Marketing strategy and the hunt for era V

Abstract

This paper sets out a vision and bold research agenda for the future of marketing strategy. It is a response to a recent special issue of the Journal of Marketing Management in which Shelby Hunt (2018) celebrates the achievements of forty years of marketing strategy. In noting the passing of the 'old guard', Hunt calls on a new generation of scholars to meet the challenges confronting marketing and to develop new theories and frameworks to advance Marketing Strategy into Era V.We take for our inspiration Hunt's own words, specifically his reference to the 'promising' and 'problematic' that he uses to characterise the current and latent state of marketing strategy. To build our vision and map out our agenda we assemble a motley crew of scholars more accustomed to the shadows of mainstream marketing theory and employ their critical reflexive oeuvre to offer an alternative reading of this discipline through the idea of Marketing Strategy as Discourse (MSAD). Within the paper we outline the role that discourse can perform as a resource to reconfigure our appreciation of marketing strategy.

Entrepreneurial marketing strategy in craft-based businesses in an emerging market: a qualitative interpretivist approach

“…This study’s findings suggest that craft-based microenterprises should strengthen their marketing strategy to enhance business performance. This study explores the unique elements of marketing strategy practice in the context of craft-based entrepreneurs by making both within-case and cross-case comparisons to determine similarities and differences in their marketing strategy formulation and implementation, thereby contributing to the marketing strategy literature (Godfrey and Higgins, 2020). Few marketing strategy studies have focused on the marketing practices of craft-based microenterprises, especially in emerging markets such as India (Lopes et al , 2021), despite interest from marketing researchers.…”