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This study aims to explore if and how business-to-business (B2B) companies can use social media to influence the buying process.

The study uses an exploratory approach into the existing literature related to the B2B buying process and its relationship with social media.

The study shows that companies in a B2B context can use social media as a means of influencing the stages of the buying process by means of using one or more of the seven functional blocks of social media.

The findings demonstrate the relation that exists between each stage of the buyer process in a B2B organization and the functional blocks of social media. This study opens the door for further research into the influence of each of these blocks on the buying process stages and the roles involved.

This study identifies how social media’s blocks influence the different stages and how organizations can use that to their benefit.

Few studies have investigated the use of social media in a B2B context. However, not many have looked into the influence of social media in the B2B buying process and buying center. This study looks into the relationship between the buying process stages and social media’s functional blocks as related to the different roles of the buying center.

Gathers empirical evidence on how South African organisations manage their corporate image management process. The aim is to establish whether one of the leading models of the corporate image management process is applicable to practitioners in the area. While there is renewed interest in both academic and management circles, relatively few studies exist in the area of image management. In‐depth interviews with ten organisations that substantially changed their images recently were undertaken. The results are reported and confirm that the current knowledge and constructs on the corporate image management process are being put into practice by marketers.

This article reviews factors necessitating the application of effective selection and motivation criteria when using independent distributors. It reports findings concerning the criteria utilised by South African manufacturing companies and compares these with findings based on another study using United Kingdom and United States samples. The findings seem to be very similar across cultures and a model is presented to aid manufacturers in the proper selection and motivation of their distributors.

Whether societal marketing is regarded as a legitimate and necessary aspect of marketing in the tobacco and liquor industries is investigated. A review of previous research on societal marketing has been undertaken. The views of both industries are discussed and some conclusions are made with regard to their role in practising societal marketing and, thus, their influence on consumer welfare.

There is evidence in the literature that organizations struggle to formulate and implement their corporate branding strategies. This paper aims to provide an overview of the corporate brand building process in higher education.

A qualitative methodology was used in this study. A single case study of a private American university was used to gather information about their corporate brand building process. University administrators and documents were used to gain insights into their brand building process.

The corporate brand building process addressed three key areas; web administration, program marketing and corporate brand positioning. The corporate brand building process was conducted in four phases and a description of these phases is provided.

As this is a single case study further research will be needed to test the validity of the research findings by using other higher education institutions as samples.

The corporate brand building process has been described and will be of use to all higher education institutions as well as other organizations wishing to build their corporate brand.

Deals with the success of relationship marketing in the private banking sector. A comprehensive literature review of relationship marketing was undertaken. A study was undertaken among a sample of 118 high net worth individuals, 53 with personal bankers, and 65 without, to establish whether relationship marketing was working in this banking sector. The results show that relationships are an important criterion in the selection of a private bank. A comprehensive analysis of the various stages a client has in a relationship with a bank are discussed. Lastly, the implications for the private banking industry are dealt with in a comprehensive manner.

The main purpose of this paper is to explore, define, reconcile and depict corporate identity (CI), corporate brand (CB) and corporate reputation (CR) in a framework that reflects the dimensions of these constructs, discriminates between them and represents their inter‐relatedness.

The paper draws on key literature relating to CI, CB and CR.

The paper develops a framework that explains and aligns the drivers of CB and CR.

Managers will be able to use the framework to help them align and optimise brand and reputation building efforts of their organisation. Academics will be able to use the framework as a basis for empirical research.

The article reconciles disparate views from a number of theoretical streams that have investigated CI, CB and CR and develops a comprehensive framework that shows that although the management and measurement of the constructs may overlap, the constructs themselves are not interchangeable.

The purpose of this paper is to determine how and to what extent corporate reputational elements are reflected in organizational storytelling in a telecommunications company. In addition, it seeks to establish the importance of employees as part of reputation building.

Taking a case approach, this paper examines storytelling in a branch of a well‐known South African telecommunications service provider, Nashua Mobile. The staff went through in‐depth interviews.

Many different stories were told about Nashua and other organisations to illustrate an idea or concept. There was a mixture of negative and positive, funny and serious stories that, although contrary, are the sum of the personality, culture, image or heritage of Nashua. The emphasis of the values that the stories revealed determined the more important cultural beliefs. This does have an influence on the firm's identity, corporate brand and reputation.

The more stories are shared, the more in‐tune with employees' needs, ideas, behaviour and concerns management can be. Management can only benefit by a process where staff collaborate and share their views. It is an important tool that should be used for organizational communication.

This is one of the first papers that links storytelling to corporate reputation. It recognises the key role employees play in building and influencing the reputation of an organisation.

Marketing planning and the annual budget are two procedures that organizations engage in. Although controlled by the marketing department and the finance department respectively, the marketing plan and annual budget are interlinked in many ways. Investigates the importance of this interrelationship. Reports on the results of a study of 41 fast moving consumer goods companies following a literature review of budgeting and marketing planning. The results show that there is a high degree of interaction between the marketing and finance departments. They also show that most companies tended to do the marketing plan and annual budget together. In addition, the sales forecast, although controlled by the marketing department, is set to meet financial targets.

The purpose of this paper is to analyse web site brand communication by small to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) in the restaurant franchise industry, using Aaker's brand personality dimensions. It shows how an SME can test its intended positioning against competitors.

A multistage methodology using a combination of content analysis and correspondence analysis was used. The intention was to illustrate a technique that can be used by SMEs at low cost and with ease.

Food SMEs are able to communicate brand personality by way of their web sites. The brands and the personality types are presented which clearly reveals the positioning of the competitors.

This paper illustrates a powerful, but simple and relatively inexpensive way for SMEs to study communicated brand personality.

The major contribution of this study is to alert SME scholars and retailers to the potential of computerized content analysis as a means of studying web site content, and the subsequent use of correspondence analysis to understand how to position against competitors.