Transformations  in
Business & Economics

LEVERAGING BUSINESS PARTNERSHIPS WITH INTERNAL RELATIONSHIPS - MODERATING EFFECTS OF SPECIAL INVESTMENTS IN SOCIAL TIES UNDER PRESSURE OF RECESSION
Gregor Pfajfar, Maciej Mitrega

ABSTRACT.One may observe a growing interest of management scholars and practitioners in business relationships since companies are nowadays dependent on other entities, resources and capabilities. The effectiveness of some marketing practices oriented at customer relationships was thoroughly discussed in prior studies, however, there is little literature related to managerial aspects of dealing with networks as more complex relational structures. In this paper we try to minimize this gap by investigating the link between the knowledge about various business partners and quality of intra-organizational relationships, as well as customer relationship quality and company performance. We also study the moderating role of making special investments in business relations under pressure of economic slowdown as experienced by B2B companies in Slovenia. We use data gathered via face-to-face interviews and analyzed through structural equation modeling (SEM) to test hypothesized relationships between research constructs. Our study encourages marketing managers to intensify networking activities with regard to both, inter-firm social ties and codified knowledge about partnering firms. These both aspects of networking are conceptualized as interconnected building blocks of a focal company capability to gain benefits from the business network that surrounds it.

KEYWORDS: business partner knowledge, internal relationships, customer relationship quality, field research, Slovenia.

JEL classification: M31.