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While service quality, trust and commitment are frequently cited as critical to achieving important firm outcomes, the role of service differentiation in this framework is largely unknown. Yet, differentiation is important because a firm's distinctiveness is linked to client‐perceived value, competitive advantage, and a target market focus. Thus, the purpose of this study is to examine the role of service differentiation in business‐to‐business relationships.

Hypotheses were tested using a sample of business clients from a large European financial services firm. The senior primary contact in each client firm was contacted by phone/e‐mail to arrange for completion of the survey. Using the survey instrument, respondents provided information on their relationship with the provider organization.

Results indicated that service quality had an impact on trust, differentiation and relationship outcomes. Trust was found to drive service differentiation. Differentiation, in turn, drove commitment which ultimately had an impact on both satisfaction and word‐of‐mouth. Importantly, it was found that service differentiation is a full mediator of the impact that service quality and trust have on client commitment towards the firm.

The findings clearly show the importance of service differentiation in achieving high levels of relationship commitment and ultimately satisfaction and positive word‐of‐mouth. As the role of differentiation in business‐to‐business relationships has received limited research focus, this paper offers managers new insights into relationship development. Importantly, differentiation is a managerially controlled variable that firms can use to influence relationship outcomes.

This study theoretically articulates and empirically validates a model of relationships between market complexity (competition intensity, heterogeneity and technological change), strategic focus on product and service differentiation, ADS offerings and differentiation advantage.

The authors develop and test hypotheses through structural equation modeling based on data from the Sixth International Manufacturing Strategy Survey (IMSS-VI), involving 931 manufacturers from 22 countries.

The results indicate that (1) market complexity has a positive impact on strategic focus on product and service differentiation; (2) focus on product and service differentiation, but not market complexity, has a positive impact on the extent to which business units offer ADS to their customers; (3) ADS have a positive impact on service differentiation advantage, but no influence on product differentiation advantage.

Managers should incorporate decisions related to ADS provision as part of their manufacturing strategy formulation processes to align markets, strategic focus on product and service differentiation, and ADS provision. ADS seem an appropriate lever for market differentiation, because they appear not only to support service differentiation advantage, but also to be consistent with strategic focus on product differentiation.

The study provides novel insights and large-scale empirical evidence on the influence of the market environment on the offering of ADS, as well as on how relationships between the product and service activity in the manufacturing organization may affect differentiation advantage.

This study aims to investigate the relationship between strategy intent (product-service innovation intention) and outcome (product-service innovation outcome), and the role that external sources of innovation play in influencing this relationship.

Using data obtained from the community innovation survey, we apply a logit regression to a sample of 1,419 Portuguese firms. By examining the moderating effect of open innovation breadth, we assess how the relationship between differentiation intent and outcome is contingent upon the involvement of external stakeholders.

Our findings reveal that the relationship between differentiation intent and outcome is contingent upon the moderating effect of open innovation breadth. Our analysis suggests that the negative influence of different sources of innovation can be addressed by adopting a paradox lens.

This research provides valuable insights for managers. By simultaneously pursuing a differentiation strategy and engaging in collaboration with external sources, firms may compromise their ability to effectively differentiate their offer. Managers should consider the potential tensions arising from internal and external stakeholder relationships to optimize their innovation strategies.

This study contributes to the existing literature by shedding light on the role of external innovation sources in influencing the relationship between differentiation intent and outcome and the importance that information systems may have in this relationship. By exploring the moderating effect of open innovation breadth, we provide a nuanced understanding of how firms can navigate organizational tensions and leverage innovation for competitive advantage.

This study aims to examine the effect of entrepreneurial orientation (EO) on the export performance of apparel small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and the role of multiple differentiation strategy as a mediation effect between their relationships. It has also investigated the moderation impact of export market category between EO and performance relationship. The multiple differentiation strategy comprises the product (PDD), customer (CTD), service (SVD) and brand (BDD) differentiations.

A cross-sectional survey was carried out by providing a questionnaire to senior managers and owners of the apparel SMEs from the developed and developing markets exporters. The primary data of 550 was treated by the partial least squares-structural equation modelling) technique for final analysis.

The study revealed EO’s positive and significant effect on SMEs’ export performance. The study has found the mediation effect of product, customer and brand differentiation strategies between EO and export performance relationships from the mediation analysis. In contrast, service differentiation has found no mediation effect. However, the moderation effect (export market category) has revealed an insignificant effect between EO and performance association.

The findings of this study are based on one country data analysis. This study has been conducted in the SMEs of the apparel industry in Bangladesh, considering only owners and senior-level managers of the firms.

This research has drawn the attention of managers/owners to EO and multiple differentiation strategies enhancing export performance from the developing country context, such as Bangladesh. Multiple differentiation as a competitive strategy is the pioneer application of mediating effect between EO and export performance relationships. Moreover, this research has investigated the effect of the export market category as a moderator. Dearth research has applied the export market category to investigate the moderation effect between EO-performance models. Therefore, current research has theoretical and practical contributions to the international entrepreneurship and strategic management literature.

The purpose of this paper is to explain the effects of inherent differentiation and system level performance assessment in inventory management. This is done by comparing the performance of two common safety stock methods, by considering the methods’ inherent differentiation and item group-level performance effects.

Due to the lack of analytical relationships between the two methods, the analysis is based on event-driven simulations. Data are collected from eight different case companies. Findings explain the importance of assessing safety stock performance for groups of items and not for individual items, as is common in academic studies. It explains how the methods’ inherent differentiation and planning environment characteristics affect the relative performances of the two safety stock methods.

The study explains the importance of assessing performance of safety stock methods on a system-level, rather than on item-level measures. It explains why the demand fill-rate method has a negative impact on the performance for groups of items, while the number-of-days method has a positive impact. The study also explains how the group-level safety stock performance is affected by five demand data characteristics.

The study explains the importance of assessing performance of safety stock methods on a system-level, rather than on item-level measures. It explains why the demand fill-rate method has a negative impact on the performance for groups of items, while the number-of-days method has a positive impact. The study also explains how the group-level safety stock performance is affected by five demand data characteristics.

Understanding the necessity of system level assessment of safety stock performance, how methods inherently differentiate service levels, and how demand characteristics affect methods’ performance can guide the choice of safety stock methods in companies.

No research on the characteristics of the number-of-days safety stock method, any assessment of differentiation characteristics of and comparison with the demand fill-rate method, has been published. The variable “inherent differentiation” is also introduced and defined.

This paper reports research findings on the relationship between competitive methods, generic strategies, and firm performance. It was found that competitive methods in the banking industry correspond to Porter's generic strategy types and that a cost leadership strategy provides a statistically significant performance advantage over banks that are stuck‐in‐the‐middle. Alternatively, firms that used competitive methods to pursue a broad differentiation, customer service differentiation, or focus strategy were unable to realize a performance advantage over firms that are stuck‐in‐the‐middle. This study suggests that in the banking industry it may be difficult to generate superior returns using a differentiation or focus strategy.

States that understanding of the durability of differentiation and positioning as strategies is generally limited, although these areas are of great interest to service marketers. Argues that service marketers must be aware of the need to create and implement durable strategies. Proposes a framework for identifying strategies resistant to competitive imitation, based on the isolating mechanisms idea. Gives examples of differentiation strategies useful for exploiting isolating mechanisms. Concludes that managers analysing the role of both competitive and customer‐based isolating mechanisms will be morelikely to adopt a long‐term, proactive view of service differentiation.

This paper seeks to understand the significance of the various forms of logistical and technological differentiation as prerequisites for supply networking by introducing appropriate conceptual models and illustrative cases.

By studying the patterns of structural changes in 25 industrial companies, illustrated in four different positioning matrices, an empirical demonstration of the differentiation of logistical and technological capabilities is provided and compared with the trends observed in earlier studies of service industries and supply networks.

Considering the magnitude of changes of the logistical and technological capabilities observed in the case studies, differentiation has to be considered a precondition for – as well as a goal of – networking. More importantly, the conformance of the differentiation patterns of the capabilities and services that are embedded in the manufacturing supply chains with those of pioneering companies in service industries such as banking and retailing indicate that moves have been efficiency‐enhancing for both the individual companies and the portfolios of capabilities within the supply networks.

This paper proposes that companies in a supply network should focus first on developing a division of capabilities and finding the appropriate scale and scope of technological and organizational specialization through differentiation, and only then on building tighter inter‐firm collaboration by integrating operations and information systems. In that case integrative efforts in inter‐firm relations can produce chain‐wide benefits discussed at length in management literature.

This paper contributes to our knowledge on motivations of and obstacles for supply chain management by looking at the differentiation of capabilities relating to products and service strategies as well as technological and organizational specialization. In fact, the paper starts discussion at the junction where previous research has left off by concluding the need for focused provision of specific elements and mutually complementary competencies and capabilities.

The purpose of this paper is to create a model that compares the effects of product content differentiation and service content differentiation on small- and medium-sized enterprises’ (SMEs) perceived importance of customer reference marketing in foreign markets.

A theoretical model is developed and tested through multiple regression and mediation analysis, on an effective sample of 188 Swedish SMEs.

The results show that foreign market business assignments characterized by differentiated services make companies relatively more dependent on relationship learning and customer reference marketing. By contrast, situations of differentiated product content correlate negatively with customer reference marketing.

Reference customers can function as vehicles for international expansion when marketing offerings are complex. The findings imply that in service settings, SMEs need to maintain learning regimes with foreign market customers to effectively use them as references to win new business.

The study applies a service perspective to explain the contingencies of customer reference marketing, particularly in international business settings. The study contributes to international small business literature and research focusing on service–firm internationalization by explaining the marketing mechanisms at play in the internationalization of SMEs. In so doing, the findings can enrich relationship and network perspectives of internationalization and add a missing link to studies on networking and internationalization.

The purpose of this manuscript is to assess the impact of logistics salience on logistics capabilities and performance. Specifically, the impact of logistics salience on logistics innovativeness and logistics service differentiation is measured along with logistics innovativeness and logistics service differentiation effect on logistics performance.

Conclusions were drawn from survey data gathered from logistics and supply chain managers at US firms. Structural equation modelling was utilized to measure the statistical significance of the hypothesized model paths with all findings meeting the basic requirements of interpretation.

The results suggest that logistics salience positively impacts both logistics innovativeness and logistics service differentiation. Logistics innovativeness and logistics service differentiation both positively influence logistics performance. These findings give credence to the resource based view of the firm which states that resources lead to capabilities which leads to performance.

Conclusions based on the study's results highlight the importance of logistics within firms and indicate that the function must be made salient throughout the firm to further capitalize on the benefits of logistics. These benefits include enhanced logistics capabilities and their eventual impact on logistics performance.

Using the resource based view of the firm as the theoretical framework, the manuscript supports the notion that logistics salience is an important resource for firms looking to provide differentiated services and innovative logistics operations to their customers.