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Call for papers
Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing
Special issue on

Interactive Marketing and Trust in Financial Services – the challenges of digital communication and distribution

Research in the area of financial services marketing has during the last decade increasingly highlighted issues related to digital communication and distribution, an example of which being consumers’ acceptance of Internet banking. As technology is advancing, many financial service organizations adopt and implement new ways and media for interacting with their customers, and further examples of recent practice-related trends are banks developing and using applications for smart phones, enabling consumers to pay or borrow money over the mobile phone; insurance providers offer possibilities for managing claims reports online, and companies interacting through Web 2.0 applications (e.g., Facebook, Twitter). An important question though is how trust, and trustworthiness, in financial service relationships are affected by the ever-increasing technological development that gives cause and opportunities for changes in communication and distribution.

The issue of trust in an online setting has previously been fairly well investigated, as has the question of technology acceptance, but recent research (Gidhagen and Gebert Persson, 2011; Benamati et al., 2010) indicates a need to further explore research combining a technology acceptance approach with an understanding of trust. In addition to this, it is suggested that even though there is also rather extensive research on the issue of building/maintaining trust in e-vendors (cf., McKnight et al., 2002) there is relatively little research considering “brick-and-mortar” providers turning towards web-based services (e.g, Bramall et al., 2004).

The objective of this special issue is to facilitate a critical discussion and analysis of the role of trust in financial services in embracing the challenges of technology, channels and media in interactive marketing. The scope of the special issue is designed to capture practice and theory developments in the field that will help to understand and deal with the many challenges associated with trust, trustworthiness, interaction and technology in financial services.

Topics of relevance to this special issue include, but are not limited to:

• How trust in financial service relationships is affected by multi-channel and multi-media interaction, as a consequence of technological development.
• How trust in financial service relationships is affected by a service provider’s presence and activity in social media, e.g. on Facebook and Twitter.
• How the possibility/option to use different media affect perceived trust.
• How the (level of) technology acceptance affect customers’ perceptions of trust and trustworthiness in multi-channel interactions with financial services firms.
• How trust-building marketing strategies are affected by changes in interaction channels, long term/short term effects.
• To what extent financial service providers’ strategy changes in using new technology are customer driven and involving customers.
• Comparative analyses of differences/similarities between countries regarding how financial services customers’ trust in their financial service providers are affected by different types of interaction media.
• Comparative analyses of differences/similarities between different types of financial services regarding the effects of new technology on trust and interaction. Hence, what differences and similarities are there between e.g. bank and insurance considering the impact of new technology on trust and interaction?
• How current strategies used and traditional/prevailing theories applied are sufficient for planning and operating in the financial service industry, or if more modern theoretical approaches in marketing e.g., service logic, the active consumer, value co-creation (eg. Vargo and Lusch, 2004), together with an understanding of the impact of interactive technology (e.g., information systems, technology acceptance, self-service systems) can point toward more beneficial practices.

Submission Information

The deadline for electronic submission is 25th August, 2012. Submitted manuscripts should follow the format as indicated in the author guidelines on the journal website:

www.emeraldinsight.com/jrim.htm.

As a guide, papers should be between 4,000 to 6,000 words. Papers are reviewed by the Special Issue Guest Co-Editors and if it is judged as suitable for this publication, the manuscripts are sent to two referees for double-blind peer review.

If you would be interested in reviewing other papers which have been submitted to this issue of the journal please indicate so on Step 4 of the ScholarOne submission process in the ‘Cover Letter’ box and an account will be created for you.

Special Issue Guest Co-Editors

For more information, please contact the special issue guest co-editors:

Sabine Gebert-Persson sabine.gebert-persson@miun.se
Mikael Gidhagen mikael.gidhagen@fek.uu.se

References

Benamati, J., Fuller, M.A., Silva, M.A. and Baroudi, J. (2010), ”Clarifying the Integration of Trust and TAM in E-Commerce Environments: Implications for Systems Design and Management”, IEEE Transactions on Engineering Management, Vol. 57, No. 3, pp. 380-393.

Bramall, C., Schoefer, K. and McKechnie, S. (2004), “The Determinants and Consequences of Consumer Trust in E-Retailing: A Conceptual Framework”, Irish Marketing Review, Vol. 17, No. 1 & 2, pp. 13-22.

Gidhagen, M. and Gebert Persson, S. (2011), “Determinants of Digitally Instigated Insurance Relationships”, International Journal of Bank Marketing, Vol. 29, No. 7, pp. 517-534.

McKnight, D. H., Choudhury, V., Kacmar, C. (2002), “The Impact of Initial Consumer Trust on Intentions to Transact with a Web Site: A Trust Building Model”, Journal of Strategic Information Systems, Vol. 11, No. 3-4, pp. 297-323.

Vargo, S. L. and Lusch, R. F. (2004), ‘‘Evolving to a new dominant logic for marketing’’, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 68, January, pp. 1-17.

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