طبقه بندی تصمیمات خرید تجارت b2b: اهمیت و احتمال خطر به عنوان یک چارچوب برای منافع کسب و کار الکترونیکی

Business-to-business (B2B) markets have been considered an attractive e-business venue for the realization of cost reduction and exchange creation utilities. However, as marketers have long argued, there are different types of buying situations, and the benefits sought in each may vary substantially. The present work builds on the thinking of previous industrial buying typologies by integrating perceived risk concepts into the business buying decision. Specifically, we develop a classification grid of industrial buying situations and then explicitly link likely e-business benefits to the various situations. The proposed framework holds implications for management and research related to supply chain relationships.

The promise of efficiencies generated by new information technologies offers attractive avenues to reduce cost through purchasing strategies. Many writers view the Internet as the means to the transactional efficiencies of EDI on a large scale (Henig, 2000). However, with the emergence of exchanges and auctions, a critical question is how the power of the Internet is best used to support a sound supply chain strategy that balances costs and service. Recent commentary surrounding online exchanges illustrates the barriers to widespread adoption of e-business technologies in business-to-business (B2B) markets. As Wise and Morrison (2000) argued, two of the most critical flaws of current exchanges are that they ignore much of the research on effective relationship management and that they give sellers little incentive to participate. This is underscored by one analyst, who observed, “Let's see, you want me to put all my products and prices online so my customers can beat me about the head and shoulders. Then, I can commoditize myself even more to take my razor-thin margins down to microscopic levels. Finally, I get to pay transaction fees for this privilege. What am I missing?” (Henig, 2000). While price minimization is an intriguing prospect, not all purchases are driven by the same criteria Desai-Sarnowski, 2001 and Porter, 2001. The objective of this paper is to classify organizational purchasing situations into categories with implications for the use of e-business. It proposes that the utilities of e-business are varied and that these benefits depend on buying circumstances. The link between specific organizational buying circumstances and the applicable utilities of e-business is an important issue for practicing managers and academics. The sheer volume of the B2B market is substantial and its growth projections make it one of the most attractive areas for e-business (Halford, 2000). Matching specific types of organizational buying situations with different uses of e-business offers a more realistic perspective on the benefits these technologies can provide both buyers and sellers. This paper will examine these benefits, identify industrial buying decisions using risk dimensions as a framework to classify decisions, and establish links between e-business benefits sought and buying situations. Understanding the strategic implications of a purchasing situation will benefit buyers and sellers. For the buyer, it will identify the most appropriate purchase criteria. For the seller, it will help in the development of appropriate value propositions.

E-business has received considerable attention in the popular press, and before the recent dot.com crash, several authors expected dramatic change in the B2B sector. While this paper does not disagree with the premise that significant changes are possible, it argues that the nature of change is not the same for all companies and that different situations hold unique strategic e-business implications for purchasing requirements. To this end, this framework has explicated how two risk dimensions interact to influence the nature of e-business utilities sought by industrial buyers and sellers. The proposed contingency framework is a further step in the evolution of current thinking related to the strategic impact of technological change on buyer–seller relationships