Marketing’s contribution to business strategy: market orientation, relationship marketing and resource‐advantage theory

Abstract

Although overlooked to some degree by non-marketing disciplines, the discipline of marketing has contributed significantly to the body of knowledge on business strategy over the last two decades. This paper evaluates these contributions, examines how they complement dominant non-marketing theories of business strategy, and shows how marketing offers a generalized theory of competition that integrates the concepts of both marketing and non-marketing theories of business strategy.

What characterises the culture of a market-oriented organisation applying a customer-intimacy philosophy?

“…Theoretical support for this can be found in previous studies. 7,15 They support the notion that strong customer relationships lead to lower costs for the company because loyal customers build business by buying more, are less pricesensitive and provide good word-of-mouth advertising. Extant literature also states that the focus has historically been on attracting new customers.…”

“…Theoretical approaches to modern strategy According to Hunt and Lambe,7 contributions to modern business strategy have come from a broad range of disciplines, including economics, strategic management, organisational behaviour and operations management. 16 -25 Three dominant theoretical approaches to modern strategy (industry-based theory, resourcebased theory and competence-based theory) are recognised in Hunt and Lambe ' s paper.…”

“…16 -25 Three dominant theoretical approaches to modern strategy (industry-based theory, resourcebased theory and competence-based theory) are recognised in Hunt and Lambe ' s paper. 7 I am aware that Bain ' s book, 26 when combined with the works of Mason,27 forms the basis of industrial organisation economics, which postulates that structure determines conduct, which determines performance. Industry-based theory of strategy, as exemplifi ed by Porter, 19 turns industrial organisation economics ' upside down ' because Porter ' s ' fi ve forces ' framework maintains that the profi tability of a fi rm in an industry is determined by the threat of new entrants to the industry, the threat of substitute products or services, the bargaining power of its suppliers, the bargaining power of its customers and the intensity of rivalry among its competitors.…”

“…9,40 The fundamental imperative of market orientation strategy is therefore that, in order to achieve competitive advantage and, thereby superior fi nancial performance, fi rms should systematically gather information on current and potential customers and competitors and use this information in a coordinated, crossdepartmental fashion to guide strategy recognition, understanding, creation, selection, implementation and modifi cation. 7 Hence, market-oriented organisational culture prompts proactive innovation by enabling fi rms to anticipate potential market segments and envision market offerings that might be attractive to such segments, as well as prompting the need to acquire, develop or create the required resources to produce the offerings.…”

The performance implications of strategic capital for public leisure providers

“…The underlying assumption is that resources which are both significantly heterogeneous across firms and imperfectly mobile can generate competitive advantage and superior financial performance (Hunt & Lambe, 2000). However, it is recognised that purely possessing a valuable resource alone does not allow the organisation to achieve a competitive advantage; rather, it is necessary to develop and position all value creating, tangible and intangible entities through a specified strategy (Hughes & Morgan, 2007).…”