There are a lot of brand experience in Metaverse. For example, we can participate in Samsung Galaxy Fan party, UC Berkeley graduation class, and even Ralph Lauren store in Metaverse. When the consumers experience such events in Metaverse, they have to use their avatar by making a user name. They have the option of using either their real or fictional name in Metaverse. There are two types of avatar in Metaverse. First, they can use actual self-avatar by using their real name. Second, they can create totally new avatars using made up name. The name is one of the symbols of self. Therefore, we can easily predict that consumer experience with avatar will affect the consumer perception differently. Which type of avatar will then enhance the brand engagement? Results show that the consumer experience with avatars affected brand attitudes differently. Also, the consumer's experience with avatars based on their actual images in the Metaverse affected the positive brand attitude. This study suggests that Metaverse avatars can also let people interact with themselves and with each other in parasocial ways. This study examines the role of avatar in virtual world; consumers experience with avatar can provide useful implications in terms of digital transformation.

Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) exploded onto the global digital landscape in 2020, spurred by pandemic-related lockdowns and government stimulus (Ossinger, 2021). An NFT is a unit of data stored on a blockchain that represents or authenticates digital or physical items (Nadini, 2021). Since it resides on a blockchain, NFTs carry the benefits of decentralization, anti-tampering, and traceability (Joy et al., 2022). Fashion brands quickly capitalized on these features, launching fashion NFT collections and garnering significant profits from the sale of fashion NFTs in 2021 (Zhao, 2021). For example, Nike’s December 2021 acquisition of RTFKT (pronounced “artifact”) resulted in USD 185 million in sales less than a year after their acquisition (Marr, 2022).

Integrating both the Computers-Are-Social-Actors Theory and Social Exchange Theory, this study investigates human-robot interactions in a frontline service setting. Data was collected via an intercept survey of 282 Gen Z visitors at a polytechnic library in Singapore. The data was analyzed using structural equation modelling with partial least squares. The results demonstrate the significant positive effects of robot anthropomorphism attributes, namely perceived warmth, perceived coolness, appearance, social capability, and personalized service on perceived trust as well as the significant positive effects of perceived coolness and social capability on positive emotion. Both trust and emotion affected consumer co-creation while only emotion impacted consumer wellbeing. The results add to the service robot literature and offer practical guidance for service managers to leverage trust in designing and personalizing inclusive service experiences for successful human-robot interactions.

With the rise of social media platforms, influencer marketing has become an essential tool for marketers to promote their products and services. Value co-creation behavior of influencers involves collaborating with their followers and brands to create content that provides value to their audience. This approach can help to build stronger relationships with followers and drive engagement and sales for the brands they work with.

With the popularity of live streaming commerce, the characteristics of streamers and products subtly influence consumer behavior through visual live streaming form. Based on dual-process theory, this paper develops a comprehensive theoretical model to examine how consumer perceived streamer characteristics and product characteristics influence streamer attractiveness and product attractiveness, and explore how consumer behavior inertia is affected by streamer attractiveness and product attractiveness. An online survey consisting of 300 participants was recruited to empirically examine the proposed research model. The results indicated that consumer perceived streamer characteristics and product characteristics are important factors affecting the streamer attractiveness and product attractiveness, which in turn positively affect consumer’s shopping experience memory, which further influence consumer behavior inertia. In addition, the moderating effects of mindfulness are also examined.

An increasing number of companies are using service robots, such as physical robots and virtual chatbots, to interact with their customers. Service robots are autonomous agents with the purpose of providing services to customers by performing a variety of physical and nonphysical tasks (Joerling et al., 2019). Conceptual work has suggested that social robots will increasingly be used in the front line of service encounters (Gonzalez-Jimenez, 2018; Van Doorn et al., 2017). Real examples of the inclusion of these robots in retail settings already exist. For instance, some retailers use Softbank´s robot Pepper to greet and inform customers. Social robots such as Pepper can use their sensors and cameras to interpret customer reactions and adapt accordingly. Moreover, the robot can even make product recommendations based on the assessed customer´s mood, age, gender and, if available, purchase history (McKenna, 2018). Not surprisingly, there is a vast market potential associated with these robots, which is expected to grow to 87 billion by 2025 (BCG, 2017).

Coffee has become one of the most popular beverages since the 1960s. These days, coffee is more about pleasure, experience, success, lifestyle, high concentration, and social status. Bhumiratana et al. (2014) state that individuals consume coffee with the intention of eliciting positive high-energy emotions, which can help in reducing fatigue, increasing alertness, improving work performance, and promoting a focused mental state, such as feeling motivated, productive, in-control, or clear-minded. Aguirre (2016) and Bhumiratana et al. (2014) also suggest that people drink coffee to stay awake. As coffee has popularized, café has become important as a place for people meetings. However, customers may tend to evaluate coffee as a service product depending on what service encounter they faced. They might perceive the taste and quality of coffee differently by following their mindset and stereotypes about perfect coffee. Customers pay attention to many factors in consuming coffee depending on service encounters. They may pay less for coffee prepared by robots and evaluate coffee prepared by humans as more precious. Therefore, this study proposes a specific factor theoretical framework of customers’ mindset about coffee prepared by human baristas and robot-barista. The study aims to determine how customers evaluate coffee prepared by baristas and robot-barista. Specifically, to which characteristics they pay attention in barista or robot-barista cases. Then, the study examines relationship between expected and perceived coffee characteristics and intentions to revisit café. Finally, the study compares customers' expectations about coffee depending on contact (barista) or untact (robot-barista) service.

In this research, we investigate how sponsored listings on an online search engine influence the consumer’s final decision choices. In an era of digital transformation where companies very often opt for sponsored advertisements, we explore how an anchoring effect (exacerbated by other factors) impacts the evaluation process and final outcome. More specifically, using a mix of secondary data from a large hotel aggregator and experiments, this work empirically validates that sponsored results (i.e., the first paid result) on a search engine results page indeed acts as an anchor. In addition, we find evidence the anchoring effect increases as a) the results are more versus less homogeneous, and b) the screen size of the search device is larger. What’s more, the anchoring effect is largely stable and does not fluctuate based on the category or decision importance. The effect also remains intact whether or not search engine results are randomized through the history of the browser. We also find the anchor influences subsequent evaluations, and options similar to the anchor are more likely to be chosen irrespective of the anchor’s attractiveness despite industry convention that consumers ignore sponsored results (see Henderson 2019) and research indicating consumers routinely select organic over sponsored search results.

In this research, we investigate the effectiveness of bleed brand logos for the metaverse shopping travelers from the viewpoint of a container metaphor. Bleed is a technique that enlarges parts of a logo while omitting others. Many firms use a bleed logo to improve visibility and allow the metaverse shopping travelers to retrieve the brand-related information quickly. Regarding the issue, we conducted three studies and found that in a metaverse space not filled with other traveler avatars, travelers would feel that the environment is in their control, and they could enjoy the experience. In this instance, firms could earn a high brand evaluation with a high bleed logo. However, when the metaverse space is crowded with other traveler avatars and, thus, travelers experience negative feelings brought up by their sense of being out of control, a high bleed logo results in their low evaluations of the brand because shopping travelers feel like some contents in the logo are out of the frame.

The objective of this study is to compare the efficiency of VR and 2D in the tourism industry as marketing tools, using affective forecasting and purchase intention. Accordingly, this study has two primary research aims. The first is to examine if a higher level of mental imagery (resulting from VR) is more effective than a lower level (2D) in a tourism marketing context. To evaluate this, the researchers use experimental method, measuring predicted dominance, predicted pleasure and predicted arousal, as well as purchase intention towards the hotel. Relevant to the tourism industry, tourism products are spatially and temporally distant (vs. near). This study aims to investigate how differently mental imagery, resulting from VR (versus 2D) experience, generates affective forecasting of a tourism product when tourists plan distant (versus near) future trips (temporal distance).

This study constructs a model to predict ad attitude when AI influencers act as ad endorsers. In the results, search products and rational ad appeal have more positive ad attitude, perceived empathy and perceived expertise as mediator. These three variables can be reinforced by the consistency of ad appeals and product categories.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology offers many opportunities for use in influencer marketing. There is however, no standardised ethical frameworks for use in this specific field. We offer a foundation framework to emphasise the social well-being goal and relate it to stakeholders involved.

The present study compared the effectiveness of virtual influencers (VIs) to human influencers through the theoretical lens of the uncanny valley and parasocial relationship using an online experiment. Specifically, we posited that highly humanlike VIs may evoke the feeling of the uncanny valley, as compared to human influencers or cartoonlike influencers, which, in turn, would act as a psychological barrier to building a parasocial relationship with the specific type of virtual influencer and decrease advertising attitude. The results indicated that people do feel the uncanniness from both highly humanlike and cartoonish influencers as compared to human influencers. This particular psychological experience negatively influenced the parasocial relationship, which, in turn, negatively affected the attitude toward a social media advertisement featuring the VIs. However, importantly, this effect was moderated by individual differences in anthropomorphism. This is one of the first studies that directly compared the effectiveness of different types of social media influencers in a rigorously designed experimental setting and expands the previous research on Vis, uncanny valley, and parasocial relationship. Both theoretical and managerial contributions of the study were discussed.

In recent years, social media influencers (SMIs) have brought dramatic shifts to the marketing trend. Apart from product endorsement and ad campaigns, they are increasingly hired by brands for promoting social causes including Black Lives Matter movement, COVID-19, and LGBTQ+ issues owing to their perceived authenticity and expertise (Open Influence, 2022). As such, brands promoting social causes to take ethical obligations to the society, namely, corporate social responsibility (CSR), has become an indispensable business practice (McWilliams & Siegel, 2001). Accordingly, past studies revealed that SMIs’ capability of creating authentic connection with target consumers and the fact that stakeholder awareness and authentic motives are preconditions for the success of CSR initiatives can create a synergic effect (Yang et al., 2021).

Sponsored product reviews have emerged as an important tool in influencer marketing. In particular, non-monetary sponsorships, where brands give influencers a product as a gift for a free trial, are widely used in influencer marketing. Yet, there is little understanding of i) the impact of non-monetary sponsorship on consumers’ downstream behaviors, such as social media engagement, ii) the moderating effect of influencer type, and iii) the underlying mechanisms through consumer perceptions of the brand (i.e., brand trust) and product (i.e., perceived product quality). To fill this gap, we first empirically examined the impact of non-monetary sponsorship on customer engagement using an Instagram dataset through regression analyses. In this analysis, the propensity score matching (PSM) method was employed to match non-monetary sponsored posts with other similar posts, which controls unobserved confounding variables and resolves the endogeneity problem. The empirical analysis shows that non-monetary sponsorship increases social media engagement, and the positive impact is stronger when a micro-influencer generates a non-monetary sponsored post. Next, using a lab experiment, we provide evidence for a causal link between non-monetary sponsorship and consumers’ downstream behavior (i.e., social media engagement, purchase intention, and brand attitude) and support the mediation through higher perceived product quality and brand trust. We contribute to the literature on influencer marketing by documenting the positive impact of non-monetary sponsorship on social media engagement, examining the moderating role of influencer type, and providing novel mechanisms underlying the effect of non-monetary sponsorship. The findings also highlight the changes in consumer perception of sponsorship and offer insights into the design of influencer marketing campaigns for marketing practitioners.

This study analyzed the presence and effect of sexual appeal of plus-size models using Victoria's Secret's Instagram content. A content analysis using roBERTa deep-learning model found that, plus-size models’ sexual appeals increased number of likes and comments, but explicit sexual appeals resulted in less positive sentiments than thin models’.

Covid-19 pandemic has significantly affected online advertising market. The pandemic has changed customers’ shopping behavior by decreasing customer traffic in offline businesses but increasing customers’ online activities that has led to growth of online shopping and advertising. While the outbreak of Covid-19 has sparked growth of online advertising in general, its impact on various industries may not be the same, given the differences in product characteristics and consumer behavior across different products and services. This paper aims to address this question by empirically examining how Covid-19 has affected online search advertising market. First, we examine how Covid-19 has affected the behavior of online users and advertisers, the main stakeholders in the search advertising market, in terms of user traffic and clicks and advertiser bids and payments. Second, we examine if the impacts of Covid-19 on behavior of online users and advertisers would be different in various industries.

Consumers may not be fully aware of the level of personalization used in brand placements in digital advertising. Personalized brand placements use customer data to select and insert preferred brands into digital media content, such as having Coke appear in a YouTube video for someone who favors Coca-Cola. This personalization can enhance the consumer experience (Trifts & Aghakhani, 2018) but may also backfire if placements don't account for changes in brand preference or when personalized placements are co-consumed with a person whose preferences strongly diverge from one’s own (e.g., one’s romantic partner; Brick, Fitzsimons, Chartrand, & Fitzsimons, 2018). Brands have a significant impact on how people perceive each other. Brands convey social information and symbolic meaning (Keller, 1993; Levy, 1959) and can influence behavior (e.g., Fitzsimons, Chartrand, & Fitzsimons 2008) and provide a source of affiliation (Escalas & Bettman, 2003). However, less is known about how brands affect basic social connections like empathy. This notable gap is relevant to the evaluation of the impact of brand placements in digital advertising as brand logos are quite visible in brand placements and can be the first piece of information someone observes when forming an attitude towards another person. For example, imagine an Instagram post of a person wearing a Harley Davidson baseball cap. What kind of person did you imagine? Does your impression change if, instead, the brand was People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or the Trump Organization? Moreover, how likely would you be to engage with media showcasing a person supporting this brand. In the current research, we propose that personally disliked brands create a negative bias in person perception and consumer judgment, a phenomenon we coin “brand negativity bias.” Our results show that disliking a brand can reduce empathy for others and substantially bias attitudes toward a digital product associated with but not created by the brand. Specifically, we show process evidence that suggests disliked brand placements reduce (1) empathy toward others through reductions in perceived similarity and (2) attitudes toward a digital product through perceived similarity and empathy, as serial processes. In addition, although we do not empirically test an overall mechanism that explains the negativity bias in its entirety, we speculate several reasons that underlie the broad influence of personally disliked brands (e.g., symbolic, ideological, or moral). From a societal point of view, our findings inform the public to be mindful of how simple consumption cues can bias people’s decision making, which holds implications beyond consumer judgment in domains involving first impressions.

Prior studies have focused primarily on the issue of consumers’ privacy concerns in personalized advertising, but little is known about the effect of transparency awareness using data collection notifications on consumers. This study focuses on the relationship between consumers’ perceptions of the AI algorithms underlying online behavioral advertising (OBA) and the advertising effects. Our research model indicates that displaying data collection notifications regarding OBA and personalized ads increases favorable perceptions of AI systems, such as transparency. Moreover, the model suggests that personalized ads induce higher perceived surveillance than non-personalized ads.

A bibliometric analysis, spanning five decades of knowledge is employed with the aim of: (i) assessing core intellectual knowledge of international services research; (ii) examining the contribution of international services marketing to broader research disciplines; and, (iii) estimating forecasting trends for the most promising international services research directions.