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Market intelligence is critical to marketing strategy planning for any business. While considerable study has been made of the intelligence‐gathering practices of large corporations, very little research has been reported focusing on the competitive information activities of small businesses. The research involved a survey of small business owners and managers in South Carolina, USA. The study addressed three questions: What market intelligence practices do small businesses use? What market intelligence practices do they think their competitors use? How important is market intelligence to small businesses? The market intelligence practices most frequently used are observing competitors and talking with suppliers or delivery people. Small business owners were least likely to use practices such as job interviews or hiring competitors′ employees to gain information. Respondents perceived their competitors as being more likely to pursue market intelligence activities. If a firm used a specific practice, they thought their competitors did also. Among small business owners market intelligence does not appear to be a critical management concern.

The history of competitive intelligence (as an organizational function) and its evolution out of marketing research are discussed. Besides a straight historical overview, the transition from marketing research to competitive intelligence is analyzed in order to point to both the potential strengths and weaknesses of having intelligence form an independent “freestanding” discipline. While military analogies can be seductive, organizations should continue to embrace the marketing concept which centers on cooperation and service, not conflict.

The paper seeks to explain how competitive intelligence officers can participate more fully in strategy formulation and implementation, and how they can contribute to the strategic intelligence process.

The paper presents a review of the literature and the development of a strategic marketing intelligence and multi‐organisational resilience framework.

Competitive intelligence officers can contribute more fully to the strategic intelligence process and help establish an intelligence culture that incorporates counter‐intelligence. By adopting a broader understanding of what strategic marketing represents, marketing managers can devise new approaches to managing customer relationships and can develop international/global brand positioning strategies that when implemented counter the actions of legitimate competitors and new entrants, and disrupt the actions of counterfeiters and fraudsters.

A study can be undertaken to establish how a multi‐organisational resilience value system evolves within an organisation, and how trust and credibility among competitive intelligence professionals can be developed.

Academics and practitioners can collaborate in order to establish how an intelligence culture can be created within an organisation. Furthermore, they can also collaborate in establishing how a proactive approach to risk assessment can underpin scenario analysis and planning and aid the strategic decision‐making process.

A number of insights are provided into how competitive intelligence officers contribute to the development of a multi‐organisational resilience value system that is underpinned by an intelligence culture.

In recent years, world growth has slowed and markets have matured or become more protective. It appears that the only way for many companies to grow is at the expense of their competitors. Many large companies in Asia are turning to market intelligence for input into their strategic management system and decision making. The marketing intelligence cycle typically consists of directing, collecting, compiling, cataloguing, analysing and communicating data. The processing stage of intelligence gathering is the critical stage where the raw material is recorded and analyzed. In this article we use the SWOT framework for the analysis of a manufacturing industry – the lawn mower. This case illustrates how market intelligence could be used as an important and effective instrument for management planning, implementation and control.

The purpose of this paper is to advance and investigate empirically how entrepreneurial attitude and normative beliefs influence managerial scanning for competitive intelligence and how managerial scanning efforts subsequently impact managerial interpretation of organizations' strengths and weaknesses in the competitive arena.

A structural equation model was tested with survey data from 309 managers in the USA.

The results indicate that entrepreneurial attitude orientation and market orientation significantly impact managerial scanning for competitive intelligence, which in turn leads to managerial representations of competitive advantage.

This paper demonstrates that scanning for competitive intelligence is more an entrepreneurial activity than a routine activity for managers, and that managerial scanning efforts can be maximized in highly market‐oriented organizations that value competitive intelligence collection and dissemination. Proactive scanning for competitive intelligence enables managers to develop a fuller picture of the superiority or deficiency of their organizations. Future research needs to address the inherent cyclicity of the managerial sense‐making process.

This paper is the first effort to examine empirically the scanning cycle – that is, the relationships between managerial business motivation, intelligence scanning and sense‐making. It offers strategic guides to both academicians and practitioners on how to achieve a better understanding of the complex and dynamic market through proactive scanning activities.

This paper aims to identify the importance that branch employees of Greek banks attach to the internet as a tool of marketing intelligence, and the factors that affect its acceptance as such a tool.

Using the technology‐acceptance model (TAM) as a basis, a questionnaire is designed by the researchers, and completed by employees. Structural equation modelling (SEM) is used to analyse the data, and this confirms the relationships proposed by the TAM.

The main findings of the study are that: branch employees of Greek banks feel that a marketing‐intelligence system is a prerequisite for effectiveness in their work; although the internet is the fourth‐most important source of market intelligence for branch employees of Greek banks, they require greater access to the internet to meet their market‐intelligence needs; perceived usefulness and perceived ease of use of the internet directly affect bank employees' attitudes – which, in turn, affect the employees' intentions of using the internet as a marketing‐intelligence tool; and education and working experience affect employees' attitudes indirectly (through perceived usefulness).

Main limitations of this study are related to the sampling method and the fact that the field research was conducted only in Athens, the capital of Greece.

Finally, the paper suggests how banks could exploit the internet as a marketing intelligence tool for their branch employees and what actions should be planned in order to facilitate its adoption.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate how managers in technology‐intensive companies conceptualize and perceive “intelligence” variables in successful and unsuccessful new product development (NPD) projects, and explore the role that intelligence variables play in differentiating between successful and unsuccessful NPD outcomes. Limitations and future research directions are also discussed.

The most senior person responsible for NPD within a sample of Finnish technology‐intensive companies completed a self‐administered internet survey on the role of intelligence in successful and unsuccessful NPD projects. The JMP 1‐2‐3‐software package (version 8 for Mac) by SAS was used for statistical analysis.

The findings indicate that managers in technology‐intensive companies rely on two broad types of intelligence, technical production and market information, during the NPD process. Most intelligence variables are positively related to NPD success. In addition, it appears that managers attach lower importance to intelligence variables in successful NPD outcomes when comparisons are made with previous research.

Managers in Finnish technology‐intensive companies should carefully analyze both technical‐production information and market information in the NPD process although technical‐production information is the more important factor in the analysis of information requirements in successful NPD outcomes relative to market information.

Although market intelligence variables have been studied in the context of differentiating successful and unsuccessful industrial NPD, they have largely focused on the NPD process in broad‐based industrial and manufacturing companies. The paper examines the role of market intelligence in the NPD process of technology‐intensive companies using Finland as the study setting.

Retailer loyalty card marketing intelligence presents actual customer purchasing preferences, competitor activities and performance. Typically, extant literature implies that larger firms with formal marketing planning approaches will be more able to leverage it, structured as it is within a formalized statistical format. Small business literature on the other hand emphasizes their more informal approach to marketing planning. The purpose of this paper is to consider, for the first time, the potential relationship between retailer loyalty card marketing intelligence and small business market orientation.

A conceptual model is developed which diagrammatically interprets how retailer loyalty card marketing intelligence can relate to small business market orientation. Propositions provide a basis for further discussion with applied and research implications.

A pertinent aspect of the conceptualization is the role of small business owner‐manager insight and intuition within an experiential learning context. A complementary relationship is posited in the leveraging of retailer loyalty card marketing intelligence to enhance small business market orientation, which with higher levels of entrepreneurship orientation can lead to positive organizational outcomes, such as facilitating more successful and informed engagement with larger suppliers.

The paper addresses the increasing pressure small businesses face in dealing with retailer loyalty card marketing intelligence. Generally, literature has yet to adequately address marketing planning implications for firms. The informal/formal tension when considering small businesses presents a particularly interesting area of conceptual development, integrating market orientation literature and also recent developments which point to interaction between market and entrepreneurship orientations. This paper therefore provides a basis for a new small business research agenda in an area which is highly topical and important, with a synthesis of the extant literature in developing a conceptualization and propositions. The conceptualization and propositions can facilitate the development of new research and thinking in this potentially fruitful area of future enquiry.

This article highlights the role that marketing intelligence officers need to fulfill if they are to assist marketing strategists in a broad range of duties. The marketing literature incorporates several bodies of knowledge, and reference is made to corporate security and the work of organized criminal syndicates. The topics covered will be relevant to both academic researchers and practising managers.

The work is based on a review of a wide literature and various established and futuristic concerns have been highlighted. The paper can be viewed as a critical appreciation.

Marketing intelligence officers need to be given a wider role in order that they engage more fully in the analysis and interpretation of data and information. Marketing intelligence officers need to develop their skill and knowledge base, and adopt a proactive stance to strategy formulation and implementation. By raising their profile, marketing intelligence officers will be able to seek out future management challenges. Senior managers need to put in place an effective corporate security system.

There is a need to establish how facilitating technology such as the internet is going to transform the working environment for marketing staff. Marketing intelligence officers need to undertake research in order to establish how consumer groups and associations exercise their power.

Senior marketing managers need to ensure that more attention is given to management development programs for marketing intelligence officers. The customer service management process needs to match more closely customer expectations with customer satisfaction levels.

A company’s vulnerability is highlighted and corporate security is linked to marketing. The usefulness of marketing intelligence systems and processes are made public, and so too is the strategic marketing concept.

In the development of a firm’s market orientation, management commitment plays a critical role. This study aimed to examine the influence of management commitment on market orientation on the basis of the MARKOR framework of market orientation. This was done through a survey of three-star, four-star and five-star licensed hotels located in Ghana. PLS-SEM was used to analyse data based on SmartPLS. Results showed a positive relationship between management commitment and the behavioural processes included in the MARKOR framework of market orientation: intelligence generation, intelligence dissemination and responsiveness to intelligence. Results also revealed that intelligence dissemination mediates the relationship between management commitment and responsiveness to intelligence. Intelligence generation was not found to mediate this relationship. This study has extended current knowledge by elaborating how management commitment influences market orientation practices.