This PhD examines the practices of clothing product development, particularly in connection with retail buying, and their implications with regard to sustainability. These are two fundamental dimensions of the clothing sector, yet they have not received adequate attention in the literature. My research redresses this gap in three key ways. Firstly, there tends to be an assumption in much of the literature that the US system of retail buying is applicable universally. However, my research revealed that own-label buying processes in the UK clothing sector operate differently to those referred to in US texts. Secondly, my research found that other roles that work alongside buying and design teams are significant in clothing product development (e.g. merchandisers, textile designers and technologists), although this has been under-reported or omitted in previous studies. Thirdly, sustainability is a prominent issue which is affecting product development in the clothing sector increasingly, ultimately impacting upon consumer behaviour in terms of selection, purchase, maintenance and disposal of garments, yet it was virtually absent from existing studies. The overall aims of this critical appraisal document are to introduce the two key strands of my research into clothing product development practices and their implications for sustainability, to locate my research within existing studies, and to outline the impact of my publications for my field of research.

The main aim of this study is to add to the current knowledge about the corporate website favourability within the discipline of marketing by developing a rigorous conceptual framework of factors that influence corporate website favourability, and to explore how corporate website favourability contributes to building corporate image, corporate reputation, consumer-company identification and loyalty within the context of the financial setting in the UK and Russia. This research addresses two main questions: 1) what is the impact of the specific antecedents of corporate website favourability on corporate image, corporate reputation, consumer-company identification and loyalty? 2) what are the main favourable influences of corporate website favourability on corporate image, corporate reputation, consumer-company identification and loyalty? To achieve the goals of this research, the thesis adopts a mixed method research design - a predominantly quantitative approach, which is supported by insights from an exploratory phase that embodies in-depth interviews and focus group discussions. The thesis draws on attribution, social identity and signalling theories. Based on the multi-disciplinary approach, this study resulted in the introduction of a validated conceptual framework that explains the phenomenon of corporate website favourability. The conceptual framework was supported and enhanced by a qualitative study (in-depth interviews and focus groups) that added three factors which influence corporate website favourability: customer service, website credibility and perceived corporate social responsibility. The conceptual framework was empirically evaluated through the insights from 555 questionnaires in the UK and 563 questionnaires in Russia. The sample of respondents permitted multivariate data analysis to be conducted in both contexts. The data from two contexts (consumers from HSBC in the UK and Sberbank in Russia) were analysed separately. This research employed exploratory factor analysis (EFA), cronbach’s alpha, and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to ensure that the scales developed and adapted were robust in terms of validity and reliability. Afterwards, structural equation modelling (SEM) was used to conduct the hypothesis testing for each context. The model confirmed a good fit to the data, good convergent, discriminant and nomological validity and stable reliability in both contexts. The proposed conceptual model showed that 17 hypotheses in the UK and 14 hypotheses in Russia were supported out of the 19 hypotheses. Thus, overall, the research framework was generally supported in both contexts. The results indicated that navigation, information, security, availability, perceived corporate social responsibility, and perceived corporate culture influence corporate website favourability in the UK and Russia. Furthermore, the findings showed that the usability factor does not influence corporate website favourability in either country. Unexpectedly, the visual, customisation, website credibility, and customer service factors were rejected in Russia, but accepted in the UK. Additionally, corporate website favourability was found to have a direct positive affect on corporate image and satisfaction in both the UK and Russia. However, the relationship between attractiveness and corporate image was only supported in Russia, and not in the UK. In addition, in both contexts, corporate image was positively related to corporate reputation, corporate reputation was positively connected to consumer-company identification, and, finally, consumer-company identification was positively related to loyalty. This study is the first systematic research which has conceptualised and operationalised the notion of corporate website favourability, its antecedents and its consequences. It is anticipated to be of value in advancing existing knowledge by proposing a threefold theoretical contribution to the literature: 1) theoretical extension (level of conceptualisation and measurement); 2) assessment of theory; and 3) investigation of generalisation. Additionally, it is hoped that the findings of this research would make a substantial managerial contribution to the understanding of marketing and communication managers and website designers regarding the entire association among corporate website favourability, its antecedents and consequence. Furthermore, it is expected that this examination will enhance the knowledge of company decision-makers, communication professionals and website specialists about the building of a favourable corporate website in line with the corporate identity strategy of the company. Corporate website favourability should be adopted by companies, as part of the overall corporate identity management.

Throughout the past few decades, global brands with strong visual identities have been entering the Arabic market. From the start, the Arabic language was integrated into packaging, signage and advertisements in an unstructured style. Today, some regulations require the translation of brand names and adaptation of the Latin logo mark and the rest of the visual identity. However, logo marks are still not always adequately designed and managed when adapted to different markets with a new language, script, and culture. The study seeks to explore the phenomenon of logo mark adaptations in the Arab region from Latin to Arabic scripts, to provide a toolkit for designers and the process of brand management to maintain the visual identities. This research investigates the subject by using a qualitative multi-stage case study approach to investigate the subject visually, linguistically, and culturally. A conceptual framework adapted the concept of third culture to identify three cultures for global brands; the first culture consists of the brands’ logo mark and visual elements. The second culture consists of the new market into which it is expanding, and the third culture is created by the global brands where the first and second cultures overlap. This study is divided into three stages: (1) describing the current state of Arabic adapted logo marks by conducting visual observation and archival research; (2) exploring how the brands managed their visual identities by performing document analysis on guideline manuals; and (3) investigating designers’ perspective of Latin logo mark adaptations into Arabic by carrying out interviews. The findings of this study indicate that every global brand that expands to a new market creates a third culture brand. Thus, each global brand has a third culture logo constructed as a result of the overlap of the first and second cultures. Each visual element that constitutes the third culture logo contains different factors for adapting to the new market linguistically, culturally and visually. The study develops the Third Culture Brand and Third Culture Logo models adopted from the concept of the third culture to a context that has not been applied before, creating an adaptation tool to aid maintaining the consistency of the corporation’s visual identity. Also, the research presents a practical recommendation presented in a guidebook as a toolkit for global brands adapting their logo marks to regions with non-Latin scripts. The guide advises both the brand managers and the designers to work side by side from the beginning of all the major decision-making steps to implementing the adaptations.

This study draws on the resource-based, knowledge-based, complementary and dynamic marketing capability theories in order to understand the internal dimensions of dynamic marketing capability (DMC) as well as the applicability of DMC in the exporting process. Specifically, this thesis investigates the multi-level structure of DMC, and also explores the crucial role of DMC in implementing knowledge-based resources to better value offerings within adverse market conditions. This study develops an integrated conceptual model that shows how knowledge-based resources and knowledge management capabilities enhance export performance. This research has employed structural equation modeling to understand the causal relationships through information from 315 personal interview-based surveys of export-oriented manufacturing and IT service organisations in Bangladesh. The results reveal that the DMC is a multi-level higher-order reflective construct that consists of four higher-order marketing capabilities. The findings show that DMC mediates the exporter's international ambidexterity dimensions (i.e. market exploration and market exploitation) to improve export performance under the lens of unpredictable market conditions and aggressive competitive pressures. In particular, this research identifies that DMC is a knowledge management process through which internationalisation knowledge can be implemented to satisfy customers' demands in exporting environments. The findings provide fresh insights by showing that the development of DMC is a complex process and it is not an ordinary marketing capability. An exporting organisation should adjust its accumulated internationalisation knowledge and knowledge management marketing capabilities in order to mitigate threats of radical market changes and satisfy its customers' demands better than other major export competitors.

Although the role of retail environment in affecting customer behaviour is highly acknowledged by marketing scholars, the mechanism causing the effect is still a promising area of research. In this respect, most of S-O-R-based research in the relevant literature comprises either emotional or cognitive states as organism factors. Together, emotion and cognition as mediators are mostly investigated in studies addressing either a single or a few environmental stimuli, with less attention paid to the interplay mediating role of customer emotion and cognition on the shopping environment-customer behaviour relationship. With this in mind, this thesis aims to investigate the effect of various factors within the shopping environment on customer mall behaviour through examining the mediating role of customer emotions and cognition. With the stimulus-organism-response (SOR) model as a backbone, and supported by the cognitive theory of emotions as well as “affect as information” theory, different scenarios of mediation for both customer emotions and cognition (O) in the relationship between shopping environment factors (S) and customer behavioural response (R) are addressed in one holistic framework. Based on a thorough analysis of the existing literature, a conceptual research model comprising eleven main research hypotheses is developed and then empirically examined. Using a dataset of 1,028 valid survey questionnaires collected using the mall intercept technique, structural equation modelling asserts the capability of various factors within the shopping environment in influencing customer behavioural response through a cognitive-emotional sequence of mediation. Analysis shows that, out of the seventeen direct structural paths included in the structural model, thirteen paths are significant and in the hypothesised direction, lending support to the majority of research hypotheses. The findings of hypothesis testing indicate that the mall shopping environment plays an important role in shaping customer cognition (evaluation of a mall’s overall shopping environment) and in driving their behavioural response, while its direct impact on customer emotions seems to be much less significant. Both customer emotions and cognition are important in predicting customer mall behaviour. However, pleasure, and not the emotion of arousal, plays a role in determining how customers behave in shopping malls. The mediating effect of customer emotions on the relationship between shopping environment factors and customer behavioural response is marginal, while cognition plays a critical mediating impact. Nevertheless, in accordance with the overall finding of this thesis, the mediating role of emotions becomes more significant as a second-step mediating variable. Theoretically, this study introduces a comprehensive understanding on how a mall’s shopping environment affects customer buying behaviour. It also provides distinctive insights onto the mechanism by which customer emotions and cognition mediate the effect. Practically, the findings emphasise the significance of the shopping environment as a marketing tool. The research findings are informative to malls’ operators seeking to understand how the shopping mall environment can be best utilised to enrich the shopping experience of customers and to ultimately drive their buying behaviour. Limitations and areas of future research are also discussed.

This research uses a case study of a UK car insurance company to investigate the relationships among price aggregator (re-intermediation) purchase channel, purchasing habits, marketing response models, marketing mix variables, business models, and strategic customer relationship marketing. The introduction of aggregators within the industry has changed the UK car insurance environment substantially in terms of the above core aspects. The research explores the following questions. How do the insights map to the particular business contexts of the case company and its drive for sustained growth and profitability? How does re-intermediation relate to strategic marketing planning and implementation via the marketing mix? How can the results help to reposition the case company with regards to its future growth and profitability through an integrated business model? How has the performance of existing distribution channels been affected by the advent of price comparison models? A wide range of statistical models and data mining tools were applied to this research, including vector autoregressive (VAR) modelling, general linear regression, quantile regression, autoregressive, moving average; autoregressive integrated moving average, GARCH, logistic regression; decision trees and neural networks models. The research also uses scenario testing for business model understanding and hypothesis testing for marketing framework. These methods allowed the researcher to better understand the new aggregator enriched environment. By way of main theoretical and practical contributions to knowledge, the study provides an in-depth knowledge of the insurance re-intermediation problem and the construction of an Integrated Business Re-intermediation Model (IBRM) that enhances growth and profitability of company x, and insurance companies in general. This the first to study the effects of reintermedation within the UK car insurance industry which compares the business prospects of the case car insurance company pre- and post-joining an aggregator. The analyses show that price aggregator channel significantly interact with other channels in influencing the customer retention rates and life time values available to the company and hence its future growth and profitability. Insights from the IBRM model could be used to develop the car insurance and related businesses further.

Networks are an abstract representation of connections (the "edges") between entities (the "nodes"). One can represent many different types of data in this way, including many social, biological, technological and physical systems. Examples we discuss in this thesis include networks of friendship ties between individuals on Facebook, coauthorship networks between scientists, and similarities in voting patterns between members of the US Congress. Analysing intermediate-sized (or "meso-scale") features often reveals insights about a network's structure and function. A particular type of meso-scale feature are "communities", where one typically thinks of a community as a set of nodes that is particularly "well-connected" internally but has "few" connections to other nodes in a network. A complementary interpretation of a community is as a set of nodes that "trap" a diffusion-like dynamical process for a "long" time. Based on this dynamical interpretation, we investigate "size-resolved community structure" in networks by identifying bottlenecks of locally-biased dynamical processes that start at seed sets of nodes. By sampling many different local communities for different seeds and different strengths of the locality bias of the dynamical process, we obtain a picture of the way communities at different size scales compare in a network. This "size-resolved community structure" provides a signature of community structure in a network and its qualitative features are related to the way local communities combine to form the larger scale structure of a network. For many data sets, ordinary networks are not sufficient to represent the detailed connectivity patterns. For example, connections often evolve over time and one may have different types of connections between the same entities. Multilayer networks provide a framework to represent these different types of situations. The perspective of communities as bottlenecks to dynamical processes extends in a natural way to multilayer networks and we use it to illustrate that two types of random walk on a multilayer network that have been used as the basis for identifying communities in a multilayer network correspond to very different notions of what it means for a set of nodes to be a good multilayer community. This exemplifies the need for multilayer benchmark networks with known community structure to compare the ability of different methods to identify intuitive community structure. We propose a method for generating benchmark networks with general multilayer structure and use it as the basis for a preliminary comparison of different multilayer community detection methods. Finally, we use multilayer community detection to analyse survey data about people's perception of their hair. One key advantage of this type of data compared to most traditional network data sets is that we have a large number of potential explanatory variables that we can use to interpret the results of identifying communities which allows us to identify some potentially interesting hypothesis.

The purpose of this research is to explore diaspora entrepreneurship from a business history and marketing perspective, and compare the differences in marketing strategies between diaspora and non-diaspora entrepreneurs in the development of cosmetic brands. The research is focused on four cosmetic brands as case studies (Avon, Estée Lauder, Maybelline, and Johnson & Johnson) and three periods of interest (date of brand creation, during the Great Depression and during World War II). A case study methodology relies heavily on the historical archives of the companies, supported by data from open-ended unstructured interviews. Thematic analysis was used, and through a combination theory of entrepreneurial opportunity identification and development, marketing strategies, and resource-based view, data was analysed through manual coding. The findings indicate that firstly, diaspora entrepreneurs have a tendency to venture into market-oriented businesses through niches, while non-diaspora entrepreneurs seem more interested in brand-oriented businesses at the point of brand creation. Secondly, during the Great Depression diaspora entrepreneurs put more endeavour into marketing innovation, whilst the non-diaspora entrepreneurs continued to improve their product through innovations, retaining the same product line and target market. Finally, during World War II diaspora entrepreneurs started to implement market segmentation, whilst non-diaspora entrepreneurs ventured into vertical product differentiation. Drawing upon literature on diasporas, entrepreneurship and marketing, this thesis has reconceptualised diaspora entrepreneurship, and studying the diaspora phenomena from a business management perspective. It contributes to the emerging stream of research on diaspora entrepreneurship and introduces a unique historical insight from a business history and marketing perspective. It notes the implications for entrepreneurs relevant to entry processes, diaspora entrepreneurship, and management. This study primarily advances a better knowledge of diaspora entrepreneurship in a historical context.

Although research on foreign market entry and expansion behaviour has attracted significant interest in the literature, there is a general lack of research (both conceptual and empirical) on the exit behaviour of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) firms. To address this issue, the current study develops a conceptual framework by extending the Environment-Strategy-Performance (ESP) paradigm to include the exit decision as a consequence of current performance. This thesis draws notions from various theories including the ESP paradigm, fit theory, dynamic capabilities (DC) theory, and the theory of competitive advantage. The objective is to take an initial step towards reducing the discrepancy between previous conceptual research and empirical research on exit, by developing a conceptual framework and empirically examining it in the context of Chinese Outward Foreign Direct Investment (OFDI). It also aims to lay the conceptual foundation for subsequent empirical research on international marketing and international exit. Several research hypotheses are advanced and tested using questionnaire survey data. The main research results show that both dissatisfactory performance of a foreign affiliate, and the internal strategic misfit between a foreign affiliate and its headquarters are important triggers of the exit decision. However, when the moderating role of a foreign affiliate’s marketing capabilities is considered, the impact of strategic misfit on the exit decision becomes not significant, whereas the influence of dissatisfactory performance on the exit decision remains significant. The research results have generated new insights into both international marketing strategy and international exit behaviour. Implications for both headquarters’ managers and foreign affiliates’ managers are also discussed.

Understanding an individual’s self-interests remains a challenging task for consumer marketing because brands have no direct access to individual’s inner mind in order to satisfy his or her consumption-related wants, needs and expectations. In the case of luxury brands, customer service experts only seek to maintain close relationships with wealthy and elite customers, and they cannot extend the same individualized services to mass-market consumers. Among the new middle classes in emerging markets, consumers do not have strong brand attachments, but they do have high purchasing power with regard to luxuries. To bridge this gap, mobile technology could be an ideal interface through which luxury brands could enhance interactive communication and engagement with consumers. Nevertheless, research findings have revealed major discrepancies in the adoption of technology. While luxury brands have been ‘slow’ in their adoption of such technologies, consumers have adopted mobile devices as extensions of themselves in the digital world, which greatly enrich their lifestyles. Therefore, a medium should be developed to bridge this gap. The Gearbox of Exchange is proposed to help integrate the consumer’s self-interests with those of luxury brands. Through conditional access with a mutually agreed-upon exchange value to balance privacy concerns and financial risks, the consumer might be willing to share customized information with the brands with which they trust to engage. The luxury brands will benefit from the sharing of this customized information, as they can better predict an individual’s preferences and choices. This virtual engagement will revitalize customization to activate personalized services for every individual. These mutually agreed-upon interactions will develop into a mutual interdependence, a B2B2C relationship. This bond will protect brands from severe competition. More importantly, their knowledge of customized information, which is provided through their direct access to consumers’ self-interests, will fill the black box of radical behaviourism and enhance these brands’ abilities to predict individual choices. Therefore, the knowledge generated from the Gearbox of Exchange will not be meaningless to transform consumer analysis into micro marketing.