Money is much more than dollars, pounds or yen. The digitization of money has led to the emergence of numerous virtual currencies (i.e., company-issued currencies for purchases within the company’s ecosystem). Billions of US dollars are exchanged using such virtual currencies every year. Still, most pricing-related research focuses on payments using official currencies. In our article, we build upon payment mechanism and processing fluency research to predict consumers’ purchase intentions with virtual currencies. Study 1 addresses how perceived money similarity can be predicted by semantic similarity measurements. In Studies 2 and 3, we replicate real-world purchase scenarios to show how a virtual currency’s dissimilarity to money decreases purchase intentions through both the decrease of processing fluency and the increase of pain of payment. Managerial as well as theoretical implications are discussed.

It is axiomatic that strategic flexibility is a key success factor in generating competitive advantage. Despite this maxim, often peddled in the normative literature, empirical studies have produced inconsistent results for the strength and direction of this relationship. We synthesize these results and provide empirical support for a general, moderate, and positive effect of strategic flexibility on firm performance. Moreover, we find that strategic flexibility indirectly affects financial performance through its positive effects on innovation capability and superior market position, and that strategic flexibility has a negative direct effect on financial performance. Importantly, the meta-analytic evidence also indicates that the strategic flexibility-performance relationship depends on measurement methods, the research context, and certain environmental characteristics. Exploratory analyses regarding the antecedents of strategic flexibility reveal many meaningful differences to the predominant expectations in prior research. Overall, our results provide the necessary nuance to discerning the specific antecedent and consequential effects of strategic flexibility, thereby providing valuable implications for managers, and outlining a research agenda for future inquiries.

It is axiomatic that strategic flexibility is a key success factor in generating competitive advantage. Despite this maxim, often peddled in the normative literature, empirical studies have produced inconsistent results for the strength and direction of this relationship. We synthesize these results and provide empirical support for a general, moderate, and positive effect of strategic flexibility on firm performance. Moreover, we find that strategic flexibility indirectly affects financial performance through its positive effects on innovation capability and superior market position, and that strategic flexibility has a negative direct effect on financial performance. Importantly, the meta-analytic evidence also indicates that the strategic flexibility-performance relationship depends on measurement methods, the research context, and certain environmental characteristics. Exploratory analyses regarding the antecedents of strategic flexibility reveal many meaningful differences to the predominant expectations in prior research. Overall, our results provide the necessary nuance to discerning the specific antecedent and consequential effects of strategic flexibility, thereby providing valuable implications for managers, and outlining a research agenda for future inquiries.

Purpose - This paper conceptualizes and empirically tests the determinants of service interaction quality (SIQ) as attitude, behavior, and expertise of service provider (SP). Further, the individual and simultaneous effects of SIQ and its dimensions on important marketing outcomes are tested. Design/methodology/approach - The narrative review of extant research helps formulate a conceptual model of SIQ, which is investigated using univariate and multivariate meta-analysis. Findings - There are interdependencies between drivers of SIQ that underlines the need to (a) conceptualize service interaction as a dyadic phenomenon, (b) use contemporary multilevel models, dyadic models, non-linear SEMs, and process studies, and (c) study new and diverse services contexts. Meta-analysis illustrates the relative importance of the three drivers of SIQ and, in turn, their impact on consumer satisfaction and loyalty. Research limitations/implications - The meta-analysis is based on existing research, which unfortunately has not examined critical services or exigency situations where SIQ is of paramount importance. Future research will be tasked with diversifying to several important domains where SIQ is a critical aspect of perceived service quality. Practical implications - This study emphasizes that, although the expertise of SP is important, firms would be surprised to learn that the attitude and behavior of their employees are equally important antecedents. In fact, there is a delicate balance that needs to be found; otherwise, attitudinal factors can have an overall counterproductive effect on consumer satisfaction. Originality/value - This paper provides an empirical synthesis of SIQ and opens up interesting areas for further research. Keywords: Service interaction quality, Attitude, Behavior, Expertise, Meta-analysis, Review Paper type: Research paper

This study investigates antecedents of a salesperson's cross-functional orientation and its effect on cross-selling success. Results indicate a strong effect of cross-functional orientation on cross-selling success. Moreover, results show a strong influence of salesperson specific variables on cross-functional orientation and cross-selling success.