Managing Key Business-to-Business Relationships

Abstract

Date of submission: Tuesday, February 28, 2006 6,748 words excluding references and tablesManaging key business-to-business relationships: what marketing can learn from supply chain management Key Account Management (KAM) is a rapidly-growing area of interest in business-to-business marketing. However, unnoticed by marketing, a quiet revolution has taken place in Supply Chain Management (SCM), where the traditional focus on least-cost transactions has given way to a focus on long-term relationships with a few key suppliers. It is thus apparent that the two disciplines are converging. This paper uses a cross-disciplinary approach to explore whether these developments from the field of SCM provide insights into key business-to-business relationships. A detailed case study of a long-term relationship between a business-to-business services provider and a key customer in the construction industry suggests that there is a definable overlap. The supply chain model illuminates five important elements of the KAM relationship and offers a promising method for the evaluation of such relationships. As a result of the research, both supplier and customer companies implemented actions to improve and strengthen their important relationship.

Social Networks within Sales Organizations: Their Development and Importance for Salesperson Performance

“…This finding provides strong supporting evidence for the suggestion that intraorganizational factors can contribute greatly to sales performance (Ryals and Humphries 2007). Our results also show that political skill positively influences salespeople's development of relational centrality, and because it takes time to develop this social network position, this relationship is strengthened by salespeople's tenure in the organization.…”

Key Account Management – A Review

“…The importance of KAM in establishing long term business relationships between buyer and seller in B2B markets is extensively recognised in literature (Ojasalo, 2001;Homburg, Workman, & Jensen, 2002;Henneberg, Pardo, & Mouzas, 2005;Wengler, Ehret, & Saab, 2006;Ryals & Humphries, 2007;Davies & Ryals, 2014;Marcos-Cuevas, Natti, Palo, & Ryals, 2014). However, this long term perspective of KAM lacks of appropriate empirical examination .…”

Services Marketing Within Business-to-Business Context: A Content Analysis of 1996 – 2014 Period

“…Most of the relationship papers (24 articles) represent content addressing the relationship aspects such as; quality, satisfaction, value, trust, commitment etc. (Filiatrault and Lapierre, 1997;Patterson, 2000;Mittal, 2010;Bennett et al 2004;Money, 2004;Lapierre et al 1999;Gounaris, 2005;Molinari et al 2008;Rapp et al 2008;Theron et al 2008;Stan et al 2007;Chumpitaz et al 2007;Durvasula et al 2002;Peterson et al 2005;Doney et al 2007;Parry et al 2012;Ryals and Humphries, 2007;Mencarelli and Riviere, 2014;ALHussan et al 2014;Kelly and Scott, 2012;Bolton et al 2003;Keiningham et al 2003;Vosgerau et al 2008;Eid et al 2006;Johnson et al 2001), 6-7 studies addressed the network (Gummesson and Polese, 2009;Covelio and Brodie, 2001;Covelio et al 2002;Wilkinson, 2006;Jones et al 2013;Moliner-Velazquez et al 2014), and 6 addressed buyer-seller relationship (Barry et al 2008;Homburg and Garbe, 1999;Edvardsson et al 2008;Viio and Gronroos, 2014;Edvardsson et al 2014;Lambert and Enz, 2012). The remaining studies are related with relationship quality (Palmatier, 2008;Boles et al 2000;…”