• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.171-183
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• 2012

In the development of technologies, the exhibition industry has received much attention from governments and companies as an important way of marketing activities. Also, the exhibitors have considered the exhibition as new channels of marketing activities. However, the growing size of exhibitions for net square feet and the number of visitors naturally creates the competitive environment for them. Therefore, to make use of the effective marketing tools in these environments, they have planned and implemented many promotion technics. Especially, through smart environment which makes them provide real-time information for visitors, they can implement various kinds of promotion. However, promotions ignoring visitors' various needs and preferences can lose the original purposes and functions of them. That is, as indiscriminate promotions make visitors feel like spam, they can't achieve their purposes. Therefore, they need an approach using STP strategy which segments visitors through right evidences (Segmentation), selects the target visitors (Targeting), and give proper services to them (Positioning). For using STP Strategy in the smart exhibition environment, we consider these characteristics of it. First, an exhibition is defined as market events of a specific duration, which are held at intervals. According to this, exhibitors who plan some promotions should different events and promotions in each exhibition. Therefore, when they adopt traditional STP strategies, a system can provide services using insufficient information and of existing visitors, and should guarantee the performance of it. Second, to segment automatically, cluster analysis which is generally used as data mining technology can be adopted. In the smart exhibition environment, information of visitors can be acquired in real-time. At the same time, services using this information should be also provided in real-time. However, many clustering algorithms have scalability problem which they hardly work on a large database and require for domain knowledge to determine input parameters. Therefore, through selecting a suitable methodology and fitting, it should provide real-time services. Finally, it is needed to make use of data in the smart exhibition environment. As there are useful data such as booth visit records and participation records for events, the STP strategy for the smart exhibition is based on not only demographical segmentation but also behavioral segmentation. Therefore, in this study, we analyze a case of the promotion methodology which exhibitors can provide a differentiated service to segmented visitors in the smart exhibition environment. First, considering characteristics of the smart exhibition environment, we draw evidences of segmentation and fit the clustering methodology for providing real-time services. There are many studies for classify visitors, but we adopt a segmentation methodology based on visitors' behavioral traits. Through the direct observation, Veron and Levasseur classify visitors into four groups to liken visitors' traits to animals (Butterfly, fish, grasshopper, and ant). Especially, because variables of their classification like the number of visits and the average time of a visit can estimate in the smart exhibition environment, it can provide theoretical and practical background for our system. Next, we construct a pilot system which automatically selects suitable visitors along the objectives of promotions and instantly provide promotion messages to them. That is, based on the segmentation of our methodology, our system automatically selects suitable visitors along the characteristics of promotions. We adopt this system to real exhibition environment, and analyze data from results of adaptation. As a result, as we classify visitors into four types through their behavioral pattern in the exhibition, we provide some insights for researchers who build the smart exhibition environment and can gain promotion strategies fitting each cluster. First, visitors of ANT type show high response rate for promotion messages except experience promotion. So they are fascinated by actual profits in exhibition area, and dislike promotions requiring a long time. Contrastively, visitors of GRASSHOPPER type show high response rate only for experience promotion. Second, visitors of FISH type appear favors to coupon and contents promotions. That is, although they don't look in detail, they prefer to obtain further information such as brochure. Especially, exhibitors that want to give much information for limited time should give attention to visitors of this type. Consequently, these promotion strategies are expected to give exhibitors some insights when they plan and organize their activities, and grow the performance of them.

• The Korean Journal of Malacology
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.125-134
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• 2006

We investigated the reproductive cycle of the hard clam, Meretrix petechialis with its gonadal development by histological observations. The seasonal changes in biochemical component of the adductor muscle, visceral mass, foot muscle and mantle of the clam were studied by biochemical analysis, from January to December, 2002. The reproductive cycle of this species can be divided into five successive stages: early stage (January to March), late active stage (February to May), ripe stage (April to August), partially spawned stage (July to August) and spent/inactive stage (September to January). Total protein content in the visceral mass was over two times higher than that in the adductor muscle. Monthly changes of total protein content in the adductor muscle were not statistically significant (ANOVA, p = 0.071), while the changes in the visceral mass were significant (p < 0.001). Total protein content in visceral mass was higher during the early active, late active, and ripe stages (from January to May), while the lowest in July. Glycogen content in the adductor muscle was higher than that in the visceral mass. Monthly changes in glycogen contents were statistically significant in both adductor muscle (F = 237.2, p < 0.001) and the visceral mass (F = 64.04, p < 0.001). Glycogen content in the adductor muscle was the highest in the ripe stage (April). Its content was lower in the partially spawned and the spent/inactive stages (June-September). Glycogen contents in the visceral mass were relatively lower until the early active stage, while the highest in the late active stage. RNA content was higher in visceral mass than that in the adductor muscle. Monthly changes in RNA contents were significant in both adductor muscle (F = 195.2, p < 0.001) and visceral mass (F = 78.85, p < 0.001). RNA content in the adductor muscle was high in the early active stage (January-February), and then it decreased rapidly in the late active stage (March-April), thereafter, slightly increased during the partially spawned stage (June-July). RNA content in the visceral mass reached a maximum during the ripe stage (May), and then it decreased rapidly during the partially-spawned stage (June-July). There was significant positive correlation in total protein contents between adductor muscle and visceral mass (r = 0.715, p = 0.020). However, there was no correlation between adductor muscle and visceral mass in glycogen (p = 0.550), while a negative correlation was found between the adductor muscle and visceral mass in RNA (p = 0.518) contents. Especially, changes in RNA content showed a negative correlation between the adductor muscle tissue and visceral mass. Therefore, these results suggest that the nutrient content of the adductor muscle, visceral muscle and foot muscle changed in response to gonadal energy needs.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.26 no.2
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• pp.27-42
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• 2020

Traditional companies with offline stores were unable to secure large display space due to the problems of cost. This limitation inevitably allowed limited kinds of products to be displayed on the shelves, which resulted in consumers being deprived of the opportunity to experience various items. Taking advantage of the virtual space called the Internet, online shopping goes beyond the limits of limitations in physical space of offline shopping and is now able to display numerous products on web pages that can satisfy consumers with a variety of needs. Paradoxically, however, this can also cause consumers to experience the difficulty of comparing and evaluating too many alternatives in their purchase decision-making process. As an effort to address this side effect, various kinds of consumer's purchase decision support systems have been studied, such as keyword-based item search service and recommender systems. These systems can reduce search time for items, prevent consumer from leaving while browsing, and contribute to the seller's increased sales. Among those systems, recommender systems based on association rule mining techniques can effectively detect interrelated products from transaction data such as orders. The association between products obtained by statistical analysis provides clues to predicting how interested consumers will be in another product. However, since its algorithm is based on the number of transactions, products not sold enough so far in the early days of launch may not be included in the list of recommendations even though they are highly likely to be sold. Such missing items may not have sufficient opportunities to be exposed to consumers to record sufficient sales, and then fall into a vicious cycle of a vicious cycle of declining sales and omission in the recommendation list. This situation is an inevitable outcome in situations in which recommendations are made based on past transaction histories, rather than on determining potential future sales possibilities. This study started with the idea that reflecting the means by which this potential possibility can be identified indirectly would help to select highly recommended products. In the light of the fact that the attributes of a product affect the consumer's purchasing decisions, this study was conducted to reflect them in the recommender systems. In other words, consumers who visit a product page have shown interest in the attributes of the product and would be also interested in other products with the same attributes. On such assumption, based on these attributes, the recommender system can select recommended products that can show a higher acceptance rate. Given that a category is one of the main attributes of a product, it can be a good indicator of not only direct associations between two items but also potential associations that have yet to be revealed. Based on this idea, the study devised a recommender system that reflects not only associations between products but also categories. Through regression analysis, two kinds of associations were combined to form a model that could predict the hit rate of recommendation. To evaluate the performance of the proposed model, another regression model was also developed based only on associations between products. Comparative experiments were designed to be similar to the environment in which products are actually recommended in online shopping malls. First, the association rules for all possible combinations of antecedent and consequent items were generated from the order data. Then, hit rates for each of the associated rules were predicted from the support and confidence that are calculated by each of the models. The comparative experiments using order data collected from an online shopping mall show that the recommendation accuracy can be improved by further reflecting not only the association between products but also categories in the recommendation of related products. The proposed model showed a 2 to 3 percent improvement in hit rates compared to the existing model. From a practical point of view, it is expected to have a positive effect on improving consumers' purchasing satisfaction and increasing sellers' sales.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Traditional Landscape Architecture
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• v.37 no.2
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• pp.74-88
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• 2019

This study developed the Assessment Indicator evaluating eco-cultural value of temple forest in Korea and applied the developed Assessment Indicator to Songgwang-sa(also known as Seungbo-sachal), one of the Three Jewels Temple. Literature reviews and the draft of Assessment Indicator were drawn from brainstorming(including 2 forest therapy experts, 1 Buddhist monk expert, 1 landscape architect, 1 forest expert, and 6 researchers). After that, the Assessment Indicator drawn from the group of experts(the 1st in-depth interview: 32 people, the 2nd in-depth interview: 30 people) was verified and revised. The final Assessment Indicator, which was composed of 4 parts and 20 items, was developed. The results are as follows. The eco-cultural Assessment Indicator of temple forest was composed of 4 parts, which were Historical Cultural value, Ecological value, Recreatory Visitational value, and Educational Useful value, and 20 items and each item had 5 points. Historical Cultural value had 5 items and its total points were 25. Ecological value had 5 items and had total 25 points. Recreatory Visitational value had 6 items, 30 total points. Educational Useful value had 4 items, 20 total points. The total points of the eco-cultural Assessment Indicator were 100 points. As a result of applying the developed Assessment Indicator to the target place, Songgwang-sa in Mt. Jogye, Historical Cultural value of temple forest was calculated as 23 points(out of 25). Ecological value was 21 point(out of 25), Recreatory Visitational value, 22 points(out of 30), and Educational Useful value, 16 points(out of 20). The total points were 82(out of 100). Consequently, this study is meaningful based on the following 5 aspects. Firstly, this study challenged the development of the eco-cultural Assessment Indicator of temple forest for the first time. It is significant because the developed Assessment Indicator can be a useful resource for the eco-cultural value of temple forest. Secondly, the result showed that Educational Useful value and Recreatory Visitational value of forest temple were very low. Therefore, the supports for leisure, tour, education, and use of temple forest are needed from Korea Forest Service, Ministry of Environment, Cultural Heritage Administration and other government agencies since they acknowledge the temple forest as the best customers in Korea. Thirdly, the excellence or for eco-cultural value of temple forest needs to be extended in a national level. It is possible to make a Korean National Bran(e.g., the Therapy at the Temple) by blending temple stay, which is only in temples, and therapy, and is also possible to be a global tour industry. Fourthly, this study suggested legal definition about the necessary of legal definition for temple forest because there is no legal definition on temple forest in the current situation. When the definition of temple forest is legally arranaged, it would be a foundation for conserving eco-cultural value of temple forest, for organizing exclusively responsible departments in governmental institutions, and further for registering temple forest as World Natural Heritage. Lastly, the developed eco-cultural Assessment Indicators of temple forest from this study would be applied to "the 7 Sansa, Buddhist Mountain Monasteries in Korea(Sansa)" and the characteristics of each 7 temple are drawn. This study would be a basic data for temples' management and use with the eco-cultural Assessment Indicator of temple forest.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.171-196
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• 2018

With the development of the web, two-way communication and evaluation became possible and marketing paradigms shifted. In order to meet the needs of consumers, web design trends are continuously responding to consumer feedback. As the web becomes more and more important, both academics and businesses are studying consumer emotions and satisfaction on the web. However, some consumer characteristics are not well considered. Demographic characteristics such as age and sex have been studied extensively, but few studies consider psychological characteristics such as regulatory focus (i.e., emotional regulation). In this study, we analyze the effect of web style on consumer emotion. Many studies analyze the relationship between the web and regulatory focus, but most concentrate on the purpose of web use, particularly motivation and information search, rather than on web style and design. The web communicates with users through visual elements. Because the human brain is influenced by all five senses, both design factors and emotional responses are important in the web environment. Therefore, in this study, we examine the relationship between consumer emotion and satisfaction and web style and design. Previous studies have considered the effects of web layout, structure, and color on emotions. In this study, however, we excluded these web components, in contrast to earlier studies, and analyzed the relationship between consumer satisfaction and emotional indexes of web-style only. To perform this analysis, we collected consumer surveys presenting 40 web style themes to 204 consumers. Each consumer evaluated four themes. The emotional adjectives evaluated by consumers were composed of 18 contrast pairs, and the upper emotional indexes were extracted through factor analysis. The emotional indexes were 'softness,' 'modernity,' 'clearness,' and 'jam.' Hypotheses were established based on the assumption that emotional indexes have different effects on consumer satisfaction. After the analysis, hypotheses 1, 2, and 3 were accepted and hypothesis 4 was rejected. While hypothesis 4 was rejected, its effect on consumer satisfaction was negative, not positive. This means that emotional indexes such as 'softness,' 'modernity,' and 'clearness' have a positive effect on consumer satisfaction. In other words, consumers prefer emotions that are soft, emotional, natural, rounded, dynamic, modern, elaborate, unique, bright, pure, and clear. 'Jam' has a negative effect on consumer satisfaction. It means, consumer prefer the emotion which is empty, plain, and simple. Regulatory focus shows differences in motivation and propensity in various domains. It is important to consider organizational behavior and decision making according to the regulatory focus tendency, and it affects not only political, cultural, ethical judgments and behavior but also broad psychological problems. Regulatory focus also differs from emotional response. Promotion focus responds more strongly to positive emotional responses. On the other hand, prevention focus has a strong response to negative emotions. Web style is a type of service, and consumer satisfaction is affected not only by cognitive evaluation but also by emotion. This emotional response depends on whether the consumer will benefit or harm himself. Therefore, it is necessary to confirm the difference of the consumer's emotional response according to the regulatory focus which is one of the characteristics and viewpoint of the consumers about the web style. After MMR analysis result, hypothesis 5.3 was accepted, and hypothesis 5.4 was rejected. But hypothesis 5.4 supported in the opposite direction to the hypothesis. After validation, we confirmed the mechanism of emotional response according to the tendency of regulatory focus. Using the results, we developed the structure of web-style recommendation system and recommend methods through regulatory focus. We classified the regulatory focus group in to three categories that promotion, grey, prevention. Then, we suggest web-style recommend method along the group. If we further develop this study, we expect that the existing regulatory focus theory can be extended not only to the motivational part but also to the emotional behavioral response according to the regulatory focus tendency. Moreover, we believe that it is possible to recommend web-style according to regulatory focus and emotional desire which consumers most prefer.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.25 no.3
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• pp.117-140
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• 2019

As the aging phenomenon accelerates and various social problems related to the elderly of the vulnerable are raised, the need for effective elderly care solutions to protect the health and safety of the elderly generation is growing. Recently, more and more people are using Smart Toys equipped with ICT technology for care for elderly. In particular, log data collected through smart toys is highly valuable to be used as a quantitative and objective indicator in areas such as policy-making and service planning. However, research related to smart toys is limited, such as the development of smart toys and the validation of smart toy effectiveness. In other words, there is a dearth of research to derive insights based on log data collected through smart toys and to use them for decision making. This study will analyze log data collected from smart toy and derive effective insights to improve the quality of life for elderly users. Specifically, the user profiling-based analysis and elicitation of a change in quality of life mechanism based on behavior were performed. First, in the user profiling analysis, two important dimensions of classifying the type of elderly group from five factors of elderly user's living management were derived: 'Routine Activities' and 'Work-out Activities'. Based on the dimensions derived, a hierarchical cluster analysis and K-Means clustering were performed to classify the entire elderly user into three groups. Through a profiling analysis, the demographic characteristics of each group of elderlies and the behavior of using smart toy were identified. Second, stepwise regression was performed in eliciting the mechanism of change in quality of life. The effects of interaction, content usage, and indoor activity have been identified on the improvement of depression and lifestyle for the elderly. In addition, it identified the role of user performance evaluation and satisfaction with smart toy as a parameter that mediated the relationship between usage behavior and quality of life change. Specific mechanisms are as follows. First, the interaction between smart toy and elderly was found to have an effect of improving the depression by mediating attitudes to smart toy. The 'Satisfaction toward Smart Toy,' a variable that affects the improvement of the elderly's depression, changes how users evaluate smart toy performance. At this time, it has been identified that it is the interaction with smart toy that has a positive effect on smart toy These results can be interpreted as an elderly with a desire to meet emotional stability interact actively with smart toy, and a positive assessment of smart toy, greatly appreciating the effectiveness of smart toy. Second, the content usage has been confirmed to have a direct effect on improving lifestyle without going through other variables. Elderly who use a lot of the content provided by smart toy have improved their lifestyle. However, this effect has occurred regardless of the attitude the user has toward smart toy. Third, log data show that a high degree of indoor activity improves both the lifestyle and depression of the elderly. The more indoor activity, the better the lifestyle of the elderly, and these effects occur regardless of the user's attitude toward smart toy. In addition, elderly with a high degree of indoor activity are satisfied with smart toys, which cause improvement in the elderly's depression. However, it can be interpreted that elderly who prefer outdoor activities than indoor activities, or those who are less active due to health problems, are hard to satisfied with smart toys, and are not able to get the effects of improving depression. In summary, based on the activities of the elderly, three groups of elderly were identified and the important characteristics of each type were identified. In addition, this study sought to identify the mechanism by which the behavior of the elderly on smart toy affects the lives of the actual elderly, and to derive user needs and insights.

• The Korean Nurse
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.77-96
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• 1997

The duty shifts of hospital nurses not only affect nurses' physical and mental health but also present various personnel management problems which often result in high turnover rates. In this context a study was carried out from October to November 1995 for a period of two months to find out the status of hospital nurses' duty shift patterns, and preferred duty hours and fixed duty shifts. The study population was 867 RNs working in five general hospitals located in Seoul and its vicinity. The questionnaire developed by the writer was used for data collection. The response rate was 85.9 percent or 745 returns. The SAS program was used for data analysis with the computation of frequencies, percentages and Chi square test. The findings of the study are as follows: 1. General characteristics of the study population: 56 percent of respondents was (25 years group and 76.5 percent were "single": the predominant proportion of respondents was junior nursing college graduates(92.2%) and have less than 5 years nursing experience in hospitals(65.5%). For their future working plan in nursing profession, nearly 50% responded as uncertain The reasons given for their career plan was predominantly 'personal growth and development' rather than financial reasons. 2. The interval for rotations of duty stations was found to be mostly irregular(56.4%) while others reported as weekly(16.1%), monthly(12.9%), and fixed terms(4.6%). 3. The main problems related to duty shifts particularly the evening and night duty nurses reported were "not enough time for the family, " "afraid of security problems after the work when returning home late at night." and "lack of leisure time". "problems in physical and physiological adjustment." "problems in family life." "lack of time for interactions with fellow nurses" etc. 4. The forty percent of respondents reported to have '1-2 times' of duty shift rotations while all others reported that '0 time'. '2-3 times'. 'more than 3 times' etc. which suggest the irregularity in duty shift rotations. 5. The majority(62.8%) of study population found to favor the rotating system of duty stations. The reasons for favoring the rotation system were: the opportunity for "learning new things and personal development." "better human relations are possible. "better understanding in various duty stations." "changes in monotonous routine job" etc. The proportion of those disfavor the rotating 'system was 34.7 percent. giving the reasons of"it impedes development of specialization." "poor job performances." "stress factors" etc. Furthermore. respondents made the following comments in relation to the rotation of duty stations: the nurses should be given the opportunity to participate in the. decision making process: personal interest and aptitudes should be considered: regular intervals for the rotations or it should be planned in advance. etc. 6. For the future career plan. the older. married group with longer nursing experiences appeared to think the nursing as their lifetime career more likely than the younger. single group with shorter nursing experiences ($x^2=61.19.{\;}p=.000;{\;}x^2=41.55.{\;}p=.000$). The reason given for their future career plan regardless of length of future service, was predominantly "personal growth and development" rather than financial reasons. For further analysis, the group those with the shorter career plan appeared to claim "financial reasons" for their future career more readily than the group who consider the nursing job as their lifetime career$(x^2$= 11.73, p=.003) did. This finding suggests the need for careful .considerations in personnel management of nursing administration particularly when dealing with the nurses' career development. The majority of respondents preferred the fixed day shift. However, further analysis of those preferred evening shift by age and civil status, "< 25 years group"(15.1%) and "single group"(13.2) were more likely to favor the fixed evening shift than > 25 years(6.4%) and married(4.8%)groups. This differences were statistically significant ($x^2=14.54, {\;}p=.000;{\;}x^2=8.75, {\;}p=.003$). 7. A great majority of respondents(86.9% or n=647) found to prefer the day shifts. When the four different types of duty shifts(Types A. B. C, D) were presented, 55.0 percent of total respondents preferred the A type or the existing one followed by D type(22.7%). B type(12.4%) and C type(8.2%). 8. When the condition of monetary incentives for the evening(20% of salary) and night shifts(40% of. salary) of the existing duty type was presented. again the day shift appeared to be the most preferred one although the rate was slightly lower(66.4% against 86.9%). In the case of evening shift, with the same incentive, the preference rates for evening and night shifts increased from 11.0 to 22.4 percent and from 0.5 to 3.0 percent respectively. When the age variable was controlled. < 25 yrs group showed higher rates(31.6%. 4.8%) than those of > 25 yrs group(15.5%. 1.3%) respectively preferring the evening and night shifts(p=.000). The civil status also seemed to operate on the preferences of the duty shifts as the single group showed lower rate(69.0%) for day duty against 83. 6% of the married group. and higher rates for evening and night duties(27.2%. 15.1%) respectively against those of the married group(3.8%. 1.8%) while a higher proportion of the married group(83. 6%) preferred the day duties than the single group(69.0%). These differences were found to be statistically all significant(p=.001). 9. The findings on preferences of three different types of fixed duty hours namely, B, C. and D(with additional monetary incentives) are as follows in order of preference: B type(12hrs a day, 3days a wk): day shift(64.1%), evening shift(26.1%). night shift(6.5%) C type(12hrs a day. 4days a wk) : evening shift(49.2%). day shift(32.8%), night shift(11.5%) D type(10hrs a day. 4days a wk): showed the similar trend as B type. The findings of higher preferences on the evening and night duties when the incentives are given. as shown above, suggest the need for the introductions of different patterns of duty hours and incentive measures in order to overcome the difficulties in rostering the nursing duties. However, the interpretation of the above data, particularly the C type, needs cautions as the total number of respondents is very small(n=61). It requires further in-depth study. In conclusion. it seemed to suggest that the patterns of nurses duty hours and shifts in the most hospitals in the country have neither been tried for different duty types nor been flexible. The stereotype rostering system of three shifts and insensitiveness for personal life aspect of nurses seemed to be prevailing. This study seems to support that irregular and frequent rotations of duty shifts may be contributing factors for most nurses' maladjustment problems in physical and mental health. personal and family life which eventually may result in high turnover rates. In order to overcome the increasing problems in personnel management of hospital nurses particularly in rostering of evening and night duty shifts, which may related to eventual high turnover rates, the findings of this study strongly suggest the need for an introduction of new rostering systems including fixed duties and appropriate incentive measures for evenings and nights which the most nurses want to avoid, In considering the nursing care of inpatients is the round-the clock business. the practice of the nursing duty shift system is inevitable. In this context, based on the findings of this study. the following are recommended: 1. The further in-depth studies on duty shifts and hours need to be undertaken for the development of appropriate and effective rostering systems for hospital nurses. 2. An introduction of appropriate incentive measures for evening and night duty shifts along with organizational considerations such as the trials for preferred duty time bands, duty hours, and fixed duty shifts should be considered if good quality of care for the patients be maintained for the round the clock. This may require an initiation of systematic research and development activities in the field of hospital nursing administration as a part of permanent system in the hospital. 3. Planned and regular intervals, orientation and training, and professional and personal growth should be considered for the rotation of different duty stations or units. 4. In considering the higher degree of preferences in the duty type of "10hours a day, 4days a week" shown in this study, it would be worthwhile to undertake the R&D type studies in large hospital settings.

• Journal of Global Scholars of Marketing Science
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.19-45
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• 2008

This study is to empirically examine the primary dimensions of visual merchandising (VMD) of internet shopping mall, namely store design, merchandise, and merchandising cues, to be a attractive virtual store to the shoppers. The authors reviewed the literature related to the major components of VMD from the perspective of the AIDA model, which has been mainly applied to the offline store settings. The major purposes of the study are as follows; first, tries to derive the variables related with the components of visual merchandising through reviewing the existing literatures, establish the hypotheses, and test it empirically. Second, examines the relationships between the components of VMD and the attitude toward the VMD, however, putting more emphasis on finding out the component structure of the VMD. VMD needs to be examined with the perspective that an online shopping mall is a virtual self-service or clerkless store, which could reduce the number of employees, help the shoppers search, evaluate and purchase for themselves, and to be explored in terms of the in-store persuasion processes of customers. This study reviewed the literatures related to store design, merchandise, and merchandising cues which might be relevant to the store, product, and promotion respectively. VMD is a total communication tool, and AIDA model could explain the in-store consumer behavior of online shopping. Store design has to do with triggering a consumer attention to the online mall, merchandise with a product related interest, and merchandising cues with promotions such as recommendation and links that induce the desire to pruchase. These three steps might be seen as the processes for purchase actions. The theoretical rationale for the relationship between VMD and AIDA could be found in Tyagi(2005) that the three steps of consumer-oriented merchandising are a store, a product assortment, and placement, in Omar(1999) that three types of interior display are a architectural design display, commodity display, and point-of-sales(POS) display, and in Davies and Ward(2005) that the retail store interior image is related to an atmosphere, merchandise, and in-store promotion. Lee et al(2000) suggested as the web merchandising components a merchandising cues, a shopping metaphor which is an assistant tool for search, a store design, a layout(web design), and a product assortment. The store design which includes differentiation, simplicity and navigation is supposed to be related to the attention to the virtual store. Second, the merchandise dimensions comprising product assortments, visual information and product reputation have to do with the interest in the product offerings. Finally, the merchandising cues that refer to merchandiser(MD)'s recommendation of products and providing the hyperlinks to relevant goods for the shopper is concerned with attempt to induce the desire to purchase. The questionnaire survey was carried out to collect the data about the consumers who would shop at internet shopping malls frequently. To select the subject malls, the mall ranking data announced by a mall rating agency was used to differentiate the most popular and least popular five mall each. The subjects was instructed to answer the questions after navigating the designated mall for five minutes. The 300 questionnaire was distributed to the consumers, 166 samples were used in the final analysis. The empirical testing focused on identifying and confirming the dimensionality of VMD and its subdimensions using a structural equation modeling method. The confirmatory factor analysis for the endogeneous and exogeneous variables was carried out in four parts. The second-order factor analysis was done for a store design, a merchandise, and a merchandising cues, and first-order confirmatory factor analysis for the attitude toward the VMD. The model test results shows that the chi-square value of structural equation is 144.39(d.f 49), significant at 0.01 level which means the proposed model was rejected. But, judging from the ratio of chi-square value vs. degree of freedom, the ratio was 2.94 which smaller than an acceptable level of 3.0, RMR is 0.087 which is higher than a generally acceptable level of 0.08. GFI and AGFI is turned out to be 0.90 and 0.84 respectively. Both NFI and NNFI is 0.94, and CFI 0.95. The major test results are as follows; first, the second-order factor analysis and structural equational modeling reveals that the differentiation, simplicity and ease of identifying current status of the transaction are confirmed to be subdimensions of store design and to be a significant predictors of the dependent variable. This result implies that when designing an online shopping mall, it is necessary to differentiate visually from other malls to improve the effectiveness of the communications of store design. That is, the differentiated store design raise the contrast stimulus to sensory organs to promote the memory of the store and to have a favorable attitude toward the VMD of a store. The results that navigation which means the easiness of identifying current status of shopping affects the attitude to VMD could be interpreted that the navigating processes via the hyperlinks which is characteristics of an internet shopping is a complex and cognitive process and shoppers are likely to lack the sense of overall structure of the store. Consequently, shoppers are likely to be alost amid shopping not knowing where to go. The orientation tool enhance the accessibility of information to raise the perceptive power about the store environment.(Titus & Everett 1995) Second, the primary dimension of merchandise and its subdimensions was confirmed to be unidimensional respectively, have a construct validity, and nomological validity which the VMD dimensions supposed to have a positive correlation with the dependent variable. The subdimensions of product assortment, brand fame and information provision proved to have a positive effect on the attitude toward the VMD. It could be interpreted that the more plentiful the product and brand assortment of the mall is, the more likely the shoppers to favor it. Brand fame and information provision as well affect the VMD attitude, which means that the more famous the brand, the more likely the shoppers would trust and feel familiar with the mall, and the plentifully and visually presented information could have the shopper have a favorable attitude toward the store VMD. Third, it turned out to be that merchandising cue of product recommendation and hyperlinks affect the VMD attitude. This could be interpreted that recommended products could reduce the uncertainty related with the purchase decision, and the hyperlinks to relevant products would help the shopper save the cognitive effort exerted into the information search and gathering, which could lead to a favorable attitude to the VMD. This study tried to sheds some new light on the VMD of online store by reviewing the variables mentioned to be relevant with offline VMD in the existing literatures, and tried to link the VMD components from the perspective of AIDA model. The effect size of the VMD dimensions on the attitude was in the order of the merchandise, the store design and the merchandising cues.It is said that an internet has an unlimited place for display, however, the virtual store is not unlimited since the consumer has a limited amount of cognitive ability to process the external information and internal memory. Particularly, the shoppers are likely to face some difficulties in decision making on account of too many alternative and information overloads. Therefore, the internet shopping mall manager should take into consideration the cost of information search on the part of the consumer, to establish the optimal product placements and search routes. An efficient store composition would be possible by reducing the psychological burdens and cognitive efforts exerted to information search and alternatives evaluation. The store image is in most part determined by the product category and its brand it deals in. The results of this study support this proposition that the merchandise is most important to the VMD attitude than other components, the manager is required to take a strategic approach to VMD. The internet users are getting more accustomed and more knowledgeable about the internet media and more likely to accept the internet as a shopping channel as the period of time during which they use the internet to shop become longer. The web merchandiser should be aware that the product introduction using a moving pictures and a bulletin board become more important in order to present the interactive product information visually and communicate with customers more actively, therefore leading to making the quantity and quality of product information more rich.

• Journal of Distribution Research
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• v.15 no.4
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• pp.1-19
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• 2010

As having the movement of developing private brand (PB) goods, domestic big retailers are facing up with new problems. Thus, it is required studies of PB products, and how consumers recognize PB products as a consideration commodity set. Also, it is worthy in order that it gives us the important meaning on the marketing strategy with focusing on evaluating the differences between customers buying PB grocery goods with respect to demographic characteristics and purchasing behaviors. PB has some advantages for customers and retailers. However, according to AC Nielson's report (2005), Asian and emerging market has 1/5 sales relatively to Western countries. But we can assume that the emerging market has the most potential growth through this result. As a result from several other studies, it becomes necessary to not only increase the rate of selling composition of PB product temporarily, but also analyze the characteristics of customers using big retailers and segmenting customer groups to make PB product as a consideration commodity set for them. In addition, it is needed to have a variety of acts of marketing. From studies related to PB, there is a prejudice - cheap products have low quality - but, evaluation by customers who have used those products shows neutral stand, and there is a study representing that it is the most important to accumulate the belief between the retailers selling PB products and consumers using those for the accurate evaluation and intention on purchasing. Also, by the result from analyzing the characteristics of customers buying PB products, we could assume that higher income and higher education level, more preference on PB products. Especially, according to TNS's research, the primary targets of PB product are 30's who seeks value for money and planned spending habits, and 40's who have teenager children, and are interested in encouraging themselves. This paper used Probit model to analyze the characteristics of consumers. This model helps us to analyze with the variables representing the demographic characteristics of consumers (gender, age, educational level, occupation, income level, living area), and variables related to purchasing behavior (visiting frequency on big retailers, the average amount that they pay for goods in there, and check-up which brand made those goods). The method we used in this study is by man to man interview and survey on-line with the rate of 89% and 11% in Seoul and Gyunggi Province, respectively, for about one month from the beginning of February, 2008. As a result of this, under the assumption that people buy PB products more as long as they go shopping more, it was not meaningful for target groups which we pointed out as frequently visiting customers to be. Although, we have expected women buy more PB products than men do, gender doesn't mean anything for the result. And, it has inferred that married people buy more PB goods than singles do. It was also meaningless with variables related to occupation. Because housewives are often exposed to any kind of supermarket than workers are, we could not get any relatives. Moreover, we couldn't proof that younger generation prefer big retailers more than older people who 50~60's. Education levels doesn't affect on the purchase of PB product as well. Related to living area, the result is statistically not similar as we expected whether living in Seoul or not. It shows there is no relationship with the preference on retail brands and PB products, and it is similar with the study researched by TNS(2008) that customers tend to buy PB product impulsively no matter which brand it is and where they are even though their shopping place is the big market where customers are often using. Variables on which we had meaningful results are income level and living place. That is, customers who have 3,000,000~6,000,000 WON every month on average are more willing to buy PB products than other customers whose income is over 6,000,000 WON, and residents not living in Seoul prefer PB goods than those who are living in Seoul. To explain more about what we got, if there is only one condition about customer's visiting frequency on big retails, we could come up with this result that more exposed to PB products, more purchasing frequency. Consequently, it brings the important insight that large retailers have to prepare something to make customers visit them often to increase selling rate of PB products. To demonstrate the result of analyzing more, what is more efficient variables are demographically including marital status, income level, and residential area to buy items that affect the PB products and could include the frequency of visiting large markets by the purchase habits. Specifically, then, married couples rather than singles, middle-income customers than high-income customers, and local residents not living in Seoul than customers in Seoul are more likely to purchase PB goods. In addition, as long as a customer visits two times more, then the purchasing rate of PB products is to increase over 5.3%. Therefore, it seems that retailers are better to make a shopping place as fun and comfortable places. With overwhelming the idea that PB products are just cheap, one-time purchase goods, it is needed to increase the loyalty on those goods like NB products, try to make PB products as a consideration products set, and occur to sustainable sales. Especially, as suggested by this paper, it seems like it strongly needs to identify the characteristics of customers who prefer PB, to segment those customers, and to select the main target, and to do positioning with well-planned marketing strategies. Then, it is able to give us a meaningful point on marketing strategy by developing the field of PB study, identifying the difference of life style and shopping habits of customers.