Marketing-specific intellectual capital: conceptualization, scale development and empirical illustration

Abstract

PurposeThe aims of this paper are to identify and classify the knowledge resources that shape intellectual capital (IC) within the marketing function, to develop and validate a related scale and to demonstrate the scale's applicability in an empirical context.Design/methodology/approachA literature-based approach was adopted to identify and classify knowledge assets in the field of marketing. The new scale's content was then tested in a number of companies with different profiles. A subsequent survey of a representative sample of 346 Spanish firms sought to validate the scale and to assess those companies' marketing-related IC.FindingsThe literature search provided the basis for a marketing-related IC architecture comprising three main categories, nine subcategories and eighty items whose validity was tested and confirmed. The survey revealed that marketing-specific human capital (HC) is the most developed knowledge resource in Spanish firms, followed by marketing-specific relational capital (RC), while marketing-specific structural capital (SC) is the least developed. Significant differences were also found among companies with different profiles (B2C vs B2B, high-tech vs low-tech and manufacturing vs services).Originality/valueThis study makes a valuable contribution to the IC literature as one of the first to deploy the general IC framework in a specific functional area (here: marketing and sales) for more meaningful and in-depth assessment of firm-specific knowledge resources.

Dynamic Capabilities and Their Impact on Intellectual Capital and Innovation Performance

“…[33] stated that firms with high intellectual capital are more competent at innovating and enhancing their performance. Numerous researchers considered well the fact that new product expansion can be maintained via the development of intellectual capital in a firm [34][35][36]. Intellectual capital has been much discussed in developed countries for organisation value creation.…”

Putting knowledge to work: the combined role of marketing and sales employees’ knowledge and motivation to produce superior customer experiences

“…Within the ICV, knowledge resources are split up into three main categories: human capital (i.e., knowledge residing in the employees of the firm), structural or organizational capital (i.e., knowledge embedded in the company's structures and processes), and relational or social capital (i.e., knowledge residing in relationships, both internal and external to the firm). Human capital (which constitutes the focus of this paper) encompasses both employees' explicit or "conscious" knowledge (e.g., knowledge about facts, characteristics, and trends) and tacit or "automatic" knowledge (i.e., skills, abilities, or knowhow) (Peñalba-Aguirrezabalaga et al, 2020).…”

“…Additionally, skills or know-how-based knowledge (Kogut and Zander, 1992) affect the quality of implementation of the selected action alternatives. Therefore, we examine the impact of marketing-specific human capital (i.e., all the knowledge and skills possessed by marketing and sales employees; Peñalba-Aguirrezabalaga et al, 2020) on the generation and delivery of superior CE as compared to competitors.…”

“…This is why the knowledge and skills of marketing and sales employees are highly important in providing positive CEs. Such knowledge and skills constitute a company's marketing-specific human capital (Peñalba-Aguirrezabalaga et al, 2020). The latter includes several subcategories, discussed below.…”

“…Our results contribute to the IC and KM literature, where more contextual approaches to IC have been called for (Kianto et al, 2018). Marketing is a specific context that focuses particularly on customer value creation (Kotler and Armstrong, 2018), which has also received recent attention in IC research (Peñalba-Aguirrezabalaga et al, 2020). In this study, we adopted a contextual approach to human capital, demonstrating the organizational value of knowledge and skills possessed by marketing and sales employees.…”