Word-of-Mouth Communication in the Industrial Adoption Process

Abstract

Research conducted in three industrial markets indicates that word-of-mouth communication within firms is an important influence in the later stages of the adoption process. Opinion leaders were found to be more heavily exposed to impersonal sources of information than other buying influentials in the firm.

Communicating customer references on industrial companies' Web sites

“…The results of the study have implications to the research on customer references and referrals (Gomez-Arias & Montermoso, 2007;Helm, 2003;Salminen & Möller, 2006) and industrial word-of-mouth (Hansen, Samuelsen, & Silseth, 2008;Martilla, 1971;Money, 2004;Webster, 1970). While previous studies have focused mainly on the motivation and consequences of referral making, this study is one of the first attempts to shed light on the actual reference utilization practices used by industrial companies.…”

“…Originally stemming from the consumer marketing setting, word-of-mouth behavior has been studied to some extent also in the context of industrial markets (e.g. Hansen, Samuelsen, & Silseth, 2008;Martilla, 1971;Money, Gilly, & Graham, 1998;Money, 2004;Webster, 1970). The earliest studies on word-of-mouth behavior in the industrial marketing context found that informal word-ofmouth communication is less common in industrial markets than in consumer markets (Webster, 1970).…”

Practices and functions of customer reference marketing — Leveraging customer references as marketing assets

“…Originally stemming from the consumer marketing context, wordof-mouth (WOM) behavior has also been studied to some extent in the context of industrial markets (e.g., Webster, 1970;Martilla, 1971;Money, Gilly & Graham, 1998;Money, 2004;Hansen, Samuelsen & Silseth, 2008). However, as the concept by definition refers to informal information exchange between individuals (Westbrook, 1987), it does not provide tools to explain all the aspects of supplier-initiated customer reference marketing because it does not include the supplier's own influence on the process or the status-transfer effects (Podolny, 1993;Podolny, 1994) from reputable reference customers.…”

“…The variety of external and internal functions that customer references were found to serve gives a more wide-ranging view of their roles as marketing assets beyond the word-of-mouth and referral effects accentuated in prior studies (Webster, 1970;Martilla, 1971;Ryals & Knox, 2007;Wangenheim & Bayón, 2007;Hansen et al, 2008;Olaru et al, 2008;Lacey and Morgan, 2009). The prevailing view about the role of customer references seems to be incomplete, as there are several internal functions of customer references that may contribute to offering development, organizational learning and the supplier's understanding of its own competencies and abilities to deliver customer value.…”

The Implications of Business-to-Business and Consumer Market Differences for B2B Branding Strategy

“…Nevertheless, his study suggests that opinion-leader companies have similar characteristics, including their generally larger size, commitment to new product development, progressive top management, and financial success. Martilla's (1971) study of word-of-mouth communication in industrial markets counters Webster's findings. Martilla attempted to verify whether the consumer product adoption process applied to industrial markets.…”