Using the theory of indigenous interpersonal relationship and the metaphor of the brand-as-relationship-partner (BARP), this paper develops a theoretical construct of consumer-brand relationship in the Chinese context and proposes a brand relationship framework that consists of four basic types, namely “family member”, “good friend”, “cooperation partner”, and “acquaintance”. This paper also reports the findings of two studies that test the acceptability of the theoretical construct. Study 1 proves that the relationship metaphor is suitable for the appraisal of consumer-brand relationship in the Chinese context. Study 2 confirms that the brand relationship types and brand relationship quality have satisfactory concurrent validity.

This study develops a research model that can be used to evaluate website brand equity from the perspective of web contents. To evaluate the model and to examine the effects of web contents on brand equity, a SEM analysis is conducted on twenty Chinese websites which could be classified into four different types. The results show that the website brand equity model, which is composed of five dimensions, namely brand loyalty, perceived quality, brand relationship, brand experience and brand attraction, is useful for measuring website brand value, and also applicable to different web types. Web contents factors, such as recourses, design, service and interactivity, are found to be the antecedents of website brand equity, and they all affect dimensions of website brand equity. However, the effects vary according to web types. The results also demonstrate that portal websites’ brand equity value is the highest while shopping websites’ brand equity value is the lowest among the four web types. Suggestions and implications are provided for website brand management.

Status quo bias is an important factor which affects investors’ decision-making. The extant research on this issue only takes the prospect theory into consideration. In fact, framing effect, investor emotion and information structure are also important variables affecting status quo bias. This paper explores the impact on investors’ status quo bias from the perspectives of framing effect, investor emotion and information structure, using the experimental method. Results show that investors’ status quo bias is higher in the price differential frame than in the ratio frame of the investable portfolio. In addition, investors’ status quo bias does exist in the three emotions conditions. Particularly, status quo bias is lower in the positive emotion investors and higher in the negative emotion. Respondents’ choice of certain options is five times as uncertain options. The level of status quo bias in self-status assignment group is higher than that in external-status assignment group.

As the business environment becomes increasingly complex and dynamic, more firms begin to adopt corporate entrepreneurship strategy in pursuit of sustainable competitive advantage. Based on the network theory, this paper compares three types of resources acquisitions and argues that unique network resources are the underlying reason that entrepreneurship activities benefit from enterprise clusters. It also explores the relationship among network resources, entrepreneurial orientation (EO) and firm performance. Finally, drawing on the data of the enterprise clusters in Zhejiang Province, empirical results show that a firm’s performance is positively related to entrepreneurial orientation and network resources, which greatly increases the enhancement of EO to firm performance.

This paper proposes a theoretical framework which applies concepts of “will expectation” and “should expectation” to exploring the effects of service recovery on customers’ post-recovery satisfaction. The relationship among customers’ perceptions of service recovery and their different expectations for service recovery will determine the probability of customers’ post-recovery satisfaction exceeding their pre-failure satisfaction (service recovery paradox, SRP). Only when perceptions are higher than both will and should expectations, SRP is much likely to occur. In other cases, it will be difficult to have SRP. We extend this theory to dynamic process. The proposed theory could explain the conflicting findings of previous studies about SRP. Results of exploratory studies provide empirical support for our theory in the static case. Managerial implications and further research direction are also discussed.

This research investigates the effects of advertising strategy, that is, rational advertising and emotional advertising, on brand love. Based on the consumer-brand relationship literature, brand love is defined as a reciprocal, dynamic, multiplex, and purposive relationship between satisfied consumers and their brands, and has three key components: brand intimacy, brand passion, and brand commitment. Using a series of pretests and a main experiment, we examine how rational and emotional advertising affect brand love as well as its components for different products and services. Results show that for products, there is an interaction between advertising strategy and product type in influencing brand love. Specifically, rational advertising is more effective for utilitarian-value based products while emotional advertising is more effective for hedonic-value based products. For services, we find that emotional advertising is more effective for both utilitarian- and hedonic-value based services.

This study finds that Chinese consumers’ perception of country image can be divided into four dimensions: appraisal of the relationship with China, degree of country development, general product appraisal, and general people appraisal. The items in these four dimensions vary for different countries. The study incorporates country image into the Fishbein’s model, and finds good fitness between the model and data, which suggests that the Fishbein’s model has good generalizability and cross-culture adaptability. Results show that country image has no direct impact on purchase intention; instead, it impacts on consumers’ purchase intention indirectly through the effects on functional appraisal and symbolic appraisal, brand attitude and subjective norm. The effect of country image on purchase intention varies for different products. Specifically, the effect of country image on purchase intention of apparel is greater than that of cell phone, and that on purchase intention of car is the lowest.

Electronic intermediaries are recognized as one of the most significant B2C business models in the Internet era. A trustworthy intermediary website functions as both an information intermediary and a credibility intermediary. Given the critical role of trust in driving online purchase behaviors, the technology acceptance model (TAM) has been applied to investigating the impact of technology on online trust from the perspective of users’ perception of Web interface. However, consumers’ trust in an electronic intermediary derives from not only technological factors, but also factors of brand reputation and consumers’ individual experiences. We conducted an experiment in the context of hotel booking websites. Results based on structural equation modeling indicate that the impact of an intermediary’s reputation exceeds that of technology acceptance. Besides, reputation sum and reputation distance, which stand for synthesis effect and the cask effect respectively, are the two mechanisms of trust transfer.