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Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Examining consequences of brand hate in business-to-business relationships
T2 - The moderating role of relationship length
AU - Sameeni, Maleeha Shahid
AU - Ahmad, Wasim
AU - Qadeer, Faisal
PY - 2024/10/31
Y1 - 2024/10/31
N2 - This study advances the ongoing scholarly research on brand hate discourse by investigating its consequences in the business-to-business (B2B) context – thereby attempting to initiate a novel trajectory in brand hate literature by including the B2B perspective. The paper demonstrates and validates a conceptual model that connects brand hate with complaining (an immediate behavior), boycott, and retaliation (next stage behaviors) adopted by business buyers with varying relationship lengths with the selling brand. Based on two empirical studies, a survey, and a scenario-based quasi-experiment, results demonstrate that aggressive behaviors of business customers are associated with buyers’ emotional processes (hate). In particular, it confirms the direct effect of brand hate on complaining, boycott, and retaliation. Further, it demonstrates the mediation mechanism of complaining between hate-boycott and hate-retaliation relationships. Interestingly, these effects are more substantial for customers with longer relationship length. The findings enrich B2B literature on negative customer-brand relationships and provide managerial guidance for devising strategies to cope with brand hate and unfavorable consequential behaviors.
AB - This study advances the ongoing scholarly research on brand hate discourse by investigating its consequences in the business-to-business (B2B) context – thereby attempting to initiate a novel trajectory in brand hate literature by including the B2B perspective. The paper demonstrates and validates a conceptual model that connects brand hate with complaining (an immediate behavior), boycott, and retaliation (next stage behaviors) adopted by business buyers with varying relationship lengths with the selling brand. Based on two empirical studies, a survey, and a scenario-based quasi-experiment, results demonstrate that aggressive behaviors of business customers are associated with buyers’ emotional processes (hate). In particular, it confirms the direct effect of brand hate on complaining, boycott, and retaliation. Further, it demonstrates the mediation mechanism of complaining between hate-boycott and hate-retaliation relationships. Interestingly, these effects are more substantial for customers with longer relationship length. The findings enrich B2B literature on negative customer-brand relationships and provide managerial guidance for devising strategies to cope with brand hate and unfavorable consequential behaviors.
KW - brand hate, B2B, complaining, boycott, retaliation, scenario-based quasi-experiment
U2 - 10.1016/j.indmarman.2024.08.002
DO - 10.1016/j.indmarman.2024.08.002
M3 - Journal article
VL - 122
SP - 26
EP - 36
JO - Industrial Marketing Management
JF - Industrial Marketing Management
SN - 0019-8501
ER -