Resumen de Marketing capability and financial performance
This dissertation concentrates on the continuing debate of the impact of marketing on financial returns, and put special emphasis on the capability-performance relationship. The main results of this research which contribute to several branches of extant literature are as follows:
1. This study demonstrates the relevance of developing and focusing on marketing capabilities centered on the customer. The marketing research tradition is still focused on studying marketing capabilities centered on sales. Findings revealed that the metric of customer centered marketing capability has a larger impact on operational performance (in terms of ¿EBIT, ¿EBITDA, and ¿net income) than does the metric of sales centered marketing capability.
2. This dissertation assesses the importance of customer centered marketing capabilities in issuing better analysts' stock recommendations. Indeed, findings indicated that the growth of customer centered marketing capability improves the recommendation of analysts and reduces the dispersion of those recommendations. Sales centered marketing capability does not have a significant impact on analysts' recommendations. These findings stress the relevance of customer centered marketing capability for the investor community (e.g. stock analysts).
3. This work draws on the literatures of organizational capability, organizational learning, and marketing dynamics, to elucidate which of the marketing capabilities, ordinary or dynamic, has a larger impact on financial performance. Not surprisingly, the results stressed the larger effect of the dynamic marketing capability than ordinary marketing capability in increasing operational performance (in terms of cash flow from operations and ROA) and forward-looking performance (in terms of Tobin's Q and Market Capitalization).
4. Notwithstanding the point three can be a rudimentary thought, such theory is not a straightforward logic when the moderator role of industry (or market) dynamic is introduced in the model. Findings revealed that in cases of evolving industries (e.g. computer software) dynamic marketing capabilities are more relevant, and in cases of stationary industries (e.g. food manufacturing) ordinary marketing capabilities are more important. Therefore, the call for an emphasis on dynamic capabilities in this era of knowledge society is not always true (in terms of creating better performance), it depends on the condition of the industry in which the firm participates.
5. In an attempt to generalize the marketing capability-performance relationship to different contexts, this study examines that phenomenon in developed countries such as US, Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden. Using several years of analysis, findings indicated that marketing capability has a net significant impact on firms' financial performance beyond the effects of firms' size, the type of industry, countries' macroeconomic variables (such as growth of GDP, inflation and unemployment), and most importantly beyond the effects of the countries' institutional pillars.
6. In addition to the point number five, this dissertation also explains the moderator role of the countries' institutional pillars in the impact of firms' marketing capability on financial performance. Interestingly, marketing capability has a larger impact on revenue growth in countries with more regulative environments while marketing capability has a larger effect on net income growth in countries with more individualistic culture and with less normative orientation.
The results remain robust and consistent across different samples, measures, and methods common to marketing and financial literature. The findings have different implications for marketing practitioners, CEOs, marketing theory, and marketing academics. For instance, practitioners should develop a customer centered marketing capability because this capability will make their efforts to be profitable for the firm. Practitioners should inform to the market about the improvements of this capability because this fact will be considered by market analysts to issue better stock recommendations. Practitioners should pay attention to the condition of the industry when evaluating to opt for ordinary or dynamic customer centered capability. Practitioners who intend to expand internationally should also develop a customer centered capability because this capability succeeds beyond country factors.
