Risk distribution and bonding mechanisms in industrial marketing

This paper models the interactive process of planning, negotiating, selling, and putting into operation a highly complex technical object as a “precarious partnership.” The process consists of several steps or phases. Typically, the participants in such a process are in different relative positions of strength and especially information. For the weaker side, these differences usually bring about the danger of being exploited by the other side. If the interactive process consisted of isolated phases only, this danger could prevent the interaction. However, in the course of the entire process, the relative positions are repeatedly switched. This fact influences incentives, behavior, and expectations of both sides, which in return reduces the potential confilict over time, strengthens the mutual commitment, and limits the risks of cooperation to the extent that cooperation becomes possible and reasonable. Many procedural and institutional characteristics of the marketing of complex technical objects fit into this interpretation. The method of analysis used in this article could help to narrow the gap between marketing science and the economic analysis of market processes.     

Industrial buyers' expectations of supplier-attributes across developing countries: Implications for marketing strategies

This paper presents a cross-country comparative study of industrial buyers' expectations of supplier attributes which manifest in the process of supplier selection. The results indicate a variance in these expectations across the countries, implying a multinational rather than a global approach in marketing industrial goods beyond domestic borders. The possible role of cultural factors in the formation of these divergent expectations is suggested. The implications of the findings for developing appropriate marketing strategies, and for future research, are discussed.     

Relationship management: Managing the selling and the buying interface

The new age of industrial marketing, now often referred to as business-to-business marketing, is built upon effective relationship management. The industrial marketer must coordinate the marketing relevant activities of a company with the procurement needs and information requirements of the buying company. Managing this relationship requires the management of the selling and the buying interface. Competitive advantage hinges on the selling company's ability to demonstrate value that results from its cross-functional interdependencies and on its ability to influence the buying center participants' procurement decision processes. This article presents a conceptual approach to understanding and structuring relationship management. In addition, this approach provides a managerially useful framework for implementing industrial marketing strategy through managing the selling and buying interface.     

Conceptualization and Integration of Marketing Intelligence: The Case of an Industrial Manufacturer

Purpose: The primary goal of this article was to conceptualize a systematic marketing intelligence process for industrial manufacturers because, up until now, such concepts have only been focused on consumer goods settings. Hence, this article investigates how marketing intelligence activities are developed and managed effectively in industrial markets.

Methodology/approach: The authors conducted a case study of Maschinenfabrik Reinhausen, a German based manufacturer of regulation technology for power transformers.

Findings: We found that a systematic marketing intelligence process should be based on the resource- and market-based view of strategy as well as on the market orientation construct. When implementing marketing intelligence, the integration of the sales force within the whole process is the crucial lever for an industrial company. The formalization of the process is necessary to ensure its continuity and acceptance; however, the varying intensity allows the necessary flexibility of the process.

Research implications: The constraints of the decisive process steps of marketing intelligence have to be further enhanced for industrial markets. It is important to find out how the integration of the sales force can best be designed to incorporate reward systems and motivation structures, and how to establish a corporate marketing-minded culture throughout the organization.

Practical implications: The important steps for a well implemented marketing intelligence process are a preparation phase, followed by the gathering, analysis, and dissemination of information. This article highlights the success factors for each process step. Above all, managerial and organizational commitment is necessary for the implementation of the whole process.

Originality/value/contribution: By focusing on the industrial manufacturing business, this study provides deep insights into a neglected area of research. Light needs to be shed on marketing intelligence in industrial markets, where the lack of traditional market research has to be compensated.     

The Role of Advertising in the Adoption of Industrial Goods: A Look at the Raw Materials Industry

Although there is comparatively little money spent annually on industrial advertising, several studies have indicated its effectiveness and efficiency during the early stages of the industrial adoption process. This paper examines the comparative effectiveness of five promotional tools in the marketing of an undifferentiated industrial good. Within the cognitive—affective—conative adoption framework, this paper analyzes the role of both personal and non-personal media in the marketing communications process. The results of the study have application for both industrial advertising practitioners and communications researchers.     

Quo Vadis,marketing? Toward a relationship marketing paradigm

The marketing mix and its 4Ps have remained the marketing paradigm for decades. In the article it is argued that the foundation for this paradigm is weak and that it has had negative effects on marketing research and practice. Contemporary research into services marketing and industrial marketing demonstrates that a new approach to marketing is required. This new approach is based on building and management of relationships. A paradigm shift in marketing is under way. The thoughts and actions of marketing academics and practitioners should not be constrained by a paradigm from the 1950s and 1960s.     

Integrating strategy,industrial product innovation and marketing research

This article investigates the function of marketing research with respect to new industrial product innovation, commercialization, and ultimate adoption and diffusion. Although industrial firms have implemented strategic planning concepts extensively, because of the uncertain nature of intermediate markets, they have failed to utilize the full capabilities of marketing research early in the new product innovation and development process.The article also contends that even where there has been awareness of a critical lack of information at the innovation, commercialization, and diffusion-adoption interfaces, discussion of the nature of this information has been insufficient and too narrowly focused to comprehend the decision-support needs of management. Properly integrating industrial marketing research and new product innovation requires remedying four basic problems, viz., problems of appropriate and full utilization, problems of substance and approach, problems of timing and uncertainty, and problems of integration with other functions. The paper concludes with a schema identifying a broad range of useful market research techniques within a framework which encompasses the sequential aspects of bringing a new industrial product to the market from conceptualization to adoption.     

Product attributes for business markets: Implications for selling and sales management

This article offers a conceptual framework for classifying attributes of offerings in a business‐marketing context. Typologies on the nature of product‐related attributes and classification of industrial products are synthesized for viewing levels of product meaning. Repertory grid procedures first developed in clinical psychology and recently adapted for use in business settings are presented as an approach for eliciting salient/determinant attributes. Enhanced effectiveness of the classic industrial selling process is demonstrated along with implications for managing the sales force. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

The impact of telephone notification strategies on response to an industrial mail survey

The mail questionnaire is a popular method of gathering data among marketing academics. However, response rates from industrial populations are often low. A number of alternative strategies designed to enhance response from industrialists are evaluated. The results show that satisfactory response rates can be achieved by the integration of telephone and mail contacts within a survey design without loss of response quality nor distortion of sample composition.     

“Relationship marketing” and the “markets‐as‐networks approach”—a comparative analysis of two evolving streams of research

Predating the increased attention by marketing academics on relationship marketing, European marketing scholars developed a network approach to the study of industrial markets that is also based on relationships between seller and buyer as a fundamental concept. This article aims to analyse the similarities and the differences between relationship marketing studies and network studies. After comparative analyses of definitions, empirical and research foundations, attributes related to governance structures and to the marketing mix approach and of major issues addressed in the research agendas, the conclusion is: relationship marketing in its limited interpretation is just a development within the marketing mix approach. Relationship marketing in its extended interpretation is, or rather could become, close to the markets‐as‐networks approach. However the basic attribute in network studies of “embeddedness” is largely missing in relationship marketing. To develop relationship marketing as a generic concept, researchers need to address also the issue of the generic nature of the market. Because when relationships are regarded as the generic governance form for transactions, then the market itself becomes network‐like!     

Industrial marketing strategies and different national environments

This article analyzes the marketing strategies of industrial suppliers in five Western European countries. The strategies are characterized in a quality dimension and a customer adaptation dimension. In the quality dimension the strategies are found to be related to characteristics of the industrial environment of the supplier country. In the adaptation dimension they are related to the cultural affinity with the customer country as perceived by industrial purchasers in these countries.     

产业集群“离合”营销模式研究——以长垣起重机集群营销创新模式为例

长垣起重机集群的快速崛起为我们提供了一种独特的营销模式——产业集群"离合"营销模式。在长垣起重机产业集群成长过程中,独立、分散、灵活的集群式产业营销团队起着十分关键的作用。这种分布广泛、规模庞大且相对独立自由的集群式产业营销团队并不属于任何企业,而是属于整个产业集群,他们根据客户需求和厂商产品属性进行最优匹配,将市场与厂商连接起来。这种离合式的产业集群营销运行模式,将生产与营销分离开来,使内部营销行为转化为外部公关行为,使生产企业专注于生产,营销人员专注于营销,同时营销人员将所收集的市场信息反馈给生产企业,为企业根据顾客导向调整生产结构提供参考,可为产业集群转型升级与高速发展提供低成本、低风险、高效率、高速度的产业扩张路径,具有重要现实价值;这种离合式的产业集群营销模式,使营销理论从企业内部扩展到产业集群,形成产业集群营销理论,是未来营销理论重要的研究方向,具有重要理论意义。当然,这种模式也具有局限性,仅适用于对品牌要求不高、购买决策模式为公共关系型的大型机械产业集群。     

Customer Loyalty in Clusters: Perceived Value and Satisfaction as Antecedents

Purpose: This article studies, from the perspective of relationship marketing, the loyalty behavior of industrial customers in the context of an industrial cluster. Loyalty is a key variable for studying long-term relationships between firms.

Research implications: Recent advances in consumer and services marketing consider that perceived value and satisfaction are central to explaining customer loyalty. However, very few business-to-business (B2B) studies explain the antecedents of customer loyalty, where perceived value acquires a multidimensional perspective. This study adopts the relationship marketing approach, and loyalty behavior is analyzed in a specific setting: an industrial cluster. Furthermore, the effect of the number of suppliers is analyzed as a possible moderator in the relationships of the model.

Methodology approach: We have chosen the Spanish tile cluster to test a series of hypotheses. Questionnaires were elaborated from primary and secondary information and structural equation models (SEM) have been used for statistical treatment and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA).

Findings: This study highlights the importance of the relationships among perceived value, satisfaction, and loyalty and the importance of the different dimensions of perceived value.

Practical implications: The empirical study and the results provide important evidence for managers, specifically, the critical influence of the emotional and social perceived values by the customer on his or her level of satisfaction and on the achievement of final loyalty—the importance in the commercial training programs of this matters.

Originality, value, and contribution: This study highlights the importance of the most intangibles dimensions of value for the industrial cluster relations between companies.     

What if your owners also own other firms in your industry? The relationship between institutional common ownership,marketing, and firm performance

The growth in institutional holdings of public firms has led to increased interest in the concept of common ownership, in which the same investor owns stakes in multiple firms within the same industry. Economic theory suggests that common ownership could affect firm performance, but little empirical research has examined the nature of this effect or how a firm’s extant marketing potentially relates to this effect. This paper addresses this gap by proposing a relationship between common ownership and firm performance that is moderated by the firm’s extant marketing capabilities and its relative marketing strategic emphasis. Our empirical approach employs data from over 43 million institutional holdings to develop a measure of common ownership and accounts for empirical issues like endogeneity and unobserved heterogeneity. The results document a positive relationship between common ownership and firm performance and provide some evidence that this effect is stronger for firms with lower marketing capabilities and a relative strategic emphasis towards R&D spending. These results suggest that public policymakers should consider the firms’ extant strategic marketing when assessing regulations on common ownership.     

Determinants of industrial mail survey response: A survey‐on‐surveys analysis of researchers' and managers' views

This paper compares the perceptions of marketing research executives and industrial respondents regarding factors impacting on industrial mail survey response. Following a review of the different research traditions to the study of mail response rates, a “survey‐on‐surveys “ approach is introduced and used to study the potential impacts of different design and implementation factors on survey response. The results of the study provide empirical evidence on the perceived influence of a wide variety of response‐inducing factors in industrial mail surveys, and are used to generate managerial recommendations for the conduct of the latter. Directions for future research are also identified.     

Market development in practice: A case study of user‐initiated product innovation

User‐initiated innovation refers to the inauguration of new industrial processes and products by their users rather than by manufacturers. The marketing literature has recently been enhanced by the reconceptualisation of industrial innovation to include the possibility of this customer‐active approach. But the accounts of customer‐active innovation which have so far appeared confine the role of the user to the development of internally‐applied process innovations, leaving their wider commercial exploitation entirely to manufacturers. This article presents a case study of the development of flexible manufacturing systems in a major British company and demonstrates the importance of recognising the active role of users in product innovation.     

The decision‐making process in viral marketing—A review and suggestions for further research

Viral marketing is used to widely distribute content. To achieve this goal, the basic decision‐making process from content reception to interaction must be clarified. This paper examines the decision‐making process of individuals in viral marketing using a new dynamic model. In addition, this work reviews the existing literature on viral marketing and structures to identify existing issues for further research. The decision‐making process is basically divided into two stages. In the first decision stage, individuals decide whether content should be considered. When individuals agree to view the content, they decide in the second stage whether they want to interact with it. These two decisions are influenced by three factors: the framework conditions, content, and interaction aims. With the help of the decision model, this paper summarizes the most important findings from viral marketing research over the last 20 years. In addition, this work provides new opportunities for further research in the field of viral marketing.     

Developing an Inter-Organization Relational Management Perspective

Abstract

Relationship marketing has become a frequently used strategy to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of an organization's marketing efforts. In order to manage relationships effectively over time, the domain (i.e., type of relationship) and the relational linkage (i.e., richness of interaction and communications) must be determined. In this paper, a process for establishing virtual management perspectives is developed illustrating the steps necessary for managing relationships between organizations and individuals within organizations. Taking a proactive approach to the management of relationships appears to be an essential dimension in insuring their success.     

Value creation by company‐consumer interaction

Company‐customer interaction is becoming increasingly widespread in industrial markets, bringing benefits that are both productive and strategic. This paper looks at the prerequisites for applying the same logic in consumer markets.

The conclusion is that due to new technology and the emergence of more qualified and demanding consumers, the logic is already appearing in a wider range of industries, with interaction in one or more activities in the value‐creating process; in design, production and marketing as well as in the consumption and later destruction of products. But, up to now, the benefits are mainly on the consumer side. There seems to be some potential for considerable strategic advantages for companies, however, provided that their organizational structure is modified, new communication channels are built, the competence of the front‐line staff is developed, and the company culture becomes more consumer‐oriented.