The authors argue that perceptions of service quality vary across cultural groups, as defined by each culture’s position on Hofstede’s dimensions. They explicitly map the relationship between service quality perceptions and cultural dimension positions and draw the implications for international service market segmentation. They also test the hypotheses constituting their theoretical analysis. They show that the importance of SERVQUAL dimensions is correlated with Hofstede’s cultural dimensions. They also used the correlation coefficients to compute a Cultural Service Quality Index that could be used to segment international service markets and allocate resources across segments.

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The Relationships between Culture and Service Quality Perceptions Basis for Cross-Cultural Market Segmentation and Resource Allocation

This paper examines the role of culture as a factor in enhancing the effectiveness of health communication. We describe culture and how it may be applied in audience segmentation and introduce a model of health communication planning—McGuire's communication/persuasion model—as a framework for considering the ways in which culture may influence health communication effectiveness. For three components of the model (source, message, and channel factors), the paper reviews how each affects communication and persuasion, and how each may be affected by culture. We conclude with recommendations for future research on culture and health communication.

The Role of Culture in Health Communication

Failure to consistently deliver promises is a likely outcome for high contact services. While many organizations create blueprints to recover from service failures, these tend to focus on production processes rather than the individual needs of customers. Develops a framework based on equity, for studying the effects on customers of service failure and recovery. In a study of restaurant customers, the construct of equity is found to be significantly correlated with respondents’ intention to repurchase. Significant differences in equity were observed between genders and age groups, suggesting that service recovery processes should be more closely tailored to the demographic characteristics of customers.

Equity and repurchase intention following service failure

Many factors may contribute to consumers' satisfaction with Internet shopping, but the issue has rarely been addressed from the perspective of customer participation Drawing on the attribute-based model, this article examines the attributes important for consumer satisfaction with Internet-based self-service technology (ISST) In addition, the current study argues that the importance of the attributes in determining consumers' satisfaction would vary as a function of their readiness to adopt technology A survey was conducted to collect data from experienced users of online travel agencies or bookstores The results based on 459 participants show that efficiency, ease of use, performance, perceived control and convenience are attributes having significant impacts on users' satisfaction with ISST This study also identifies three consumer segments among ISST users based on their scores on technology-readiness drivers and inhibitors As predicted, the importance of each attribute at determining user satisf

An attribute-based model of quality satisfaction for Internet self-service technology

This paper studies the impact of generic strategies on firm performance using a longitudinal study of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Austria. In two surveys, data on the strategic behavior and performance of the same group of firms were gathered for the period from 1992 to 2002. The study expands existing literature, which provides little evidence whether the persistent commitment to a generic strategy over a longer period pays off or whether strategic change is the rule in SMEs, reflecting their flexibility as a potential competitive advantage. We consider the traditional generic strategies of cost-efficiency and differentiation, but also examine the group of firms that have no clear strategy or are “stuck in the middle.” Within this group, we distinguish between those companies that deliberately combine traditional low cost production and differentiation, i.e., follow a combination strategy, firms that change their strategy and those that have no strategy. We argue that a combination strategy is a viable strategic choice for SMEs in the long run. We found that the majority of firms pursued a persistent strategy over a 10-year period, but that companies that changed their generic strategy did not produce inferior results to those that adhered to a single strategy over the entire period. Our results reveal that firms that follow a combination strategy outperform companies with no generic strategy in terms of profitability and growth and achieve higher profitability than companies that follow a differentiation strategy.

Generic strategies and firm performance in SMEs: a longitudinal study of Austrian SMEs

This edition of Market Segmentation includes the key elements that made the first edition the resource for marketing professionals. Its state-of-the-art demographic and psychographic segmentation techniques and case studies are completely updated to reflect the latest data and applications. This expanded edition also covers international market segmentation and database marketing/single source data to help analyze market opportunities. Topics include: the pre-segmented market; physical attributes; statistical software; segmentation resources; developing global market strategies.

Art T. Weinstein

Papers

Market Segmentation: Using Demographics, Psychographics and Other Niche Marketing Techniques to Predict and Model Customer Behavior