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The make‐up, structure, functioning and outputs of multi‐person buying decision‐making units, commonly referred to as “buying centers,” have received substantial attention in the business marketing literature. Although most business buying decisions are non‐static in nature, theorists and researchers have been hard pressed to effectively capture the dynamic nature of business buyers’ decision‐making processes. This paper presents a synthesis of recent buying center research and reports the findings of a study which attempted to capture “process effects” in buying center structure during the buying process. Study findings affirm the widely held belief that buying centers change over time and provide interesting insights regarding how these decision‐making units change in structure and make‐up over time. The resulting implications and caveats of these findings for business marketers are discussed.

Advances in information technology (IT) and the globalization of business are both realities and opportunities of the twenty‐first century. This article aims to examine the role of information technology in the globalization of business buying behavior.

Literature and theory are used to develop a conceptual model of adoption of information technology (IT) and globalization of business buying behavior. Firm‐level and global moderating factors are also examined.

IT adoption includes IT adoption by buyer and by seller and the compatibility of both IT systems. Globalizations of buying behavior is moderated by firm‐level factors like perceived risk, digitizability and by task and global moderating factors like availability of alternative suppliers in buyer country, cultural distance and the political stability in the supplier country.

The paper provides a number of propositions that can be tested empirically, and also extensions for training and skills for business buyers.

The correct choice of IT systems for compatibility with buyers and sellers can mitigate the negative effects of moderating factors.

The paper sets out the impact of IT adoption by buyer and seller firms and its impact on globalization of business buying behavior in the twenty‐first century.

This chapter reviews emergent research streams as a basis for a dynamic multilevel perspective on organizational buying behavior that can link seminal studies to more contemporary issues raised by managers and scholars alike. Since Johnston and Lewin's (1996) review, the literature does not include a comprehensive analysis of recent themes or general directions. From a managerial perspective, some of these issues that need coverage include the following questions. What are the best practices for integrating the organizational buying process with product design, development, and innovation? How can technology, media, and automation be leveraged in the buying process? For supplier relationships in which trust and commitment have been established, what are the best practices for using this to build competitive advantage? What are the best practices for leveraging the brands of products or services that are not owned by a firm? What are the best practices for managing buying processes across international markets?

Most existing classifications of business services have taken the perspective of the supplier as opposed to that of the buyer. To address this imbalance, the purpose of this paper is to propose a classification of business services based on how the buying company applies the service with respect to its own business processes.

The paper considers some specific aspects of the process of buying and exchanging business services, focusing on the everyday production and consumption of services as opposed to the initial purchasing and negotiation phases.

Earlier literature has developed similar, albeit less elaborate classifications, but does not provide detailed insight into how such classifications are related to differentiated buyer‐supplier interaction. This classification distinguishes between four business service applications; as a component, semi‐manufacture, instrument or consumable. For each of these four types of services, interaction has to achieve different objectives and consequently they differ with regards to required organizational resources in terms of required capabilities and buyer‐supplier interfaces.

Primarily conceptual and exploratory in nature, this paper is intended as a review of existing literature and possible starting point for further empirical validation and theoretical refinement. The paper contends that the differences in application have a significant impact on interaction patterns, but this is not to say that other variables have no impact on buyer‐supplier interaction patterns. Subsequent research should seek to control for those other possible sources of variation.

The overall implication of this classification is that for different services, the buying company should assess how they are applied. Subsequently, it is relevant for firms to consider what functional aspects are crucial and who are likely to become, or who should be involved and to what extent, in the purchasing decision process and in the interactions that take place after the decision has been made.

Theories on industrial buying behavior differ fundamentally with regard to motivation and direction of industrial purchasing decisions. This becomes extremely in the case of new institutional economics, highlighting administrative aspects, and market process theory, focusing on entrepreneurial aspects of buying decisions. This paper aims to challenge these approaches by setting up an experimental design. Decisions of sales and purchasing managers were investigated with respect to their motivation of self‐protection or opportunity seeking.

The contribution is based on an experimental design. The design is based on a prospect theory scenario. Prospect theory states that successful economic agents show a stronger tendency towards self‐protection, whereas under‐performing economic agents are willing to bear greater risks in search for opportunities.

The results suggest that indeed out‐performers show a tendency to risk avoidance and under‐performers are willing to bear more risks. The most important implication is that new institutional economics‐based approaches to buying behavior are not universally valid. However, they apply to specific situations. In that respect the contribution shows a direction for the proper application of transaction cost‐based concepts.

Managers are advised to take the economic performance of their customer companies into account. Outperforming companies are more responsive to measures for self‐protection. Under‐performing customers may be more tolerant towards risk if it is compensated with the expectation of better opportunities.

The empirical research is new in so far as it is the first to apply a prospect theory framework to a business market environment. The results show clearly that the methodology, as originally applied in prospect theory, needs refinement when transferred to a business market context.

The aim of this paper is to provide understanding on how the buyer can mobilize experience-based information scattered around the business network, by means of customer references, word-of-mouth and reputation, and how this facilitates the buying process.

The qualitative study scrutinizes eight cases comprising buyers of knowledge intensive services and technology innovations. The paper draws on the literature on buying and purchasing, customer references, word-of-mouth and reputational information.

The findings identify the different roles of references, word-of-mouth, collegial advice networks, and reputation, and suggest that experience-based information provides information on offerings, suppliers and the problem solving situation in complex buying per se.

The article's contribution is to provide a framework depicting the employment of experience-based information in complex buying, which ensues through focal and continuous buying processes. Insights from this research are broadly applicable to the contexts of knowledge intensive, innovation and solutions business. Further qualitative research should aim to form constructs and define their interrelations to be tested in subsequent quantitative research.

This study generates new understanding on how buyers gather and use experience-based information to solve complex problems in buying. It contributes by merging references, word-of-mouth, collegial social networks, and reputation as sources of experience-based information, identifying information embedded in those means, and exploring how the information and means are used throughout the complex buying situation.

This study aims to investigate the influence of personal factors on the buying behavior of consumers with the intentions of sales promotion in the fashion industry. Precisely, it focuses on the marketing techniques and practices in sales promotion activities to influence the buying intentions of consumers in personal ways.

Based on a comprehensive literature review of personal factors, sales promotion and buying behavior, this study has applied a positivist approach to collect data in quantitative way through questionnaires-based survey. The study has analyzed the collected data using structural equation modeling through smart partial least square.

Personal factors and its sub-dimensions such as market maven, stability and open minded have demonstrated a positive relationship in the conceptual construct. In the same manner, sales promotion and its sub-dimensions like social factors and physical layout have also positive effects.

This study is only limited to the fashion industry of Pakistan and future research may be conducted in other services and manufacturing industries. Future research may assess the role of moderating variables like gender.

This study clarifies the influence of personal characteristics on consumers buying behavior in sales promotion activities in the fashion industry to achieve business objectives.

By integrating personal factors and sales promotion literature, the main contribution of this paper is the analysis of personal characteristics and promotional practices in the fashion industry of Pakistan, during Eid-ul-Fitter holidays to enhance the consumers buying behavior. Precisely, this study has assessed the effect some unique characteristics of consumers like market maven, stable, open minded and agreeable on their buying behavior in sales promotion activities. This study has apprised marketing professionals to apply the conception of personal characteristics in sales promotion activities to boost up the buying behavior of consumers in enthusiastic way.

Marketing Management, Business Strategy and Promotion & Advertising.

Associated degree, undergraduate and graduate students as well as executives from profit-making organizations.

Groupon is the world's largest daily-deal Web site and a pioneer in the group-buying industry. The major feature of the company's business model is that merchants use Groupon as a platform to offer coupons with a discounted price, and the coupon buyers can then redeem these coupons. Groupon has done business in over 50 countries and, by 2012, had over 39.5 million subscribers received its daily news. It had a 59.1 per cent share of the daily-deals market in 2013. Groupon is a publicly listed company on the NASDAQ in the USA, trading under the ticker symbol of “GPRN”.

The students' business knowledge and skills will be sharpened by working through this case, and students will be challenged to identify solutions to the marketing concerns: specifically, how the driving approach of its daily-deal business model enabled the company to adopt a growth strategy that will confront the difficulties of the emergent “golden age” of the daily-deal industry in the twenty-first century. In addition, it will also be of help to the students to take the active roles of thinker, analyst, evaluator, decision-maker and implementer to evaluate the continuing changes in a competitive environment and consider how Groupon can seize available opportunities to predict future performance by comparing data from 2008 and 2012.

Teaching notes are available for educators only. Please contact your library to gain login details or email support@emeraldinsight.com to request teaching notes.

This study aims to observe different purchasing and evaluation phases during the buying of business services, thus revealing the necessity for integration of different entities during the purchasing process.

On the basis of a systematic analysis, explorative case study methods involving five Swiss multinational companies are used. In addition, the study provides a structured literature review and uses the short-term perspective of the industrial marketing and purchasing (imp) approach as a conceptual approach.

In addition to specific and business service-related difficulties, the research observes different phases “levels of integration” within the evaluation process that takes place within a company: a preparation phase, an acquisition phase and an operational phase.

The study is limited to a qualitative research approach addressing five cases from Switzerland. However, assuming the results are generalizable, future research on service evaluation should always differentiate between the different phases of an evaluation.

It is shown that for practitioners, social, financial, service and informational exchange (as per imp approach) is closely related to an adequate integration of all involved entities during the different phases of purchasing. Therefore, this research provides practical support for the purchasing process to ensure highly efficient business services.

As there has been almost no research on business service evaluation, this paper is the first work known to extend the short-term perspective of the imp approach by addressing the different purchasing phases of an integrated service evaluation.

A self‐help guide to achieving success in business. Directed more towards the self‐employed, it is relevant to other managers in organizations. Divided into clear sections on creativity and dealing with change; importance of clear goal setting; developing winning business and marketing strategies; negotiating skills; leadership; financial skills; and time management.