Oliver Thomas Emrich

Multichannel retailers aim at steering customers to physical stores to increase cross-selling, benefit from higher margins, and offer multisensory experiences. The question is how retailers can steer customers to strategically important channels. We propose that retailers may induce customers to switch to physical stores by communicating information about channel integration on their websites but that this explicit communication of channel integration is additionally influenced by the implicit communication of shopping benefits, which customers and retailers may not be aware of. Using a multilevel and multisource approach with field data of 1,479 customers from 104 firms, we find that informational online-to-physical channel integration on a retailer’s website influences customers’ online-to-physical store switching and that the density of shopping benefits concurrently communicated moderates this effect. Our results extend literature on channel choice and provide implications for retailers on how to design their websites as information hubs to steer customers to physical stores.

To what extent should multichannel retailers integrate assortments across channels? Previous literature controversially discusses the question of which integration strategy is most successful but arguments are only conceptual, and no empirical assessment exists. This article presents a framework that (a) shows how customers' perceived shopping benefits of variety, convenience, and reduced risk mediate the impact of multichannel assortment integration (full, asymmetrical, no) on patronage intentions and (b) differentiates the impact for retailer types based on substitutive, complementary, and independent assortment relations. Two large-scale experimental studies empirically investigate whether a dominant integration strategy exists in the context of full and simultaneous information (Study 1) and more uncertain and subsequent information accessibility (Study 2). We consistently find that full integration dominates no integration across assortment relations, but asymmetrical integration-the strategy that is most often realized by multichannel retailers-can have a detrimental impact for substitutive relations compared with no integration. Asymmetrical integration can be more beneficial than full integration for independent relations, while customer outcomes differ less for complementary relations. Researchers and managers can use our findings to understand how shopping benefits of variety, convenience, and reduced risk explain the different customer outcomes of multichannel assortment integration, depending on retailer type.

For their online shops, multichannel retailers must decide whether to adopt a prototypical design (with channel-specific attributes) or a homogenous design (with cues corresponding to their physical stores). While most retailers use a prototypical design, we propose that the effectiveness of a web design depends on customers' cognitive shopping orientations (i.e., specific schemas of store-based or web-based experiences) and their situational processing intensity (i.e., the level of cognitive processing). Three experiments reveal that a homogenous design increases online shop patronage among store-oriented customers if processing intensity is high; a prototypical design does not affect patronage among web-oriented customers. To capitalize on a homogenous design, multichannel retailers should activate customers' cognitive processing, such as with non-competitive pricing or task involvement. If store-based orientation or cognitive processing is low across the customer base, a prototypical design works as well as a homogenous design. Because retailers can induce a store-based orientation through highly visible physical cues in stores, multichannel retailing may evolve to a competition for customers' mindsets.

Companies increasingly use open innovation and co-creation processes on the Internet. Despite this rising trend in management, the different forms of open innovation on the Internet have only scarcely been investigated from a macroperspective that systematically categorizes customer-supplier interactions based on a conceptual framework. Using a cross-case study design, we characterize and differentiate six types of customer-supplier processes on the Internet regarding underlying value propositions, value network configurations, and modes of interaction. These co-creation processes can be categorized according to their value propositions that follow different stages of the consumption circle. Each value proposition, as a cohesive element, determines a different value network configuration. We examine how network leaders create different modes of interactions in these value networks that we analyze regarding power, relationship, and coordination mechanisms. Across cases, open innovation on the Internet changes the architecture of the value chain from a single-directed stream to a loop of knowledge exchange that includes almost every vertical stage. Companies therefore cannot assign customer input to a certain functionality but rather must decipher it through interdisciplinary approaches that involve the cooperation of multiple areas. The macro-perspective framework can help companies to identify in which areas they can use open innovation and how to establish co-creation processes in the newly evolving value networks.

We reinvestigate what constitutes hedonic customer experiences in collectivistic versus individualistic cultures using four country samples (N=2,336) in Germany and the U.S. as well as Oman and India. Across country samples, intrinsically enjoyable customer experiences are associated with the same underlying hedonic shopping motivations as shown in the original U.S. context. In comparison with individualistic cultures, we find that a hedonic shopping experience in collectivistic cultures is less strongly associated with selforiented gratification shopping, yet more strongly associated with others-oriented role shopping.

This research investigates the opportunities in multichannel retailing that may enable firms to integrate mobile services in accordance with their overall marketing objectives. Using a multiple case study method, the authors conduct an exploratory study, followed by survey research to verify the qualitative findings through confirmatory factor analysis. When they add mobile services, retailers can influence the situational prerequisites of consumption during the buying process, particularly in three identified fields of application. With occasion-based services, retailers create a situation that fosters immediate purchase in a specific time frame. Location-based services affect the spatial dimension of a consumer's decision process and thus the choice of retailer. Using target group-based services, the retailer can extend control over customers and attain additional opportunities for information and consumption that match typical routines of predefined customer segments. To analyze the roles of these mobile services in retail marketing planning, this study compares the three fields in terms of their market potentials, key tasks, and required competences.