Anatomy of competitive advantage: towards a contingency theory of entrepreneurial marketing

Abstract

Entrepreneurial marketing (EM), born out of the practice of firms operating in conditions of uncertainty, is emerging as a powerful alternative to cope with the decreasing effectiveness associated with traditional marketing. In this article, the authors provide their collective position regarding the field of EM. A brief history and conceptual background of EM is presented and the contextual differences that have shaped its evolution are considered. Distinctions between traditional and EM are derived based on discussions of the concepts of size, speed, market, opportunity, risk, and uncertainty. The perspective of value co-creation in uncertainty is used to develop a contingency framework to serve as the foundation towards a general theory of EM. Operand and operant resources and environmental conditions are proposed to moderate the EM process from opportunity recognition to entrepreneurial organization, EM, and temporary competitive advantage. The theoretical facets are illustrated with seven propositions and directions for future research.

Entrepreneurial marketing: the missing link in social enterprise studies

“…In light of the result of this study, it can be concluded that social enterprises have to strengthen their opportunity-seeking abilities (Gilmore, 2011;Morris et al, 2002;Whalen et al, 2016) in order to perform better in the market. They also have to employ more creative (Kotler & Keller, 2012) and innovative approaches (Olofsson, 2015;Rydback & Chen, 2010;Shaw, 2004), i.e., not counting on traditional marketing approaches that much in facing the market environment and competition since change is a necessity for competing triumphantly (Asiedu, Byrne, & Corena, 2011;Sigasa, 2015).…”

“…EM is a combination of innovative, proactive, and risk-taking activities that create, communicate, and deliver value to and by customers, entrepreneurs, marketers, their partners, and society at large (Whalen et al, 2016) Table 1 Entrepreneurial marketing processes compared to traditional marketing concepts (Stokes, 2000) Marketing…”

Incorporating coopetition into the entrepreneurial marketing literature

“…Crick (2018a) explored the: facets, antecedents, and consequences of coopetition, using three dimensions of entrepreneurial marketing, namely: a proactive orientation, resource leveraging behaviours, and innovation-focused behaviours. While Crick (2018a) highlighted that it would have been interesting to apply all seven dimensions of entrepreneurial marketing to coopetition activities (Morris et al, 2002;Whalen et al, 2016), the three that were selected explained: how coopetition can be managed (the facets of coopetition), the factors that motivate entrepreneurs to cooperate with their competitors (the antecedents of coopetition), and the performance outcomes that such strategies might yield (the consequences of coopetition). Crick (2018a) selected these three dimensions of entrepreneurial marketing, as they were conceptually-related to the coopetition literature (Bjerke and Hultman, 2002;Hills et al, 2008; (Alves and Meneses, 2015;Crick and Crick, 2016;Crick, 2018a;Daidj and Egert, 2018), but more research is needed to integrate these two strands of literature.…”

“…As coopetition activities have scarcely been incorporated into the entrepreneurial marketing literature (Alves and Meneses, 2015;Crick and Crick, 2016;Crick, 2018a;Daidj and Egert, 2018), it is proposed that scholars, exploring this field, can use their expertise to fill such research gaps. Further, the marketing/entrepreneurship interface is far from being a saturated research domain (i.e., there are plenty of issues that need to be addressed) (O'Donnell Gilmore, 2011;Mort et al, 2012;Gross et al, 2014;Miles et al, 2015; O'Cass and Morrish, 2016;Whalen et al, 2016). Entrepreneurial marketing scholars should investigate coopetition activities, as well as their: antecedents, consequences, and boundaries to study how collaborating with competitors helps entrepreneurs to overcome certain resource-disadvantages by accessing new: resources, capabilities, and opportunities from their competitors (as per Bengtsson and Johansson, 2014;Granata et al, 2018;Mathias et al, 2018).…”

“…Market orientation is the implementation of the marketing concept, through the organisation-wide: generation of, dissemination of, and responsiveness to market intelligence, whereas, entrepreneurial orientation is the degree to which firms engage in: risk-taking, innovative, and proactive behaviours (Lumpkin and Dess, 1996;Baker and Sinkula, 2009;Boso, Story and Cadogan, 2013). While there is some disagreement in the extant literature concerning how entrepreneurial marketing should be defined and conceptualised, it has been established that the marketing/entrepreneurship interface is comprised of: risk-taking, proactive, and innovative behaviours that firms use to create value for customers (Whalen, Uslay, Pascal, Omura, McAuley, Kasouf, Jones, Hultman, Hills, Hansen, Gilmore, Giglierano, Eggers and Deacon, 2016).…”