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This paper aims to provide guidelines for upstream social marketing strategy on to whom, how and when social marketers can undertake upstream social marketing.

This article is a conceptual piece using academic literature to justify and conceptualise an approach to communicating with and influencing upstream actors.

Specifically, it looks at the characteristics of policymakers targeted, then targeting methods, with a special focus on the use of media advocacy. Finally, a process of government decision-making is presented to explain message timing and content.

Specific criteria to judge time of decision-making and implementation guidelines are provided for social marketers.

In the case of complex social problems, such as obesity and environmental degradation, structural change is needed to provide people with the ability to change (Andreasen, 2006). Strategic social marketing has identified upstream social marketing as a method to influence structural change through policymakers (French and Gordon, 2015); however, literature in the area tends to be descriptive and there are no clear guidelines to its implementation (Dibb, 2014). This article seeks to provide those guidelines.

The purpose of this paper is to gain knowledge on the character of managerial implications within business-to-business (B2B) marketing, in terms of type of relevance addressed in research articles on solution business and integrated solutions.

Use of Jaworski’s framework on role-relevance to classify the type of relevance addressed in 29 journal articles. A systematic literature review on solution business preceded the selection of articles and a concern to include different journal categories.

Managerial implications in the studied articles within solution business do not seem to emphasize role-relevance particularly; they rather address applicability of findings on a company level and for B2B marketing in a more general sense. The majority of implications for practice are framed to have an impact on “present actions”. Managerial knowledge needs are dominantly addressed by “empirical findings” or “frameworks”. The dominating managerial core tasks addressed are “transformer of marketing” and “marketing strategy”.

There do not seem to be studies with managerial implications addressing future actions and thinking; providing instruments, methods or models that are role- relevant; focusing on the challenges of a “coordinator”, “strategist” or “performance controller”. The focus on solution business limits the generalizability of findings.

Results suggest that implications for practice potentially would benefit from being written in the form of explicit recommendations; targeted to a particular managerial role; and increasingly developed when it comes to proposed frameworks for them to be useful for managers in industrial marketing.

This is one of the first studies to systematically examine the character of managerial implications by categorizing results in accordance with a framework specifically addressing role-relevance.

This study aims to explore the interactions between two different and potentially complementary boundary resources in coordinating solution networks in a digital platform context: boundary spanners (those individuals who span interorganizational boundaries) and boundary interfaces (the devices that help coordinate interfirm relationships, e.g. electronic data interchanges, algorithms or chatbots).

The authors conducted a multiple case study of three firms using digital platforms to coordinate solution networks in the information communication technology and lighting facility industries. Data were collected from 30 semi-structured interviews, which are complemented by secondary data.

As task complexity increases, smarter digital interfaces are adopted. When the intelligence level of interfaces is low or moderate, they are only used as tools by boundary spanners or to support boundary spanners’ functions. When the intelligence level of interfaces is high or very high, boundary spanners design the interfaces and let them perform tasks autonomously. They are also sometimes employed to complement interfaces’ technological limitations and customers’ limited user ability.

The industry contexts of the cases may influence the results. Qualitative case data has limited generalizability.

This study offers a practical tool for solution providers to effectively deploy boundary employees and digital technologies to offer diverse customized solutions simultaneously.

This study contributes to the solution business literature by putting forward a framework of boundary resource interactions in coordinating solution networks in a digital platform context. It contributes to the boundary spanning literature by revealing the shifting functions of boundary spanners and boundary interfaces.

The evolution of the business-to-business (BtoB) realm toward solution business calls for a better understanding of how relationships develop over time in such a renewed context. This paper aims to propose a phase model for solution relationship development, considering triadic relationships in complex engineering solutions.

To depict how relationships develop in solution business, the authors adopt a qualitative approach which allows to detail the episodes of interactions between the actors. A case study approach in an extreme sector – the aerospace industry – allows highlighting certain key traits. Extending conventional dyadic analysis, this empirical study focuses on the aerospace industry, using a case study approach to analyze relationship developments between a worldwide leading aircraft manufacturer, one of its customer and four providers of products and services. The authors adopt a triadic perspective in the selection of cases, considering a total of four manufacturer-provider-customer triads.

Four dynamic phases which track solution provision dynamics and involving dyadic and triadic relationship evolution are identified: matching; combining; mixing; and sharing. Each phase calls, from a management perspective, for specific competencies and resources of the actors in interaction.

This paper contributes to the gap about solution relationship development in a changing BtoB landscape. Considering the lens of a triadic approach, the paper also helps to fill the as-yet unattended to gap between dyads and triads in the literature.

Reports findings from a major study done by a Boston consulting firm showing four solution‐based market segments in high‐tech industries. They are the specialized solution, the customized solution, the value solution, and the packaged solution. One segment is the be‐first “contrarian” buyer. One segment responds to aggressive selling while another reacts to market pull. And the fourth segment is retail‐oriented. This article may be useful to both buyers and sellers of technology in emerging, unsaturated markets.

Relationship marketing is a powerful new business approach, but an implementation framework is required. This article discusses how six corporations collaborated in an exercise to develop step‐by‐step guidelines. The framework is illustrated in fields ranging from high tech to consumer products. An important trend in marketing centers on the concept of relationship marketing, a firm's effort to develop long term, mutually beneficial links with customers. It involves a partnership approach with an account to solve complex problems. General Electric and Union Carbide were early adopters of the concept, noting that relationships go far beyond price since buyers share internal company data with suppliers and expect reciprocal commitments and loyalty. Although discussed as a general marketing approach, less is known about implementation (Copulsky and Wolf, 1990; Gronroos, 1994; Morgan and Hunt, 1994). Indeed relationship marketing can backfire if customers perceive that it is only a supplier's latest buzzword. This article reports the results of an exercise conducted by six well known corporations which collaborated to articulate exactly what elements may be involved when implementing a relationship marketing program.

In most organizations, the marketing department is one of the last areas to embrace enterprise technology. Tools and desktop applications have dominated the environment, but with the adoption of customer relationship management (CRM) systems and e‐mail marketing solutions, marketers are starting to see the benefits that large‐scale automation can bring, including increased efficiencies, more accurate reporting capabilities, and reduced costs. However, this is just the beginning. There are a few key marketing technologies that not only improve bottom line results, but also impact on the top line.

The purpose of this paper is synthesise social marketing literature over the past fifty years and deliver a set of guiding tenets to propel social marketing’s agenda forward.

Across three strands, this paper amalgamates theoretical and practitioner evidence from social marketing. This synthesis commences with a review, summary and critical discussion of five decades of social marketing research. Across Strands 2 and 3, the authors review 412 social marketing interventions reported across 10 evidence reviews and 238 case studies.

This paper demonstrates social marketing’s use of fundamental marketing principles and capability to achieve behaviour change outcomes. Social marketers have built frameworks and processes that non-profit organisations, government agencies and policymakers seeking to enact change can use. This paper delivers five tenets that summarise the findings of the three strands and delivers research priorities for the next 50 years of social marketing research to drive the field forward.

Drawing on five decades of learning, this paper proposes research priorities that can be applied to refine, recalibrate and future-proof social marketing’s success in making the world a better place.

This paper demonstrates the value of social marketing science and helps bridge gaps between theory and practice, and further strengthens social marketing’s value proposition. This paper provides confidence that money invested in social marketing programs is well spent.

This paper delivers a forward-looking perspective and provides social marketing academics and practitioners with confidence that it can assist in overcoming society’s most pressing issues. The paper encompasses key social marketing literature since it was founded 50 years ago. Five tenets will guide social marketing forward: evidencing marketing principles, operationalisation of processes, principles and activities, implementing systems thinking, creating and testing marketing theory and guiding a new social marketing era.

This study aims to investigate the new connotations, key antecedents, outcomes and contingency factors of value-based selling (VBS) in the context of business to business (B2B) industrial marketing.

This study develops a comprehensive conceptual framework of VBS by analyzing and synthesizing the existing literature on VBS and associated solutions.

The paper describes the research streams of VBS; proposes a comprehensive conceptual framework consisting of the factors influencing VBS at the organizational, individual, customer and environmental levels, together with 12 research propositions; and provides an agenda for future research.

The paper is conceptual; empirical studies are required for examining the suggested propositions and agenda.

VBS is a process-oriented sales approach that involves multiple value creation and plays a crucial role in industrial solution selling. The successful implementation of VBS depends on the micro-foundations of an organization’s dynamic capabilities and considers the influence of individual, customer and environmental factors.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to introduce value co-creation and dynamic capability theory into VBS research in the context of industrial marketing. It discusses the antecedents, outcomes and contingency factors of VBS in detail in the form of a comprehensive research framework and proposes a future research agenda. These discussions expand the theoretical research on VBS and provide useful implications for B2B marketing practice.

The authors explored the impact of a popular supply chain collaboration initiative – the shopper solution – on both retailers and manufacturers, as well as on the shopper.

The authors conducted a quasi-experimental field study, an experimental online study and an experimental behavioral lab study.

Overall, results revealed that shopper solutions increase the quantity and breadth of displayed products sold, along with sales totals. Shoppers also expressed higher willingness-to-pay (WTP) for products displayed in solutions. Shoppers positively (negatively) attributed the presence (absence) of solutions more strongly to retailers than to manufacturers due to perceived differences in manufacturers' concern for shoppers. Specifically, shoppers expressed higher (lower) word-of-mouth (WOM) and loyalty intentions toward retailers than manufacturers when solutions were (not) provided.

The authors provide a more holistic view of supply chain collaboration by showing how different chain members (retailers vs manufacturers) can experience disparate benefits from collaboration. The authors explain this within the context of shopper solutions by demonstrating that differences in perceived concern for shoppers underlies these effects. Thus, findings suggest that shopper marketing initiatives, such as solutions, are not always “win-win-win” outcomes for retailers, manufacturers and shoppers as intended. Overall, this is the first research to assess the implications of shopper solutions for retailers, manufacturers and shoppers, alike.