1,720,996 research outputs found
Public administrators' engagement in services co-creation: factors that foster and hinder organisational learning about citizens
Full text linkCitizens and public organisations are increasingly engaging in the co-creation of public services. To be successful, such co-creation efforts require public organisations to engage in organisational learning about citizens' value-creation processes. The purpose of this paper is to explore the antecedents of such organisational learning, drawing on Payne, Storbacka, and Frow's framework about value co-creation management. A model consisting of five factors is suggested and tested via a survey administered to a sample of 204 local government administrators in Italy. The findings highlight the significance of two positive antecedents (public administrators' level of citizen orientation and expected benefits from co-creation) and three negative antecedents (perceived citizens' lack of competencies and experience, perceived biases in citizens' perceptions, and lack of resources) of organisational learning. From the managerial perspective, the model tested in this study can be used by public organisations to evaluate their level of organisational learning
Adoption and impact of marketing performance assessment systems among travel agencies in Italy
No full textPurpose of the study: The purpose of the study is to analyze the current adoption and use of Marketing Performance Assessment Systems (MPAs) by travel agencies operating in Italy. Moreover, the paper intends to test the link between the use of (general and industry specific) marketing metrics and the overall performance improvement of travel agencies.
Design/methodology/approach: A cross-section approach is applied. Data are collected, through an online questionnaire, from a sample list of 1,000 travel agencies operating in Italy. Data analysis will be based both on descriptive statistics and, depending on sample adequacy, on structural equation modeling.
Findings: Currently available findings suggest that, on average, some indicators (e.g., sales/margins and customer satisfaction indicators) are largely diffused, but a comprehensive marketing performance assessment systems is often missing.
Originality/value: Overall, only a few studies have specifically investigated marketing performance measurement in tourism. To the authors’ knowledge, none of them is focused on the travel agencies’ sector. This study will contribute to fill this gap. In addition, the findings will provide evidences to understand whether the adoption of MPAs is linked to the overall performance of travel agencies.
Research limitations/implications: The cross-sectional approach overlooks the processes behind Marketing
Performance Assessment Systems’ (MPAs) adoption and use. New studies taking a longitudinal perspective would be particularly valuable to reinforce our findings.
Practical implications: The findings provide travel agencies both with an overview of Marketing Performance Assessment Systems’ (MPAs) adoption in their sector and with evidences about the impact of MPAs overall on performance
Local vs. Global Social Couponing Sites: A Study of Merchants’ Satisfaction
No full textIn recent years an increasing number of small service providers (restaurants, spas, etc.) have decided to run social couponing campaigns to enhance brand awareness, attract new customers and increase sales. Only few studies have been conducted to investigate merchants’ satisfaction with the effectiveness of social couponing. More importantly, available results are mostly based on data collected among merchants that have run their social couponing campaigns through the largest, global daily deals sites, such as Groupon and Living Social. Nonetheless in the last few years, new local, white-label deals sites have entered the market.
The purpose of this paper is to understand whether merchants’ satisfaction with the effectiveness of social couponing campaigns is different when using a local daily deal site instead of a global one. Data were collected through two surveys conducted in the Italian context: the first among 157 Italian merchants that had used Groupon; the second among 106 merchants that sold their coupons through Kauppa, a local daily deals site operating in six Italian provinces.
The results show similar levels of overall satisfaction for the two samples. Nonetheless significant differences between Groupons’ and Kauppa’s merchants emerged regarding the drivers of their satisfaction. Hence merchants may decide to use either a global or a local daily deals site, depending on the specific objectives they intend to achieve through couponing
Marketing performance measurement in hotels, travel agencies and tour operators: a study of current practices
Full text linkAs successful tourism firms invest heavily in marketing to defend or improve their competitive position, they increasingly need to measure their marketing performance. Previous studies related to tourism have largely focused on financial and operational performance, but the marketing perspective has been largely overlooked. Drawing on an in-depth investigation involving 12 hotel chains, 8 travel agencies and 8 tour operators, this study provides an overview of the state-of-the-art marketing performance measurements among some of the leading tourism firms in Italy. Several issues and unanswered questions are also identified
Negotiation Strategies, Fairness, And Contract Renewal In B2b Relationships
No full textDespite the importance of negotiations in buyer-seller relationships, the impact of alternative negotiation strategies on relationship fairness has been largely overlooked. Filling this gap is important as relationship fairness has a significant influence on relationship continuity. This study addresses this gap by developing and testing a model through a survey on a sample of 275 firms purchasing advertising services from daily deal websites. The findings highlight that a problem-solving negotiation strategy positively influence both procedural and distributive fairness, while an aggressive negotiation strategy exerts negative effects. In turn, perceived fairness has a positive effect on the intention to continue the relationship. Overall, the results suggest that fairness plays a fundamental role during all relationship stages, from negotiation to distribution of the created value
Austerity Programs and Services Quality Within Italian Municipalities. An Exploration of Trends and Evolving Practices
No full textIn Italy, as in several other countries, the current crisis and subsequent austerity programs are challenging the service quality improvement process within public administrations. Local governments are particularly severely affected by financial constraints due to a significant reduction of transfers from the central government. Given these premises, the purpose of this paper is to investigate whether the current austerity programs are negatively affecting municipal citizen orientation and service quality. The study is based on the longitudinal analysis of data we collected in 2010 and 2012 from samples of 204 and 194 Italian local municipalities, respectively. Moreover, the data interpretation is enriched by a qualitative analysis of a large amount of additional information we collected from Italian local municipalities in 2012. Contrary to common sense expectations, our findings demonstrate that, on average and up to now, austerity programs have had limited negative effects on service quality and on citizen orientation within Italian local municipalities. The reduction of resources is stimulating efficiency gains deriving from reorganization, rationalization, extra-effort expended by municipalities' employees and adoption of some egovernment tools. Nonetheless, public officials are concerned about the absence of a clear picture for the next several years, which hampers medium-term planning for interventions that further enhance efficiency and maintain service quality. The interventions and innovations reported by public officials participating to this study may serve as best practices for the managers of other municipalities
Groupon e il couponing: un’analisi sulla soddisfazione e sulla fedeltà dei merchant
No full textIl boom dei siti di social couponing, trainati dal leader Groupon, è uno dei fenomeni caratterizzanti l’e-commerce a livello mondiale degli ultimi 3-5 anni. I pochi studi disponibili sull’argomento prendono in considerazione prevalentemente gli impatti di tale fenomeno sugli acquirenti finali, che possono accedere a servizi a prezzi particolarmente scontati.
Dall’altro lato, nella prospettiva dei c.d. merchant, cioè delle imprese “inserzioniste”, i siti di couponing rappresentano un nuovo strumento di marketing e anche la prima concreta possibilità di accesso all’e-commerce per molte imprese di micro-piccole dimensioni.
Il presente lavoro esamina il social couponing da questa seconda prospettiva, quella dei merchant, esplorando i driver della loro soddisfazione e della loro fedeltà al sito di couponing. Attraverso una ricerca su un campione di 121 merchant italiani che hanno pubblicato offerte su Groupon, si evidenzia un forte legame tra soddisfazione (complessiva e rispetto a cinque diverse motivazioni di utilizzo del sito) e fedeltà. I risultati evidenziano, inoltre, come tra i merchant meno fedeli emerga un quadro confuso degli obiettivi perseguibili attraverso il couponing
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
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