Adel I. El-Ansary

Marketing strategy: taxonomy and frameworks

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present taxonomy of marketing strategy concepts and integrative frameworks that differentiate and integrate its formulation and implementation processes.Design/methodology/approach – The paper is conceptual based on a review of academic literature on marketing strategy chronicled in major marketing journals January 1990‐April 2006. We present selected references classified by key marketing strategy topics for further pursuit by interested readers. Also, the paper reflects our experience and views based on practices chronicled in corporate case studies and trade journals.Findings – The literature casts marketing strategy formulation and implementation in the context of strategic planning and marketing strategy process models. The focus of the strategic planning model is on achieving corporate financial objectives through the implementation of product, pricing, promotion, and place (distribution) programs. The focus of the marketing strategy process model is on the ...

The impact of a distributor's trust in a supplier and use of control mechanisms on relational value creation in marketing channels

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to explore empirically how a distributors trust in a supplier and its use of control mechanisms affect the values it gains from the relationship.Design/methodology/approach – Factor analysis and a structural equation model were used to test the framework in a sample of 251 distributors in the household appliances industry in China.Findings – The findings show that a distributors honesty trust in a supplier enhances the direct value gained through the use of both contract and relational norms, but hinders and promotes the indirect value gained through the use of contract and relational norms respectively. A distributors benevolence trust promotes the direct and indirect value gained through the use of relational norms, but impedes the direct value and enhances the indirect value gained through the use of contracts.Research limitations/implication – A distributors trust in a supplier may involve competence trust besides honesty trust and benevolence trust. Hence, t...

The Impact of Interpersonal Guanxi on Exercise of Power in a Chinese Marketing Channel

ABSTRACT Taking retailers and their suppliers as the unit of analysis, this study investigated the impact of interpersonal guanxi on exercise of power in a Chinese marketing channel. By analyzing the data of 225 cases collected from the supplier side, the study found that interpersonal guanxi is composed of instrumental part and emotional part, and the emotional part, that is, the closeness in emotion between reps of channel partners, is positively related to a members exercise of noncoercive power and negatively related to its exercise of coercive power, while the instrumental part, that is, the interactions between reps of channel partners, is positively related to a members exercise of both noncoercive power and coercive power.

Relationship Marketing Management

Abstract ‘History of Marketing Thought: An Update’ (Sheth & Gardner, 1982) was the last published work documenting the evolution of the various schools of marketing in context of history of marketing thought. This article provides an account of the emergence of the ‘newest’ mainstream school of thought in marketing; that is, Relationship Marketing. In pursuit of this update we became increasingly convinced that Relationship Marketing is ‘as much about management as it is about marketing.’ Indeed, the propeller of the Relationship Marketing school of thought is the recognition by academicians and practitioners alike of the need for some measure of ‘customer,’ and ‘partner,’ relationship management in the marketing system. Therefore, we propose a new name for the newest school of thought in marketing, ‘Relationship Marketing Management.’ We conclude that while Relationship Marketing Management will not rise to the status of a discipline, it will replace traditional Marketing Management as the mainstream school of marketing thought.

Effects of Social Bonding in Business-to-Business Relationships

This study investigates the social relationship between buyers’ key contact employees and sellers’ key contact employees in business-to-business marketing relationships in service industries. We specifically examine the impact of social bonding on the buyers (a) loyalty toward the seller, (b) trust in the seller, (c) satisfaction with the seller, and (d) perceptions of the service quality provided by the seller while controlling for structural and economic bonds. To address this question, we use embeddedness theory, social exchange theory, marketing exchange theory, and attribution theory. Using partial least squares analysis, we demonstrate that when structural and economic bonds were controlled, social bonds significantly impacted the buyers loyalty, trust, and satisfaction toward the seller and the buyers perceptions of the sellers service quality.

The role of wholesalers in developing countries

Abstract This article posits that the role of wholesalers in underdeveloped economies has been a neglected topic. The authors note the importance of wholesalers as an institution in the distribution sector of emerging economies. It is maintained that wholesalers in these countries are a necessary ingredient for achieving distribution effectiveness and perhaps efficiency. Two research propositions are presented to develop this neglected but extremely critical topic.

Special Issue: “History of Marketing Channels Thought: Theory Formation and Identity Confirmation”

The historical roots of marketing stretch back over 100 years to the early conceptualizations of distribution grounded in economics. These core distribution functions still need to be performed today by firms evolving continually to meet the needs of our present and future markets. The technologies themselves have changed from horse and wagon, to motor vehicles, to e-marketing with perhaps future autonomous aircraft “drone”delivery, as each technology has been replaced in turn with a more efficient, more “modern” technology to meet the needs of customers of the time. However, these new technologies must still be focused on the key marketing goal of facilitating exchange. This goal has not changed over the marketing century and is not likely to do so in the future. Throughout this long history, marketing-related organizations and marketing functions (or flows) have been central to theory development. Perhaps one reason for this focus is that it is these organizations executing the marketing functions within marketing channels that service the needs of their customers domestically and internationally. The discipline appears to continue to believe that eliminating a function cripples the channel. But the modern-day marketing “identity crisis” recognized by some scholars does not appear to fully consider the historical development of the discipline. Debates about the nature and scope of marketing, disciplinary boundaries and theoretical bases, and the synergistic relationship between theory and practice seem to lack a foundation in institutional historical memory. Perhaps this is in part the result of a decline in the attention paid to the study of the historical development of the discipline, such as the early—but still important—work of Wroe Alderson and Robert Bartels, who so greatly shaped mainstream modern marketing thought. The purpose of this Special Issue is to consider the history of marketing channels as a lens to focus on where we have been, where we are, and where we might be headed both theoretically and managerially. In this age of e-commerce transforming social media (or perhaps vice versa?), it would seem helpful to reflect on the past and consider the implications for how theory and practicemay evolve: we are thinking of the past and present as prologue. We see, for instance, how the “old” tools of direct marketing are being applied in fresh new ways to online marketing. Some examples of the research that would be welcomed include the following: