Kunal Swani joins editorial board of Journal of Business Research

Kunal Swani, associate professor of marketing

Kunal Swani, associate professor of marketing at Wright State University, has an opportunity to help marketing researchers as a newly appointed associate editor of the prestigious Journal of Business Research.

Rated as the top marketing journal in the world by Google H5 metric, the Journal of Business Research is a monthly peer-review academic journal covering research on all aspects of business.

The appointment is one of many significant things to come Swani’s way recently. He was promoted to his current title by the Raj Soin College of Business and received a Presidential Award for Excellence: Early Career Achievement. The native of India also became a U.S. citizen, and he and his wife welcomed a baby girl in July.

“It’s a big year,” he said.

Swani is one of four associate editors responsible for overseeing the business-to-business research track for the Journal of Business Research. The associate editor position is considered a mini-editor-in-chief and is often a stepping stone for those interested in becoming an editor of a journal.

He is responsible for independently handling 40 to 45 manuscripts a year, determining whether submissions should be sent to peer reviewers, working with authors to improve their papers, and recommending which papers the journal should publish.

“I’m excited about this opportunity, and I think it’s good exposure for the department and the school,” he said.

Swani says he enjoys the editing process and working with researchers to improve their papers. Serving as a journal associate editor will also help him keep up with new research.

Swani has worked with the Journal of Business Research in the past. He has published two papers in the journal on social media and has a third paper under consideration on social media and consumer engagement. He has also done ad hoc reviewing for the journal and is serving as a guest editor on a forthcoming special issue dedicated to mobile apps with his Department of Marketing colleagues John Dinsmore and Kendall Goodrich and Umut Konus, of the University of Amsterdam.

An expert in business-to-business marketing communications, Swani has conducted substantial research on the use of social media by business-to-business companies. To date, he has published 15 peer-reviewed papers, two book chapters and has three papers under review with journals.

Swani said research is an effective way to answer questions about things he finds interesting. “I like looking around, seeing certain interesting phenomena and asking questions: what is happening and why is it happening?” he said.

Teaching also provides an incentive for Swani to stay up to date with research and progress in such areas as marketing, communication and social media. Good questions from his students often lead to new research topics or class discussions.

“Most of the information I relay to students is based on my current research,” he said. ” I have a passion for teaching and educating students on current topics and preparing them for the dynamic workforce.”

Swani is originally from India and received his bachelor’s degree in engineering from Pune University. He came to the United States to pursue his MBA at Hofstra University. After working for a small business-to-business company, he earned his Ph.D. in marketing from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst.

His dissertation examined how business-to-business companies use social media to create engagement with followers.

“Although the field in the past has always talked about the use and importance of rational appeals,” he said, “our research showed that the use of emotional appeals created more engagement in terms of likes and comments when compared to business-to-consumer messages.”

Even today, he said, many managers in business-to-business companies still struggle to use social media effectively. “If companies do not post content that is engaging or helps a brand there is no benefit of social media,” Swani said.

Since he joined the Wright State Raj Soin College of Business in 2014, Swani has received the support and time necessary to pursue his vast research interests.

“I’m very thankful to my department, the college, the chair, the dean, the faculty and the staff for all of their support with research and teaching,” Swani said. “I couldn’t be in this position without their support.”