• Asia Marketing Journal
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.71-100
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• 2014

While the role of emotional antecedents of effective selling behavior would be important, the issue has not been fully addressed in the sales literature. To fill this gap, we conceptualize and empirically examine the relationships among salesperson's emotional regulation processes such as emotional intelligence (EI) and emotional labor (EL), effective selling behavior, and sales performance on the basis of educational, occupational, social psychology literature and marketing literature (e.g., Henning-Thurau, Groth, Paul, and Gremler 2006; Kidwell et al. 2011; Liu et al. 2008; Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso 2008). First, salesperson's EI is defined as his or her capability that enables correct perceptions about emotional situations in sales interactions. The EI is expected to work as psychological resources for different types of EL (i.e., deep acting and surface acting) to be performed by salesperson as emotional expression strategies (e.g., Lie et al. 2008). It is, then, expected that the features of EL selected by the salesperson would lead to different levels of adaptive selling behavior (ASB) and thereby sales performance (Monaghan 2006). Further, given that salesperson's customer orientation (CO) is found to be an important correlate of ASB (Franke and Park 2006), it is expected that CO would moderate the relationship between EL and ASB (Rozell, Pettijohn, and Parker 2004). Hence, this research attempts to shed additional light on emotionally-driven (EL) as well as cognitively-driven (CO) antecedents of ASB (Frank and Park 2006). The findings of the survey research, done with 336 salespersons in insurance and financial companies, are summarized as follows. First, salespersons with a high level of EI are found to use both deep acting (regulating the emotions themselves) and surface acting (controlling only emotional expressions) in a versatile way, when implementing EL. Second, the more the salesperson performs deep acting, the more he or she shows ASB. It is, then, important for salespersons to use deep acting more frequently in the EL process in order to enhance the quality of interacting with customers through ASB. On the other hand, the salesperson's surface acting did not have a significant relationship with ASB. Moreover, CO was found to moderate the relationship between the salesperson's deep acting and ASB. That is, the context of high CO culture and individual salesperson's deep acting would synergistically make the selling efforts adaptive to customer preferences. Conceptualizing and empirically verifying the antecedent roles of important emotional constructs such as EI and EL in salesperson's effective selling behavior (ASB) and sales performance is a major theoretical contribution in the sales literature. Managerially, this research provides a deeper understanding on the nature of tasks performed by salespersons in service industries and a few guidelines for managing the sales force. First, sales organizations had better consciously assess EI capacity in the selection and nurturing processes of salespersons, given that EI can efficiently drive EL and the resulting effective selling behavior and performance. Further, the concept of EL could provide a framework to understand the salespersons' emotional experiences in depth. Especially, sales organizations may well think over how to develop deep acting capabilities of their sales representatives. In this direction, the training on deep acting strategies would be an essential task for improving effective selling behavior and performance of salespersons. This kind of training had better incorporate the perspectives of customers such that many customers can actually discern whether salespersons are doing either surface acting or deep acting. Finally, based on the synergistic effects of deep acting and CO culture, how to build and sustain CO is always an ever-important task in sales organizations. While the prior sales literature has emphasized the process and structure of highly customer-oriented sales organization, our research not only corroborates the important aspects of customer-oriented sales organization, but also adds the important dimension of competent sales representatives who can resonate with customers by deep acting for sales excellence.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.10 no.10
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• pp.353-362
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• 2012

The purpose of this study tried to find ways to improve service quality for customers and effective program of organizational support to increase the hotel employees' job satisfaction to empirically analyze causatively impacted relationship between the perceived organizational support, job satisfaction, and service quality in the hotel industry staff recognize. Data were collected from 217 and surveyed from 1 to 30 in November 2011 in hotel. To summarize the results of the study, first, satisfaction of individual job environment, satisfaction of work environment support concerned in support for personal values both was not affected significantly. Second, support for work environment was also affecting more than support for personal worth to improve the quality of customer service and in support for the organization Third, satisfaction of the individual's work environment affected adaptability, conviction, and corporality in job satisfaction variables while support satisfaction for working conditions effected conviction and adaptability without corporality. In order to enhance adaptability to customers who employees serve, it should be created work environment to make employees feel satisfaction in individual's work environment. Therefore, hotel managers have to entertain feelings of loyalty for their hotel and make employees satisfaction with their job and their duty by enhancing support for work environment of hotel employees in order to increase business performance by improving service quality for customers.

• Journal of the Korean Applied Science and Technology
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• v.40 no.6
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• pp.1498-1505
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• 2023

This study attempted to investigate the difference in service orientation according to the individual characteristics of hair salon workers, and to identify the internal marketing factors of hair salon that influence service orientation. Questionnaires for empirical research were collected from hair salon workers in Gyeongnam, and the results of analyzing the collected questionnaires through IBM SPSS Statistics 26 are as follows. First, as a result of analyzing the difference in service orientation according to the individual characteristics of hair salon workers, the '40s or older' group and the 'working period of 10 years or longer' group showed statistically higher service orientation than other groups. Second, as a result of analyzing the causal relationship between internal marketing and service orientation, it was found that welfare, compensation system, education and training of internal marketings had the statistical effect on service orientation, and in particular, the compensation system had the strongest effect on service orientation. Therefore, service orientation for customers should be improved through internal marketing activities that take into account the individual characteristics of hair salon workers. The improvement of service orientation means the customer's intention to reuse, suggesting that ultimately the management performance of hair salon companies can be further improved.

• Journal of Korea Technology Innovation Society
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.73-97
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• 2007

R&D into future technologies should be conducted in conjunction with technological innovation strategies that are linked to corporate survival within a framework of information and knowledge-based competitiveness. As such, future technology strategies should be ensured through open R&D organizations. The development of future technologies should not be conducted simply on the basis of future forecasts, but should take into account customer needs in advance and reflect them in the development of the future technologies or services. This research aims to select as segmentation variables the customers' attitude towards accepting future telecommunication technologies and their value orientation in their everyday life, as these factors wilt have the greatest effect on the demand for future telecommunication services and thus segment the future telecom service market. Likewise, such research seeks to segment the market from the stage of technology R&D activities and employ the results to formulate technology development strategies. Based on the customer attitude towards accepting new technologies, two groups were induced, and a hierarchical customer segmentation model was provided to conduct secondary segmentation of the two groups on the basis of their respective customer value orientation. A survey was conducted in June 2006 on 800 consumers aged 15 to 69, residing in Seoul and five other major South Korean cities, through one-on-one interviews. The samples were divided into two sub-groups according to their level of acceptance of new technology; a sub-group demonstrating a high level of technology acceptance (39.4%) and another sub-group with a comparatively lower level of technology acceptance (60.6%). These two sub-groups were further divided each into 5 smaller sub-groups (10 total smaller sub-groups) through two rounds of segmentation. The ten sub-groups were then analyzed in their detailed characteristics, including general demographic characteristics, usage patterns in existing telecom services such as mobile service, broadband internet and wireless internet and the status of ownership of a computing or information device and the desire or intention to purchase one. Through these steps, we were able to statistically prove that each of these 10 sub-groups responded to telecom services as independent markets. We found that each segmented group responds as an independent individual market. Through correspondence analysis, the target segmentation groups were positioned in such a way as to facilitate the entry of future telecommunication services into the market, as well as their diffusion and transferability.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.4-14
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• 2010

Collaboration strategies entail information sharing and other varied forms of cooperation that are mutually beneficial to the company and stakeholder groups. This study addresses the specific types of collaboration used in the fashion industry while also examining strategies that have been most successful for fashion companies and perceived benefits of collaboration from the customer perspective. In the present study we define fashion companies and brands as collaborators and their partners or stakeholders as collaboratees. We define collaboration as a cooperative relationship where more than two companies, brands or individuals provide customers with beneficial outcomes utilizing their own competitive advantages on an equal basis. Collaboration strategies entail information sharing and other varied forms of cooperation that are mutually beneficial to the company and stakeholder groups. Through collaboration, fashion companies have pursued both tangible differentiation, such as design and technology applications, and intangible differentiation such as emotional and psychological benefits to customers. As a result, collaboration within the fashion industry has become an important, value creating concept. This qualitative study utilized case studies and in-depth interview methodologies to examine customers' attitudes concerning collaboration in the fashion industry. A total of 173 collaboration cases were identified in Korean and international markets from 1998 through December 2008, focusing on fashion companies. Cases were collected from documented data including websites and industry data bases and top ranked portal search sites such as: Rankey.com; Naver, Daum, and Nate; and representative fashion information websites, Samsungdesignnet and Firstviewkorea. Cases were collected between November 2008 and February 2009. Cases were selected for the analysis where one or more partners were associated with the production of fashion products (excluding textile production), retail fashion products, or designer services. Additional collaboration case information was obtained from news articles, periodicals, internet portal sites and fashion information sites as conducted in prior studies (Jeong and Kim 2008; Park and Park 2004; Yoon 2005). In total, 173 cases were selected for analysis that clearly exhibited the benefits and outcomes of collaboration efforts and strategies between fashion companies and stakeholders. Findings show that the overall results show that for both partners (collaborator and collaboratee) participating in collaboration, that the major benefits are reduction of costs and risks by sharing resource such as design power, image, costs, technology and targets, and creation of synergy. Regarding types of collaboration outcomes, product/design was most important (55%), followed by promotion (21%), price (20%), and place (4%). This result shows that collaboration plays an important role in giving life to products and designs, particularly in the fashion industry which seeks for creative and newness. To be successful in collaboration efforts, results of the depth interviews in this study confirm that fashion companies should have a clear objective on why they are doing the collaboration. After setting the objective, they should select collaboratees that match their brand image and target market, make quality co-products that have definite concepts and differentiating factors, and also pay attention to increasing brand awareness. Based on depth interviews with customers, customer benefits were categorized into six factors: pursuit for individual character; pursuit for brand; pursuit for scarcity; pursuit for fashion; pursuit for economic efficiency; and pursuit for sociality. Customers also placed more importance on image, reputation, and trust of brands regarding the cases shown in the interviews. They also commented that strong branding should come first before other marketing strategies. However, success factors recognized by experts and customers in this study showed different results by subcategories. Thus, target customers and target market should be studied from various dimensions to develop appropriate strategies for successful collaboration.

• Asia pacific journal of information systems
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.105-130
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• 2008

Consumers of e-learning market differ from those of other markets in that they are replaced in a specific time scale. For example, e-learning contents aimed at highschool senior students cannot be consumed by a specific consumer over the designated period of time. Hence e-learning service providers need to attract new groups of students every year. Due to lack of information on products designed for continuously emerging consumers, the consumers face difficulties in making rational decisions in a short time period. Increased uncertainty of product purchase leads customers to herding behaviors to obtain information of the product from others and imitate them. Taking into consideration of these features of e-learning market, this study will focus on the online herding behavior in purchasing e-learning contents. There is no definite concept for e-learning. However, it is being discussed in a wide range of perspectives from educational engineering to management to e-business etc. Based upon the existing studies, we identify two main view-points regarding e-learning. The first defines e-learning as a concept that includes existing terminologies, such as CBT (Computer Based Training), WBT (Web Based Training), and IBT (Internet Based Training). In this view, e-learning utilizes IT in order to support professors and a part of or entire education systems. In the second perspective, e-learning is defined as the usage of Internet technology to deliver diverse intelligence and achievement enhancing solutions. In other words, only the educations that are done through the Internet and network can be classified as e-learning. We take the second definition of e-learning for our working definition. The main goal of this study is to investigate what factors affect consumer intention to purchase e-learning contents and to identify the differential impact of the factors between consumers with purchase experience and those without the experience. To accomplish the goal of this study, it focuses on herding behavior and perceived usefulness as antecedents to behavioral intention. The proposed research model in the study extends the Technology Acceptance Model by adding herding behavior and usability to take into account the unique characteristics of e-learning content market and e-learning systems use, respectively. The current study also includes consumer experience with e-learning content purchase because the previous experience is believed to affect purchasing intention when consumers buy experience goods or services. Previous studies on e-learning did not consider the characteristics of e-learning contents market and the differential impact of consumer experience on the relationship between the antecedents and behavioral intention, which is the target of this study. This study employs a survey method to empirically test the proposed research model. A survey questionnaire was developed and distributed to 629 informants. 528 responses were collected, which consist of potential customer group (n = 133) and experienced customer group (n = 395). The data were analyzed using PLS method, a structural equation modeling method. Overall, both herding behavior and perceived usefulness influence consumer intention to purchase e-learning contents. In detail, in the case of potential customer group, herding behavior has stronger effect on purchase intention than does perceived usefulness. However, in the case of shopping-experienced customer group, perceived usefulness has stronger effect than does herding behavior. In sum, the results of the analysis show that with regard to purchasing experience, perceived usefulness and herding behavior had differential effects upon the purchase of e-learning contents. As a follow-up analysis, the interaction effects of the number of purchase transaction and herding behavior/perceived usefulness on purchase intention were investigated. The results show that there are no interaction effects. This study contributes to the literature in a couple of ways. From a theoretical perspective, this study examined and showed evidence that the characteristics of e-learning market such as continuous renewal of consumers and thus high uncertainty and individual experiences are important factors to be considered when the purchase intention of e-learning content is studied. This study can be used as a basis for future studies on e-learning success. From a practical perspective, this study provides several important implications on what types of marketing strategies e-learning companies need to build. The bottom lines of these strategies include target group attraction, word-of-mouth management, enhancement of web site usability quality, etc. The limitations of this study are also discussed for future studies.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.18 no.1
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• pp.23-38
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• 2012

There is a large difference between purchasing patterns in an online shopping mall and in an offline market. This difference may be caused mainly by the difference in accessibility of online and offline markets. It means that an interval between the initial purchasing decision and its realization appears to be relatively short in an online shopping mall, because a customer can make an order immediately. Because of the short interval between a purchasing decision and its realization, an online shopping mall transaction usually contains fewer items than that of an offline market. In an offline market, customers usually keep some items in mind and buy them all at once a few days after deciding to buy them, instead of buying each item individually and immediately. On the contrary, more than 70% of online shopping mall transactions contain only one item. This statistic implies that traditional data mining techniques cannot be directly applied to online market analysis, because hardly any association rules can survive with an acceptable level of Support because of too many Null Transactions. Most market basket analyses on online shopping mall transactions, therefore, have been performed by expanding the co-occurrence criteria of traditional association rule mining. While the traditional co-occurrence criteria defines items purchased in one transaction as concurrently purchased items, the expanded co-occurrence criteria regards items purchased by a customer during some predefined period (e.g., a day) as concurrently purchased items. In studies using expanded co-occurrence criteria, however, the criteria has been defined arbitrarily by researchers without any theoretical grounds or agreement. The lack of clear grounds of adopting a certain co-occurrence criteria degrades the reliability of the analytical results. Moreover, it is hard to derive new meaningful findings by combining the outcomes of previous individual studies. In this paper, we attempt to compare expanded co-occurrence criteria and propose a guideline for selecting an appropriate one. First of all, we compare the accuracy of association rules discovered according to various co-occurrence criteria. By doing this experiment we expect that we can provide a guideline for selecting appropriate co-occurrence criteria that corresponds to the purpose of the analysis. Additionally, we will perform similar experiments with several groups of customers that are segmented by each customer's average duration between orders. By this experiment, we attempt to discover the relationship between the optimal co-occurrence criteria and the customer's average duration between orders. Finally, by a series of experiments, we expect that we can provide basic guidelines for developing customized recommendation systems. Our experiments use a real dataset acquired from one of the largest internet shopping malls in Korea. We use 66,278 transactions of 3,847 customers conducted during the last two years. Overall results show that the accuracy of association rules of frequent shoppers (whose average duration between orders is relatively short) is higher than that of causal shoppers. In addition we discover that with frequent shoppers, the accuracy of association rules appears very high when the co-occurrence criteria of the training set corresponds to the validation set (i.e., target set). It implies that the co-occurrence criteria of frequent shoppers should be set according to the application purpose period. For example, an analyzer should use a day as a co-occurrence criterion if he/she wants to offer a coupon valid only for a day to potential customers who will use the coupon. On the contrary, an analyzer should use a month as a co-occurrence criterion if he/she wants to publish a coupon book that can be used for a month. In the case of causal shoppers, the accuracy of association rules appears to not be affected by the period of the application purposes. The accuracy of the causal shoppers' association rules becomes higher when the longer co-occurrence criterion has been adopted. It implies that an analyzer has to set the co-occurrence criterion for as long as possible, regardless of the application purpose period.

• International Commerce and Information Review
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.23-43
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• 2016

Many customers of individual countries are interested in overseas direct purchase. B2C is not limited in a domestic market anymore. There are giant online shopping sites such as Amazon and eBay around the world. Many local and overseas customers can access and purchase products via B2C sites. Market size of overseas direct purchase has been dramatically increased. Overseas direct purchase can be closely associated with trade or international commerce due to the massive increase. This study aims at gaining a better understanding of overseas direct purchase in the country-level not customer-level. Specifically, this study examines relationships between overseas direct purchase and customer determinants including openness, innovativeness, and strategic confirmity to normative institution. Also, moderating effect with external environments such as logistics infrastructure and market uncertainty. Relying on RBV, TCA, Institutional theory, and OSAM model, this study justifies how internal and external determinants can increase or decrease consumer awareness on overseas direct purchase.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.47-60
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• 2017

Car sharing, which is considered as a good example of innovation in the transportation sector, is a type of use in which a plurality of people share a single vehicle for a short period of time. It is divided into various types, NFP (Not For Profit) operated by a non-profit organization, B2C (Business to Customer), which is operated by a company, and Peer to Peer (P2P), which is directly connected to an individual. Among them, P2P car sharing is a method of sharing personal vehicles owned by individuals. It has the merit of reducing traffic congestion and providing for efficient traffic demand management by reducing the purchase rate of additional vehicles and minimizing the number of idle ones. This study examines the introduction of P2P car sharing in order to develop a traffic demand management policy and facilitate the transition to a sustainable transportation system. The spatial extent of the study consisted of apartment complexes in Seoul. In apartment complexes, it is possible to minimize the level of expenditure, such as operating expenses, by utilizing the APT management office and there is no difficulty in securing the necessary parking space. Therefore, apartment complexes were selected as the spatial range.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.13 no.11
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• pp.93-100
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• 2015

Purpose - The objective of this research is to investigate whether national culture influences consumers' service evaluations. The services industry is receiving increasing attention from academia and practitioners as its position grows in global markets. Standardization or localization is a traditional managerial decision in global business. As the boundaries of services expand across national borders, firms are required to decide whether to standardize services or adjust to local needs. Though it is imperative to reflect global perspectives in marketing theories, these perspectives are mostly based on Western conceptualization of the world. Through a comparison of consumer groups from two culturally remote countries, service quality evaluation mechanisms are examined based on similar stimuli. The study tries to expand service marketing perspectives across national borders. Research design, data, and methodology - Eastern and Western countries are known to be culturally distinct. One Eastern and one Western country were chosen: an Anglo-Saxon country (the U.S., England, and Australia) and South Korea. In Hofstede's cultural dimensions, the differences between the two are pronounced. The Anglo-Saxon based countries share many similarities. Samples of the same sites are targeted. Questionnaires using a service quality scale (SERVQUAL) and a customer satisfaction scale were distributed. Utilizing Hofstede's typology of culture, the service evaluation mechanisms of the respondents from the two groups are evaluated. Three hypotheses are proposed from the review of the literature. These are service evaluation habits, importance of service quality dimensions for the individualistic/collectivistic countries, and strong/weak uncertainty avoidance cultures. Consumers from the individualistic countries are considered to care about themselves and demand a higher level of responsiveness and assurance. On the other hand, consumers from high uncertainty avoidance cultures are assumed to rely more on tangible questions of service quality, as these are the only predictable service quality indicators. A t-test and regression analysis are applied to validate the constructs. Results - The respondents from the Anglo-Saxon countries are more generous on service evaluations than Koreans. Researchers have indicated that Americans tend to give higher service evolution scores than European, Mexican, and Korean counterparts. The tendency is the same here. The sample from Anglo-Saxon countries demonstrated higher service evaluation scores on every dimension of SERVQUAL. For the second hypothesis, the respondents from the collectivistic culture rely less on core service dimensions (assurance and responsiveness) due to their tendency to place more value on group harmony than individual interest. However, the third hypothesis was not validated. Conclusions - The study attempted to expand the scope of service marketing to reflect cross-national perspectives. Service quality is known to have a strong influence on customer satisfaction and loyalty behavior. However, this research demonstrated that individuals from different cultural territories respond heterogeneously to the same stimuli. Scholars argue that national cultures are main factors in such deviated behavior. Scholars and global managers should be aware of differences in consumer value judgment mechanisms such as satisfaction, expectations, and perceptions.