The Corporate brand: a valuable resource and initiator of business relationships

Nikolina Koporcic

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Conference proceedingConference contributionProfessional

    Abstract

    The purpose of this paper is to scrutinize the role and importance of corporate brands in the pre-relationship stage of business relationships and to challenge the idea where valuable resources exist just and only as a result of interactions in already established relationships. It focuses on a corporate brand as a powerful tool which attracts potential partners and leads to initiation of a business relationship and differentiation from competitors. Potential relationships are based on mutual attractiveness and belief that one partner will fulfill the promise of the other and vice versa. This belief is defined as a trust, which is often a result of a reputation that corporate brands have in a network of business actors.

    In order to sustain competitive advantage of a company, the corporate brand is seen as a firm´s Golden touch, which adds a value to the company and makes it notable to a greater extent. At the same time, corporate brand is understood as a valuable resource even before interaction occurs, and explained as a missing link in the IMP theory. As a result, the IMP approach is adopted and adapted in a paper and the new theoretical model together with the propositions about the nature of resources created. Hence, the conceptual paper is contributing to the knowledge of corporate brands and business relationships with novel managerial and practitioner implications. 

    Original languageUndefined/Unknown
    Title of host publicationProceedings of the 31st Annual IMP conference, Kolding, Denmark
    Editors Clark, Anne, Freytag, Per, Munksgaard, Kristiin
    PublisherIndustrial Marketing & Purchasing Group
    Pages
    Publication statusPublished - 2015
    MoE publication typeD3 Professional conference proceedings

    Keywords

    • Business relationships
    • Corporate brand
    • Interaction
    • Reputation
    • Resources

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