Academic research has demonstrated that sound marketing capabilities allow a firm to create superior customer value. Moreover, academic research and business practice have shown that Marketing and Sales departments are jointly responsible for marketing activities. Although scholars have devoted very limited attention to the relationship between these two departments, overlooking the role that poor alignment between the two has on the firm's capacity to generate superior customer value would be an error. The present paper proposes a model of antecedents to superior customer value creation elaborating on literature that deals with marketing capabilities and Marketing–Sales relationship. More specifically, the authors hypothesize that a firm's long-term strategic orientation, effective Marketing–Sales relationship, the use of a direct sales force and customer-oriented salespeople positively affect superior customer value creation and market performance. The empirical research confirms all hypotheses with the exception of the impact of a direct sales force.
The generation of superior customer value is at the base of a company's competitive advantage. A company creates superior customer value by offering benefits to its customers that are larger than the costs they have to bear along the product or service life cycle. Moreover, superior customer value creates a competitive advantage if the company is able to financially benefit from the exchange in the long-term, that is to say, to create such value more efficiently and effectively with respect to its competitors (Slater and Narver, 2000).
Although companies can use different strategies to create superior customer value (e.g. Treacy and Wiersema, 1993 and Day, 1994), a strong market-oriented organizational culture is an effective means for achieving this goal (Deshpandé et al., 1993 and Homburg and Pflesser, 2000). In fact, despite some contrary views (Macdonald, 1995, Christensen and Bower, 1996 and Frosch, 1996), previous research shows that market-oriented behavior positively affects market, financial and organizational performance outcomes (Jaworski and Kohli, 1993, Slater and Narver, 1994 and Homburg and Pflesser, 2000). As recently reported in a meta-analysis by Kirca, Jayachandra, and Bearden (2005), the relationship depends on the superior capabilities of market-oriented companies in offering innovative products that, as a consequence, foster customer loyalty and perceived product quality. In other terms, a company with distinctive marketing capabilities has a higher probability to create superior customer value and achieve a competitive advantage (Day, 1994 and Slater and Narver, 1995).
Previous research on the role of marketing capabilities in the creation of superior customer value has not taken into explicit consideration the complementary contribution of the two departments that possess those capabilities and exercise them through marketing processes and activities, namely, Marketing and Sales. Elaborating on the literature on marketing capabilities and Marketing–Sales relationship, the present study presents a model exploring the joint contribution of the two functions to superior customer value creation.
Many studies have claimed conceptually that a firm's excessive orientation toward short-term objectives and results limits the effectiveness of Marketing–Sales interactions, thus fostering inter-functional conflict, diminishing cooperation between the two functions, generating misalignment with respect to vision, goals and activities. However the present study is the first to empirically show that a firm's long-term strategic orientation is beneficial to its capacity to create superior customer value.
Another contribution of the study comes from its focus on the effectiveness of the relationship between Marketing and Sales. Previous empirical research on inter-departmental integration has investigated the effects of such integration on the product development process and, as a consequence, on some performance outcomes. The present paper adopts a broader perspective and studies how the effectiveness of that relationship can foster market performance via the creation of superior customer value. Moreover, current research on cross-functional coordination underlines the importance of integration mechanisms to achieve inter-departmental integration (Maltz, 1997, Maltz and Kohli, 2000 and Rouziès et al., 2005) but overlooks the satisfaction and the commitment towards the relationship with other functions. By investigating the impact of the perceived effectiveness of the relationship the present paper underlines that perceptions play a critical role in affecting the creation of superior customer value and also market performance outcomes, in line with the view that “a better understanding of the social psychological determinants and effects of relationships between Marketing and Sales will lead managers to design and institute organizational designs and human resource policies so as to minimise any negative inter-group effects” (Dewsnap and Jobber, 2002: 875).
