دانلود رایگان مقاله انگلیسی ارتباطات B2B ارتباطی از طریق مشارکت کنندگان: پروژه بین المللی پروژه کره شمالی و نروژ - الزویر 2018

ABSTRACT

Initiation is still an unclear phase of B2B relationship development. Here, we build on existing theoretical knowledge derived from relationship development, project marketing and international business literature. We use this to analyze three cases of business relationship initiations between Norwegian and South Korean actors in the shipping industry. By piecing together theoretical and empirical insights, we develop a dynamic model of the relationship initiation process that highlights the role of initiation contributors in international project business. The developed model reveals that multiple entities— such as contacts, rituals and standards—serve as initiation contributors. These trigger or facilitate the focal dyadic relationship initiation, while also preparing future initiations in the focal context. Thus, our key contribution is to bring processual and contextual dimensions to business relationship initiation. Our research also suggests practical insights as to which actors and entities suppliers need to mobilize, in order to initiate new business relationships in international project business contexts.

6. Conclusions

When it comes to the topic of first contact in an international business context, many practitioners and even scholars evoke serendipity (Ellis, 2000; Perna et al., 2015). Our contribution breaks with this dominant perspective by developing a dynamic model of the initiation process, with six key process elements, and a categorization of three categories of initiation contributors. In doing so, our research downplays the role of serendipity in first contact to highlight the possibility of facilitating business relationship initiation.

Our detailed analysis of the full processes of initiation reveals that initiation contributors facilitate initiation via two mechanisms, namely, triggering/advancing the focal initiation and contributing to future initiations in the focal context through revival and reactivation. Our results provide new avenues for research on relationship marketing approaches and provide practitioners with new opportunities to build relationships. These and our three contributions are therefore summarized next.