their franchisees as an information resource could improve the relational bond by helping them grow together through the resource sharing. Consequently, core competence factors were promoting factors that could improve franchisees' re-contract intention for a long time.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.15 no.12
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• pp.61-72
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• 2017

Purpose - Despite that the importance of small enterprises' performance in the community has been magnified, no study has been conducted yet on the performance based on consumers directly faced by small enterprises. Accordingly, this study aims to investigate the relationship between the life styles of consumers who use small enterprises' stores by type and the word of mouth(WOM) effects, which are concrete behaviors of consumers. Research design, data, and methodology - The VALS classification system was utilized to classify the types of life styles of consumers who use small enterprises' stores. The consumers were divided into a total of four types. This study was intended to investigate the effects of the types of consumers on the word of mouth(WOM) effects of consumers who use small enterprises' stores along with the effects of consumers' perception of economic situations on their word of mouth(WOM) effects after using small enterprises' stores. Results - The results of the study indicated that among the types of consumers who use small enterprises' stores, the group that pursues faith and the group that pursues knowledge had positive (+) effects on favorable word of mouth(WOM) effects. However, the group that pursues trends and the group that pursues action were shown to have no effect and positive or negative perceptions of economic situations were shown to have no effects of the word of mouth(WOM) effects of users of small enterprises' stores. Conclusions - In this study, as a measure to create small enterprises' performance, word of mouth(WOM) effects on small enterprises' stores according to consumers' consumption behaviors were examined focusing on consumers. Through the study results, the groups of consumers who use small enterprises' stores by type that provide favorable word of mouth(WOM) effects were derived. And This Study aims to investigate the relationship between the four type life styles of consumer who use small enterprises' stores and the word of mouth(WOM) effect. Accordingly This study is significant in that it derived a measure to create small enterprises' performance centering on consumers and that it presented a cornerstone for the establishment of small enterprises at the government level.

• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.16 no.3
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• pp.357-380
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• 2014

Buyers' Trust in suppliers is critical in all commerce, but particularly in the relationship between foreign provider and local consumer due to the liability of foreignness. This study examines (1)how local consumers trust in the product of MNCs is affected by their perceptions of the product attributes, (2)does the product trust affects customers loyalty, and (3)whether Global Corporate Citizenship moderates the relationship between the product attributes and trust. Based on previous researches, hypotheses are formulated and the statistical method used to test them was a moderated regression analysis using SPSS 20. 330 respondents from the university student group in Korea were used for this analysis. The results of this study are follows: Service communication and product perceptions such as quality, technological newness, design, and brand value have a significant effect on the product trust. The Effectiveness of product-related service communication had greater than that of the physical characteristics of product. But, price fairness is not significantly. The trust then has a positive relation to customers loyalty. When global corporate citizenship as the moderating role is introduced into the model, the interaction terms with 'price fairness' are verified to be significant. Therefore, global corporate citizenship moderates the relationship between price fairness and product trust. The results of the empirical study provide important implications for Korean firms operating in foreign markets. But, the findings are limited to the University students and to manufacturing sectors. Thus, the generalization of the results of this research remains limited.

• The Journal of Industrial Distribution & Business
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• v.9 no.4
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• pp.73-82
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• 2018

Purpose - Before the economic reforms, the Chinese communication industry was poorly developed. After China's entering to WTO, the Chinese market were gradually opened, domestic companies will be faced with more and more pressures of competition from the world rival countries. As time goes on, the overseas telecommunications companies will occupy the Chinese market with the opening of China Telecommunications market to outside. So this paper focuses on problems and development methods based on the research about the present situation and development methods of communication industry(communication manufacturing industry and communication manufacturing industry) in China. Research design, data, and methodology - This study analyzed the policies of China's entering to WTO. This paper observed previous researches and made an empirical research on Chinese communication industry based on the governmental policies, strategies, books and previous papers with several kinds of clear data announced formally by China authorities. Results - Most recently, reorganization of the communication industry has brought good opportunities for the development of the communication manufacturing enterprises. This paper analyze policy changes of Chinese communication industry, the status of communication manufacturing industry and communication service industry. Finally, this study for further research analyzes the existing problems and puts forward some practicable measures to solve them. Conclusions - Looking ahead, with China's rapid economic development and steady deepening of reform and opening-up, the Chinese communication industry is faced with an even broader prospect of development. Chinese communication industry will be become the pillar one in national economy after 10 years development. Foreign communication companies accelerated investment and progresses to Chinese information and communication markets. Positive ones are more foreign investment, export increase, domestic innovation, communication industry made steep growth. But negative ones are obstacles of domestic companies' development and jobless rate increase etc. Second communication manufacturing industry made good development, but computer and TV related industry made decline in growth. Third, market sizes of internet and mobile services are growing but the size of wired communication services is downsizing gradually. To overcome them, the studies of components or parts of communication manufacturing industry are needed individually. Second China Unicom, China Telecom, China Mobile etc. are Chinese representatives. The sales volumes are very similar at the beginning, but now they are different and make big differences. So the analysis about, their differences and its impact, are needed.