Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to present a comprehensive picture of the innovative efforts undertaken over time to develop the digital technologies for managing the interface between supply chain management and marketing processes and the role they play in sustaining supply chain management-marketing (SCM-M) integration from an information processing point of view.Design/methodology/approach: Patent analysis and actual examples are used to carry out this study. In detail, first, the authors identify the subset of enabling technologies pertaining to the fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0) that can be considered the most relevant for effective SCM-M integration (i.e. Industrial Internet of Things, Cloud computing, Big Data analytics and customer profiling, Cyber security). Second, the authors carry out a patent analysis aimed at providing a comprehensive overview of the patenting activity trends characterizing the set of digital technologies under investigation, hence highlighting their innovation dynamics and applications.Findings: This research provides insightful information about which digital technologies may enable the SCM-M integration. Specifically, the authors highlight the role those solutions play in terms of information acquisition, storage and elaboration for SCM-M integration by relying on illustrative actual examples. Moreover, the authors present the organisations more involved in the development of digital technologies for SCM-M integration over time and offer an examination of their technological impact in terms of influence on subsequent technological developments.Originality/value: So far, much has been said about why marketing and supply chain management functions should be integrated. However, a clear picture of the digital technologies that might be adopted to achieve this objective has yet to be revealed. Thus, the paper contributes to the literature on SCM-M integration and Industry 4.0 by highlighting the enabling technologies for the Industry 4.0 that may particularly serve for managing the SCM-M interface from an information processing perspective.
21 July 2017 in Creativity and Innovation Management
Purpose: – The purpose of this paper is to model customer experience (CE) as a “continuum”, labelled customer experience continuum (CEC). The paper adopts a CE quality construct and scale (EXQ) to determine the effect of CE on a bank's marketing outcomes. The paper discusses the study's theoretical and managerial implications, focusing on CE strategy design. Design/methodology/approach: – The paper empirically test a scale to measure customer experience quality (EXQ) for a retail bank. The paper interviews customers using a means-end-chain approach and soft-laddering to explore their CE perceptions with the bank. The paper classifies their perceptions into the categories of “brand experience” (pre-purchase), “service experience” (during purchase), and “post-purchase experience”. After a confirmatory factor analysis, the paper conducts a survey on a representative customer sample. The paper analyses the survey results with a statistical model based on the partial least squares method. The paper tests three hypotheses first, Customers’ perceptions of brand, service provider, and post-purchase experiences have a significant and positive effect on their EXQ, second, EXQ has a significant and positive effect on the marketing outcomes, namely share of wallet, satisfaction, and word-of-mouth, and third, the overall effect of EXQ on marketing outcomes is greater than that of EXQ's individual dimensions. Findings: – The results of the statistical analysis support the three hypotheses. Practical implications: – Banks should focus their CE strategies on the CEC and not on single encounters, tailoring marketing actions to specific stages in a customer's CE process. Different organisational units interacting with customers should be integrated into CE strategies, and marketing and communication budgets should be allocated according to CEC analysis. The model proposed in this paper enables the measurement of the quality of CE and its impact on marketing outcomes, thus enabling continuous improvement in CE. Originality/value: – The research proposes a different view of CE by modelling the interaction between company and customer as a continuum (CEC). It provides further empirical validation of the EXQ scale as a means of measuring CE. It also measures the impact of CE on a bank's marketing outcomes. It discusses the guidelines for designing an effective CE strategy in the banking industry.