• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.20 no.2
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• pp.123-134
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• 2010

Considering the benefits for both consumers and suppliers, firms are taking advantage of the Internet as a medium to communicate with and sell products to their consumers. This trend makes the online shopping environment a growing field for both researchers and practitioners. This paper contributes by testing a model of online consumer behavior with websites varying in levels of hedonism. Unlike past studies, we included all three types of emotions (arousal, pleasure, and dominance) and flow into the model. In this study, we assumed that website interfaces, such as background colors, music, and fonts impact the three types of emotions at the initial exposure to the site (Mazaheri, Richard, and Laroche, 2011). In turn, these emotions influence flow and consumers' perceptions of the site atmospherics-perception of site informativeness, effectiveness, and entertainment. This assumption is consistent with Zajonc (1980) who argued that affective reactions are independent of perceptual and cognitive operations and can influence responses. We, then, propose that the perceptions of site atmospherics along with flow, influence customers' attitudes toward the website and toward the product, site involvement, and purchase intentions. In addition, we studied the moderating impact of the level of hedonism of websites on all the relationship in the model. Thus, the path coefficients were compared between "high" and "low" hedonic websites. We used 39 real websites from 12 product categories (8 services and 4 physical goods) to test the model. Among them, 20 were perceived as high hedonic and 19 as low hedonic by the respondents. The result of EQS 6.1 support the overall model: $\chi^2$=1787 (df=504), CFI=.994; RMSEA=.031. All the hypotheses were significant. In addition, the results of multi-groups analyses reveal several non-invariant structural paths between high and low hedonic website groups. The findings supported the model regarding the influence of the three types of emotions on customers' perceptions of site atmospherics, flow, and other customer behavior variables. It was found that pleasure strongly influenced site attitudes and perceptions of site entertainment. Arousal positively impacted the other two types of emotions, perceptions of site informativeness, and site involvement. Additionally, the influence of arousal on flow was found to be highly significant. The results suggested a strong association between dominance and customers' perceptions of site effectiveness. Dominance was also found to be associated with site attitudes and flow. Moreover, the findings suggested that site involvement and attitudes toward the product are the most important antecedents of purchase intentions. Site informativeness and flow also significantly influenced purchase intentions. The results of multi-group analysis supported the moderating impacts of hedonism of the websites. Compared to low (high) hedonic sites, the impacts of utilitarian (hedonic) attributes on other variables were stronger in high (low) hedonic websites. Among the three types of emotions, dominance (controlling feelings) effects were stronger in high hedonic sites and pleasure effects were stronger in low hedonic sites. Moreover, the impact of site informativeness was stronger for high hedonic websites compared to their low-hedonic counterparts. On the other hand, the influence of effectiveness of information on perceptions of site informativeness and the impact of site involvement on product attitudes were stronger for low hedonic websites than for high hedonic ones.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.8 no.3
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• pp.173-181
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• 2008

This study aims to prove the connection between satisfaction and re-visit intention of customers by examining shopping value and store image depending on product types purchased at Internet shopping malls. The finding of this study revealed that shopping value could be classified into hedonic and utilitarian value, while store image could be extracted into six dimensions such as reputation, product and information service, customer service after purchase, atmosphere, convenience, and safety. Both search goods and experience goods among store image factors were found to have stronger effect on utilitarian shopping value than hedonic shopping one. In addition, it was found that store image and shopping value had an effect on customer satisfaction and re-visit intention depending on product types, with a significant difference. These findings are expected to provide marketing complications for the understanding of differentiated market segments in the Internet shopping mall market, which is facing ever-growing market.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.20 no.8
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• pp.186-198
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• 2020

The current study examines how product type and attitudes toward the webtoon - a digital comic that originated in Korea - affect consumer responses to webtoon product placement (PPL). Specifically, it examines the following responses: the perception of PPL intrusiveness, attitudes toward the PPL, attitudes toward the brand, word-of-mouth intention, and purchase intention. It further investigates how PPL type interacts with product type and attitudes toward the webtoon on consumer responses to the PPL. The findings from a 2 (product type: functional vs. hedonic) × 2 (attitudes toward the webtoon: negative vs. positive) × 2 (PPL type: creative placement vs. on-set placement) between-subject experimental study suggest the following: consumer responses to PPL in webtoon is more positive when the product is hedonic (vs. functional) and when attitudes toward the webtoon are positive (vs. negative). This study further suggests when subjects felt favorably toward the webtoon, the creative placement produced weaker perceptions of PPL intrusiveness and more favorable attitudes toward the PPL than the on-set placement. On the other hand, when subjects felt negatively toward the webtoon, the on-set placement evoked weaker perceptions of intrusiveness and more favorable attitudes toward the PPL than did the creative placement.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Clothing and Textiles
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.247-258
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• 2008

The purposes of this study were to investigate influences of consumer's shopping value, brand alliances and apparel product involvement on purchasing behavior. The subjects of 172 hedonic shopping value and 208 utilitarian shopping value were chosen to participated for data collection. The data was analyzed by factor analysis, cluster analysis, and ANOVA. The main results of study were summarized as follows: 1. When an Internet Private Brand(PB) did not form brand alliance with a National brand(NB), utilitarian shopping value consumers did not differ in preference irrespective of whether product involvement was high or not. However, when the PB formed brand alliance with well-known NB, they showed higher preference for the high involvement apparel product than the low involvement product. 2. When an Internet PB did not form brand alliance with well-known NB, the utilitarian shopping value consumers' word-of-mouth intention did not differ between the high involvement apparel product and low involvement apparel product. 3. It was revealed that when an Internet PB did not form brand alliance, the utilitarian shopping value consumers showed higher intention to purchase than that of the low involvement product.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.21 no.11
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• pp.103-111
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• 2023

Purpose: This research aims to study the selection attributes influencing the purchasing decisions of the MZ generation in online luxury stores and explores the moderating effects of consumer value. The research aims to validate the impact of reasonable pricing, brand reliability, product variety, comprehensive product information, and user-friendly interfaces on customers' decision to purchase products from online luxury stores. Research design, data and methodology: A survey was conducted with 101 participants, and data analysis included exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, as well as covariance structure model analysis. Results: The findings reveal that brand trust, product variety, and information sufficiency significantly influence brand affect, which in turn influences purchase intention. Additionally, the study identifies that consumers prioritizing hedonic value are more influenced by brand trust and information, while those prioritizing utilitarian value are more responsive to factors like reasonable price, product variety, and ease of use. Conclusions: The study provides insights into the preferences and behaviors of the MZ generation, highlighting their digital proficiency, mobile-centric lifestyle, desire for product variety, price-consciousness, social media influence, and the availability of personalized shopping experiences as factors contributing to their preference for online luxury stores. These findings contribute to understanding consumer behavior and decision-making processes in the context of online luxury shopping.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.13 no.12
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• pp.73-84
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• 2015

Purpose - Various social issues have arisen since the beginning of the 21st century therefore, enterprises that disregarded social issues have become unsustainable, and social enterprises have appeared to address these issues. A social enterprise is a social mission-focused organization that uses a market-based strategy and has a vulnerable business structure. To be self-sustainable, a social enterprise should make consumers aware of the value that it provides and secure its profitability through consumer consumption. From this perspective, this study investigates the relationship between perceived value (utilitarian and hedonic) and loyalty, and examines how memory and attitudes play mediating roles between perceived value and loyalty. For these purposes, the author developed a structural model consisting of several variables. In this model, perceived value, which was utilitarian and hedonic, was proposed to affect the memory and attitudes toward social enterprise products, thus increasing loyalty. Therefore, memory and attitudes were proposed as core mediating variables between perceived value and loyalty. Research design, data, and methodology - To analyze the proposed model, data were collected from 582 respondents and analyzed using SPSS 21.0 and AMOS 21.0. To test unidimensionality and the nomological validity of the measures of each construct, we employed a scale refinement procedure. The results of the reliability test with Cronbach's α and confirmatory factor analysis warranted the unidimensionality of the measures for each construct. In addition, the nomological validity of the measures was warranted from the results of the correlation analysis. The result of the overall model analysis demonstrated a good fit (χ²=529.881, df=144, χ²/df=3.680, p-value=0.000, GFI=0.905, NFI=0.948, CFI=0.961, RMR=0.036, RMSEA=0.068). Results - The findings are summarized as follows. First, the hedonic and utilitarian value of social enterprise products had positive effects on memory and attitudes. Second, the hedonic value of social enterprise products more strongly affects memory and attitudes than utilitarian value. Third, memory and attitudes had positive effects on loyalty. Lastly, memory had a stronger effect on loyalty than attitudes. Conclusions - The purchase rate of social enterprises' products increases only if the products are included in the "information search" and "alternative evaluation" processes in consumers' purchase decision-making processes. Therefore, a social enterprise must actively promote the fact that it pursues a social value, and shares both the hedonic and utilitarian values of its products. Accordingly, because hedonic value has a more significant impact on a company and attitudes, a social enterprise should develop hedonic values for product consumption, thereby leading consumers who care about value consumption to purchase its products. Moreover, a social enterprise must maintain good memories and attitudes for consumers because memory does not change over time, although attitude does. The limitations of this study and suggestions for future research are as follows. This study viewed "consumer loyalty" as the success factor of social enterprises, thereby considers an "increase in sales" as the success factor. Therefore, in future studies, diverse factors, including social contribution and word-of-mouth intention, should be regarded. In addition, future studies need to thoroughly review and make assurances about the relationship between memory and attitude.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Floral Art and Design
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• no.40
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• pp.125-136
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• 2019

This study aims to examine the important factors of flower shops' store attributes influencing the repurchase intention for people who buy flowers for themselves with a hedonic shopping motivation. This study was verified by empirical survey and the results are summarized as follow. First, it was found that price, salesperson's professionalism, store accessibility had a significant positive impact on the repurchasing intention of flowers. Second, it was found that price is the first important factor influencing the repurchasing intention of flowers, and next salesperson's professionalism is the second important one, and lastly store accessibility is the third important one. For implications of this study, this study investigated the cause-and-effect relationship between flower shops' store attributes and the repurchasing intention of flowers for people who buy flowers for themselves with a hedonic shopping motivation, so it provides a theoretical foundation for further studies.

• Asia Marketing Journal
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.99-123
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• 2008

Consumer satisfaction/dissatisfaction is key determinant of brand loyalty and store patronage behavior. But the results of many customer satisfaction surveys implemented by department stores show that consumer satisfactions do not predict the actual patronage behaviors well. The main reason of these surprising results would be that the consumer satisfaction indexes do not include some important determinants of consumer satisfaction. Many customer satisfaction surveys mainly focus on the evaluation of functional benefits including product assortments, merchandise prices and locational convenience. Recent studies indicate that emotional/hedonic benefits strongly influence the consumer satisfaction, intention to repurchase and intention to revisit. Our study suggests that both functional values and hedonic values should be included in developing the index of consumer satisfactions. The purpose of our study is to investigate the relationship between shopping value and consumer satisfaction, and actual patronage behavior. Shopping values is defined as the difference between total benefits and total shopping costs. Total benefits include the dimensions of product quality, service quality, and hedonic benefits. Total costs are classified as the monetary costs and non-monetary cost. The conceptual framework developed for this empirical study is as follows.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.115-130
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• 2011

Many online stores bring features that can build trust in their customers. More so, the number of products or content services on online stores has been increasing rapidly. Hence, personalization on online stores is considered to be an important technology to companies and customers. Recommender systems that provide favorable products and customer product reviews to users are the most commonly used features in this purpose. There are many studies to that investigated the relationship between social presence as an antecedent of trust and provision of recommender systems or customer product reviews. Many online stores have made efforts to increase perceived social presence of their customers through customer reviews, recommender systems, and analyzing associations among products. Primarily because social presence can increase customer trust or reuse intention for online stores. However, there were few studies that investigated the interactions between recommendation type, product type and provision of customer product reviews on social presence. Therefore, one of the purposes of this study is to identify the effects of personalized recommender systems and compare the role of customer reviews with product types. This study performed an experiment to see these interactions. Experimental web pages were developed with $2{\times}2$ factorial setting based on how to provide social presence to users with customer reviews and two product types such as hedonic and utilitarian. The hedonic type was a ringtone chosen from Nate.com while the utilitarian was a TOEIC study aid book selected from Yes24.com. To conduct the experiment, web based experiments were conducted for the participants who have been shopping on the online stores. Participants were a total of 240 and 30% of the participants had the chance of getting the presents. We found out that social presence increased for hedonic products when personalized recommendations were given compared to non.personalized recommendations. Although providing customer reviews for two product types did not significantly increase social presence, provision of customer product reviews for hedonic (ringtone) increased perceived social presence. Otherwise, provision of customer product reviews could not increase social presence when the systems recommend utilitarian products (TOEIC study.aid books). Therefore, it appears that the effects of increasing perceived social presence with customer reviews have a difference for product types. In short, the role of customer reviews could be different based on which product types were considered by customers when they are making a decision related to purchasing on the online stores. Additionally, there were no differences for increasing perceived social presence when providing customer reviews. Our participants might have focused on how recommendations had been provided and what products were recommended because our developed systems were providing recommendations after participants rating their preferences. Thus, the effects of customer reviews could appear more clearly if our participants had actual purchase opportunity for the recommendations. Personalized recommender systems can increase social presence of customers more than nonpersonalized recommender systems by using user preference. Online stores could find out how they can increase perceived social presence and satisfaction of their customers when customers want to find the proper products with recommender systems and customer reviews. In addition, the role of customer reviews of the personalized recommendations can be different based on types of the recommended products. Even if this study conducted two product types such as hedonic and utilitarian, the results revealed that customer reviews for hedonic increased social presence of customers more than customer reviews for utilitarian. Thus, online stores need to consider the role of providing customer reviews with highly personalized information based on their product types when they develop the personalized recommender systems.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.1-16
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• 2023

Due to imbalances in supply and demand within the labor market, start-ups have emerged as crucial players in the generation of high-quality employment opportunities, particularly in stagnant job markets. In response to this trend, governments are allocating substantial financial and human resources to initiatives that support start-up development. This has led to an increasing rate of engagement in start-up ventures across diverse age groups, not limited to younger individuals. Start-ups are enterprises focused on the commercialization of innovative ideas with the aim of achieving profitability in the marketplace. Research concerning the successful market integration of new products and the attainment of sustainable growth is pivotal. Such research is instrumental not only for the success of start-ups but also for realizing the broader social functions and contributions that these enterprises can offer. Previous research has often examined new product market-entry strategies, often referred to as new product marketing, particularly for large companies and SMEs. However, there is a gap in studies focusing on prototype marketing strategies specific to start-ups. Thus, this study aims to examine the impact of Pre-announcing marketing strategies on the market attention garnered by start-ups with low recognition and limited infrastructure, and how such attention contributes to their sustainable growth. Specifically, the study aims to uncover the causal relationship between information attributes like relevance, vividness, and novelty in building customer relationships, and their impact on purchase intentions influenced by performance expectations and hedonic motivations. In terms of Pre-announcing information attributes, relevance, vividness, and novelty positively influence performance expectations and hedonic motivations as outlined in the extended Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT2). These factors, in turn, positively impact the purchase intention for pre-announced new products from start-ups. These findings are expected to provide both theory and practical insights into the factors influencing market entry through the use of Pre-announcing marketing strategies for start-up new products.