The role of information technology in strategic buyer–supplier relationships

Information technology (IT) has long been acknowledged as an integral part of inter-organizational business exchange. The extant research, however, tends to emphasize the focal company perspective and focuses on operational issues, perceiving IT and business relationships as separable. Through a qualitative dyadic case study, our study defines how IT is positioned with regard to various elements of a strategic buyer–supplier relationship and the respective actors' operational and managerial behaviors. The study defines the role of IT regarding the structural, action, and management layers of a relationship and shows how IT can be a strong element around which relationship management activities are implemented to improve the consistency and performance of the relationship. The study prepares the ground for further qualitative and quantitative research to enhance a holistic understanding on IT in relation to the structures and processes in inter-organizational contexts of business relationships and networks.     

Business models: Impact on business markets and opportunities for marketing research

Business models have evolved in the context of new venture creation. By offering an entrepreneurial perspective to established marketing elements such as value propositions, value capturing and value networks, business models provide marketing discipline with both challenges and opportunities to engage with entrepreneurial environments. In particular, business models call for approaches that elucidate value-in-use of marketing offerings, reveal the performance of contracts in orchestrating value networks and identify the performance of network configurations. In this article we present some implications of and opportunities for business models for marketing research.     

Temporal dynamics of trust in ongoing inter-organizational relationships

This paper reports the results of a qualitative study undertaken to understand the nature of trust and its consequences for both suppliers and buyers in short term (relatively new) and long term (older/more mature) relationships in inter-organizational contexts. Scholars have recently pointed out the importance of research that investigates the temporal characteristics and dynamics of trust in inter-organizational studies. Our paper responds to this call by indentifying the changing nature of the level of trust as the buyer–supplier relationship matures. Our findings contribute to sparse and conflicting previous research on the relationship between length of partnership and perceptions of trust, types of dark side consequences of trusting relationships, and reasons buyers and suppliers continue or terminate low/no-trust associations. Specifically, we illustrate that buyers and suppliers draw on substantially different metaphors for understanding the nature of trust in long and short term exchange relationships. Suppliers see marked differences in trust with long term versus short term exchange partners, while buyers see little or no difference. Suppliers and buyers also appear to have different conceptions of how trust is nested (or not) within the broader economic and/or personal relationship. Through our inductive model, we elaborate several types of betrayal and disappointment, distinguish several factors that lead suppliers and buyers to stay in relationships with partners they don't trust, and identify key issues that topple untrusting relationships into terminated relationships.     

Boundary spanner relational behavior and inter-organizational control in supply chain relationships

Boundary spanner relational behavior is considered critical in the successful management of buyer–supplier relationships and may help avoiding high costs of more formal inter-organizational controls. Yet, the influence of partners' boundary spanners on effective supply chain collaboration has had much less inquiry than the influence of broader inter-organizational controls. We use survey data of 200 buyer–supplier relationships to examine how these individual and organizational control mechanisms influence the performance effects of interfirm collaborations that vary in scope of activities undertaken. Findings show that collaboration scope as well as boundary spanner relational behavior and inter-organizational controls are positively associated with performance. The effect of collaboration scope on firm performance, however, also depends on both mechanisms but in opposite directions: while its influence on performance is enhanced by inter-organizational controls, relational behavior of partners' boundary spanners has a negative moderating effect, indicating that such behavior contributes more to the effective management of collaborations of narrow scope than those of broader scope.     

Exporter-importer relationship quality: The inhibiting role of uncertainty, distance, and conflict

The article examines the impact of uncertainty, distance, and conflict on key elements comprising the quality of the relationship between U.S. industrial exporters and their overseas customers. Information received from 151 manufacturers revealed that these three parameters play a significant negative role in building sound relationship quality, in terms of adaptation, commitment, communication, cooperation, satisfaction, trust, and understanding — which, in turn, may inhibit the firm's progression along the internationalization path. Specifically, an inverse association was found between uncertainty, distance, and conflict, on one hand, and commitment, cooperation, and satisfaction, on the other. In addition, in relationships characterized by high uncertainty, adaptation, communication, trust, and understanding were low. In high distance relationships, communication was insufficient, and in high conflict situations, trust and understanding were low. Several managerial implications are extracted from the study, as well as directions for future research.     

Managing the trade-off between relationships and value networks. Towards a value-based approach of customer relationship management in business-to-business markets

The management of buyer-seller relationships was an early antecedent to the development of customer relationship management (CRM) concepts. Currently, CRM concepts are being challenged by the rise of value networks. Value networks can and, often, do interfere with customer relationships and thereby call for a broader range of concepts to analyze and understand relationship management and the influence of value networks on relationships. This introductory article describes the nature of the problem between relationships and value networks, reviews the current state of research, and describes the contributions of the articles presented in this special issue on CRM in business-to-business markets.     

Inter-organizational meets inter-personal: An exploratory study of social capital processes in relationships between Northern European and ethnic Chinese firms

This paper deals with social capital in a business network setting focusing on three aspects of social capital: social interaction, social bonds and trust. The paper argues that because of variations in underlying principles and inter-organizational business practices between different countries and culture, social capital processes will take different forms and place different levels of importance on relationships in different countries. The paper investigates how northern European managers perceive social interaction, social bonds and trust in conducting business with ethnic Chinese business partners. The explorative study builds on interviews with 28 Finnish and Swedish managers in Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand. The findings of the study indicate that when northern European and ethnic Chinese firms develop trading relationships, the resulting relationship is neither Nordic nor Chinese. Both parties deviate from their native behaviour and a new type of relationship evolves as the exchange partners interact.     

Value in business markets: What do we know? Where are we going?

This article presents a review of the existing literature on value in business markets, from the perspective of both business marketing and purchasing and supply management, in three steps. First, some of the early research strands on value are examined including value analysis and engineering, the augmented product concept, consumer values, and economic value of customers. Then this seminal research and more recent research are categorized according to two distinct levels of analysis: the value of goods and services versus the value of buyer-supplier relationships, and different understandings of the role of business marketing and purchasing and supply are discussed. Lastly, a number of future research avenues, which can be organized around the value of products/relationships on the one hand and value analysis/creation/delivery on the other, are considered.     

Embedding of a new business as a cumulative process of combining different but complementary types of projects: The case of a project-based firm

Within the industrial network approach, new business formation is a cumulative process of relating the new business to the existing business network over time. This paper combines the literatures on industrial networks and projects (management) to explore the roles of two different types of (temporary) inter-organizational projects in the embedding process. The paper examines the embedding in a network of a new project-based firm that went from being a new entity to becoming capable of taking a stronger network position by using different types of projects as embedding tools. Embedding of the new firm in the business network required the combining of different but complementary types of projects to build a stronger network position. We find that (temporary) inter-organizational projects are tools for embedding the firm in a network of relationships. The inter-organizational projects can provide the firm with opportunities to both discover and develop not only its own resources but also the resources of others, leading it to change perceptions and principles on what resources are useful to access and who possesses those resources.     

基于传染病模型的口碑传播预测

早在上个世纪五六十年代就有人提出过口碑营销的概念,这是一种以消费者自己为导向自发宣传企业产品的一种效应。多年来,关于如何高效地利用口碑营销价值的问题得到了众多学者的关注,但主要研究内容都侧重于不变数目人群消费圈子的传播效应预测,以及口碑营销的纯理论研究机制,缺乏对动态人数变化的分析。故本文侧重于对消费移出者这样一种动态趋势的口碑营销现象进行研究,采用微分方程模型的方法,对消费者口碑效应做一个简单地预测。本文的研究对实际生活中的营销投入有一定的参考借鉴价值。     

Measuring inter-organizational trust—a critical review of the empirical research in 1990-2003

This study reviews empirical research on inter-organizational trust. Since the early 1990s, researchers on inter-organizational relationships have consistently argued that mutual trust is an essential factor of relationship quality and performance. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the advancements and setbacks in current empirical research in terms of measuring inter-organizational trust. This paper analyzes the theoretical approach, the conceptualization and operationalization, and the measurement issues covered in studies on inter-organizational trust conducted from 1990 to 2003. Although trust has emerged as an important factor in inter-organizational relationships, there are still major conceptual and methodological challenges to be met in studying this complex concept. The results show major inconsistencies in conceptualization, operationalization, and measurement of trust. The paper concludes with suggestions for further empirical research.     

A simulation of business-to-business decision making in a relationship marketing context

The dynamic and interactive SUGARSCAPE simulation is adapted to represent agent-based relationship marketing models in business-to-business exchanges. Computer-generated selling agents operate in complex environments using relationship marketing approaches that may or may not be uniformly distributed inside their organizations. The intricate nature of these models also allows for diverse combinations of buyer traits that impact their decisions as well as seller profitability. These features include individual and firm exchange experiences, the ability to identify and to become loyal to sellers, and the sharing of information within and among buyer firms. Relationship marketing is played out or operationalized based on pricing tactics that show differences between asking prices and post-exchange value.     

Analyzing business relationships and distinguishing different interaction levels

Over the years, there have been a large number of attempts to understand relationships in industrial markets. However, even if relationships are built up on the basis of series of interactions, these studies have not offered systematic categorization of different types of relationship interactions. The present article proposes a refined conceptualization for identifying different types of relationship interaction units, labeled interaction levels, ranging from a single exchange to a relationship portfolio. Compared to the current use of two interaction levels in relationship studies, the proposed conceptualization allows a more elaborate analysis of single relationships and better comparisons of different relationships.     

The antecedents and consequences of organizational and personal commitment in business service relationships

This paper explores the potential for business service customers to form separate bonds of commitment with the service firm and the service representative. It examines the role of the individual and identifies six potential antecedents to each type of commitment. It also proposes that both types of commitment will influence the degree of relational exchange between the customer and the service firm. The hypotheses are tested using multiple regression and data from a survey of marketing research managers. The results support the majority of the hypotheses.     

Effects of inter-organizational compatibility on supply chain capabilities: Exploring the mediating role of inter-organizational information systems (IOIS) integration

Growing globalization and environmental uncertainty have increased the challenges managers face in delivering services or products to the customer. Integration of information systems across partnering organizations has become the backbone of supply chain management, as amalgamation facilitates the sharing of information required to enhance organizational flexibility and responsiveness while minimizing risk and inventory costs. Using data from the Australian retailing sectors, this study investigates the mediating role of inter-organizational information system (IOIS) integration on the relationships between inter-organizational compatibility and supply chain capabilities. The results indicate that inter-organizational compatibility of technical, strategic, and cultural inter-organizational dimensions facilitate IOIS integration and supply chain capabilities. To maximize benefits for all chain members, IOIS integration needs to be embedded in the strategies and goals of partnering organizations. Business-to-business and industrial marketing managers need to be aware that IOIS integration processes require support of top managers of the partnering organizations and should be embedded in the organizations' strategic goals.     

Interpersonal attraction in buyer–supplier relationships: A cyclical model rooted in social psychology

The concept of attraction is not reserved for the study of interpersonal relationships between husband and wife, family members, or lifelong friends. On the contrary, it contains much potential as a variable describing interpersonal business exchange relationships. This potential has been noted by well-known industrial marketing scholars in the past, and recent theoretical advances have incorporated attraction to describe buyer–supplier exchange, although primarily at the interorganizational level of analysis. The in-depth understanding of interpersonal attraction between boundary spanners representing buying and supply companies has yet to be developed. By drawing on social psychology and social exchange literature, this paper attempts to fill some of this gap. It contributes by uncovering the elements and process of interpersonal attraction. Furthermore, propositions are formulated to guide future research efforts on interpersonal attraction in the buyer–supplier context. Finally, the managerial value and challenges of applying attraction to buyer–supplier exchange relationships are discussed.     

我国近年来电力营销模式的特征及发展趋势分析

为适应电力市场发展的需要,电力企业的营销模式正经历着从生产经营到市场营销经营的转变、从粗放型的经营到精细型的营销管理的转变,在不同的阶段电力企业的营销模式呈现不同的特征。大营销,大服务是电力企业营销模式发展的方向,其目标就是要促进电力资源的合理利用,从而提高企业效益,服务我国经济社会的发展需要。