Transaction cost economics has been widely used in international marketing, particularly for foreign market entry and expansion. However, existing applications largely focus on traditional firms engaged in dyadic transactions and overlook the structurally distinct nature of sharing economy platforms such as Uber and Airbnb. Unlike traditional firms, these platforms operate through triadic exchanges that mediate interactions between crowdsourced providers and customers and are governed by algorithmic control over provider behavior. The proposed framework extends transaction cost economics to global sharing economy platforms by reexamining its behavioral assumptions, transaction attributes, and transaction costs. This framework incorporates multiplex opportunism and platform trust as behavioral assumptions; algorithmic specificity, multiplatform participation, regulatory complexity, and institutional uncertainty as transaction attributes; and ecosystem advantage and location-specific knowledge as contextual moderators. In addition, it identifies four specific transaction costs (i.e., onboarding, coordination, adaptation, and safeguarding) facing sharing economy platforms and/or providers. Illustrative evidence for this framework that highlights how these features shape platform–provider dynamics across international markets is provided via case studies of Uber and Airbnb's international expansion activities. The article concludes with a set of testable research propositions to guide future inquiries on the internationalization of sharing economy platforms and the governance of global crowdsourced ecosystems.
While advertising is known to influence consumer preferences and spending, its impact on household borrowing behavior remains underexplored. The authors address this gap by examining whether country-level advertising spending encourages consumers to borrow more to purchase branded products. Using a unique dataset on consumer credit from 18 countries, the authors assess the direct effect of advertising spending on consumer credit. Drawing on institutional theory, the authors focus on three pillars, namely, the normative pillar (income inequality), the regulatory pillar (rule of law and regulatory quality), and the cultural pillar (conservatism and self-enhancement) as moderators of advertising's impact on consumer credit. The findings suggest that advertising spending is positively associated with consumer credit. This result is robust to various model specifications, endogeneity, and alternative mechanisms. The strength of advertising spending's impact on consumer credit depends on the normative pillar (income inequality) and the regulatory pillar of the institutional environment (rule of law and regulatory quality) but not cultural values. Collectively, the results suggest that advertising spending has a significant impact on consumer borrowing, but its impact on consumer spending depends primarily on income inequality, rule of law, and regulatory quality differences across countries.
Empirical evidence shows that foreign languages act as implicit country-of-origin (COO) cues and affect consumer responses toward a brand. However, it is unclear whether unconventional lettering—an implicit COO cue that uses a foreign language script distinct from the consumers’ mother tongue—affects consumers to a greater extent than a “made in” label (explicit COO cue). This study investigates the effect of unconventional lettering versus “made in” labels on consumers’ willingness to pay. Across three experiments, consumers exhibit higher willingness to pay for brands featuring unconventional lettering than for those with a “made in” label on the packaging. The results further demonstrate that (1) this effect can also operate indirectly through enhanced perceptions of brand authenticity, and (2) it is strengthened when consumer cosmopolitanism is high. Implications for research and practice are discussed, and suggestions for future research are offered.
Coolness can be a significant product success factor in today's global markets. Yet the field lacks a systematic understanding of consumers' interpretations of product coolness across cultures and of the factors that drive possible cultural variations. The authors conduct two studies (with Anglophone consumers) to conceptualize product coolness, followed by two cross-cultural surveys (in cultures that use the English word "cool" in everyday language) that test an integrative framework for product coolness. The framework replicates across the sampled cultures, which include U.S., German, and Chinese consumers. Major findings are as follows: (1) Consumers universally interpret coolness in two largely distinct ways: A product is cool if it generates excitement or admiration (personal interpretation of coolness) or if its appeal is socially validated (social interpretation of coolness), with the former interpretation being generally more pronounced. (2) These interpretations universally correlate with distinct product attributes often associated with coolness and with desirable and undesirable coolness-related outcomes. (3) Robust cross-cultural variations emerge, linked to specific cultural values. Chinese consumers subscribe to the social interpretation, rely on exclusivity as a driver of coolness, and desire cool products to a larger extent than U.S. and German consumers. This finding can be primarily explained by Chinese consumers' stronger orientation toward ascription (vs. achievement).
