Call for Papers: New Perspectives on B2B Marketing - Connecting Marketing and Technology

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Rapid changes in the contemporary business world influence the understanding of the theory and practice of the company and its relationships. The aim of this special issue is to present a wide spectrum of new perspectives on B2B marketing with special attention devoted to a connection between marketing and technology.

Cognitive computing and Big Data Analytics have created new possibilities for marketing decisions that allow for the integration of Internet Technology into the business, industry sector and decision-making process. The rapid pace of the development of the Internet of Things (IoT) and the implementation of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning by companies facilitate more and more adequate and value-created machine to machine (M2M) interactions. These processes are related to ensuring the higher level of automatization, leading to the use of autonomous machines. An important value which is delivered by M2M interactions approach, both: internally (e.g. as part of the companies’ operation processes) and externally to the customers, is the real-time management (e.g. agriculture of farms and wineries) and the remote management of processes, (e.g. in monitoring the production processes; in the oil and gas industry). Terms such as: smart manufacturing or industrial revolution 4.0 are used.

All of those changes create opportunities for marketers. The theory and practice of B2B marketing, including B2B relationship marketing which is focused on the interactive and network approach, require that the influence of M2M interactions, which is developing in geometric progression nowadays, is to be taken into careful consideration. There is still limited research into how value is created and communicated in the world of M2M interactions with regard to business relationships. What seems to be important is to deliberate if and how the M2M interactions, as an increasing part of holistic B2B interaction processes, influence concepts such as trust, engagement, collaboration, value co-creation, power. It is because of the more and more extensive scale in the business practice of integrated activities of humans and machines in the stream of value chain. The integration of sales and customer service into company’s operations seems to be particularly important.

Another important aspect can be identified in the need of connecting R&D activities with customer orientation. The markets’ expectations regarding the acceleration of the product and technology innovation require the supply chain co-creation in R&D projects. One of the important solutions in product upgrading is the use of the real-time monitoring (including IoT) of B2B customers’ use of products, e.g. through sensors measuring temperature, pressure or other parameters. The engagement of supply chain participants in cooperative innovation projects including NPD, seems to be another important issue in terms of increasing performance of R&D projects and for building business relationship.

It can be concluded that in order for B2B marketing to be effective, careful deliberations on how value is created and communicated in the world of M2M interactions are necessary. It can be helpful to analyze industry-specific contexts and the specificity of industrial marketing in the emerging markets or developed markets context. The original research, conceptual or methodological manuscripts are welcome. All manuscripts should have real relevance to the industrial/B2B or business market domain.

Topics of interest include but are not limited to the following:

• Human versus machine interactions in B2B marketing context
• Value co-creation in B2B setting involving M2M interactions
• Trust and engagement in business relationships under the influence of industrial machine to machine (M2M) implementations
• Business networks and the use of M2M interactions
• Industrial marketing practices for companies using the M2M internet technologies
• Sales management and KAM with the use of M2M interactions
• Artificial intelligence and business relationships
• The use of Internet of things (IoT) in industrial marketing
• Influence of technological innovations on B2B companies’ supply chain and business model
• R&D cooperative projects in supply chain
• Technology design in connection with customer orientation
• Business ethics and sustainability in connecting marketing and technology in M2M world
• Digital B2B marketing
• Digital technologies versus manufacturing companies servitization
• Governance in digital networks
• Cognitive computing and machine learning approaches to marketing decisions
• Cognitive computing and Big Data analytics for advanced marketing decisions
• B2B marketing in emerging markets
• Dynamic and relational approach in B2B relationship marketing
• Co-creating in a B2B context
• Collaborative innovation in business relationships
• Innovation in B2B services and internationalization
• Power and power asymmetries in business relationships versus cooperation on innovative projects
• Emotions and experiences in B2B marketing
• Social innovation by strategic alliances in a B2B relationship

SUBMISSIONS
There is a single issue of EMPAS (issue 4, volume 11) allocated for this special issue in 2019. The deadline for submission of full papers is 30 June 2019. Submissions should be directed to the guest editor: Dariusz Siemieniako, Bialystok University of Technology: d.siemieniako@pb.edu.pl

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
Papers should be between 33.000 - 43.000 signs with spaces in length, including references. Authors must refer to the Guidelines for Authors for references, spelling, figures and tables etc. Articles will be chosen on the basis of their academic rigour and clarity of writing. The language of submissions will be English.