Samenvatting artikelen Marketing Performance
Article 1: Assessing Performance Outcomes in Marketing (Katsikas et al, 2016)
A central question in the marketing discipling is the role that firms’ marketing play in explaining
performance outcomes. Reason for this study is that linking marketing with performance outcomes is
a critical issue, but also there has been no attention to how performance is and should be
conceptualized and measured. There is no well-defined, theoretical framework for developing valid
measures of performance outcomes that may be associated with marketing. We can’t get cumulative
knowledge from research because a lot of different ways to asses performance are used.
Operational performance: refers to the fulfillment of goals within different value-chain activity areas
of the firm that may subsequently lead to organizational performance.
Organizational performance: the economic outcomes resulting from the interplay among an
organization’s attributes, actions and environment.
The conceptual model identifies the fundamental steps in the creation of operational and
organizational marketing performance outcomes:
It begins with the
marketing resources,
strategy and actions
that become manifest
in the product market
place in firms’
realized marketing
programs. The
purchase and post-
purchase behavior of
customers results in
customer-level
performance
outcomes, you can
look at this
individually or on
group level. After this, outcomes can also be viewed on a product-market level (sales, market share
etc.). The marketing-performance outcome chain is dynamic, because:
- Companies invest financial resources they’ve gained again to build and maintain their
marketing related (and complementary) resources and opportunities.
- Companies learn while going through the chain, it can lead to adjustments in the selection of
marketing resources or future the marketing programs.
A framework for evaluating marketing performance outcomes should consider five issues:
1. Theoretical rationale: whether performance is formally defined and a rationale provided for
the performance conceptualization adopted in the theoretical body of an article. Researchers
often refer in broad and abstract terms to performance.
2. Conceptual approach of the treatment of performance: three major conceptual approaches
that we employ in our evaluation:
a. Latent conceptualization: performance is a superordinate phenomenon, it exists on a
more abstract level than its indicators/components. With the shared variance of the
indicators, we can assess performance (example: performance is shared variance
among indicators of profitability, customer satisfaction and market effectiveness).
, b. Separate constructs: performance as comprising separate constructs and focus their
theorizing and assessment on one or more of the specific aspects of performance
(example: selecting market capitalization as the ultimate performance outcome).
c. Aggregate construct: performance is the sum of dimensions and we can assess it with
mathematical combinations (example: combining different aspects of brand equity to
compute a dollar brand value, which is used as performance outcome).
3. Aspects of performance assessed: there are six key aspects of performance that may be
assessed in empirical studies: customer mindset outcomes, customer behavior outcomes,
customer-level performance outcomes, product market performance outcomes, accounting
performance outcomes and financial-market performance outcomes (from framework).
4. Referents of performance: standards against which performance is assessed, it’s important
to choose referents based on the theory underlying the research model being tested:
a. Absolute: the absence of any explicit or implicit referent (profit)
b. Relative to inputs: outcomes relative to the used resources (ROI)
c. Temporal: outcomes relative to performance on the same criteria in other time
frames (margin growth)
d. Competition-industry: outcomes relative to others (ROI relative to competitors)
e. Firm goals: are planned outcomes achieved (sales volume relative to goal)
f. Stock market: the extent to which stock-related performance outcomes differ from
those of the whole stock market (abnormal stock returns)
5. Time horizon: the period of the measurement
a. Historical (ROS over past three years)
b. Current (overall performance at current period)
c. Future (expected new product performance over next five years)
Method: 998 relevant journals are analyzed and the data is coded.
Results:
- Theoretical rationale and conceptual approach: less than 10% of researches have a clear
definition and theoretical justification of their conceptualization. Most of the time latent-
construct conceptualization is used. Also, there are often a lot of inconsistencies between the
conceptualization and the operationalization.
- Aspects and measures: the focus is mostly on accounting and product-market aspects. There
is a growing focus on financial-market returns.
o Customer-based: is used in 23% of the researches. Mostly they used customer
satisfaction. Brand equity is the least common.
o Product-market: mostly focus on market share, this is used a lot more than product-
based (like unit sales) or brand-related (like revenue premium) measures.
o Accounting: profit and sales revenue are very common. Cash flow is the least
common, this is remarkable because this is a very relevant measure. Also, cost-
related performance are less common.
o Financial-market: the use of stock-market related measure is increasing, probably
because focusing on stakeholders is emphasized more now. Remarkably, growth-
related measures are not common, while growth is often the main goal of firms.
- Referents and time horizon: referents relative to inputs and absolute referents are most
common. Temporal and goal-related referents are the least common. This can be seen as
problematic. Also, the focus is mostly on current performance and the least on the future,
because this is difficult regarding data.
,Discussion and implications:
- Results show a rapid rise in interest in assessing marketing’s performance outcomes
reflection of the increasingly ‘show-me’ imperative that has grown stronger as firms have
moved to zero-based budgeting. It may also reflect warnings that marketing will become
irrelevant when it’s viewed as being soft an unable to show linkages with performance.
- With no common conceptualization and operationalization of the aspects of marketing
performance, we cannot know whether differences in results across studies are due to the
effect of differences in (1) the study context, (2) the independent variables examined or (3)
the selection and operationalization of dependent variables measuring performance.
- Guidelines (practical steps that are actionable) for assessment of marketing performance:
o Avoid conceptualizing and operationalizing performance as a global latent construct.
Specifying more aspects is better.
o Clearly depict the conceptualization that is adopted and provide a rationale.
, oSelect one or more indicators from within each chosen performance aspect.
oDon’t expect relationships between independent variables/indicators of different
aspects to necessarily converge.
o Make explicit referents and time horizon and provide a rationale.
o Theorize and hypothesize expected cause-and-effect relationships that are specific to
and tightly connected with the particular performance aspect and the indicators.
o Report sample sizes and correlations.
- Managerial implications (two main insights):
o Managers should select at least one metric within each aspect of the chain based on
its perceived importance within the category or industry. This give a comprehensive
mix of evaluative and forward-looking diagnostic metrics.
o Study is useful for managers in explaining the causal linkages between the firm’s
marketing efforts and the types of accounting and financial performance metrics on
which goals are typically set by the firm. Linkages can also be negative.
Article 2: Market Orientation: A Meta-Analytic Review and Assessment of Its Antecedents and
Impact on Performance (Kirca et al, 2005)
Marketing concept: to achieve sustained success, firms should identify and satisfy customer needs
more effectively than their competitors. Much of the prolific market orientation literature examines
the extent to which firms behave, or are inclined to behave, in accordance with the marketing
concept.
Market orientation has been conceptualized from two perspectives:
- The behavioral perspective: concentrates on organizational activities that are related to the
generation and dissemination of and responsiveness to market intelligence
- The cultural perspective: focuses on organizational norms and values that encourage
behaviors that are consistent with market orientation
Method: meta-analysis (researchers have investigated several antecedents and consequences of
market orientation to better understand its role in organizations. They obtained different findings.
These studies have been all qualitative. Therefore the researchers in this article have conducted a
meta-analysis to get insights into these inconsistencies.)
Framework:
Article 1: Assessing Performance Outcomes in Marketing (Katsikas et al, 2016)
A central question in the marketing discipling is the role that firms’ marketing play in explaining
performance outcomes. Reason for this study is that linking marketing with performance outcomes is
a critical issue, but also there has been no attention to how performance is and should be
conceptualized and measured. There is no well-defined, theoretical framework for developing valid
measures of performance outcomes that may be associated with marketing. We can’t get cumulative
knowledge from research because a lot of different ways to asses performance are used.
Operational performance: refers to the fulfillment of goals within different value-chain activity areas
of the firm that may subsequently lead to organizational performance.
Organizational performance: the economic outcomes resulting from the interplay among an
organization’s attributes, actions and environment.
The conceptual model identifies the fundamental steps in the creation of operational and
organizational marketing performance outcomes:
It begins with the
marketing resources,
strategy and actions
that become manifest
in the product market
place in firms’
realized marketing
programs. The
purchase and post-
purchase behavior of
customers results in
customer-level
performance
outcomes, you can
look at this
individually or on
group level. After this, outcomes can also be viewed on a product-market level (sales, market share
etc.). The marketing-performance outcome chain is dynamic, because:
- Companies invest financial resources they’ve gained again to build and maintain their
marketing related (and complementary) resources and opportunities.
- Companies learn while going through the chain, it can lead to adjustments in the selection of
marketing resources or future the marketing programs.
A framework for evaluating marketing performance outcomes should consider five issues:
1. Theoretical rationale: whether performance is formally defined and a rationale provided for
the performance conceptualization adopted in the theoretical body of an article. Researchers
often refer in broad and abstract terms to performance.
2. Conceptual approach of the treatment of performance: three major conceptual approaches
that we employ in our evaluation:
a. Latent conceptualization: performance is a superordinate phenomenon, it exists on a
more abstract level than its indicators/components. With the shared variance of the
indicators, we can assess performance (example: performance is shared variance
among indicators of profitability, customer satisfaction and market effectiveness).
, b. Separate constructs: performance as comprising separate constructs and focus their
theorizing and assessment on one or more of the specific aspects of performance
(example: selecting market capitalization as the ultimate performance outcome).
c. Aggregate construct: performance is the sum of dimensions and we can assess it with
mathematical combinations (example: combining different aspects of brand equity to
compute a dollar brand value, which is used as performance outcome).
3. Aspects of performance assessed: there are six key aspects of performance that may be
assessed in empirical studies: customer mindset outcomes, customer behavior outcomes,
customer-level performance outcomes, product market performance outcomes, accounting
performance outcomes and financial-market performance outcomes (from framework).
4. Referents of performance: standards against which performance is assessed, it’s important
to choose referents based on the theory underlying the research model being tested:
a. Absolute: the absence of any explicit or implicit referent (profit)
b. Relative to inputs: outcomes relative to the used resources (ROI)
c. Temporal: outcomes relative to performance on the same criteria in other time
frames (margin growth)
d. Competition-industry: outcomes relative to others (ROI relative to competitors)
e. Firm goals: are planned outcomes achieved (sales volume relative to goal)
f. Stock market: the extent to which stock-related performance outcomes differ from
those of the whole stock market (abnormal stock returns)
5. Time horizon: the period of the measurement
a. Historical (ROS over past three years)
b. Current (overall performance at current period)
c. Future (expected new product performance over next five years)
Method: 998 relevant journals are analyzed and the data is coded.
Results:
- Theoretical rationale and conceptual approach: less than 10% of researches have a clear
definition and theoretical justification of their conceptualization. Most of the time latent-
construct conceptualization is used. Also, there are often a lot of inconsistencies between the
conceptualization and the operationalization.
- Aspects and measures: the focus is mostly on accounting and product-market aspects. There
is a growing focus on financial-market returns.
o Customer-based: is used in 23% of the researches. Mostly they used customer
satisfaction. Brand equity is the least common.
o Product-market: mostly focus on market share, this is used a lot more than product-
based (like unit sales) or brand-related (like revenue premium) measures.
o Accounting: profit and sales revenue are very common. Cash flow is the least
common, this is remarkable because this is a very relevant measure. Also, cost-
related performance are less common.
o Financial-market: the use of stock-market related measure is increasing, probably
because focusing on stakeholders is emphasized more now. Remarkably, growth-
related measures are not common, while growth is often the main goal of firms.
- Referents and time horizon: referents relative to inputs and absolute referents are most
common. Temporal and goal-related referents are the least common. This can be seen as
problematic. Also, the focus is mostly on current performance and the least on the future,
because this is difficult regarding data.
,Discussion and implications:
- Results show a rapid rise in interest in assessing marketing’s performance outcomes
reflection of the increasingly ‘show-me’ imperative that has grown stronger as firms have
moved to zero-based budgeting. It may also reflect warnings that marketing will become
irrelevant when it’s viewed as being soft an unable to show linkages with performance.
- With no common conceptualization and operationalization of the aspects of marketing
performance, we cannot know whether differences in results across studies are due to the
effect of differences in (1) the study context, (2) the independent variables examined or (3)
the selection and operationalization of dependent variables measuring performance.
- Guidelines (practical steps that are actionable) for assessment of marketing performance:
o Avoid conceptualizing and operationalizing performance as a global latent construct.
Specifying more aspects is better.
o Clearly depict the conceptualization that is adopted and provide a rationale.
, oSelect one or more indicators from within each chosen performance aspect.
oDon’t expect relationships between independent variables/indicators of different
aspects to necessarily converge.
o Make explicit referents and time horizon and provide a rationale.
o Theorize and hypothesize expected cause-and-effect relationships that are specific to
and tightly connected with the particular performance aspect and the indicators.
o Report sample sizes and correlations.
- Managerial implications (two main insights):
o Managers should select at least one metric within each aspect of the chain based on
its perceived importance within the category or industry. This give a comprehensive
mix of evaluative and forward-looking diagnostic metrics.
o Study is useful for managers in explaining the causal linkages between the firm’s
marketing efforts and the types of accounting and financial performance metrics on
which goals are typically set by the firm. Linkages can also be negative.
Article 2: Market Orientation: A Meta-Analytic Review and Assessment of Its Antecedents and
Impact on Performance (Kirca et al, 2005)
Marketing concept: to achieve sustained success, firms should identify and satisfy customer needs
more effectively than their competitors. Much of the prolific market orientation literature examines
the extent to which firms behave, or are inclined to behave, in accordance with the marketing
concept.
Market orientation has been conceptualized from two perspectives:
- The behavioral perspective: concentrates on organizational activities that are related to the
generation and dissemination of and responsiveness to market intelligence
- The cultural perspective: focuses on organizational norms and values that encourage
behaviors that are consistent with market orientation
Method: meta-analysis (researchers have investigated several antecedents and consequences of
market orientation to better understand its role in organizations. They obtained different findings.
These studies have been all qualitative. Therefore the researchers in this article have conducted a
meta-analysis to get insights into these inconsistencies.)
Framework:
