Marwa Tourky

AI agents are increasingly used in customer relationship management strategies to improve efficiency and reduce costs. Amid rapid advances in technology, the programs are becoming more human-like and versatile. However, AI agents with inadequate emotional responses can create an empathy gap, resulting in negative outcomes. If users' experiences fail to live up to their expectations, the resultant negative disconfirmation has damaging consequences for customers, the brand and the corporation. This chapter sets out the current types of human interactions with digital systems before examining the antecedents to negative outcomes, the three key types of negative disconfirmation and the consequences for areas such as brand engagement, AI agent trust and AI-induced brand hate. It then highlights that these harms are not inevitable, highlighting the mitigating action that firms can take to ensure their AI agents do not undermine their own customer relationship management efforts. Suggestions for future research are also provided.

This chapter analyses the pivotal role of sound in shaping the customer journey and elevating brand experiences. We explain the profound influence of auditory elements, in particular sound, music, silence, or noise, on consumer perception and behavior. By demystifying sonic branding and its implications for brand experiences, we highlight the often-overlooked potency of sound in creating memorable customer experiences. Finally, we draw on a real-world case study of Intel to illustrate sound strategies that have been successful for businesses. Request access from your librarian to read this chapter's full text.

This rejoinder responds to a commentary (Horak et al., 2023) on our article ‘De-Linking from Western Epistemologies: UsingGuanxi-Type Relationships to Attract and Retain Hotel Guests in the Middle East' (2022). We thank the authors for engaging with our work and are grateful to the editor for the chance to respond. Firstly, we do not accept the central assertion that we imposed the Chinese concept ofguanxion a Middle Eastern context. Some aspects ofguanxiextend beyond China, and we consider it part of our role as researchers to explore universal behavioral aspects that transcend specific cultural settings. While we describedguanxito introduce the variables, we drew a clear distinction betweenguanxiitself andguanxi-type relationships, and provided on page 859 an explicit statement about what we meant by the term ‘guanxi-type relationships’, i.e. the networks of interpersonal ties found in the Middle East. While this distinction could have been more clearly emphasized in places, we consider that the article as a whole made it abundantly clear.

Relationships are widely recognized as key to business success in the form of both informal interpersonal networks and formal organizational relationships. While Chinese personal networks (guanxi) have attracted scholars’ interest, the concept has not been fully investigated or understood in other contexts, especially the Middle East, where personal networks fulfill some of the same roles. The underlying socio-cultural formulae of the distinctive cultural dimensions that influence relationship formation in the Middle East also remain under-explored. This research therefore investigates the dimensions ofguanxi-type relationships in the Middle East and introduces a new model integrating these relationships into the existing relationship marketing framework, enabling firms to harness personal networks for organizational gain, in turn generating customer satisfaction and retention. Using empirical data from a survey of 637 hotel guests in 17 countries – drawn from a unique target population of guests introduced to Middle Eastern hotels via personal relationships – we show howguanxi-type relationships influence organizational relationships and improve satisfaction and retention. Our significant contributions to theory and practice include extending a holistic understanding ofguanxi, enhancing knowledge of its dimensions in the Middle East, and providing managers with clear evidence for a hybrid system ofguanxi-type and organizational relationships.

The ongoing transformation of branding in developing countries remains under-researched despite its central importance to competitive advantage. The Egyptian banking sector is a prime example: it depends largely on brand equity, but current strategies may not have equal effects in national and international banks. This research therefore quantitively confirms the direction of causality from brand loyalty to brand equity, before conducting a large quantitative study with 622 valid responses, examining consumer-based brand equity in the banking sector. The study’s use of Aaker’s model is especially significant as the model’s complex application in developing countries is not fully understood. The results show that brand loyalty positively mediates the effects of brand awareness, brand associations, and perceived quality on overall brand equity, as well as having a direct effect on overall brand equity; and suggest that Egyptian customers access quality signals more from international brands than from national brands. This study therefore sheds important light on how brand equity operates in the Middle East and North Africa banking sector, and extends the use of Aaker’s model, offering new insights to bank managers on building and maintaining brand equity.