P. Rajan Varadarajan

Sustainable Competitive Advantage in Service Industries: a Conceptual Model and Research Propositions

This paper presents a review of the literature to demonstrate that research in services marketing is characterized more by an operations management orientation than a strategic orientation. Diverse literature on sustainable competitive advantage (SCA) is synthesized and a conceptual model of drivers of SCA is proposed in this paper. Lessons from the manufacturing sector form the basis for a number of sources of SCA for services industries outlined in the paper. The distinctive characteristics of services are posited to moderate the effectiveness of the sources of competitive advantage.

Marketing Strategy: An Assessment of the State of the Field and Outlook

This article provides an assessment of the state of the field of marketing strategy research and the outlook. Using institutional theory, the authors develop an organizing framework to serve as a road map for assessing research in marketing strategy. Their assessment of the state of the field based on a review of extant literature suggests that significant strides in conceptual development and empirical research have been achieved in a number of areas. Several recent developments in the business world, including deconglomeration and increased organizational focus on managing and leveraging market-based assets such as brand equity and customer equity, suggest that marketing is likely to play a more important role in charting the strategic direction of the firm. However, the theoretical contributions of the field to the academic dialogue on strategy leave much to be desired.

Market Situation Interpretation and Response: The Role of Cognitive Style, Organizational Culture, and Information Use

Improving marketing decision making requires a better understanding of the factors that influence how managers interpret and respond to a market situation. Building on extant literature, the authors develop a model that delineates antecedents of and responses to the interpretation of a market situation. Using case-scenario methodology, the authors test the model in the context of a marketing decision (annual advertising and promotion budget recommendation) with data collected from a nationwide sample of hospital marketing executives. The results of the partial least squares analysis show that (1) cognitive style, organizational culture, and information use affect the extent to which managers perceive a given market situation as one in which they can control the outcomes of their decision; (2) the more managers perceive a situation as controllable, the more they appraise that situation as an opportunity; and (3) the more managers appraise a situation as an opportunity, the greater is the magnitude of their response.

Marketing strategy and the internet: An organizing framework

Competitive strategy is primarily concerned with how a business should deploy resources at its disposal to achieve and maintain defensible competitive positional advantages in the marketplace. Competitive marketing strategy focuses on how a business should deploy marketing resources at its disposal to facilitate the achievement and maintenance of competitive positional advantages in the marketplace. In a growing number of product-markets, the competitive landscape has evolved from a predominantly physical marketplace to one encompassing both the physical and the electronic marketplace. This article presents a conceptual framework delineating the drivers and outcomes of marketing strategy in the context of competing in this broader, evolving marketplace. The proposed framework provides insights into changes in the nature and scope of marketing strategy; specific industry, product, buyer, and buying environment characteristics; and the unique skills and resources of the firm that assume added relevance in the context of competing in the evolving marketplace.

The Contingency Approach: Its Foundations and Relevance to Theory Building and Research in Marketing

The contingency approach and its relevance to theory building and research in marketing is described. The approach is delineated and its theoretical foundations traced. Several established contingency theories within the management discipline are outlined and the research they have stimulated on related topics in marketing are highlighted. An assessment of the current state of the contingency approach in marketing literature is then provided.

Diversification and Performance: A Reexamination using A New Two-Dimensional Conceptualization of Diversity in Firms

The article discusses a study which examines the linkage between diversity and performance using a two-dimensional conceptualization of diversity in business enterprises. Methods for measuring dive...

Generating New Product Ideas: An Initial Investigation of the Role of Market Information and Organizational Characteristics

Although product innovation is widely recognized as crucial to the success of organizations, the literature still contains certain gaps that limit our understanding of successful product innovation. These gaps include a lack of research employing a decompositional approach (i,e., analysis of the drivers at each stage of the process) to studying product innovation and a related lack of research investigating the effect of organizational characteristics on specific stages of the product innovation process. The authors attempt to close these gaps by developing and testing a model examining the moderating effects of organizational characteristics on the relationship between the amount of market information gathered and the number of new product ideas generated by work groups in organizations. The study findings provide insights into the types of organizational structure and climate characteristics that can have an impact on the relationship between amount of market information and new product idea generation.

Diversification and Measures of Performance: Additional Empirical Evidence

The article focuses on a study which explored diversification, financial performance and other issues involved in corporate strategy. A discussion is presented about corporate management and proces...

Delineating the scope of corporate, business, and marketing strategy

Abstract The conceptualization of strategy in terms of corporate, business, and functional level strategies has gained wide acceptance in the strategic management and marketing literatures. Under this schema, strategy at each level is presumed to have a well defined domain, and key decisions associated with each level are presumed to be made by decision makers at that level. While the above hierarchial conceptualization of strategy does have its merits, as pointed out in this paper, when used as a basis for defining and delimiting the scope of corporate, business and marketing strategy, and specifying the locus of strategic decision making within organizations, the overlapping nature of these strategic domains and the multiplicity of environmental and organizational factors that may lead to a divergence between the locus of strategy and locus of decision making should be recognized.

Environmental management:The construct and research propositions

Abstract The environmental management perspective assumes that marketing strategies can be used to control, manage, or change the context within which organizations operate. This article considers the factors underlying differences in the extent to which organizations are proactive in managing their environments. Literatures relating to the environmental determinism and strategic choice perspectives are reviewed, and a model delineating the major factors explaining differences among organizations in their level of environmental management is presented. Several propositions relating these factors to environmental management are developed and discussed.