Supplier-Selected Referrals

Abstract

In business-to-business markets, suppliers often ask an existing customer to provide a referral for them (i.e., a supplier-selected referral), in which the supplier selects a referrer to influence a specific potential customer favorably. The selection of the referrer is important because the right referrer providing the right message can generate business for the supplier. To study supplier-selected referrals, the authors extend the dyadic sourcemessage-recipient communication framework to propose a framework that incorporates the supplier and the supplier's management of the communication between the referrer and the potential customer. They label this framework the Managed Triadic Communication (MaTriC) framework. The authors conduct three experimental studies in which they apply the MaTriC framework to the domain of supplier-selected referrals and focus on the contingent role of supplier uncertainty. The authors find that the benefits of a supplier-selected referral are contingent on supplier uncertainty. For example, their findings imply that an outsupplier should focus on selecting a referrer that would give an all-positive evaluation (vs. a balanced evaluation), whereas an insupplier should focus on selecting a highly credible referrer, even if that referral does not provide an all-positive evaluation of the supplier.

Analysing moderated mediation effects: Marketing applications

“…All authors contributed equally to this work and are listed in alphabetical order. Preacher et al (2007) Hayes (2013a, 2013b) b Haws and Winterich (2013), Winterich et al (2013), Biswas et al (2013), Rego et al (2013), Thompson and Malaviya (2013), Devezer et al (2014), Hada et al (2014) Sirianni et al 2013…”

L’analyse des effets de médiation modérée : Applications en marketing

“…Haws et ; Winterich et al (2013) ; Biswas et al 2013; Rego et al (2013) ; Thompson et Malaviya (2013) ; Devezer et al (2014) ; Hada et al (2014). Sirianni et al (2013) ; Ma et al (2014) ; Coulter et Grewal (2014) ; Giebelhausen et al (2014) ; Sundar et Noseworthy (2014).…”

Decision-making in supply risk and supply disruption management

“…Hence, nWOM can have tremendous consequences and may affect the purchase decisions of not only a supplier's existing, but also potential customers (Ferguson & Johnston, 2011;Money, Gilly, & Graham, 1998). In industrial buying contexts, nWOM could be shared through, for instance, supplier-selected referrals (Hada, Grewal, & Lilien, 2014). Industrial buyers tend to rely on referrals even more than consumers (Wangenheim & Bayón, 2007) and considerable empirical evidence shows that both purchase intention and nWOM are related to actual behavior (E. W. Anderson, Fornell, & Lehmann, 1994;Morgan & Rego, 2006).…”