Research in strategic marketing: past and future(Developing New Models, Reviews, Measures, Methods with Future Research Agenda)

Deadline for Submission: December 9, 2019

First round of Reviews: 40–45 days after the deadline.

The recent developments such as Globalization, and the emergence of countries such as China have brought about a wide array of changes in the world (Buckley & Ghauri, 2004; Ghemawat, 2017). Competition has intensified in different markets including services sector (Mostaghel, Oghazi, Beheshti, & Hultman, 2015). There is an exponential growth in innovation and technological advances in both developed as well as developing countries that is impacting the approach to marketing in identifying lead markets, brand management, services marketing and export-import management. Firms are using sophisticated data capturing technologies such as electronic point of sale (EPOS) data, customer relationship management (CRM), big data, social media and customer analytics to identify market needs, develop prototypes, choose to position, and select segmentation strategies, and ultimately develop marketing-mix strategies. Despite these advancements and decades of research, many of the academic research studies in marketing still use the same old frameworks, models, and methods, and researchers still carry out recycled and replete studies changing country and industry contexts (Paul, 2018). Thousands of studies have been published repeatedly using the same popular methods such as structural equation modelling, and other multivariate statistical techniques in different country and industry contexts.

Many researchers repeatedly use the same theories. Theories/models such as the theory of planned behaviour, variants of service quality models (SERVQUAL and SERVPER), general hierarchical attitude models, have become replete because of recycled studies using them in different contexts. We need new models, theories, measures and impactful propositions to avoid replicated research based on the same model or theory (Keupp and Gassmann 2009; Paul, 2018; Paul & Sahadev, 2017) in order to make sure that the field of research in Marketing is not running out of a research agenda for the future, as well as to create an impactful research culture. The development of a new model or theory or a measure or method or a review article with future research agenda is likely to be impactful. Such works would serve as a foundation for future research. The time is ripe to take stock again and review the current state-of-the-art in marketing research. The objective of the special issue is to develop a better understanding of the extant literature based on the last 30 years of research and provide fruitful directions for future research in the area of marketing, especially strategic marketing (See Paul & Bhakar, 2018; Shuv-Ami, A., Vrontis, D., & Thrassou, 2018).

The goal of this special issue is to encourage researchers to focus on theory development rather than doing replete and recycled research on the same topics repeatedly. Therefore, we encourage scholars to be creative and to use a variety of empirical and descriptive methods to construct new theories and frameworks that may act as foundational manuscripts on these topics. We also encourage researchers to draw upon MacInnis (2011) to engage in developing novel conceptual frameworks on the burgeoning topics in the marketing domain.

We will publish three types of papers in this special issue.

Type 1: papers that are primarily intended to build theory, theoretical models/frameworks and testable original propositions

Reason: These types of papers serve as foundation papers for future researchers.

For specimen of these types of articles, See articles published in Academy of Management Review, AMS Review for specimen articles.

Also, see

1. MacInnis, D. J. (2011). A framework for conceptual contributions in marketing. Journal of Marketing, 75(4), 136–154.

2. Paul, J., & Mas, Eric (2019). Towards a 7-P framework for International Marketing. Journal of Strategic Marketing. https://doi.org/10.1080/0965254X.2019.1569111

3. Paul, J., & Sahadev, S. (2018). Service failure and problems: Internal marketing solutions for facing the future. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 40, 304–311. (Introducing COPS Framework)

Type 2: papers with an attempt to develop new measures (example, scale) and reason: new measures and methods would serve as the basis for future research

References:

1. Shuv-Ami, A., Vrontis, D., & Thrassou, A. (2018). Brand Lovemarks Scale of Sport Fans. Journal of Promotion Management, 24(2) 215–232.

2. Paul, J. (2018). Masstige model and measure for brand management. European Management Journal. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.emj.2018.07.003

3. El-Adly, M. I., & Eid, R. (2016). An empirical study of the relationship between shopping environment, customer perceived value, satisfaction, and loyalty in the UAE malls context. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, 31, 217–227.

Type 3: literature reviews with directions for future research

(Both systematic literature reviews and meta-analysis, at least 25% of the paper should be dedicated for developing future research agenda). Theme-based Reviews, Theory-based reviews and Method-based reviews.

Reason: Collection of Related Literature on the Research Topic has a great role to play in writing quality research papers.

We urge researchers to focus on research agenda development, as seen in these articles.

For a specimen of these types of articles, See most downloaded articles from respective journals given below.

3.1. Theory-based review

Gilal et.al (2018). The role of self-determination theory in marketing science: An integrative review and agenda for research. European Management Journal. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.emj.2018.10.004

Williams, M. D., Rana, N. P., & Dwivedi, Y. K. (2015). The unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT): a literature review. Journal of Enterprise Information Management, 28(3), 443–488.

3.2. Theme-based review

Paul, J., Parthasarathy, S; Gupta, P. (2017). Exporting Challenges in a Small Firm. A Review and Research Agenda. Journal of World Business, 52(3), 327–342.

Paul, J., & Benito, G. R. (2018). A review of research on outward foreign direct investment from emerging countries, including China: what do we know, how do we know and where should we be heading? Asia Pacific Business Review, 24(1), 90–115.

3.3. Meta-analysis

Knoll, J., & Matthes, J. (2017). The effectiveness of celebrity endorsements: A meta-analysis. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 45(1), 55–75.

Dwivedi, Y. K., Rana, N. P., Jeyaraj, A., Clement, M., & Williams, M. D. (2017). Re-examining the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT): Towards a revised theoretical model. Information Systems Frontiers, 1–16. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10796-017-9774-y

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.