Chief marketing officer and internationalization—a resource-based view

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to examine whether the selection of a new outsider chief marketing officer from a developed-country incumbent firm with an established brand can serve as an alternative strategy to the acquisition of developed-country firms in benefiting the internationalization of a postselection emerging-market brand marketer that suffers from late-mover disadvantages.

Design/methodology/approach

A pretest (survey) and two main studies (experiments) were conducted to examine the proposed mediation model of “Chief Marketing Officer background—enhancement of capabilities—brand competitiveness”.

Findings

An emerging-market brand marketer gains enhanced resources and capabilities when a new chief marketing officer is recruited from a developed-country incumbent with a superior reputation, leading to improved brand competitiveness. This positive effect accrues from the new chief marketing officer's background (i.e. prior work organization) spilling over to his/her new emerging-market employer.

Originality/value

This research integrates the research streams of emerging-market firm internationalization, chief marketing officer and executive succession to provide an alternative strategy for emerging-market firms to overcome late-mover disadvantages in global markets.

Citation

Fong, C.-M. and Chang, H.-H.S. (2021), "Chief marketing officer and internationalization—a resource-based view", Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics, Vol. 33 No. 7, pp. 1615-1629. https://doi.org/10.1108/APJML-03-2020-0185