Measuring customer attractiveness

Various beneficial consequences can accrue when a customer is perceived to be an attractive customer, particularly in a business-to-business context. Opinions differ as to what makes for customer attractiveness and a number of different features have been suggested as contributing to it. Currently there exists no comprehensive view of what factors constitute customer attractiveness and how this may be valued, measured and evaluated. Drawing on various facets of customer attractiveness suggested in the literature, this paper seeks to delineate the customer attractiveness construct and develop an instrument to measure it. The paper concludes by discussing how the scale developed can be used as a tool to address some critical issues in assessing customer attractiveness.     

The drivers of customer attractiveness,supplier satisfaction and preferred customer status: A literature review

In this paper, we focus on the preferential treatment of buyers by their suppliers. As there is a lack of detailed information regarding the reasons that suppliers serve some buyers better than others, our research addresses a supplier's evaluation of customers and how this evaluation can be influenced by buyers. To give an overview of the drivers of preferential treatment by suppliers, the provided literature review covers three research fields that are considered crucial to this issue: (i) customer attractiveness, (ii) supplier satisfaction and (iii) preferred customer status. By integrating these research topics, we provide a state-of-the-art analysis and overview of the various drivers of preferential treatment, build a preliminary conceptual model and suggest several directions for future research. The identification of the drivers and the resulting conceptual framework can serve as a stepping stone for additional research in this new field.     

Capturing value creation in business relationships: A customer perspective

Collaborative relationships in business markets are of growing importance to customers and suppliers alike. Customers need to decide whether to invest in a new supplier relationship, to maintain and develop a valued relationship, or to divest from a low-value relationship. Suppliers, in turn, face growing commoditization of products and seek to differentiate themselves through relationships. The measurement of value creation in buyer-seller relationships is still in its infancy, and a sound understanding of how firms create and deliver value in business relationships is needed. Emerging studies investigate relationship value based on dimensions derived from theory and lack a managerial perspective. Therefore, the present research explored relationship value from a grounded theory perspective. In-depth interviews with purchasing managers identified eight value drivers in manufacturer-supplier relationships. Implications for the measurement of the concept are discussed, and directions for further research are suggested.     

Refining value-based differentiation in business relationships: A study of the higher order relationship building blocks that influence behavioural intentions

Research on the behavioural intentions (BI) of business-to-business customers has focused on the influence and the interactions among constructs driving BI, giving rise to two perspectives for the structural equation modeling of constructs influencing BI. In the first perspective, BI is impacted directly by relationship quality (RQ) and its antecedents such as relationship benefits (RB) and relationship sacrifices (RS). The second perspective suggests that antecedent dimensions of RB and RS may act indirectly through the construct of relationship value (RV), which drives RQ but also directly influences BI. The current study was undertaken to resolve the differences between these two perspectives. The findings indicate that RQ has a strong direct influence on BI while RV has a weak direct influence but a significant indirect influence on BI through the RQ construct. In addition, the constructs of RB and RS influence RQ directly, as well as through the RV construct.     

Buyer attentiveness in buyer-supplier relationships

How do a manufacturing firm's (supplier) relationship marketing activities lead to more profitable business-to-business (B2B) customers? This research proposes that a supplier's relationship activities develop a buyer's attentiveness toward the supplier, which, in turn, leads to profitable buyer purchasing behaviors. Findings from 119 buyer organizations support this contention, and, additionally, buyer attentiveness was found to have a stronger positive influence on favorable buyer behavior than does either buyer dependence or relationship length. This study contributes to our understanding of long-term buyer-supplier relationships in B2B markets.     

Initiation of business relationships in service-dominant settings

Industrial companies today are becoming increasingly service-oriented and therefore need to shift from selling hardware to valuing services and managing customer relationships. A new and particularly significant challenge for these companies is how to initiate relationships which is an issue that has received surprisingly limited scientific attention. The aim of this study is to develop a conceptualization that explores the dynamics in the relationship initiation process in service-dominant settings. Narratives from three sellers of professional services, augmented with narratives from a buyer's view, form the empirical basis of the study. The dynamics in the relationship initiation process are clarified with three new concepts: status, converter, and inhibitor. The paper concludes with implications of the new conceptualization and suggestions for future research.     

Towards an understanding of attraction in buyer–supplier relationships

This paper explores how firms are attracted to one another within buyer–supplier dyads. It draws attention to ways of managing in a relational mode as an alternative to managing in a controlling mode. This study argues that in order to improve value creation and value transfer in buyer–supplier relationships it is not enough to optimize and coordinate management and control systems. Following Dwyer et al. [Dwyer, R., Schurr, P.H. and Oh, S. (1987). Developing buyer–seller relationships. Journal of Marketing, 51: 11–27.], it argues that mutual attraction is important in developing relationships. It is also argued that this can be achieved through a range of perceptual approaches and actions, which enhance performance between the parties involved. A conceptual model of attraction is developed with theoretical underpinnings in social exchange theory. It proposes three behavioral constraints: expected value, trust, and dependence. These components of attraction interact to draw dyadic parties closer together or push them apart. Finally, implications for research and practice are discussed.     

Industrial brand value and relationship performance in business markets — A general structural equation model

This paper develops a general model of industrial brand value and relationship performance in business-to-business markets from the perspectives of consumer and industrial marketing literature. The structural equation model integrates the analysis of industrial brand value and relationship performance. The model describes the extent to which supplier-buyer transaction performance is influenced by the eight important factors: supplier competence, purchasing value, customer satisfaction, switching cost, brand trust and loyalty, relationship quality, commitment, and transactional performance.The general model is applied to organizational buyer groups of comprehensive industrial markets (Electronics, Chemicals, Equipment, etc). The analysis finds that supplier competence directly affects purchasing value and customer satisfaction, and via purchasing value and customer satisfaction, it indirectly affects commitment, switching cost, brand trust and loyalty. The managerial implications of the study results are also discussed.     

Resource acquisition strategies in business relationships

Integrating the IMP Group approach with aspects of the resource-based view of the firm, we seek to develop and test a typology of relationship strategies based on different resource acquisition foci. For this purpose, we conducted interviews with thirty CEOs and other senior marketing managers in the UK and the USA. In-depth content analysis identified five main resource acquisition strategies (RAS) behind building business relationships: money bonds, new market bonds, utilization bonds, intellectual bonds, and credibility bonds. We further carried out a quantitative study with 658 senior managers in the USA to test for the generalizability of our findings. Results of a one-way repeated ANOVA and multinomial logistic regression analysis show significant differences between the five RAS for business relationships. However, a pair-wise comparison provides evidence for the existence of hybrid strategies. In addition, an investigation of the association between the RAS of business relationships on the one hand, and business strategy on the other, revealed equifinality of alternative business strategies vis-à-vis the applied relationship strategy. Finally, our analysis revealed no significant differences between the distributions of RAS types for knowledge intensive versus non-knowledge intensive business services. However, we found that RAS distribution is significantly associated with company size.     

The role of boundary spanners in the formation of customer attractiveness

This paper examines the question of how to understand the formation of suppliers perceived customer attractiveness. It argues that existing conceptualization of buyer–supplier relationships are too simplistic to understand the full complexity involved in the formation of such perceptions, and models the buyer–supplier relationship as a set of micro-dyads and intra-, inter-organizational exchange relationships. In exploring these micro-dyads this research apply an embedded case study approach and explores three buyer–supplier relationships. Following Bacharach et al. [Bacharach, S.B., Bamberger, P., & Sonnenstuhl, W.J. (1996). The organizational transformation process: The micropolitics of dissonance reduction and the alignment of logics of action. Administrative Science Quarterly, 41(3), 477–506.], it is interested in the involved actors sense-making processes and the concept of “logics of action” is deployed. The analysis demonstrates how suppliers' formation of perceptions related to customer attractiveness can be understood as constituted through a set of discrete historical means/ends alignments and misalignments between boundary spanning roles in the involved organizations.     

Value-based sales process adaptation in business relationships

In business relationships, the seller is often expected to adapt to the buyer. The main purpose of this study is to understand how business firms adapt their sales processes to the buyer. The resulting framework, which reveals how different modes of adaptation are contingent upon the type of product being purchased, includes three layers: sales process adaptation, seller–buyer relationship orientation, and the purchasing portfolio. The study is a qualitative one and utilizes a retrospective case study, where the main sources of information are in-depth semi-structured interviews with key informants representing the seller and buyer counterparts in the ICT industry. Our study adds to the understanding of how different modes of adaptation are contingent upon the type of item being sold and purchased. Managerial implications include that to strategically adapt, the seller could focus on the purchasing portfolio. Although previous research has recognized adaptation as a central aspect in relationships, how the sales process could be adapted to the buyer has received little attention. This study focuses on the adaptation of sales to strategically match it to the buyer's situation.     

Market-driving versus market-driven: Divergent roles of market orientation in business relationships

This study focuses on market orientation (MO) and customer intimacy (CI) in business-to-business marketing. These are generally regarded as key success factors in marketing. The authors argue, however, that the relationship between MO and customer relationship has not been properly examined, nor has its dependence on a firm's strategic market posture been understood. A contingency framework is proposed to test the postulated relationships between the key constructs. Our results indicate a strong positive association between MO and CI. Furthermore, this linkage is clearly influenced by the market focus and business logic adopted. In managerial terms, business executives must carefully match the strategic posture of the firm, its MO, and customer relationship management (CRM). Our findings strongly support a contingency modeling approach in studying the factors underlying marketing performance in business markets.     

The involvement and influence of emotions in problematic business relationships

This paper discusses emotions as mediators in business-to-business relationships which is an understudied topic. Yet within consumer marketing, emotions have been widely studied, and calls have been made for business relationship research to take account of managers' emotions. This study addresses the gap by firstly establishing the relevance of emotions in problematic business relationships and secondly showing how emotions are a major component in determining the outcomes of the problematic relationships. Interview data in the form of narratives describing problematic relationships is analyzed and identifies both the emotions experienced by participants and their role in the future course of the business relationship.     

Exploring the impact of relationship transparency on business relationships: A cross-sectional study among purchasing managers in Germany

This paper introduces the notion of relationship transparency. It delineates this new concept from the interaction model of business relationships. We define relationship transparency as an individual's subjective perception of being informed about the relevant actions and properties of the other party in the interaction. Empirical data gathered in a cross-sectional survey among purchasing managers in Germany provide evidence that relationship transparency contributes to the overall success of a business relationship. According to our conceptual model and structural equation estimates, transparency delivers value to the customer, increases customer satisfaction and ultimately leads to favorable behavioral intentions.     

A service perspective on business relationships: The value creation, interaction and marketing interface

Adopting a service perspective or logic on business directs suppliers' focus in business relationships towards engaging with their customers' business processes. The purpose of this article is to analyze implications for value creation and marketing of adopting a service logic in business relationships. In the article it is demonstrated that a service perspective is multi-dimensional, enabling the mutual creation of value, with service as a mediating factor in that process. It is argued that value creation, purchasing, usage and marketing are intertwined processes. Here supplier-customer interactions are in a focal position. This perspective enables marketers to better understand how to develop and extend service offerings through assistance to customers' processes relevant to their businesses. Therefore, the underpinning logic of industrial interactions is analyzed in detail, extending marketing's conventional boundaries.     

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.     

Exploring the role of spatial relationships to transform knowledge in a business idea — Beyond a geographic proximity

The “space” dimension has characterized the aggregation of firms, ranging from industrial districts to clusters. Within a local system, as emphasized by the Triple Helix model (Etzkowitz & Leydesdorff, 2000), universities, firms, and public institutions generate synergies by producing and exploiting technological knowledge. From this perspective, local relationships become synonymous with spatial relationships characterized by geographic proximity. However, is it possible to find different dimensions of proximity influencing spatial relationships in order to support innovation? This paper demonstrates that different proximity dimensions influence firms' boundaries and the development of spatial relationships through which actors interact to develop resource combinations identified in innovation. After a review of the these topics, the paper provides findings related to the spatial relationships developed by Petroceramics as a hosted spin-off of the Italian Technological Pole (POINT) as well as its subsequent relocation to the Kilometro Rosso Science Park. As such, this paper deals with how technological knowledge is transformed into a business idea through spatial relationships based on different dimensions of proximity.     

Exploring perceptions of interdependencies: Strategic options in supplier-customer relationships

This paper investigates how three indicators, 1) convergence-divergence in actor characteristics, 2) relationship atmosphere, and 3) degree of overlap in the network pictures of collaborating partners, relate to the perceived interdependencies and strategic options seen in specific supplier-customer relationships. The paper presents the case of a Danish food company, which offers the same pallet of new products to different customers. Joint developments are coordinated equivalently across customer relationships, and the customers draw on the same company technology and knowledge resources. Still, the company perceives interdependencies and related strategic options as very divergent across the customer relationships.     

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.