دانلود رایگان مقاله انگلیسی مدیریت استراتژیک محصول و پسوند برند: گسترش برند سازمانی در B2B در مقابل بازار B2C - الزویر 2017

ABSTRACT

Decisions about expanding an existing product portfolio and capturing new markets are of critical importance to a firm's financial performance and growth. Yet, important questions remain in regard to the extent to which product and brand extensions contribute to a firm's profit in B2B and B2C markets, respectively, and how firms with corporate brands in these markets should pursue an extension strategy that provides maximum impact on firm profit. The authors theorize and empirically address these questions based on a study of firms listed in the U.S. Fortune 500 published ranking. Findings of this research have important prescriptive implications for the management of B2B and B2C firms' growth-based extension strategy and contribute to B2B theory.

6. Discussion

A fundamental concern for B2B firms is how to maximize the profit contribution of their extension strategies. We complement existing work and extend current knowledge in this area by uniquely defining and operationalizing product extensions and distinguishing three types of brand extensions. We find that product extensions have a strong, positive effect on the profit of firms that operate in B2B markets, while the effect takes the shape of an inverted-U for B2C firms. A very different picture emerges for brand extensions. Although the increasing number of complementary brand extensions positively affects the profit of both B2B and B2C firms, the substitutable brand extensions show a positive impact on firm profit only in the B2B market, but not in the B2C market. The contribution of independent brand extensions is positive for a B2C firm's profit, but is in the shape of an inverted-U for a B2B firm's profit.

The current findings highlight the importance of proactively managing the number of product and brand extensions as well as the different types thereof. Instead of showing the traditional dichotomy of product versus brand extensions, the present findings suggest that managers need to consider both the frequency of product and brand extensions as well as different types of brand extensions (i.e., substitutable, complementary, and independent) when managing a portfolio of brand extensions. The strategic management of a brand's extension portfolio needs to be guided by the proactive management of the need space and mind space of customers.