The COVID-19 pandemic has significantly impacted the tourism and hospitality industry. This study aims to reconceptualize the concept of customer perceived value (CPV) in Isfahan’s five-star hotels during the pandemic using the grounded theory (GT) approach in the context of qualitative research. The objective of this study is to explore the key dimensions of CPV and identify the main strategies that enhance the value perceived by hotel customers. Data were collected with interviews with 30 experts in the hotel and hospitality industry, and MAXQDA software was used to analyze the data. The dominant themes that emerged from the content analysis included health-oriented self-gratification value, financial value, quality value, emotional value, social value, epistemic value, information value, and health security value. Additionally, the subthemes identified were trust, satisfaction, and information access. All these themes could potentially be employed by hotel sectors as solutions to enhance customer satisfaction during the pandemic. From a practical standpoint, this study provides insights to hotel managers or practitioners to implement updated strategies that contribute to knowledge development about customer perceived value in the hotel sector, which can lead to enhanced customer satisfaction and loyalty. The article makes theoretical contributions to the literature on CPV by identifying new dimensions that are relevant to the pandemic. This extension of the literature provides a more comprehensive understanding of CPV in crisis situations and can inform future research on the topic. The article also discusses future research directions.

Today, marketing researchers have considered creating a good congruency between clients and Brands personality. Because, it has two of the most important consequences; one, creating a long term relationship and two, word of mouth. Hence, this research has been to explain the relationship of the brand personality congruency and word of mouth with mediating customer-brand relationship in the banking industry. The study sample is including all students at the Shahid Beheshti University. In the sampling, the sample was calculated using Cochran formula, minimum requirement of 385 samples. Then, randomly and easy, 412 questionnaires were collected and; their data was used. In order to analyze Questionnaire data and test hypotheses was performed description test, means comparison and structural equation modeling using Smart-PLS software. The results show that personality congruency has positive and significance effect on customer-brand relationship dimensions (Self-Connection, Partner Quality and Affective Commitment); and relationships have been confirmed. Also, relationship between customer-brand relationship dimensions and word of mouth have been confirmed; and they have positive and significance effect. According to results of total effect, the largest total effect for word of mouth, it belongs to personality congruency (0.705); and this effect is only indirect. After personality congruency, partner quality has more effective on word of mouth (0.367).

The aim of this study is to investigate the relationship between individuals’ attitudes and marketing knowledge sharing. This research is an applied objective research and data collection method of description-correlation nature the subjects under study by this research are employees of Arak Shaz and petrochemical industry. The sample size was estimated 90 people. The method is stratified random sampling. A standard questionnaire was used to collect data. Marketing knowledge sharing questionnaire of Moghimi and Ramazani (2011) contains 17 items and attitudes questionnaire of Hamidizadeh (2010) contains 5 items. Logical validity (face and content) of questionnaires was reviewed and approved through university professors and several experts of this industry. Also construct validity was reviewed and approved by confirmatory factor analysis using AMOS software. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of 7.0 was obtained for variables that indicate internal consistency of items and acceptable reliability of the questionnaire. The research hypothesis test using univariate linear regression was performed with application of software SPSS. The results showed that, given that the t-statistic value is less than -1.96 (t=-2.39), the relationship between two variables, attitudes and marketing knowledge sharing was significant at the 5% error level (P-Value<0.05). So, the relationship between marketing knowledge sharing and attitudes is positive and direct. This means that people in the organization do not have positive tendency and attitude to share their knowledge with others and negative attitudes regarding the sharing of knowledge has had more impact on staff. Standard regression coefficient (0.15) also specified the share of independent variable in explaining the changes of dependent variable so that for every one unit increase in negative attitude of individuals, knowledge sharing decreases 0.15 percent.

The aim of this study is to investigate the relationship between marketing knowledge sharing and developing competitive advantage. This research is an applied objective research and data collection method of description-correlation nature the subjects under study by this research are employees of Arak Shazand petrochemical industry. The sample size was estimated 90 people. The method is stratified random sampling. A standard questionnaire was used to collect data. Marketing knowledge sharing questionnaire of Moghimi and Ramazani (2011) contains 17 items and developing competitive advantage questionnaire of Hill and Jones (2010) contains 16 items. Logical validity (face and content) of questionnaires was reviewed and approved through several university professors and several experts of this industry. Also, construct validity was reviewed and approved by confirmatory factor analysis using AMOS software. Cronbach's alpha coefficient of 0.7 was obtained for variables that indicate internal consistency of items and acceptable reliability of the questionnaire. The research hypothesis test using univariate linear regression was performed with application of SPSS software. The results showed that, given that the t-statistic value is greater than 1.96 (t = 6.48), the relationship between two variables, competitive advantage and marketing knowledge sharing was significant at the 5% error level Standard regression coefficient (0.57) also specified the share of independent variable in explaining the changes of dependent variable so that for every one unit increase in variable of marketing knowledge sharing, competitive advantage increases 0.57.