Emphasis or Balance?

Abstract

A sample of 162 Indian manufacturing and service companies were used to examine different forms of market orientation and the impact of these forms on organizational performance. A cluster-analysis identified four distinct clusters: “undeveloped,” “customer-focused,” “competitor-focused,” and “comprehensive.” The performance of these clusters differed significantly across growth in overall revenue, ability to retain customers, success of new products/services, controlling operational expenses, and return on capital. Implications of these findings for firms competing in India's post-economic liberalization milieu are discussed.     

The effects of managerial attitudes to design on company performance

Central to current thinking on what makes companies competitive is the notion that “it's not what you do, it's the way that you do it”. The way a task is carried out in a company is itself very much related to the attitudes and opinions of the company's managers. This article focuses on top managers’ attitudes to product design and shows which ones are related to superior competitive performance. An examination of the attitudes shows that there are seven basic managerial orientations to design. The most successful orientation is called the “balanced orientation” and consists of attitudes that underpin a commitment to leading the field technically and making developments market‐relevant.     

Marketing capability—A key success factor in small business?

This article focuses on the marketing problems of small manufacturing companies. The principal thesis is that marketing is generally perceived from too narrow a perspective. A more comprehensive and yet detailed view of marketing should benefit small business management. The authors develop a marketing capability framework which can be used as a qualitative tool for examining the “state‐of‐the‐art” of marketing in small manufacturing companies. This marketing capability framework is employed in examining the performance of 36 Finnish and Swedish companies using case study analysis.     

The role and function of the chief marketing executive and the marketing department: A study of medium‐sized companies in the UK

The unification of “marketing” functions under the control of a chief marketing executive has long been regarded as central to implementing the marketing concept. While not accepting the logic that suggests that marketing orientation implies any particular set of organisational arrangements, this article examines new empirical data concerned with the role and status of the chief marketing executive and the marketing department, in a sample of manufacturing firms, to suggest that they function very differently in different companies.

Such distinctions have important implications for our understanding of how marketing operates in organisations, and the different ways in which it may be developed, both in manufacturing and in other sectors.     

Towards a paradigm shift in marketing? An examination of current marketing practices

In recent years, the traditional Transaction approach to marketing has been challenged to the point where a number of authors have suggested that a “paradigm shift” is occurring. The “newparadigm” is commonly referred to as Relationship Marketing, and has been used to reflect a number of different types of relational marketing activity, including Database, Interaction and Network marketing. This paper investigates current marketing practice to clarify the relevance of these alternative approaches using four case studies and a survey of 134 firms. The results do not support the notion of a complete “paradigm shift”. Rather, the findings show that for many firms, transactional marketing is relevant and practised concurrently with various types of relational marketing. It is concluded that while relational marketing issues are currently receiving attention from academics and practitioners alike, the role of transactional marketing should not be ignored or underestimated.     

Competitive Marketing Strategies: A Survey of Japanese Manufacturing Firms' Competitive Performance in the British Market

The role of Japanese corporations in world markets has become so crucial that an understanding of the rules of competition employed by the Japanese is essential for all those involved in international business. The aim of this survey was to gain an insight into the role marketing plays in affecting the competitive position of Japanese firms in the British market. In particular the researcher focused on the overall approach of Japanese companies to the marketplace and the process by which they identify and bring products to the market.

The broad findings emerging from this study present few surprises, Japanese companies do not seem to suffer from a “sales orientation”, a “production orientation” or “finance orientation” as opposed to a “marketing orientation”. The in‐roads being made into the British market are based by and large on a strategy aimed at satisfying customer needs and wants. Japanese companies saw their strengths in placing emphasis on research and engineering and bringing the right product to the market quickly and decisively.     

Much ado about nothing: No fear of becoming a multinational

This paper compares the home employment performance of Spanish “switching” companies, which carry out Foreign Direct Investment for the first time, with employment performance corresponding to non investing local (national) companies. We use data from manufacturing firms for the period 2000–2013. The counterfactual group of national companies is obtained using the Propensity Score Matching technique with a large sample of firms. The analysis shows that the reduction in employment was less relevant among switching companies in comparison with local ones. This result permits us to conclude that internationalization through foreign direct investment is not causing a more intense reduction in employment among parent companies than among local firms. This holds also true for the period prior to the crisis (2000–2007).     

The Manufacturing Sector’s Environmental Motives: A Game-theoretic Analysis

What motivates manufacturing companies to make costly investments in producing in an environmentally clean manner? The traditional argument is that such behaviour is value reducing, and that therefore, firms must be forced by regulation to invest in “green” production processes. A counter-argument is that firms have an incentive to make environmental investments in an attempt to attract “green” consumers and investors, hence gaining competitive advantage over their rivals. In this paper, we employ a game-theoretic approach that demonstrates that competing firms’ incentives to make voluntary investments in environmental “clean-up” are affected by the size of the investment costs and the extent of consumer and investor “green” awareness. We argue that an increase in green behaviour can be induced by a combination of governmental subsidies for firms that invest in environmentally clean production processes, together with an education program that promotes “green” awareness amongst consumers, investors and the managers themselves.     

Mitigating the Myopia of Dominant Logics: On Differential Performance and Strategic Supply Chain Research

The primary question of management scholarship is, “What leads some firms to be successful even as others fail?” Over the years, a variety of dominant logics have emerged to inform this question. Synthesized, these logics make it clear that companies win when they create customer value better than the competition and efficiently enough to be profitable. That is, firms that design distinctive and dynamic value‐added systems win competitive battles. This observation is salient to the Journal of Business Logistics community as systems design and value creation are focal decision areas of supply chain management. With this in mind, we briefly discuss two of many areas for which strategic supply chain research can inform differential performance.     

Marketing planning in the larger family business

In recent decades a considerable literature on marketing planning has accumulated. The larger part relates to marketing planning in big firms with specialized, professional managers. There are books on the subject, like that of Malcolm McDonald which has gone through several editions, and there is also a steady stream of articles in the academic journals. In addition, the marketing planning activities of big firms are referred to by many more writers in the overlapping but broader contexts of “strategic marketing” and “strategic planning”. A lesser part of the literature relates to marketing planning in small firms. The small firms in question are usually very small. Typically they are owner‐managed and employ just a handful of people in a single location. The purpose of this study is to fill a gap in the literature by examining a medium‐sized firm; a category which seems to have been neglected by researchers.

Most modern economies are characterized by a significant group of middle‐sized firms, still owner‐managed, but with multi‐million dollar turnovers. Many of these remain family companies and constitute an important reservoir of business initiative. One such family business is the focus of this study. Given the relative lack of scrutiny of such firms to date, the author decided to conduct an in depth evaluation from within one large, family firm rather than seek by means of questionnaire to obtain information from a significant sample of the group. The results of the study suggest that neither the existing typologies of small firm approaches to marketing nor the formal models of marketing planning attributed to big companies necessarily characterize the marketing planning and management of larger, family businesses.     

The Use of the Survey in Industrial Market Research

Awareness and use of marketing research is consistently shown to be a characteristic of successful firms. Despite this, companies that market industrial goods and services still design and implement fewer market research studies than their counterparts in the consumer field. Consequently, on a first attempt their comparative inexperience leaves them vulnerable to the many pitfalls of implementing a successful survey. This paper serves as a practical guide to the issues governing choice among alternative survey methods, and to weighing up the pros and cons of personal and telephone interviews and mail questionnaires.     

Chaffee,Steven H., and Petrick,Michael J. Using the Mass Media: Communication Problems in American Society. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1974

Abstract

In recent years, a number of internal and external forces have urged companies to pay increased attention to the role that corporate advertising plays in marketing communications strategy. Despite this increased importance, a comprehensive view of current corporate advertising practices does not exist. This study reports the practices of the 500 largest manufacturing and the 300 largest non-manufacturing firms in the U.S. and makes observations on several key management issues, including the definition of corporate advertising, objectives and measurement, funding, and future directions.     

Who Invests in the Least Developed Countries?

Abstract

Africa is a giant market with a population of Europe and Japan combined, and highly diversified with respect to culture, natural resources, economic development, and political regimes. Yet, the continent is largely ignored with respect to research on the multinational activities of U.S. firms. In this paper, we provide the first evidence regarding the operating characteristics of U.S. firms that operate in Africa. We find that firms with operations in Africa are larger, more diversified, and more profitable than a matched control sample of multinational firms. This paper also shows that technology firms, manufacturing firms, and mining firms dominate the rest of companies operating in Africa. Certain geographical regions in Africa also seem to attract more companies than others, with Southern Africa being the most preferred region, while Central Africa is the least preferred. Finally, when a multinational firm invests in a specific country in Africa, it tends to do so in several business sectors.     

Competing through relationships: Grounding relationship marketing in resource‐advantage theory

A common element of all views of relationship marketing is the “co‐operate‐to‐compete” thesis. That is, to be an effective competitor often requires one to be an effective co‐operator. One implication of this thesis is that not all instances of firms co‐operating with each other constitute anti‐competitive collusion. This article argues that, although neoclassical, perfect competition theory cannot provide a theoretical foundation for relationship marketing's “co‐operate‐to‐compete” thesis, the recently developed “resource‐advantage” theory of competition can do so. Furthermore, this article uses resource‐advantage theory to address the relationship portfolio conundrum. Specifically, the paper argues that firms should develop a relationship portfolio that is comprised of relationships that constitute relational resources.     

Electronic Commerce Encourages Differentiation

Abstract

This paper explores why and how ecommerce firms differentiate their products and services. Consumers who shop online are able to do quick and easy comparison shopping, including shopping in an active market for used goods. Since online product search and price comparisons are faster, easier, and involve fewer shopping costs, firms who sell online must differentiate their products and services to a greater extent than those who do not sell online. These product and service differentiations may be certified and rated by host shopping sites and by outside ratings companies.     

Effects of Network Embeddedness on the Relationship Between Environmental Volatility and Interfirm Contracts

Purpose: This study examines the effects of an embedded network on the contractual relationship between exchange parties under conditions reflecting varying levels of environmental volatility and investigates the role of an important network factor—the embedded network—in the contractual relationship between manufacturers and their suppliers.

Methodology: The empirical test was conducted with manufacturing companies in the context of manufacturer–supplier relationships. Construct measures were based on existing measures and previous research. Measurement reliability and validity were established using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis and an overall measurement model was assessed with structural equation modeling using LISREL.

Findings: The results of a survey of manufacturers indicate that firms in an embedded network preferred “soft” contracts even when they face volatile environments, whereas those facing volatile environments in a less embedded network preferred “hard” contracts with explicitly specified written requirements. Network partners carefully evaluated embedded networks (a critical factor that has not received enough attention) before forming contractual relationships in a network perceiving interfirm relationships differently.

Originality: The study introduces network embeddedness to explain governance mechanisms in volatile environments and shows that the explicit recognition of embedded network may facilitate the development of contracts with specific provisions as the contractual relationship evolves.     

Managing for Excellence in the Food and Beverages Industry

Abstract

In order to understand how to manage for excellence in the food and beverages industry, one must recognize some key principles that are utilized by top companies in this industry. The following article will provide detail examples of three top organizations to let the readers realize the strategies used by each company and what makes them superior than other competitors. The first example is about Nestlé's excellent achievement on market research and successful story about “Wellness strategy”. The second example shows how Coca-Cola produces the world's best known product and implements “Total Quality Management” and “Just-In-Time” system. The third example reveals the success secrets of McDonald's franchise kingdom and “three-legged-stool” relationship with its franchisees and suppliers. To be the top leader in the food and beverage industry, we suggest learning these skills.     

Solving Export Marketing Problems of Small and Medium-Sized Firms from Developing Countries

Abstract

This study shows how networks can be used to solve the export marketing problems manufacturing firms in developing countries are facing. Major export barriers perceived by manufacturing firms in Eritrea are identified and, subsequently, differences in perceptions between footwear and textile manufacturers, and small and medium sized firms are examined. The findings suggest that some problems can be solved through individual action by the firms (market or hierarchy). However, small and medium-sized firms on their own can't solve the most important problems, like the lack of market information, the preparation of proper designs and the fulfillment of minimum quantity requirements. The major conclusion is that export market entry by SMEs in developing countries will not be successful if no horizontal and vertical business networks are established.     

Sales Training in a Dynamic Market

Abstract

The Singaporean hotel industry is examined, with particular emphasis on me differences between global and local sales force training. Empirical evidence indicates that there is a wide divergence between global and local practices. It appears that global firms perceive that sales training leads to greater sales force performance and view sales training as being part of their strategic marketing plan. Global firms also employ a more formal training curriculum, focus on “soft” competencies, and have an established training culture. Conversely, local firms rely upon “on-the-job training (OJT)” and appear not to understand that sales training programs can be a source of competitive advantage. Managerial implications and suggestions for future research are presented.     

Does it transfer? The effects of pre-internationalization experience on post-entry organizational learning in entrepreneurial Chinese firms

Although organizational learning plays a critical role in the internationalization of firms, researchers have largely focused on learning that occurs after a firm’s international entry (“learning by doing”). Few studies have discussed how a firm’s experiences prior to international entry affect its organizational learning after entry. Using a sample of Chinese internationalizers, we argue that pre-entry characteristics will influence organizational learning after international entry. We argue and show that prior experience with international companies in the domestic market is transferable and does affect an organization’s post-entry learning through a mechanism called analogical reasoning or “learning by analogy.”