Akira Asada and Christopher M. McLeod

Employer branding has recently begun to attract attention in sport management to explain unique branding efforts by sports leagues. Although previous research has discussed its effectiveness in athlete recruitment and retention, little is known about how employer branding affects consumers. In this study, we conceptualized a sports league’s employer branding as a psychological contract between the league and athletes and examined how consumers react to the formation and breach of such a contract. Our experimental studies suggested that sports leagues can improve their credibility and...Read more

Akira Asada and Yong Jae Ko

The purpose of this study was to examine gender differences in the relationship between sports consumers’ perceived influence of word-of-mouth (WOM) recommendation and its antecedents. We conducted a survey with sports consumers who had received a WOM recommendation to watch a sporting event and actually watched the event. Survey participants indicated how much the WOM recommendation influenced their sport-watching behavior. The results of structural equation modeling (SEM) showed that a recommender’s trustworthiness, the richness of message content, and the strength of message delivery...Read more