Exploring the Marketing Program Antecedents of Performance in a Global Company

Abstract

1As the era of globalization continues to manifest through the emergence of global companies, the use of marketing programs in these firms has become increasingly important. This research examines global marketing program-related factors, their drivers, and their performance consequences. The global marketing program, as the authors conceptualize it, consists of three key factors: global marketing strategy, global marketing structure, and global marketing processes. The authors develop and test an empirical model to portray the application of the global marketing program factors with respect to product standardization and product processes. As such, global customer convergence and leadership's global orientation have significant, positive effects on global product standardization and global marketing structure. The authors find that global product standardization and global marketing structure drive the implementation of global product processes, which are positively related to marketing performance.The environmental forces of globalization have provided means for the fittest of multinational corporations (MNCs) to thrive in a new world in which suppliers, competitors, and customers are no longer bound by the nation-state, or even region. Free trade and business acumen have found a way to achieve what none has been able to before: a convergence in consumer attitudes and behaviors, which can be satisfied only by organizations that operate beyond traditional geographic and cultural boundaries. The key to success for companies in this age comes from the ability to accommodate the forces that create mutual desires; the true challenge for marketing managers is to implement marketing concepts through processes that link the organization and the customer.In general, it is accepted that marketing is a complex set of functions that involve tactics, or the act of demand stimulation and selling; culture, which provides a means to implement a customer orientation; and strategy, which translates the marketing concept into actions that create competitive advantage (Webster 2002). Although the relative importance of how well a firm's strategies fit with an environment has been explored (Vekatraman and Prescott 1990), as has the importance of the fit between the marketing structure and processes with a firm's strategy (Srivastava, Shervani, and

Global customer team design: Dimensions, determinants, and performance outcomes

“…This approach is in line with the recommendations for a two-step approach in which the measurement model is estimated separately prior to the simultaneous estimation of the measurement and structural submodels (Anderson & Gerbing, 1988;Fornell & Yi, 1992) and is consistent with other studies in the marketing area (e.g. Townsend et al, 2004;Zou & Cavusgil, 2002) Table 7 reports the results for the second-order measurement model. The chi-square/degrees of freedom ratio (χ²/df), root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA), root mean square residual (RMR), comparative fit index (CFI), and goodness-of-fit index (GFI) values are satisfactory for all four dimensions and thus suggest the CFA models fit the data adequately (Hu & Bentler, 1999).…”

“…Top management support often is identified as crucial for all aspects of GCM activities Homburg et al, 2002;Millman & Wilson, 1999), and some support emerges for the positive relationship between top management support and GCM effectiveness (Workman et al, 2003), as well as marketing performance (Townsend, Yeniyurt, Deligonul, & Cavusgil, 2004) and market orientation (Jaworski & Kohli, 1993). In particular, support in the form of resource allocations and public recognition of the GCT's efforts conveys the importance that top management attributes to the GCM initiative and is pivotal for overcoming potential resistance or power struggles within the firm and legitimizing the efforts of the team as a strategic undertaking .…”

Reflections on international marketing: destructive regeneration and multinational firms

“…To minimize redundancy in operations and investments, and to rationalize value-adding activities, firms will need to adopt common practices, platforms, and reward mechanisms. Instrumental in implementing this global rationalization are such integrating tools as global supply chains, global product platforms, global teams, intranets, and global talent pools (Hult et al 2007;Sinkovics et al 2011;Townsend et al 2004).…”

Achieving Subsidiary Integration in International Innovation by Managerial “Tools”

“…By highlighting the association between integration and subsidiary performance, our study complements the literature that stresses the benefits of integration from the parent company's or the overall MNC's view (e.g., Bartlett and Ghoshal 1989;cavusgil et al 2004;townsend et al 2004;Yeniyurt et al 2005;Zou and cavusgil 2002). there are basically two ways for a subsidiary to attain superior financial performance-first, by being successful on the external market, and second, by using its bargaining power to appropriate more internal rents (Mudambi and Navarra 2004).…”

“…We concentrate on three specific formal "tools" for which there is consensus in the literature regarding their importance and relevance: inter-subsidiary knowledge asset transfer (cf. Kogut and Zander 1992;luo 2002;Szulanski 1996;townsend et al 2004;tsai 2002), subsidiary mandates (cf. Birkinshaw 1996;cantwell and Mudambi 2005;Feinberg 2000;Roth and Morrison 1992), and subsidiary autonomy (cf.…”