Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to: first, examine why companies create brand pages in social media, how they use them, what policies and strategies they follow, and what outcomes do they expect; and second – from firms’ point of view – how users are benefited from such pages. Design/methodology/approach – A qualitative study approach was employed for this study. Data were collected from personal interviews with 14 marketing managers responsible for the social media activity of their company, providing preliminary evidence about the actions firms take, the motivations that led them to getting involved, and the derived outcomes. Findings – The main actions of the firm are making prize competitions, announcing new products/services, interacting with fans, providing advice and useful information, and handling customer service issues. The basic motivations are the increasing popularity of social media, competitors’ presence, headquarters’ strategy, and cost reduction pressure. Interact with customers, create/enhance relationships with customers, brand awareness, customer engagement, promote products/increase of sales, and the more targeted acquisition of new customers, were referred to as the main expected outcomes for companies. Research limitations/implications – Given the qualitative nature of the study and the emerging field of research about social media, findings should be considered as preliminary and exploratory. Interviews with companies from more sectors and also with social media users will provide a more comprehensive view of the topic. Practical implications – The paper identifies several opportunities for company managers, suggesting practices for effective social media handling. Originality/value – Considering the rapid development of social media and their penetration in business marketing actions, this paper is an exploratory step toward the ways firms utilize social media channels.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of service quality and satisfaction on three consumer behavioral intentions, namely word‐of‐mouth, site revisit, and purchase intentions in the context of internet shopping.Design/methodology/approachTo achieve this objective 240 online interviews were carried out (response rate 24 percent) from a randomly generated sample of 1,052 online shoppers using the database of a leading Internet provider in Greece as the sample frame.FindingsData analysis involved the comparison of three rival models using structural equations modeling. The prevailed model reveals that e‐service quality has a positive effect on e‐satisfaction, while it also influences, both directly and indirectly through e‐satisfaction, the consumer's behavioral intentions, namely site revisit, word‐of‐mouth communication and repeat purchase.Research limitations/implicationsThe results confirm that cognitive evaluations precede emotional responses and that quality is a strong antecedent of satisfaction. However, the findings highlight the importance of the interaction experience with the e‐shop on perceived quality. Moreover, the study underlines the crucial impact of the four key e‐service quality drivers on the entire cycle of buying, including post‐purchase behavior, confirming existing evidence in both off‐ and on‐line context.Practical implicationsPractitioners should carefully consider their web site's attributes. They should make their sites easy‐to‐use and easy‐to‐navigate and place extra emphasis on providing fast, accurate, and uncluttered information through their web sites. Also they should direct marketing activities with the aim to enhance satisfaction from e‐shopping, particularly regarding the service encounter incidents.Originality/valueThe paper makes a scholar contribution by examining the notion of e‐service quality and how it relates with e‐satisfaction while exploring unexamined consumers' behavioral intentions and both their direct and indirect antecedents.

The article explores the quality dimensions that the visitors of national and foreign business‐to‐consumer portals use to assess the performance of their service offering. Based on the SERVQUAL model and previous research on Web site evaluation and quality, the paper identified three quality dimensions that proved to be stable across sites’ nationality and user profiles. Several implications are drawn from these results for both Web site marketers and future academic research.

Purpose The study aims to develop and test a relationship-building model for green brands. It synthesizes findings on the consumer motives offered by green brands, with relationship marketing and branding literature to the specific context of green brands to build a parsimonious model testing the links amongst four relational benefits, i.e. confidence, socialization, self-expression and altruism; two relational mediators, i.e. satisfaction and relationship quality; three behavioural outcomes, i.e. word-of-mouth, expectation of continuity and cross-buying; and two moderators of the benefits-mediators relationship, i.e. environmental consciousness and relationship length. Design/methodology/approach Data are collected from consumers of three brands of natural cosmetic products, totalling 848 questionnaires. Structural equation modelling is used to test the hypothesized relationships across the three brands. Findings The results show that confidence benefit has the strongest influence on relationship quality, followed by self-expression and altruism. Relationships quality and satisfaction with the green brand have a significant impact on all three behavioural outcomes. Both environmental consciousness and length of the relationship moderate the hypothesized interrelationships. Research limitations/implications A new set of relational benefits for the green context is suggested. Several future research opportunities are suggested. Practical implications The study offers suggestions for managers to leverage relationship benefits for relationship strengthening. Originality/value No previous work has studied in an integrated way the relationship benefits and mediators to model the consumer–green brand relationship. The study provides a better understanding of the antecedents of consumer loyalty towards green brands.

PurposeWhen compared with the field of new product development, research on new services has seen fewer developments and offers less comprehensive insights. This paper tries to fill this gap by providing empirical findings from two qualitative longitudinal case studies of new service development. Knowledge on the management issues for developing new bank offerings efficiently is limited. Furthermore, recent research suggests that organisational learning can contribute greatly to the success of innovation projects. The aims of this paper are to provide a detailed description of the development process of a new financial product and to identify learning actions that may contribute to its effectiveness.Design/methodology/approachThe paper reports findings from a qualitative, longitudinal case study of a well‐known French bank, and of a retailer. The research focuses on the description of the process, the organisational issues involved and the decision making during the development process.FindingsThe findings lead to the proposition of a model of new service development comprising a strong organisational learning component. Research and managerial implications are discussed for ways to better understand the new service development process and to enhance its effectiveness. The results reveal an informal development process consisting of a sequence of issues to solve and decisions to make. Multiple learning actions and strategies are identified that enhance the process's effectiveness and efficiency.Research limitations/implicationsGeneralisation of the proposed NSD model will require further qualitative and quantitative investigations. For the qualitative part, observations of the development of standardised offers are necessary to enrich the initial framework. Furthermore, non‐standardised offers would constitute a specific research field, given the dimensions of complexity and divergence of the delivery processes. For the quantitative part, the impact of learning process on results of the development may be assessed on the basis of measurements used in similar contexts, such as the impact of learning on the success of joint ventures.Originality/valueFindings suggest that learning during innovation should be supported for banks and retailers. Several opportunities for further research are therefore suggested.