Throughout recent years, many physical establishments were forced to close, and events were canceled due to the outbreak of Covid-19. Consequently, brands, especially luxury brands, saw their contact with consumers greatly diminished and revenues decreased significantly (D’Arpizio et al., 2021). On the contrary, the global gaming industry saw its demand, exposure, and revenues increase. In fact, this industry is expected to exceed $200 billion by the end of 2023 (Gilliland, 2020), and there were more than 2.6 billion players worldwide in 2020 (Palframan, 2021). Thus, in 2020, many luxury brands opted to significantly upsurge their investments in the world of online gaming. The adoption of game advertising also represents a way for the luxury industry to adapt to its current target, as 81% of Gen Z and 77% of Millennials are gamers (Jain, 2021). By 2025, both generations are expected to account for 50% of the market, making them important players in the sector. However, there is still little empirical research regarding consumers’ perceptions of game advertising in the context of luxury brands. Thus, this research aims to study the impact that brand credibility and the use of game advertising have on the perceived coolness of luxury brands and, subsequently, on their equity.

Artificial intelligence (AI) technology is recognized as essential in the 4th industrial revolution (Schwab, 2017), which is capable of interacting with the environment and processing and transforming data information to inform goal-directed behavior (Paschen, Kietzmann, & Kietzmann, 2019). Due to the advances in intelligent systems and the incorporation of AI agents in smart devices, more than eight billion digital voice assistants will be used globally by 2024 (Thormundsson, 2022; Gilkson & Woolley, 2020). For successful and positive consumer-brand relationships, constructs such as trust, satisfaction, and commitment are vital (Garbarino & Johnson, 1999; Nyadzayo & Khajehzadehb, 2016). Unlike humans, Artificial intelligence agents could achieve relationship marketing engagement by encouraging users to anthropomorphize the other parties in their technology-mediated interactions, such as applications like chatbots, virtual assistants, and service robots (Steinhoff et al., 2019). Those applications can also use humanoid traits to engage customers in organizations (van Doorn et al., 2017).

The capability for Artificial Intelligence in the beauty industry is enormous, as customers are demanding increasingly customized offers that only these strategies can offer. However, there is still a scarcity of empirical research on customer experiences enabled by AI, which highlights this research's relevance, which we intend to bridge.

Religious tourism is one of the most important touristic segments globally. Yet, the cognitive and emotional processes shaping destination loyalty in this context, and the impacts of Augmented Reality (AR) technology were not fully investigated. This study takes a unique approach to examine how awe influences recommendation and revisiting intentions through the mediation of rational (e.g., authenticity) and affective (e.g., emotional) mechanisms. Furthermore, our research unveils the role of AR for reinforcing the future intentions of tourists towards a religious site.

Technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) or Robotics are emerging as a new way of improving services, readjusting and impacting all business industries and relationships among people (Loureiro et al., 2021; Makridakis, 2017; Mingotto et al., 2020). The hospitality industry is no exception to this (Mingotto et al., 2020) since a quick growth in the use of robots and AI in this industry has been seen, registering a turnover of 249 million U.S. dollars (International Federation of Robots, 2021). This demonstrates that these technologies have a huge potential to grow, being relevant to deeply study them. Since very few of the existing studies highlight the robot-human interactions, further studies on the enhancement of human well-being through transhumanistic technologies, close relationship marketing capabilities, and the evolution of the engagement process between humans and AI-enabled machines are needed (Loureiro et al., 2021). To address the existing gaps and consider Susan Fournier’s (1998) study on customer-brand relationships, the main goal of this study is to find support for this researcher by associating customer-brand relationship studies with a customer-robot relationship. It also aims to understand individuals’ attitudes towards different types of social robots and the relationship process between social robots and humans, in the hospitality industry, and the influence of identification in the creation of attachment, connection, and commitment. The possible contributions of the customer-robot emotional relationship on customers’ feelings of wellness were also studied.

One of the main challenges brands face nowadays is the ability to provide a real-life experience through online platforms. The aim of this study is to analyze an AR try-on app versus a website, considering consumers self-concept and testimonials. To this end, an online survey was conducted, in which respondents were exposed to two of four scenarios: AR APP or website experience, and positive versus negative reviews presence. Our findings indicate that ideal self-congruence impacts both, purchase intention and confidence. The present study positively contributes to the AR and self-concept literature, while opening new avenues of research for both academics and practitioners.

This research aims to assess the current status of online trade relations between Kuwait and Portugal. To do so, we examine how firm managers from Portugal and Kuwait use online platforms to engage customers to enhance firm performance. A set of existing constructs was chosen (Online Experience, Customer Inspiration, Online Customer Engagement, Firm Performance, National Culture), which were included in a proposed model of structural equations, in order to assess the contribution of Online Experience and Customer inspiration to the current status of online trade relations (through Online Customer Engagement), and how these can be improved to the further development of e-commerce between the two countries.

Virtual Reality is based on three key characteristics: immersion, interactivity (Boyd & Koles, 2018). Firstly, when exposed to a virtual environment, the individual experiences the sense of immersion or presence within that environment. The user feels like being there and escaping or becoming isolated from the real world. Beside immersion, VR provides a very dynamic environment (Loureiro et al., 2019), which is important to create consumer involvement. Hence, the current study explores antecedents of emotions and purchase intention in virtual supermarket setting

This research seeks to unveil how YouTube influencers and digital interaction can contribute to the process of customer-brand relationship and engagement. Based on in-depth interviews of female Youtubers devoted to the lifestyle categories, we aim to comprehend the engagement factors that influencers should rely on to promote engagement between their followers and the brands they advocate.