▼ Past research on Competitive Intelligence (CI) has been centered at the organization level, and thus provides little foundation for investigations aimed at the salesperson level. To fill this gap, the current study examines the influence of salesperson’s CI use on performance. Social identity theory is employed as a mechanism to better understand how salespeople socially construct the meaning of CI. The proposed model incorporates role perceptions as antecedents to CI use and behavioral as well as performance outcomes of it. Manager level constructs such as recognition and coaching are included as moderators. To test the model empirically, 513 salespeople from a US-based Fortune-500 company were surveyed. Objective performance data were collected from the company’s archival database. Structural equation modeling was used to analyze the hypothesized model. Results of the study indicate that salespeople’s role stress hinder their motivation toward role behaviors, namely CI collection and CI use. On the other hand, positive role perceptions act as drivers that foster salespeople’s effort toward collecting CI and using it. Recognition from managers enhances the relationship between a salesperson’s role identity salience and CI collection underlining the manager’s role in this process. The CI use links positively to adaptive selling behaviors emphasizing the importance of competitor knowledge apart from customer and product knowledge. Additionally, post-hoc analysis suggests that salespeople enhance their performance by using CI only if it is coupled with coaching from managers. Therefore, in order to create a CI-conducive environment, managers have to provide coaching accordingly. Advisors/Committee Members: Rapp, Adam.

▼ Recent trends such as ad skipping have led to the adoption of alternative promotion strategies in reaching target audiences. Brand placement (BP), the inclusion of brands into entertainment with an attempt to persuade, is an increasingly common tactic used by marketers. Academic research has had a hard time keeping up with practice and has primarily focused on cognitive effects, viewing BP as another form of advertising. A few empirical studies have considered alternative theories for explaining BP effects in light of its unique entertainment setting. These studies show complementary nonconscious effects such as implicit memory and implicit attitude and find that explicit measures do not mediate effects on implicit measures, but lead to negative attitude effects. To date, however, no study has looked at how brand associations are learned from BP. To fill this gap, this dissertation adopted the implicit learning framework from cognitive psychology. Implicit learning suggests that even complex information can be learned 1) without awareness of what is learned, 2) without intention to learn, and 3) as a byproduct of some explicit learning. A total of 725 subjects were recruited to participate in three separate experiments conducted to investigate the effect of awareness on implicit learning and explicit learning in three different settings: across marketing communications, within BP, and across BP-advertising sequences. Measures assessed viewer learning of four of the nine brands embedded in the film I, Robot after viewing either the entire film or an edited clip. Learning was also used to explain conventional measures such as brand memory and brand attitude. Key findings show that 1) brand associations are learned differently in the BP and advertising contexts, 2) prominence may actually deter implicit learning within BP, and 3) there are interactive effects when BP and advertising are used together. Persuasion knowledge was found to be a useful covariate when looking across marketing communications, but not within BP. Implications for both theory and practice are derived. Advisors/Committee Members: Hu, Michael Y.

▼ To understand brand management in the contemporary marketing environment and assist firms in developing ways to boost brand management effectiveness, this study attempts to establish and empirically test the relationships between two theoretical constructs, brand managers' brand management intangible capital and brand management capability. This study has three objectives: It 1) identifies individual brand managers' specific knowledge, skills and capabilities critical to effective brand management; 2) establishes measurement models for individual brand managers' intangible capital and capability; and 3) empirically tests the relationships among brand managers' intangible capital, capability and brand management outcomes. The research framework of this study is grounded in three streams of firm-level theories, the Resource Based View, the Resource-Advantage theory and the theory of firm capability. This dissertation integrates these theories into a research framework and applies these firm-level theories to the individual brand manager level. By doing so, this study provides a unique theoretical lens to examine contemporary brand management. Advisors/Committee Members: Hu, Michael.

▼ How do retailers choose their locations? Surprisingly little current information is available delineating how retailers go about the site selection process. This study investigates the process by which retailers choose among the shopping center formats available in a marketplace. Specifically considered are options to locate in free-standing locations, shopping malls, strip shopping centers, lifestyle centers, and downtown shopping districts. Retailers’ decisions as to where to locate are dependent on a number of factors. Theories from geography, economics, retailing, environmental psychology, and services marketing provide context for the theoretical model of retail location choice advanced in the present study. In order to explain the site selection process, five constructs suggested by the traditional site selection literature are incorporated into a multinomial logit model; these include (1) socioeconomic/ demographic, (2) situational, (3) site specific, (4) competitive, and (5) store specific factors. In addition to the five traditional constructs usually associated with retail site selection, the present model adds constructs related to (6) managerial intuition and (7) process quality. These areas are often overlooked but are relevant to the site selection process. This study makes a contribution to both theoretical and managerial study of retail location decisions. From a theoretical viewpoint, this is the first attempt to incorporate the full range of traditional site selection variables and allows for the examination of the relative importance of each. In addition, this work integrates a broader spectrum of variables by including managerial intuition and process quality. Managerially, this study provides shopping center developers and managers with a clear understanding of how retailers make location decisions. Armed with this knowledge, developers and managers will be better equipped to tailor their offerings and communications to appeal to a select retailer target market. Advisors/Committee Members: Bridges, Eileen.

▼ Past research focused on the effects of the fit between the partner brands on brand alliances and the spillover effects. This dissertation examines brand alliance evaluation from the perspective of an individual brand. An integrated congruence framework is developed to assess (a) the effects of congruence (expectancy and relevancy) on brand alliance evaluation, and (b) the differential spillover effects on each partner brand. In addition, this research extends the congruence framework into the global arena context by incorporating perceived country image and consumer ethnocentrism.Using a sample of 774 participants from the U.S. and Canada, this dissertation empirically tests the integrated congruence model of brand alliance evaluation with two types of brand alliances: ice cream/chocolate brand alliances and airline alliances. Four experimental conditions, combinations of expectancy (high/low) and relevancy (high/low), were set up for each brand alliance. Experimental findings fully supported the hypotheses in this study. This research fills a critical void in the brand alliance literature, by casting the problem in the context of partner selection. In doing so, practical and managerial implications are drawn. This study also provides implications for international marketers on how to choose their international partners to form a global brand alliance. Advisors/Committee Members: Hu, Michael.

▼ Marketing activities are designed and executed to increase brand equity. The financial benefit derived from brand equity is defined as brand value. In this dissertation, a brand valuation model and a new brand value measure are proposed in the context of mergers and acquisitions. The data is collected from Thomson ONE Banker Mergers and Acquisitions database, SEC filings, COMPUSTAT database, CRSP database, and USPTO’s trademark database. To be included in the sample, a merger and acquisition deal has to have a US-based target firm in a consumer product and service related industry and a US-based acquiring firm. All deals are completed between January 1, 2001 and June 30, 2010 and the acquiring firm reported the brand value for a target firm in their SEC filings. The sample has 98 merger and acquisition deals. Bahadir, Bharadwaj, and Srivastava (2008) used the dollar amount the acquiring firm assigned to the target firm’s brand to represent brand value, and developed a brand valuation model with capability and strategic fits between acquiring and target firms. First, I extend their model with Ohlson’s valuation approach (1995). Results show that target firm characteristics explain more of the variability in brand value than acquiring firm characteristics. Second, a new measure of brand value is proposed based on shareholders’ value for the brand. An event study methodology based on Brown and Warner (1980, 1984) with Carhart’s (1997) four-parameter risk adjustment specification is used. Changes in acquiring firm stock returns due to acquisition announcements are further adjusted to the brand level. The brand valuation model with this new measure shows substantially greater explanatory power than the model with the previous measure of brand value. Validity of using shareholders’ value is largely supported by the results of this study. Advisors/Committee Members: Hu, Michael.

▼ Brand extension allows a firm to leverage its current brand equity in its new product introduction. This study addresses three key issues in brand extensions: consumer affect transfer process, the impact of extension products on the parent brand equity and the stock market valuation of brand extensions. Essay 1 examines how brand affect is transferred from the parent product to the extension product. The congruency framework (expectancy and relevancy) is used to explain the affect transfer process. Results of three experimental studies suggest that both factors positively influence this process and the largest amount of affect is transferred when both conditions are met. Essay 2 addresses the network effects in brand extensions. The theory of network externalities from economics is used to explain the reciprocal network effects from the extension products to the umbrella brand. The study posits that three characteristics of the extension products’ portfolio influence the parent brand equity: the portfolio size, the similarity among products in a portfolio and the presence of the attribute compatibility. Experimental findings firmly support these prescribed effects. Essay 3 assesses the stock market responses to the brand extension announcements and compares with two related strategies: line extension and brand alliances. The magnitude of the responses is the largest for brand alliances, moderate for brand extensions and the minimal for line extensions. Advisors/Committee Members: Hu, Michael.

▼ Attribution theory and justice theory have been used to model consumer reactions to general failure and firms’ recovery efforts respectively. This dissertation employs the customer satisfaction framework to integrate attribution with recovery. Consumer recovery expectation provides the conceptual link between these two constructs. Using a sample of 450 participants, this dissertation empirically tests the integrated model of customer satisfaction with service failure and recovery. Participants are classified based on their self-reported attribution of a general failure scenario. A 2×2×3 factorial experiment with three recovery attributes is used to match recoveries with expectations. Results show that the degree to which consumers blame a causal agent for a failure is positively related to their expectation from that causal agent. The effect of recovery on customer satisfaction largely depends on justice-based recovery expectations. This study also suggests that there is no single recovery that will be effective for all failures. The appropriate recovery is based on consumer recovery expectations. In general, compensation along with other non-monetary related attributes such as quick response, empathy, and politeness of employees, is more effective than compensation alone. Advisors/Committee Members: Hu, Michael Y.

▼ Gift exchange is a mechanism by which relationships are created, maintained, and managed. However, research reveals that the gifts givers prefer to give often differ from the gifts recipients prefer to receive, and relies on error in the givers’ gift choice to explain giver-recipient gift preference asymmetry. This dissertation adopts an attachment theory perspective of gift exchange to examine givers and recipients’ gift exchange preferences. Attachment theory (Bowlby, 1969/1973/1980) explains how individuals’ working models of self and other influence their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors toward relationships. As gift exchange strengthens, confirms, or distances relationship intimacy, the work in dissertation demonstrates that individuals are predisposed toward certain gift preferences in order to influence relationship intimacy in accord with their attachment style. Generally, recipient- and relationship-focused gifts confirm or strengthen relationships, while giver-focused gifts weaken them (Kleine et al., 1995; Ruth et al., 1999). Therefore, this dissertation asserts that attachment style affects the identity-congruence levels givers and recipients prefer in gifts. Based on data from 151 friendship dyads, study 1 uses the Actor-Partner Interdependence Model (APIM) to investigate how givers’ and recipients’ attachment styles dyadically affect the levels of identity-congruence preferred in gifts given and received. Study 2 provides a practical investigation into how marketers can influence gift givers’ selection of a brand as a gift. Using data collected from 491 participants, study 2 demonstrates how matching an advertising message to an individual’s attachment style facilitates persuasion. This dissertation seeks to contribute to theory and practice in several ways. This work establishes the attachment theory perspective of gift exchange as a relationship-level phenomenon and explains how attachment styles dyadically affect preference for gifts expressing differential levels of identity-congruence. In doing so, an alternate explanation for giver-recipient gift preference asymmetry is provided. Finally, a practical tactic that marketers can use to influence the selection of their brand as a gift is provided. Advisors/Committee Members: Jewell, Robert.

▼ During the past three decades, the pharmaceutical industry has increased its reliance on incremental innovation to drive growth. This change in conduct reflects the industry’s response to a series of changes that has impacted negatively the return on its research and development investment. This dissertation examines the relationship between these changes in conduct and financial performance. First, the structure-conduct-performance paradigm and the resource-based theory of competitive advantage are referenced to establish the basis for the dynamics of change at industry and firm levels. Then, a value relevance model is defined to study the relationship between the change in innovative focus and the change in financial performance. This research studies the brand-name pharmaceutical industry from 1980 to 2009. Data to study the relationship between innovative focus and performance are compiled from three sources. Financial data are drawn from Standard & Poor’s Compustat database and firms’ annual reports. Data to operationalize innovative focus are acquired from the United States Food and Drug Administration’s Drugs@FDA database. The value relevance model defined for this research is evaluated using time series and pooled time series approaches. The results confirm the pharmaceutical industry’s innovative focus changes significantly during the period studied. The change in innovative focus significantly drives change in financial performance. Closer analysis of strategic change at the firm level reveals some firms increase their focus on incremental innovation while others do not. Financial performance changes only for the firms that increase their focus on incremental innovation. In the long run, the financial performance of the firms that change strategy by increasing their focus on incremental innovation exceeds that of the firms that do not. This research contributes to the value-relevance literature by examining allocation of the research and development investment, rather than the magnitude of the investment, and its role in driving financial performance. The results from this research have important implications for managers as they set new-product portfolio strategy to drive superior financial performance for their firms. Advisors/Committee Members: Hu, Michael.

▼ This dissertation creates a theoretical framework designed to understand how consumers react when their brand preferences are not congruent with the preferences of their reference group. Past research on reference group influence has largely focused on how groups influence an individual’s decision to conform or not conform to the preferences of the group. Group identification has been viewed as the main determinant as to whether an individual would conform or not conform to their group’s normative expectations. However, this research fails to consider an individual’s behaviors when they do not agree with the preferences of the group. While some research from sociology and psychology has identified possible behavioral responses that an individual may engage in when their brand preferences are not congruent with those of their reference group, this research is incomplete. This dissertation creates a framework to understand when specific types of nonconformist and conformist behavioral responses will be employed under conditions of normative conflict. Moreover, past research has failed to consider behavioral responses that go beyond conforming and not conforming to explore the possibility that an individual may choose to hide their consumption from their reference group in response to conflicting brand preferences. By hiding one’s consumption behavior, an individual maintains the appearance of conformity while in reality not conformity. Hiding consumption behavior has been briefly discussed in the consumer behavior literature, but research on this behavior has been limited. The focus of this dissertation differs from research that investigates hiding behavior that may take place by those individuals with compulsive buying habits, which occurs because of an inability to control purchasing. The behavioral response under analysis is hiding behavior that occurs when there is conflict between the individual’s brand preferences and a reference group’s brand preferences. Limited discussion of this type of behavior is provided by Fournier (1998) when she notes that individuals engage in secret brand relationships where they hide their brand consumption from others. This dissertation provides the first in-depth examination of consumers’ efforts to hide their non-deviant consumption behaviors from their social groups. In order to determine when an individual will engage in one of the pre-existing responses identified in the literature or when they will choose to hide their behavior, this research adds two moderator variables: severity of sanctions and risk of exposure. In addition to determining under what conditions an individual will hide their consumption behavior, this dissertation also examines if individual differences exists that differentiates those who choose to hide their consumption behaviors and those who do not. Finally, this dissertation analyzes the consequences that hiding behavior has on the consumer’s relationship with their reference group and their relationship with the brand. Advisors/Committee Members: Wiggins Johnson, Jennifer.

▼ Many studies have explored the link between acquisitions and innovation. The empirical findings to date remain inconsistent. This dissertation is comprised of two studies that attempt to resolve some of these inconsistencies. The first study takes a knowledge-based view of innovation and attempts to establish how acquisitions influence innovation outcomes. The second study examines the influence of marketing and R&D capability fit between acquiring and target firms on these outcomes.To empirically test these propositions, 657 U.S.-based acquisitions completed between January 1984 and December 2002 are examined. Data to support this research come from three databases. Acquisition data containing information on acquiring and target firms is sourced from the Thomson Financial SDC Platinum database. Firm-level financial data used to derive capability measures comes from Compustat. The National Bureau of Economic Research patent database is used to construct knowledge and innovation measures. The first study compares acquiring firms and non-acquiring firms to establish 1) the conditions by which firms complete acquisitions and 2) the influence acquisitions have on innovation. In the second study, four capability fit indices are established between acquiring firms and target firms along the marketing and R&D capability dimensions. These four fit indices are used to explain innovation outcomes of the acquiring firms. The results from the two studies provide several insights. First, findings from the first study indicate one possible reason for acquisition is a lack of technical knowledge. Acquiring firms are able to increase their innovation quality following an acquisition. The examination of capability fit suggests that high marketing capability of acquiring firms combined with high R&D capability of target firms yields a high level of technical knowledge. Advisors/Committee Members: Hu, Michael.