Purpose Despite the growing interest by scholars, practitioners and public policymakers, there are still divergent and fragmented conceptualizations of nation branding as the field is still developing. In response, the purpose of this paper is to review and synthesize nation branding research and to provide directions for future research. Design/methodology/approach The authors review peer-reviewed theoretical and empirical journal articles published during the last two decades – from 1998 to 2018. Selected journal articles on nation branding were subsequently synthesized for further insights. Findings The field of nation branding is fragmented and has developed in the course of the last two decades in different directions. This paper identifies key publication outlets and articles, major theoretical and methodological approaches and primary variables of interest that exist in the nation branding literature. The findings also highlight several research themes for future research. Originality/value This research fills a need to summaries the current state of the nation branding literature and identifies research issues that need to be addressed in the future.

If you would like to write for this, or any other Emerald publication, then please use our Emerald for Authors service information about how to choose which publication to write for and submission guidelines are available for all. Please visit www.emeraldinsight.com/authors for more information. About Emerald www.emeraldinsight.comEmerald is a global publisher linking research and practice to the benefit of society. The company manages a portfolio of more than 290 journals and over 2,350 books and book series volumes, as well as providing an extensive range of online products and additional customer resources and services.Emerald is both COUNTER 4 and TRANSFER compliant. The organization is a partner of the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE) and also works with Portico and the LOCKSS initiative for digital archive preservation. AbstractDevelopments in electronic technology are changing the way business is normally done. This paper investigates how Internet technology reshapes consumer behavior, specifically in online information search. While information search has been a major research stream in the consumer behavior literature, online search for product/service information is a relatively new area. This paper proposes a conceptual framework for studying the determinants of online information search. Since information search online is a precursor to online purchase, an in-depth understanding of how consumers gather information online is critical to Internet business success.

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Purpose – This paper aims to examine how the three market orientation components (customer orientation, competitor orientation and interfunctional coordination) influence industrial manufacturers’ customer relationship management outcomes in a business-to-business (B2B) context. Design/methodology/approach – In linking market orientation components and their relationship outcomes, the authors examined the moderating effect of interfunctional coordination. The model was tested using data collected from 279 manufacturing firms in the USA. Findings – While customer orientation and competitor orientation both influence customer relationship outcomes, interfunctional coordination does not. However, interfunctional coordination lessens the positive relationships between customer orientation and customer retention as well as between competitor orientation and customer satisfaction. Although competitor orientation has a slightly stronger impact on customer satisfaction than customer orientation does, it only has an indirect relationship with customer retention through customer satisfaction. Originality/value – The findings illustrated the effects of the three components of market orientation on customer relationship outcomes within manufacturing-centered firms, and provided managerial implications to industrial manufacturers on market orientation implementation strategies in regard to successful B2B customer relationship management.

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