Purpose: – The purpose of this paper is to determine the explanatory factors for the selection of Islamic banks and evaluate the moderating role of demographic characteristics. This study seeks to better understand these determinants in Tunisia, a country with a developing Islamic finance system and a culture different from those in other Muslim countries studied in the literature. Design/methodology/approach: – The authors developed a two-sided approach: a quantitative survey and 12 semi-structured interviews based on four customer segments identified by the quantitative study. For the survey, data were collected from 180 Islamic bank clients in Tunisia. The factors adopted for the selection of an Islamic bank are service quality, trust, and compliance with Sharia (Islamic) law. The authors identified and measured the selection criteria using a factor analysis, regression analysis, and demographic characteristics analysis. Findings: – Customers consider several factors while choosing an Islamic bank: the quality of service offered by the financial institutions, trust, and (especially) compliance with Sharia law. Moreover, gender and age appear to be the only moderators between the selection of an Islamic bank and these determinants. Practical implications: – This study offers Islamic banks a better understanding of how Tunisian customers select financial institutions. These banks must consider the different determinants of choice in order to create value for consumers and prepare their marketing strategies. The authors identify four customer segments based on gender and age by which the banks may improve their positioning and market share, thus contributing to the development of Islamic financial institutions in Tunisia. Originality/value: – This is the first study of its kind in Tunisia, where the market share of Islamic finance remains low. The study enriches the Islamic marketing literature on the quality of Islamic financial institutions’ service, trust, and compliance with Sharia law. It also tests demographic characteristics as moderators. The results and implications of this research can be applied to countries similar to Tunisia.

Purpose: This study aims to adopt a mixed-methods approach (accounting and business data) to analyse the effects of the financial institution’s governance on both the knowledge of social responsibility and the consumer’s attitudes and behaviours, and testing the moderating role of the brand identification in the banking sector during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, this concept has been neglected in previous studies. Design/methodology/approach: Data were collected from a sample of 600 respondents in two major Tunisian cities. Participants were selected on the basis of a convenience sampling in which the structural equation modelling method was adopted through SMART PLS 3.0 software. Findings: The results showed that good corporate governance has a positive influence on the knowledge of the company's social responsibility, which positively influences its brand image. Therefore, the company's brand image positively influences the customer’s satisfaction, which positively influences the recommending behaviour of the financial institutions in the COVID-19 era. However, the brand identification has no moderating effect. Practical implications: Managers of financial institutions are advised to pay particular attention to good corporate governance, as it is mandatory for these companies to assume social responsibility and make it known to clients. Therefore, it is obvious to create a good image in the mind of the consumers to satisfy them to recommend the company in question. It is interesting to mobilise the period of health crisis (COVID-19) to create a favourable attitude among the customers because they are sensitive when evaluating and ranking financial institutions according to the relationships that exist especially during this period. Originality/value: In fact, there are many studies that dealt with the banking sector. Some of them dealt with the sector through the institutional accounting section while others dealt with the sector through the commercial and marketing section. Therefore, the first contribution of this research is to test a mixed model made up of accounting and commercial data. This model is among the first to determine the effects of the financial institution's governance on the knowledge of social responsibility and on the consumer’s attitude and behaviour to test the moderating role of brand identification in the banking sector. The second contribution is to test this model in a period of health crisis (COVID-19). The third contribution is the use of a mixed sample of data collected from two regions. Then, the fourth contribution is the addition of tests for the verification, robustness and validation of the results obtained. Finally, the fifth contribution is the addition of control variables to test their effects on the research model.

Purpose: The study is based on a hybrid model composed of accounting and business data and is amongst the first to test the impact of corporate social responsibility (CSR) performance on the financial performance of the company, as well as the impact of financial performance on CSR performance. The bidirectional logic chosen by the study is rarely adopted in the global context and has never been tested in the Swedish context. Moreover, the purpose of this paper is to test the mediating effect of customer loyalty on the company’s CSR performance-financial performance relationship to assess this effect over the long term. This design has been neglected in previous studies.Design/methodology/approach: Data was collected from a sample of 110 Swedish companies during the period 2009–2019. This study collects the data from the Thomson Reuters Eikon database. A multiple regression analysis was performed to test the hypotheses.Findings: The results confirmed the bidirectional relationship between CSR performance and company financial performance. This means that CSR performance positively influences the company’s financial performance. Similarly, financial performance positively influences the company’s CSR performance. Moreover, customer loyalty has a positive and significant mediating effect on the company’s CSR performance-financial performance relationship.Originality/value: This study adds several inputs. The first contribution of the research is to test a hybrid model composed of accounting and commercial data. This model is amongst the first to test the impact of CSR performance on the financial performance of the company and the impact of financial performance on CSR performance. The second contribution is the bidirectional logic chosen by the study which is rarely adopted in the global context and has never been tested in the Swedish context. The third contribution is to test the mediating effect of customer loyalty on the company’s CSR performance-financial performance relationship to assess this effect over the long term. This design has been neglected in previous studies. The fourth contribution is the choice of the field of investigation for the reliability of the data used and the generalisation of the results obtained.

Purpose: This study is exploratory in nature. The purpose of this paper is to examine the intention to use smartphones by mobile users for m-services in a growing market. In fact, it empirically studies the influence of ubiquity and immersion in the virtual context on the perceived value (utilitarian and hedonic) of the mobile user’s experience. Moreover, it is an academic embarkation upon the examination of the effect of perceived value on the intension of using smartphones by mobile users for the m-services. Finally, it tests the mediating role of the perceived (utilitarian and hedonic) value between ubiquity/immersion and the intention to use smartphones for m-services.Design/methodology/approach: The data are collected from a sample of 300 Tunisian students and analyzed using the structural equation modeling technique.Findings: The results show that ubiquity and immersion positively influence the value perceived by mobile internet users. They also confirm that the perceived (utilitarian and hedonic) value positively affects the intensity of smartphone usage by mobile internet users for m-services and show the mediating role of the perceived (utilitarian and hedonic) value between ubiquity/immersion and the intention to use smartphones for m-services.Practical implications: Companies in place focus on the importance of smartphone shopping by communicating about the comparative advantages of this type of purchase to make this option a possible choice in the future. The immersive dimension in the virtual context of commerce can be exploited as a factor of differentiation, at a time when commercial trafficking is intensifying; for example, immersive merchant sites, to enrich their particular utilitarian value with an equally hedonic value. The hedonic and utilitarian dimensions of the perceived value constitute a mediator and an important lever for the distributors within the framework of the m-commerce. Due to a genuine consideration of the availability and the possibility to carry out the service at any time and any place in view of the fact that it is perceived as being useful and compatible with the needs and way of life of the individuals’ intention, the use of smartphones for the m-served is explained by the lived values which are in turn explained by the ubiquity.Originality/value: Despite the massive adoption of information and communication technology, especially the internet, in distribution and service delivery, very little research has focused on the intensity of use of smartphones by mobile internet users for m-services. This exploratory study is the first to test the effect of ubiquity and immersion in the virtual context on the perceived (utilitarian and hedonic) value of the mobile internet users’ experience as well as the effect of the perceived value on the intensity of use of smartphones by mobile internet users for m-services in the Tunisian context. Moreover, it puts under scrutiny the mediating effect of the perceived value in the determination of the intention to use smartphones by mobile users for the m-services in the Tunisian context.

Today, the use of chatbots for different functions in various industries has become a very interesting business for companies. Chatbots are promising types of interfaces. It is therefore necessary to understand how customers interact with retailers' interfaces in order to provide them with a better experience. In this study, we mobilise two theories, such as Stimilus-Organism-Response and Social Presence Theory, to formulate our research hypotheses. We have made major contributions to the interactive marketing and artificial intelligence literature by focusing on an emerging interactive technology: text chatbots. Our aim is to test the hedonic attributes of consumer trust in text chatbots by integrating the social and emotional aspects of this interaction. We also want to look at the moderating effects of text chatbot disclosure and task complexity. Based on the responses, we ran a questionnaire survey. A total of 353 people were polled for data. Participants were chosen at random. The structural equation modelling technique was used. First, the findings revealed that empathy and friendliness are major hedonic predictors of consumers' confidence in text chatbots. Second, the results demonstrate that the chatbot's task complexity and disclosure partially affect the empathy-trust relationship and the usability-trust relationship. We have made significant contributions to the field of interactive marketing research and artificial intelligence by focusing on new interactive technologies such as text-based chatbots. Our study is one of the first to look at the hedonic determinants of customer belief in text-based chatbots (1). All previous research has concentrated on the practical application of chatbots for digital customer service. The moderating effects of human-chatbot contact are investigated in our study (2). These two contributions make our research original. The findings give additional information that e-service providers and chatbot developers may utilise to improve their services, understand their effects on user experience, and provide a guide for strategy development and relationship building.

The managers continue in retail, for use as a source of competitive advantage for old factors such as price, product and promotion. This strategic approach cancels the role performance of logistics to create value for the consumer. These determine how performance objectives of store visitors. However, these logistics performance has not treated well in the field of retailing. The purpose of this article is to study the role of logistics in a retail store to determine client outcomes such as happiness and satisfaction. We developed and tested a model that has been estimated using the responses of 180 consumers Tunisians. The results show that logistics performance retail influence positively and significantly happiness and satisfaction. Similarly, happiness in turn influences positively and significantly customer satisfaction