Furthering marketing knowledge with relevance to the Asia Pacific

Citation

Cui, C.C. and Cadogan, J. (2009), "Furthering marketing knowledge with relevance to the Asia Pacific", Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics, Vol. 21 No. 4. https://doi.org/10.1108/apjml.2009.00821daa.002

Furthering marketing knowledge with relevance to the Asia Pacific

Article Type: Guest editorial From: Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics, Volume 21, Issue 4.

The Asia Pacific region is economically and culturally diverse, and geographically broad, including countries such as China, Japan, India, Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Australia, and New Zealand, among others. The growing political and economic importance of this region has attracted increasing research attention, but the region's difference from the rest of the world creates challenges for researchers, particularly in terms of the relevance and focus of research undertaken from within the Asia Pacific region. For instance, there is growing evidence to suggest that many “Western” models and theories do not hold perfectly when extended into the Asia Pacific region. Partly this is because the majority of marketing models and theories are developed in Western countries (typically the United States), and with a Western bias (Steenkamp, 2005). There are mounting calls for researchers to adopt a more international perspective, and move away from the dominant Western “Silo” (see Ambler et al., 1999; Steenkamp, 2005). In some cases new contingencies may need to be considered, while in others, new models and new hypotheses may need to be developed to account for the cultural and geographical differences the Asia Pacific region presents.

In response to the need for furthering marketing knowledge with relevance to the Asia Pacific, the Asia Pacific Marketing Special Interest Group of Academy of Marketing (UK) convened a special track on marketing in the Asia Pacific at the 2007 conference. Three best papers presented at the track are included in this special section of this issue*.

The first paper by Au-Yeung and Lu explores the extent to which the development of retailers' own labels in Taiwan resemble or differ from the historical development of that in the West as documented in literature. Branded own labels are a relatively recent development in grocery retail market in Taiwan. This paper reports that the development of retail own label products in Taiwan does not follow the pattern witnessed in the West as described in literature. Only some of the strategic motives of using own labels as stated in existing literature are fully echoed in this study. Furthermore, the progress of most of the retailers in Taiwan studied does not mirror the typical stages of evolution as advocated in the early literature.

The second paper by Arambewela and Hall draws on the expectancy-disconfirmation framework to examine perceptions of the level of satisfaction with educational and noneducational services in Australia among international postgraduate business students from China, India, Indonesia and Thailand. The authors' findings indicate that the importance of service quality factors in both educational and noneducational services vary among nationality groups and therefore have a differential impact on student satisfaction. They argue that universities should develop a diversified strategic marketing plan that incorporates the differential needs of international postgraduate business students.

The third paper, by Qu, reports on a study of the impact of market orientation and corporate social responsibility on business performance in the hotel industry in China. In China, society still has high expectations of firms' social obligations despite the recent move into market-operated corporate systems. This socio-political environment provides a unique research context for understanding the inter-relations between market orientation, corporate social responsibility and business performance. Qu argues that given the current Chinese environment, corporate social responsibility is a key mediator in market orientated companies' efforts towards better business performance. Results from this study show that market orientation is a key antecedent to corporate social responsibility. The study reveals that although both market orientation and corporate social responsibility could enhance performance, once the effects of corporate social responsibility are accounted for, the direct effects of market orientation on performance diminish considerably to almost nonexistent. This provides evidence that market orientation's impact on organizational performance is mediated by corporate social responsibility. These findings seem to be of particular importance because China is significantly different from developed countries where most of the market orientation and corporate social responsibility studies were conducted.

The three papers in this special section examine important issues in different industries in different geographic locations in the Asia Pacific region. The studies reported here represent worthwhile efforts in drawing on but also going beyond the received marketing theories and models to advance our understanding of important marketing issues with relevance to the Asia Pacific region. In pursuing research advancement of important issues with a focus on this strategically important region, we recommend continuing efforts in the following for future work:

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  replications of “Western” marketing theories/models in the Asia Pacific region – with a particular emphasis on identifying models that do not hold in the Asia Pacific region (i.e. conspicuous examples of model failure in marketing theory);

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  tests of the generalizability and stability of “Western” marketing theories/models in the Asia Pacific region;

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  extensions of “Western” marketing theories/models, taking into account cultural, geographic and other contingencies specific to the Asia Pacific region;

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  the development of marketing theories/models specifically with the Asia Pacific context in mind;

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  the testing of previously untested marketing theories/models using data obtained from Asia Pacific countries;

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  recognizing that the Asia Pacific region is large and diverse – tests of model validity, generalizability and stability across countries within the Asia Pacific region;

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  empirical cross-national comparisons (e.g. Asia Pacific data vs data from a Western country) of marketing theories/models; and

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  the development of new marketing theories/models explicitly attempting to control for contingencies that differentially affect Asia Pacific/Western/other countries.

We also suggest that there is a need to progress theory at different levels within the marketing research arena. For example, a great deal of attention is being paid to issues concerning consumers and their responses to marketing stimuli across and within nations. Much of this research focus necessarily draws on theories of consumer culture and cultural differences between individuals in Western and in non-Western societies. There is a need to delve deeper into these matters. Similarly, marketing strategy (e.g. development and implementation) issues need to be investigated. Here, there may be an additional need to recognize that organizations can have cultures of their own too, and that organizational cultural factors may be of relevance to strategy researchers focusing on the points raised above. We look forward to seeing greater attention being paid to these issues in the coming years.

Charles C. CuiThe University of Manchester, UK

John CadoganLoughborough University, UK