Marketing Strategies to Enhance Profitability Among
International Oil and Gas Service Companies
Section 1: Foundation of the Study
Background of the Problem
One of the most important objectives of any business unit is achieving
profitability, which indicates effectiveness of marketing strategies in
promoting products and services (Jemaiyo, 2013). Marketing strategies are
essential to a successful business (Kotler & Keller, 2012), and embracing
appropriate marketing strategies based on market changes is crucial for
sustaining business activities (Arnett & Wittmann, 2014). The dramatic drop
in oil price, starting in the second half of 2014, has affected many
international and regional projects in the oil and gas industry (Duhon, 2015).
Fewer projects mean fewer opportunities for business development and
support within the oilfield industry.
Considering the challenging environment, marketing managers should
develop a strong relationship with all stakeholders to tailor the right products
and services based on the customers’ needs. Decline in oil price affects oil
production and drops revenue related to oil supply (Smagulova, Doskeyeva,
& Radko, 2016). Exploring novel marketing strategies is necessary to stay
competitive and profitable (Appiah-Adu & Amoako, 2016). During financial
recessions, organization leaders tend to shed marketing functions; however,
Civi (2013) asserted that firms’ leaders should foster aggressive marketing
during economic downturn. In this doctoral study, I aimed to explore the
strategies that senior marketing managers of international oilfield service
companies implement to solve downturn market challenges.
Problem Statement
Since the second half of 2014, depressed oil price has caused a
dramatic decline in a number of oil and gas projects and has changed the
market demand for this commodity, resulting in reduced revenues (Duhon,
2015). Because of reduced oil prices, cash balances of 97 global oil and
natural gas companies declined more than $8 billion for the fiscal year
ending June 2015, reducing the profitability of these companies to almost
zero (U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2015). The general business
problem that I addressed in this study is that revenues of some multinational
service companies in the oil and gas industry in the Middle East have
declined. The specific business problem that I addressed in this study is that
some senior marketing managers of international service companies in the
oil and gas industry (ISCOGI) across the Middle East lack strategies to
enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits in periods of declining oil
prices.
Purpose Statement
The purpose of this qualitative multiple case study was to explore
strategies that senior marketing managers of ISCOGI in the Middle East
used to enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits during periods of
declining oil prices. The target population consisted of senior marketing
managers who worked in different ISCOGI in the Middle East, each with
several subsidiaries worldwide. I initiated my study with a sample of five
participants from the list of companies attending the annual event of Abu
Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference (ADIPEC, 2016),
which is one of the world’s most influential oil and gas conferences.
Participants included marketing managers who successfully used strategies
to enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits in their respective
companies during periods of declining oil prices. The overall
accomplishment of companies in terms of competitive advantages is an
indication of marketing managers’ capability in using successful marketing
strategies (Ahmed, Kristal, & Pagell, 2014). My finding’s implications for
positive social change include the potential for profit sustainability of the
corporations and contribution to prosperity of employees’ dependents and
local communities. Greater profits mean more operations and further
activities that necessitate employment, and, consequently, reduce
unemployment
rates.
Nature of the Study
I used a qualitative research for this study. Using a qualitative method
provides flexibility in having an in-depth understanding of phenomena and
exploring information on perspectives of individuals (Andriopoulos &
Slater, 2013; Erickson, 2012; Nassaji, 2015). Researchers use the qualitative
method to comprehensively understand the topic and explore the subject
based on the realities of the participants’ experiences (Anyan, 2013; Hazzan
& Nutov, 2014; Koning & Waistell, 2012; Yin, 2014). Researchers use a
qualitative method to explore information and understand events (Bailey,
2014). In addition, researchers use the qualitative method to uncover trends
in opinions and thoughts for a deeper understanding of problems (Garcia &
Gluesing, 2013; Upjohn,
Attwood, Lerotholi, Pfeiffer, & Verheyen, 2013). In this study, I sought to
explore the strategies that senior marketing managers of international oil and
gas service companies used to enhance profitability and increase market
share. A qualitative approach was appropriate for addressing my study’s
purpose.
Researchers use a quantitative study to describe numerical changes via
assessing the relationship and differences among variables (Harrison, 2013),
testing the hypotheses, and generalizing the results (Shelton, Smith, & Mort,
2014; Wisdom, Cavaleri, Onwuegbuzie, & Green, 2012). Using a
quantitative method, researchers may not be able to explore the participants’
experiences deeply through numerical models (Staggers & Blaz, 2013;
Venkatesh, Brown, & Bala, 2013). A mixed method is a combination of
qualitative and quantitative methods to answer the research question(s)
(Harrison, 2013). However, because the purpose of this doctoral study was
not to examine the relationship or differences among variables, quantitative
and mixed methods methodologies were not appropriate for exploring the
marketing strategies that senior marketing managers of the international oil
and gas service companies used to enhance sales performance, revenues, and
profits.
Several qualitative designs exist, such as case study, ethnography,
phenomenology, grounded theory, and narrative inquiry (Erickson, 2012;
Petty, Thomas, Stew, 2012; Rowley, 2012). However, considering the nature
of the problem I examined, a case study was appropriate for this study.
Researchers use case studies to build a foundation of previous theoretical or
conceptual propositions and collect data per predefined protocols (Hyett,
Kenny, & Deckson-Swift, 2014; Yin, 2014). Because the purpose of this
study was to explore the strategies that senior marketing managers of
international oil and gas service companies used to enhance sales
performance, revenues, and profits, I chose a multiple case study as the
design. According to Yin (2014), a multiple case study is a proper design in
an exploratory stage of a study, which may lead to more robust and
compelling results. Using a multiple case study might facilitate the
understanding of the problem through incorporating various data collection
methods among different cases.
In not choosing the other research designs, I considered the focus of
each design. Grounded theory is an appropriate design when researchers
seek to generate a new theory (Timmermans & Tavory, 2012; Thomas,
2012), which was not within the scope of my doctoral study. Ethnography
design has similarities with grounded theory with a focus on the cultural
aspects of the study (Flick, 2014; Zhu & Bargiela-Ciappini, 2013). I
excluded ethnography because I did not intend to explore the cultural
features of the marketing strategy. In phenomenological design, the focus is
on the meaning of participants’ lived experiences (Madjar, 2014). Therefore,
phenomenological design was not suitable for this doctoral study.
Researchers can use a narrative design to study an individual life story
(Beattie, 2014; Safari & Thilenius, 2013; Wolgemuth, 2014). Hence, I did
not select a narrative design. My approach was a qualitative multiple case
study design to understand the marketing strategies that marketing managers
in an international service company within the oil and gas industry used to
enhance the sales performance of their corporations.
Research Question
The central question in my doctoral study was: What strategies do
senior marketing managers of ISCOGI use to enhance sales performance,
revenues, and profits during declining oil price periods? Researchers will
benefit from developing a clear and rich research question (Doody & Bailey,
2016). The objective of the study was to explore marketing strategies that
marketing managers in the international oil and gas service companies used
to improve the performance of their corresponding companies in terms of
profits. Following is the list of the interview questions that I used.
Interview Questions
1. What marketing strategies do you use to improve sales
performance and increase revenues and profits during the periods of
declining oil prices?
2. What strategic marketing decisions do you consider to mitigate
the effect of a decline in the oil price on sales performance, revenues, and
profits?
3. What strategies do you use to deliver any possible changes in
your marketing strategies during the periods of declining oil price to
discernible customer groups?
4. What instruments, processes, and procedures do you use to
measure the success of your marketing strategies during a decline in oil
price?
5. What are the barriers to implementing your marketing strategies
for enhancing sales performance, revenues, and profits during the periods of
declining oil price?
6. What other additional information would you like to add to
strategies you use for enhancing sales performance, revenues, and profits
during periods of declining oil prices?
Conceptual Framework
In this study, I used the segmentation, targeting, and positioning (STP)
model as my conceptual framework. Wendell Smith (1956) developed the
STP model, and, later, Kotler (1994) enhanced the model. The purpose of
the STP model is to provide a tool to comprehend the attributes of different
segments of a market and to develop and tune the marketing strategies
accordingly (Smith, 1956). Smith identified the following key constructs for
the STP model: (a) market segmentation, which represents clustering the
existing and potential customers based on their common attributes; (b)
market targeting, which discusses the process of focusing marketing
strategies on a particular group; and (c) market positioning, which describes
how to locate the products and services in customers’ minds against
competitors. The STP model is a segment of marketing strategy that
marketers use to identify discernible customer groups, recognize the best
segments to serve, and generate value for corresponding companies.
The STP model provides a means for positioning products and
services to address different clusters of customers in an efficient manner
(Dibb & Simkin, 1991). Therefore, marketing managers can focus on the
most profitable segments of their business markets and create the maximum
benefit from existing and upcoming opportunities. The STP conceptual
framework provides a foundation for understanding strategic decisions that
marketing managers in the international oil and gas service companies use to
increase sales performance. As applied to this study, I used STP conceptual
framework for understanding and identifying the approaches that address the
marketing strategies for enhancing sales performance and increasing
revenues and profits in periods of declining oil prices.
Operational Definitions
Operational definitions section entails the terms, jargon, and
commonly used words in the study. In my study, I used definitions from
peer-reviewed papers and government sites and I have listed them in
alphabetic order in this section. I have not included words and terms found
in basic academic dictionaries.
Market positioning: Market positioning is a marketing strategy of
locating the products and services in customers’ minds against competitors
(Smith, 1956). Market segmentation: Market segmentation is the
breakdown of the whole market into smaller clusters in which specific
customers with common needs or passions are served with specific products
or services (Aigbomian & Oboro, 2015).
Market targeting: Market targeting covers the process of directing and
tailoring the marketing strategies towards a specific group of customers
(Dibb & Simkin, 1991). Marketing strategy: Marketing strategy includes a
set of actions and decisions integrated together for the sake of identifying
and meeting customers’ requirements, and achieving the organization’s
marketing objectives (Mohammadzadeh, Aarabi, &
Salamzadeh, 2013).
Oilfield service company: An oilfield service company is a company
that provides tools, equipment, consultancy, risk management, and a wide
range of services from oil and gas exploration to production, construction,
and well abandonment (Sealy, Scott, & Walker, 2016).
Profitability: Profitability of a firm is the ability of the firms’
management in earning profit, which in its simple definition is the firms’
revenues minus the expenses related to generating the revenue (Novy-Marx,
2013).
Assumptions, Limitations, and Delimitations
Assumptions
Assumptions are intakes researchers use to conduct the study and have
a certain effect on the research findings (Jannson, 2013). As argued by
Mesel (2013), having a predefined collection of assumptions that researchers
can use as a ruler for a specific methodology, is not possible. All researchers
have specific assumptions, though some assumptions may be common in
some studies. In this study, my assumptions were threefold. My first
assumption was regarding research participants’ honesty and knowledge in
responding to the questions, and avoiding any personal bias. Therefore, I
assumed that participants would truthfully partake in the data collection
process. Employment of open-ended questions accompanied by active
listening skills facilitates the participants’ replies and mitigates their concern
about the integrity of the responses (Rubin & Rubin, 2012). The second
assumption corresponded to the methodology and design of the study; that
is, I assumed that a qualitative case study was the best choice among the
other available methods for conducting this doctoral study. Third, I assumed
that my data were accurate.
Limitations
Any shortage in research prerequisites that might influence the quality
of results or clarity of the research outcomes is a limitation (Gyatt et al.,
2011). Several limitations existed in conducting this study. The first
limitation came from a misinterpretation of findings, especially with regard
to interviewing responses. Researchers design the validation process to
ensure the repeatability of the study (Wahyuni, 2012) and to alleviate the
researcher’s bias. Chan, Fung, and Chien (2013) explained that recognizing
the personal background and attitudes before commencing the study will
limit the researchers’ bias. Yin (2014) argued that researchers’ previous
experiences with the issue could cause some level of bias. The second
limitation was related to the generalizability of the results. The third
limitation was the potential loss or lack of participants.
Delimitations
Delimitations are the boundaries that researchers define to narrow the
scope of the study (Denscombe, 2013; Simon & Goes, 2013; Yin, 2014).
This study had some delimitations such as sample size, study location, and
the oil and gas industry as the focus of the research. Such boundaries
indicated the necessity to focus on the research topic and avoid a large
sample with a vast amount of information. I interviewed five senior
marketing managers across different geographical locations in the Middle
East; however, the sample was not an exhaustive representation of all the
senior marketing managers of the ISCOGI. Another parameter that narrowed
the scope of my study was the knowledge of senior marketing managers
participating in the study. That is, the level of knowledge and experiences of
participants varied; however, all participants had a minimum of 10 years of
experience with their corresponding companies. Furthermore, although
cultural variances affect the decision-making process (Hackett & Wang,
2012), culture was not a criterion for selecting the participants for
interviewing sessions in this study.
Significance of the Study
Contribution to Business Practice
A study of marketing managers’ strategies on enhancing sales
performance and revenue of the international oil and gas service companies
was important for several reasons. First, oil and gas industry leaders could
identify the most appropriate approaches to enhance sales performance,
revenues, and profits during the periods of declining oil prices by having a
comprehensive understanding of marketing strategies. Sabitova and
Shavaleyeva (2015) argued that oil price directly affects the budget of the
business units and affects surrounding businesses. Second, the study might
indicate different marketing strategies that companies’ leaders used in
different geographical locations to increase revenues and profits. Third, the
results of the study might show whether local community members could
influence the development of appropriate marketing strategies during periods
of declining oil prices.
Implications for Social Change
The implications for positive social change include the potential to
provide novel practical insights for senior marketing managers of
international oil and gas service companies, which could assist them in
enhancing the performance of their businesses and lead to positive impact on
the economy of the host locations. The outcomes of this study might include
strategic guidelines for senior marketing managers of the ISCOGI. Higher
sales performance can result in a better cash flow and may lead to increased
operations and activities, which requires hiring more employees and
reducing unemployment.
A Review of the Professional and Academic Literature
The purpose of this qualitative multiple case study was to explore the
marketing strategies senior marketing managers of the international oil and
gas service companies used to enhance the sales performance, revenues, and
profits. To maintain business sustainability, enhance profitability, and
preserve market share, corporate marketing managers must create and
conduct strategies to meet and exceed the companies’ objectives. Through
literature reviews, researchers build an understanding of the conceptual
framework, identify a foundation to the research topic, and support the
ongoing research (Rowley, 2012). Given the complex nature of the
interactions among international oil and gas service companies with their
global customers, the existing literature related to strategies that marketing
managers of international oil and gas companies use was limited and
fragmented in scope. To review the literature pertinent to the research topic,
I provided a critical evaluation of articles in contemporary peerreviewed
journals, published books, seminal references, and available information
from government and international organizations’ websites. I organized this
review of literature in subsections related to the research question and
conceptual framework of the study. The review of the literature starts with
the conceptual framework of STP and is followed by analyzing and
contrasting the other marketing theories. I then review marketing and
marketing strategies, provide an overview of literature related to sales
performance, review marketing strategies of oilfield service companies amid
economic downturn. My aim was to build a coherent and comprehensive
understanding of extant schools of mind.
I used the following databases to find the relevant literature:
ScienceDirect, ProQuest Central, Emerald Insight, EBSCOhost, Google
Scholar, and the database of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE). The
government websites and international organizations such as American
Petroleum Institute (API), U.S. Department of Energy, and Organization of
Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) were other resources for gathering
information related to the research topic. Some of the key phrases and words
I used to extract the information include marketing strategies, segmentation,
targeting, positioning, sales performance, oil price, Internet marketing,
relationship marketing, international oil and gas service companies, and
multinational corporations (MNCs). Since limited literature is available on
the marketing strategies within the oil and gas industry, I expanded this
literature review to include a wider range of international corporations.
Systematic reviews of existing literature will shed light on true nature of the
subject under investigation (Daigneault, 2013).
Analysis and synthesis of various sources consisted of summarizing
the extant literature, comparing existing qualitative and quantitative studies
related to the research topic, and contrasting existing literature. Kegler and
Allegrante (2016) stressed the need to establish comparability between and
across research studies to facilitate evidentiary process and strategies. This
literature review contained 447 references including 414 peer-reviewed
journals (93%), 18 seminal books, seven websites, and two doctoral theses.
In my doctoral study, 90% of the referenced sources were published within 5
years from the estimated date of approval from chief academic officer
(CAO), dated from 2013 to 2017. To ensure a logical flow of information,
the literature review consisted of several subsections including the
conceptual framework of STP followed by a review of other marketing
theories; marketing and marketing strategies; sales performance; and
marketing strategies of oilfield service companies amid downturn, each of
them building upon peer-reviewed articles and semantic works of pioneers in
corresponding fields.
Segmentation, Targeting, and Positioning
Different models and processes exist through which marketers can
demonstrate their approach towards linking their companies’ marketing
strategies to the overall markets. One of the widespread models is STP
model by Smith (1956). The purpose of STP model is to provide a tool to
comprehend the attributes of different segments of a market and develop and
tune the marketing strategies accordingly (Smith, 1956). Smith identified the
following key constructs for the STP model: (a) market segmentation, which
represents clustering the existing and potential customers based on their
common attributes; (b) market targeting, which is the process of focusing
marketing strategies on a particular group; and (c) market positioning, which
indicates strategies on how to locate the products and services in customers’
minds against competitors. The STP model is a segment of marketing
strategy marketers use to identify discernible customer groups, recognize the
best segments to serve, and generate value for their companies.
The STP model provides the chance to position the products and
services to address different clusters of customers in an efficient manner
(Dibb & Simkin, 1991). Bierbooms, Van Oers, and Bongers (2014) advised
business managers to move toward a successful business by targeting the
right market, positioning the products, and developing marketing
communication strategies. Marketing managers can focus on the most
profitable segments of their business markets and create the maximum
benefit from existing and upcoming opportunities. Considering the variety in
consumers’ needs and wants, companies’ marketers have reached the idea to
move from mass marketing towards a more specific target within the market
(Dibb & Simkin, 1991). Therefore, marketers divide the customers into
different segments based on similarities in customers’ requirements and
likenesses of their buying characteristics (Venter, Write, & Dibb, 2015). A
proper market segmentation will positively affect both market performance
and salespeople’s performance (Terho, Eggert, Hass, & Ulaga, 2015).
Aigbomian and Oboro (2015) argued that the success of market
segmentation relies on the degree to which a customer is satisfied by
products and services from the corresponding firms.
In recent decades, significant changes have occurred in the nature of
the marketplaces, moving from national markets to multicultural ones. With
the evergrowing role of multicultural marketplaces in the global economy,
the focus of the international marketing has shifted from cross-national scale
to a global scale (Demangeot, Broderick, & Craig, 2015). Identity, national
integration policies, intergroup relations, networks, and competencies are the
main conceptual focuses in multicultural markets (Demangeot et al., 2015).
Although there has always been a focus on products and places, recently a
change has occurred toward people who use such products. Therefore, more
variables exist for segmenting a market in comparison with the emergence
era of market segmentation. Because multicultural marketplaces are
complex, diverse, and dynamic, new sets of challenges and opportunities
exist for marketers to ascertain and understand them, and, consequently,
strive to identify innovative marketing strategies that can address those
challenges. Such approach contrasts with the old-school idea of sending a
message to a mass audience and hoping to catch the interested consumers.
In a qualitative study, Venter et al. (2015) aimed to understand the
natural setting of market segmentation using multiple data sources within a
multinational company (MNC) in information and communication
technology (ICT). The results of the study indicated four stages for market
segmentation in the firm under study. The first stage included all the
introductory activities that involved all parties to sit together and build a
foundation for upcoming phases. In Phase 2, the team started the process of
segmentation. In Phase 3, the results of the market segmentation from the
previous stage would be reviewed by a champion and be prepared for
business strategies. The focus of the final phase was on implementation of
the plan. Establishing legitimacy, theory embodiment, contextualization, and
process maintenance are the four sets of actions that managers should
consider in adopting a marketing process (Venter et al., 2015). When only
one or two segments exist in the marketplace, a small firm has the
opportunity to compete against the larger corporations effectively; however,
the same firm does not have the same opportunity in markets with several
segments (Aigbomian & Oboro, 2015; Han, Ye, Fu, & Chen, 2014).
Therefore, market size and number of segments can affect the marketing
strategies of the companies.
Depending on a variety of reasons, some of the marketers choose their
target segments as nationwide, whereas others consider smaller and more
focused segments. In a quantitative research study, Budeva and Mullen
(2013) studied 30 countries from 1990 to 1999 to investigate the effect of
economics and national culture on segmentation patterns. Using country-
specific aggregation data to put the world market into reasonable clusters
seemed to be a reasonable approach for some organizations. Economic and
cultural variables can influence the countries to shift from one market
segment to another over a decade (Budeva & Mullen, 2013). Therefore,
Budeva and Mullen suggested that marketers review the economic and
cultural variables together on a regular basis to have a comprehensive
conclusion on their marketing strategies through international market
segmentations.
Market segmentation may also affect the industrial rearrangements.
When segmentation is in the market, the likelihood of observing industrial
mergers increases
(Chaudhuri, 2014). By reviewing more than 2 decades of data from the
United States and Europe, Chaudhuri argued that markets with a greater
level of segmentation and more cost convexity are more susceptible to face
multiple acquisitions across borders, either simultaneously or in short
consecutive intervals. As soon as a multinational enterprise
(MNE) merges with a local firm in a particular market, the price of the
MNE’s products in that local market will increase, whereas the price in other
marketplaces will decrease (Chaudhuri, 2014). According to Chaudhuri,
even countries with similar market conditions and the same level of access to
information may face industrial mergers due to strategic decisions intrigued
by trade liberalization. Therefore, market segmentation directly affects the
sales performance and profitability of the firms through affecting the end
price of the products and services.
In addition to market segmentation, researchers studied the role of
cooperation with third parties in profit augmentation. Du, Yang, Liang, and
Yang (2016) proposed a model that could explain the effects of market
segmentation strategies combined with third parties’ involvement. In their
case, hotel and travel agencies, Du et al. emphasized the growing number of
consumers who use e-commerce tools to acquire needed services, either
directly via a service provider or through third-party agencies. The results of
the study showed a mutual benefit for both service providers and third
parties in terms of securing more customers and consequently more revenue
for the service provider and business sustainability for third parties through
special offers to customers (Du et al., 2016). Therefore, in market
segmentation, marketers should look for out of the box options rather than
merely dividing the market into a particular number of segments. The
service provider should also consider the sensitivity and demand of
individual consumers in customizing their market segmentation strategies
(Du et al., 2016). Therefore, demand structure may change the market
segmentation on a case-by-case basis, which requires a comprehensive
research on the marketplace, competitors, and resources before conducting
any market segmentation strategy.
Market segmentation may affect the total cost and lead to higher
profitability. In a quantitative study, Gangurde and Akarte (2015) found that
having a higher number of segments will reduce the total cost of the
segments. With only two segments, the cost of total segment product is
decreased by 40%, whereas having three or four segments reduces costs by
60% (Gangurde & Akarte, 2015). Therefore, firms with the ability to create
more value through further segmentation can benefit from lower total
segment cost. In another study, Güçdemir and Selim (2015) reviewed 317
business customers in original equipment manufacturer sector and
introduced loyalty, average annual demand, long-term relationship potential,
the average percentage of annual demand, and average percentage change in
annual sales revenue as five new criteria for market segmentation in B2B
relationships. Such criteria provided the opportunity for marketers to
develop more effective customer relationship management (CRM) strategies.
Because variables involved in market segmentation may change with time,
marketers should review the customers’ segmentation regularly and collect
reliable data for CRM databases to extract the most appropriate
segmentation strategies (Güçdemir & Selim, 2015). Therefore, marketers
should consider all possible variables in designing the most appropriate
market segmentation strategies.
One of the strategies marketing managers use to distinguish their
products and services is differentiation. Product differentiation can influence
the brand equity and pricing strategies. Davcik and Sharma (2015) reviewed
735 fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) to build a model for examining
the effect of product differentiation on pricing of the final products. The
model covered different measures such as consumer approach, financial
approach, and marketing approach through two-stage tactic in which
regression analysis indicated the relationship between variables and price
performance while cluster analysis determined the relationship between
premium price and product differentiation driven by innovation (Davcik &
Sharma, 2015). The results of the study emphasized on important role of
product differentiation on its performance output. Likewise, innovations
based on advanced technologies have the same level of importance on
product performance. Marketers can intend for higher-price products if they
can successfully distinguish their brands from competition (Davcik &
Sharma, 2015). Moreover, since innovation marketing is still in its early
stages of development, marketing managers can differentiate their products
and services from competitors by investing in marketing innovation
(Medrano & Olarte-Pascual, 2016). Furthermore, the outcomes of the study
indicated a positive and significant relationship between marketing
investment, as a financial phenomenon, and the pricing strategy.
Using novel marketing techniques is an essential strategy in
successfully entering the international marketplaces. Haverila (2013) studied
230 eligible companies across Finland firms that had both domestic and
international revenues. Haverila argued marketing methods had an important
role in new product development (NPD) in which differentiation and pricing
were the two significant variables from a managerial standpoint. When
introducing new high-tech products to the market, managers should position
the final product in the marketplace with different features from competitors’
offering, while the new product price is in accordance to the performance
differences (Haverila, 2013). In this regard, utilization of personal sales’
information rather than traditional marketing information systems may assist
organizations managers in better preparation of marketing strategies
including segmentation and pricing techniques.
Different marketers use a variety of techniques and approaches such
as K-means, artificial neural networks, and Taguchi method in segmenting
their target markets. Some of the methodologies have few drawbacks that
prevent widespread use of the technique across international marketplaces,
for example, K-means suffers from dependency to the location of the initial
cluster centers (Hong, 2012). Taguchi method allows the marketers to
optimize the segmentation design even if an interaction exists among the
control variables. Hong investigated horizon length, research data period,
and many observations as three interacting elements of control variables and
indicated that Taguchi method enables marketers to test different operational
variables at the same time. Taguchi method provides marketers the chance of
revising their marketing strategies based on customers’ needs (Hong, 2012).
Variety seeking is another criterion that marketers can use to segment
international customers. Legoherel, Hsu, and Dauce (2015) discussed that
variety seeking effects the consumers’ choice. An alternative for segmenting
the behavioral data is Chi-square automatic interaction detection (CHAID),
especially when researchers are dealing with behavioral data (Legoherel et
al., 2015). Therefore, although there are difficulties in designing the most
proper market segmentation, marketers can practice different techniques and
select the one that most suits their target market and can address the market
needs.
Different marketing managers use different processes in segmenting
the market.
Simkin (2008) studied market segmentation based on consumers’ purchasing
behavior, customers’ profile, consumers’ decision-making, and consumers’
needs through interviewing senior and line managers of over 20 corporates.
Simkin introduced a sixstage process for implementing marketing strategies
including (a) creating a team consist of cross-functional managers from sales
and marketing to operation and distribution, (b) grouping the extant
customers, (c) recognizing the customers’ characteristics and purchasing
behavior, (d) identifying dissimilarities between customers traits and
profiles, (e) regrouping the customers with similarities in performas, and (f)
applying marketing mix for each target group. Although Simkin’s attempts
provided a systematic guideline for implementation of market segmentation,
it did not cover the situations in which firms’ managers seek for fresh
markets.
Market segmentation is a dynamic process that requires continuous
effort in reconciling the strategies according to the market changes.
Lemmens, Croux, and Stremersch (2012) studied 398 product-country
combination from 79 countries between 1977 and 2009 to identify a
dynamic modeling framework for dealing with dynamic marketplaces.
Country segmentation for new product growth is a dynamic process and as
the life cycle of the products changes, a considerable variation exists in the
segmentation of the countries (Lemmens et al., 2012). Therefore, leaders of
the companies operating across international markets should revise their
previous static segmentation models to address the changes accordingly.
Tuma and Decker (2013) proposed the use of finite mixture models (FMMs)
in developing the proper market segmentation process. Successful market
segmentation requires paying attention to crucial factors such as initializing
and convergence of the algorithms, model selection criteria, and estimation
methods (Tuma & Decker, 2013). Marketing managers must integrate the
best recommendations for selecting the most appropriate model for market
segmentation. Dynamics of the market and consumer tendencies are
influential parameters in selecting the right marketing strategy. In a
quantitative study across the United States, Love and Okada (2015) found
customers with a tendency to buy high-quality products showed a higher
level of construal associated with abstract mental models and were more
willing to pay higher prices. In contrary, customers with tendency towards
low-price products depicted the lower level of construal associated with
concrete mental models (Love & Okada, 2015). Likewise, Lemmerer and
Menrad (2015) found difficulties of the product prices have less effect on
quality-seeking consumers. As a result, different market segments showed
different willingness to pay higher or lower prices, which can significantly
affect the marketing strategies in addressing those dispositions. Love and
Okada (2015) argued marketing strategies based on increasing saliency, led
to efficient outcomes in a higher level of construal comparing to strategies
that target a lower level of construal. Therefore, marketers should focus on
the primary features of the products in segmenting the marketplaces in
which the tendency is of higher quality, and in contrary, marketers should
focus on secondary features of the products whenever targeting a lowprice
market (Love & Okada, 2015). Other behavioral and mental models may
affect the consumers’ choice, and consequently, influence the segmentation
criterion. Stakeholders in the marketplace may influence each other and alter
the market tendency. Linking stakeholder groups using the stakeholder
cross-impact analysis (SCIA), and assigning a numbers that indicate the
strength of stakeholder’s influence, provides a scatter diagram for clustering
the stakeholders in the market (Mariconda & Lurati, 2015). The result of
such scatter diagram indicated four different categories including (a) driving
stakeholders, which have a great influence on others; (b) linking
stakeholders, which have influence on others while getting influenced by
others; (c) dependent stakeholders, which are only influenced by others and
have no or little effect on others; and (d) autonomous stakeholders, which
neither influence others nor get influenced by them (Mariconda & Lurati,
2015). SCIA indicated how strong the relationship between different
stakeholders is and how they direct each other in a marketplace. Therefore,
marketers can use SCIA in identifying and targeting the most influential
stakeholders and align the marketing strategies accordingly. However, in
case of having a high number of stakeholders, the model will become
complicated; hence, the experience of marketers will play a significant role
in defining the quality of outcomes. Some researchers studied the use of
fuzzy logic in segmenting the customers (Casabayó, Agell, & Sánchez-
Hernández, 2015; Rezaei & Ortt, 2013; Zandi, Tavana, & O’Connor, 2012).
The fuzzy segmentation, which did not push individuals to belong to a single
category, would assist marketers to remove ambiguous market information
and find the reality of the market (Casabayó et al., 2015). Therefore, firms’
managers will benefit from integrating clustering techniques with adaptable
artificial intelligent tools to remove ambiguous market information and
increase the data realism. Fuzzy logic works based on two distinguishable
abilities of humans including making rational decisions when a lack of
perfect information exists and ability to make decisions while there is no
computations or measurements (Rezaei & Ortt, 2013). According to Rezaei
and Ortt, fuzzy rule-base systems give the organizations’ managers the
opportunity to formulate marketing strategies for a group of suppliers within
a particular segment. As a result, managers can use their creativity and
generate novel approaches for supplier segmentation.
The process of market segmentation goes beyond a single stage
process. Zandi et al. (2012) introduced four key stages in market
segmentation using fuzzy multi-criteria methodology including: (a)
structuring the existing problem, (b) forming the market segments, (c)
evaluating the selected segments, and (d) identifying the proper description
for each segments’ strategy. Researchers can integrate fuzzy logic theory
with real option analysis (ROA) matrix to evaluate and select the optimum
number of segments in a systematic process (Zandi et al., 2012). Success of
any decision-making process using the fuzzy models relies on the
managerial judgment and experiences of the marketers. Having the right
people in the marketing team is an essential prerequisite for any firm to
increase the chance of identifying the most appropriate segments in the
marketplace. In market segmentation process, marketers should consider all
level of market breakdown to reach the most suitable segments. Segmenting
the countries based on highincome countries (HIC), emerging market (EM),
or even continent is not an effective way for multinational corporates
(MNCs) and may just cover a superficial aspect of the market (Schlager &
Maas, 2013). After studying more than 6,513 participants from
Europe, United States, India, Brazil, Mexico, and South East Asia, Schlager
and Maas (2013) argued marketers in the MNCs should have a deep
knowledge about the marketplaces to detect all the hidden aspects of the
market heterogeneity and fit their segmentation to the needs of the market.
In segmenting a market, one may focus on how customers in
emerging markets differentiate between international and local products.
Although there are some differences, the way consumers in emerging
markets look at local versus international products is not as dramatically
different as some researchers attempt to draw (Tanusondjaja, Greenacre,
Banelis, Truong, & Andrews, 2015). Therefore, similar to developed
marketplaces, regarding market segmentation, marketing managers of MNCs
should consider all the market segmentation theories and processes in
classifying and clustering the emerging markets. In both emerging and
developed markets, the tendency of customers is towards good value for
money, high quality, and satisfying the needs (Tanusondjaja et al., 2015).
Thus, segmentation remains one of the best practices in introducing products
into the market, either an emerging or a developed market. In a quantitative
study, Chen, Chen, and Zhou (2014) studied 400 Chinese firms that had a
joint venture business model with international companies. Chen et al.
found introducing superior technologies from parent companies to their joint
ventures alongside with adding new features to products based on local
requirements would increase the chance of being distinguished from local
competitors. Additional features based on local customers preferences not
only grow the profitability of both the joint venture and the parent company
through higher sales but also increase the market share within local and
global marketplaces.
Regardless of the market segmentation technique a marketer may use,
the aim is two-fold; first to support the market needs and customers’ wants,
second to maximize the corporate performance and profitability. In addition,
there might be inter-market segmentation, which requires excessive
consideration and in-depth investigation inside the target market (Awan,
2014). Managers in a company can tend towards market orientation
strategies, or brand orientation approaches to fulfill their objectives. Market
orientation includes strategies that focus on customers’ needs and wants,
while brand orientation entails all the attempts in identifying firms’ brand
through interaction with customers (Urde, Baumgarth, & Merrilees, 2013).
Wang (2015) suggested managers in high-tech companies should try to
enhance their market orientation to increase the quality of their tech-based
products, and consequently, get an edge over the competition in innovation
performance.
A shift in the entire perception of staff, structure, and the operations of
a firm might lead to a change in the organization’s orientation, which
required a change in some of the policies of the corporates (Urde et al.,
2013). Wang (2015) discussed managers should include service innovation
in their market orientation process to have a complete picture of the
determinants of innovation performance. According to Wang, service
innovation, alongside the market orientation approach, may lead to an
increase in innovation performance. Innovation will empower organizations
leaders in collecting required inputs from customers and competition into
marketing strategies and avoid being surprised by market reactions (Božic &
Ozretic-Došen, 2015). As a result, there should be a transformation process
within the whole organization to adopt the novel mindset. In other words,
firms’ managers should be able to balance their product orientation without
compromising other strategies. Therefore, there should be a continuous
negotiation among different market orientation strategies, with a focus on
the short-term sales versus long-run brand establishments, to avoid any
possible discrepancy. Product consumers and service users may
influence the market orientation. In a sense, customers’ buying preferences
may have a direct influence on the market segmentation criterion (Brito,
Soares, Almeida, Monte & Byvoet, 2015; Robson, Pitt, & Wallstrom, 2013).
Although lifestyle and preferences of the customers may be a propelling
force for classifying the products or services (Ogbeide & Bruwer, 2013),
there are other criteria that may affect the market segmentation. Marketing
experts should consider different variables such as demographic, geographic,
biometric, product characteristics, customers behavioral, and psychographic
of customers when designing their market segmentation (Brito et al., 2015;
Hand & Singh, 2014). Having a homogeneous target group will simplify the
classification and increase the chance of attracting more potential customers
through offering more relevant products or services.
Changes in customers’ budgets, short-term and long-term objectives,
and demand from inter-connected industries may alter the buying
preferences of customers, and consequently, may lead to a different
approach towards segmenting the market based on a new criterion.
Segmenting a market based on specific criteria means deselecting other non-
qualifier customers. Deselecting the non-qualified audiences may result in
communication efficiency and increase the focus of targeting (Djokic, Salai,
KovacZnidersic, & Tomic, 2013). The outcome will be a more homogenized
target population that will receive a higher value proposition through crafted
products. Aiming specific target groups may also improve the ability of the
firms’ marketing managers to send the right message to the right audiences
(Djokic et al., 2013). Hence, marketers will progress the value proposition
and make it more compelling for each group of customers based on their
interests.
One of the parameters that can affect both market segmentation and
product positioning is how enthusiastic the customers are to pay a higher
price for the sake of higher quality. Love and Okada (2015) found that there
was a notable difference between market segments in terms of customers’
willingness to pay for a product. While some individuals are willing to pay
more for a high-quality product, others may weigh more on low price.
According to Love and Okada, marketers should focus on the primary
features of the products in the marketing segments that tendency is on the
higher quality; on the contrary, the focus in low-price markets should be in
the secondary features of the products. Therefore, in segmenting a market,
considering consumer tendency towards quality, price, or both is essential.
Marketers should decide whether they want to position their product
or service based on market orientation or brand orientation. Gruber-Muecke
and Hofer (2015) investigated 170 CEOs, marketing managers, and
marketing directors and found that market-oriented strategies had a positive
effect on the performance of the firms. Wang (2015) conducted research
across 1000 manufacturing companies and found market orientation has a
strong and direct influence on the innovation performance of the firms. Urde
and Koch (2014) conducted research on extant literature associated with
product and service positioning and found the root for market positioning
comes from sharing a huge amount of information with customers, which in
turn, requires a comprehensive understanding of customers’ needs and
implementing the most appropriate means of communications. Choosing
between being market oriented or brand oriented depends upon the intention
of the organization’s leaders and the way they are going to implement such
positioning (Urde & Koch, 2014). Consequently, the objective of the
organization has a great affect on the positioning strategies. Therefore,
creating a logical balance between positioning a product based on market
orientation or using brand orientation for market positioning is important.
For example, if the organization’s goal is to respond to customers’ unmet
needs, being market oriented will serve better while in the case of focus on
the records of accomplishment of the firm and strengthening the market
position, then a brand-oriented approach will suit more. Marketing managers
and their subsidiaries should have the flexibility to adopt different strategies
based on internal and external changes.
In the service providing industry such as oil and gas service
companies, there may be several solutions available for a customer’s issue,
which requires service providers to propose the best solution. Keränen and
Falkala (2014) emphasized the importance of creating brands that can bring
solutions to customers by understanding the primary goal of the customers
and adjusting their capabilities to answer customers’ top priorities.
Positioning a solution brand requires more in-depth analysis of the
customers’ objectives and being closely involved with customers (Keränen
& Falkala, 2014). For this reason, firms’ managers should consider
customers’ specific parameters, competitors, and the distinctive traits of the
offered solutions in positioning their brands. Moreover, managers should
know and utilize different brand positioning strategies in dealing with
different type of customers.
Sometimes, companies’ managers must position their brands against
industry leaders or large competitors. Owners of the smaller brands can
benefit from recognizing and competing large brands within their context
(Paharia, Avery, & Keinan, 2014). One of the effective marketing strategies
could be focusing on competitive narrative, especially emphasizing on the
attributes of the competition process rather than attributes of the product
(Paharia et al., 2014). Brand positioning is particularly important for
emergent products and services due to the unfamiliarity of the market with
the quality and efficiency of the new entrants. Therefore, the owner of small
or emergent brands should learn how to get involved in the competition
process and how to approach existing and potential customers. On the
contrary, Paharia et al. argued large brands’ owners should avoid triggering
the market’s competitive narratives because it may negatively affect the
consumers’ perception of the existing large brand.
In some cases, two or more companies collaborate and offer to the
market a single product as a cobrand. In such cases, positioning perceptions
in cobranding will affect the perception of customers in facing the cobrand.
Organizations’ leaders should review and understand the brand positioning
of their partner brands prior to taking any positioning strategy for their
cobrand product (Singh, Kalafatis, & Ledden, 2014). Managers can select
the dominant brand positioning for the cobrand or emphasize on similarities
or dissimilarities of each brand positioning perceptions. Considering the
importance of selecting the right partner for creating a cobrand, Singh et al.
suggested to use a positioning matrix that contains different strategies based
on different partners’ positioning before selecting the partner brands.
Sometimes, building novel strategies for the cobrands that inherit all the
strong features of each partners’ distinct brands is inevitable.
Knowing customers’ characteristics alongside the specifications of
each brand is essential for marketers. Therefore, positioning a brand requires
special attention in introducing the right personality to individual brands. Su
and Tong (2015) argued seven dimensions describe a personality of a brand
including competence, attractiveness, excitement, innovation, activity,
ruggedness, and sincerity. Understanding the brand’s personality will give
competitive advantage to managers and provide marketers the chance to
understand the consumer’s perceptions from communications, product
usage, and competitiveness of the marketplace (Su & Tong, 2015).
Consequently, marketing managers should know what customers think about
certain products and how customers differentiate competitive brands from
each other. Base on such information, marketers can customize their brand
personality to address a particular target market.
Rival Theories of the Conceptual Framework
Researchers use a variety of theories in explaining the marketing
strategies of businesses. For example, Khan (2014) studied some aspects of
marketing and found relationship marketing as an emerged marketing theory
that scholars and researchers started to use in the early 1990s. Using the
theory of relationship marketing enables researchers to understand how
building a close bond with current and potential customers will promote the
ongoing business activities (Khan, 2014). The fundamental rule of
relationship marketing is trust, commitment, and gratitude (Mishra, 2016).
Moreover, relationship marketing has a considerable effect on profitability
(Borisavljevic, 2013). Relationship marketing is an approach to edge over
competitors by strengthening the communication networks during the
implementation of marketing strategies of the firms (Gharehbashloni &
Seify, 2014). Ritter and Andersen (2014) argued marketers could enhance
the organization's performance by recognizing the cross sales potential of
customers through relationship marketing. Therefore, marketers can invest
on relationship marketing hoping for better attracting the customers towards
existing and novel products.
Khan (2014) named some of the concepts of relationship marketing
such as database marketing, loyalty marketing, micromarketing, interactive
marketing, and customers collaborating. A derivative part of relationship
marketing is the concept of the customers relationship marketing (CRM). In
fact, CRM is an emergent paradigm in which marketers use customers
information to develop and manage a strong relationship with customers and
extend the value creation (Malthouse, Haenlein, Skiera, Wege, & Zhang,
2013). Marketing managers use all the resources available to collect and
nourish the CRM databases regularly (Stein, Smith, & Lancioni, 2013).
Choudhury & Harrigan (2014) argued CRM has a positive role in creating
customers value chain when used alongside the customers knowledge
management technologies. Meanwhile, Williams, Ashill, and Naumann
(2016) claimed CRM is an effective tool only when marketers utilize it
correctly and do not try to universalize the applications of the CRM.
Applications of CRM is not limited to the relationships between firms
and their customers. CRM is a practical tool for promoting the
communication between companies and suppliers (Brindley & Oxborrow,
2014). Using CRM in conjunction with supply chain, organizations’
managers can expect an improvement in the customers satisfaction and
loyalty (Hardwick, Anderson, & Cruickshank, 2013). Antony (2013)
emphasized marketing managers can enhance their marketing initiatives
through an understanding of different aspects of the interactions between
customers and service providers. Homburg, Wilczek, and Hahn (2014) found
a considerable improvement in business achievements due to a better
relationship between organizations and their end users, customers, and other
business partners. Building a strong, trustworthy, and manageable
relationship with customers is an inevitable part of having a successful
business, and may lead to attracting more customers.
Another theory researchers utilize in studying the marketing strategies
of organizations is the resource-advantage theory. Magnusson, Westjohn,
Semenov, Randrianasolo, and Zdravkovic (2013) asserted resource-
advantage theory supports marketing strategies and competition focused
approaches to leverage the practice of business. In resource-advantage
theory, the focus is on the organizations’ resources and the influence of the
resources on the financial performance of the organization (Hunt &
Madhavaram, 2012). Although resources of an organization have a direct
effect on the organization’s success, the effect of the resources may vary
based on the size of the business, nature of the business, and the level of
competitiveness. In small businesses, distribution of scarce resources is of
high importance (Baker, 2013). Therefore, aligning the marketing strategies
with organization’s resources may add value to the competitive gains of the
organization.
Marketing and Marketing Strategy
Appropriate marketing strategies are essential parts in defining the
success of any business. Selecting the most effective marketing strategy
entails acquiring a comprehensive knowledge of all choices and their
applications under different working conditions and organizational
environments (Kotler & Keller, 2012). For several decades prior to 1950s,
the scholars and practitioners equated marketing strategy with marketing
management (Rosenberg, 1978). Perhaps, one of the incipient usages of the
term marketing strategy goes back to Lyon (1926), where he or she
described the marketing strategy as a synonym for sales management. Lyon
argued marketers should plan and replan marketing strategies to cope with
dynamic changes of the workplace and achieve the ultimate business goals.
Neelakanta and Noori (2015) contended marketers should understand the
industry, related technologies, and probable changes within the relevant
industries to be able to measure effective marketing strategies.
With the development of marketing management in the 1950s and
after, the marketing strategy was explored and developed by pioneers such
as Bartels (1988), Drucker (1954), and Smith (1956). Since then, researchers
and scholars have emphasized the importance of developing appropriate
marketing strategies that can address the needs of the customers, as well as
the marketplaces. Although companies’ managers should have a sustainable
marketing strategy, they should also cultivate novel strategies alongside the
development of market requirements and technology advancements. Kotler
and Keller (2012) stressed the significance of having a blend of flexibility
and discipline for a successful development of the most appropriate
marketing strategy. Marketers should consider the practicality and
legitimacy of the marketing strategies to ensure their success (Yang & Su,
2014). Subsequently, sticking to a solid idea without considering the internal
and external conditions may result in a failure of the plan.
Before marketing became an integral part of the organizations,
marketing managers had experienced different phases of development in
marketing practices. Kumar (2015) identified four areas of development
based on customers’ issues of profitability and the firms’ utilization of
resources in addressing such issues. These focus areas consisted of (a) how
customers’ issues can potentially bring value to the firms, (b) how to
maximize such value, (c) how to assign the resources effectively to address
customers’ issues, and (d) how to allocate proper strategies that can increase
the customers’ profitability (Kumar, 2015). Kumar acknowledged marketing
had become an integral part of the organizations due to engaging the
stakeholders in the course of value generation through marketing practices.
Implementing the customers’ feedback into marketing strategies will also
enhance the profitability (Karamehmedovic & Bredmar, 2013). Wilkinson
and Young (2013) contended that marketers should move the marketing
research towards a dynamic and processed-based methodology to combine
different worldviews, such as reductionism and constructionism. Leading
company managers, regardless of their industry nature, deploy marketing
strategies in an efficient manner that ensures performance enhancement of
the firms (Appiah-Adu & Amoako, 2016). The adaptation of novel patterns
in using the media and focusing on the marketing effectiveness and
efficiency has put the marketing discipline to a core position in the
organizations.
Embracing the most appropriate marketing strategies according to the
changes in the marketplaces is a key parameter for sales and marketing
teams (Arnett & Wittmann, 2014). Measuring the effect of marketing
strategies is essential to improve marketing performance. Mintz and Currim
(2013) argued a positive relationship exists between utilization of proper
metrics and the performance of the marketing mix. However, the process of
measuring the marketing strategies is sophisticated and requires a blend of
collaboration among multiple disciplines (Leeflang, Verhoef, Dahlström, &
Freundt, 2014). Marketers can enhance the organization's performance by
recognizing the cross sales potential of the customers (Ritter & Andersen,
2014). Integration of different metrics enables organizations’ managers to
have a better measurement of their marketing strategies. Having competent
marketing experts in an organization may increase the total influence of
marketing strategy measurements on the performance of the firm (Martensen
& Mouritsen, 2014). Therefore, having the right measurement of marketing
results and its influence on the firms’ performance is of the same importance
as having the right marketing strategies, which entails having a robust
marketing department. In a quantitative study, Feng, Morgan, and Rego
(2015) examined the consequence of empowered marketing department
within 1000 public U.S. companies on the performance of the firms. The
results of the study indicated an increase in the power of marketing
departments across U.S. firms during 1993 and 2008 had a significant
influence on the companies’ activities and their future financial performance
(Feng et al., 2015). Powerful marketing functions mean potential for
marketers to implement their marketing strategies in accordance with the
market needs and company’s mission. In a study within hospitality service
providers across the Middle East, the researchers identified different
marketing strategies may influence the development plan and the
distribution of resources (Ahmad & Saber, 2015). In a sense, marketing
strategies are in close connection with other functions of the organization
and show the necessity for a well-harmonized relationship among all
disciplines.
Developing marketing strategies requires establishment of appropriate
marketing research. In a quantitative study of over 967 Nigerian companies,
Ewah (2013) found organizations’ leaders should focus on marketing
research with the emphasis on customers’ needs. Understanding the
audience’s needs and their buying attitude will show marketers how to create
value-added content (Holliman & Rowley, 2014). Wellplanned marketing
research will identify valuable information regarding potential marketplaces
for firms’ products. An efficient marketing department would result in better
planning, more effective decisions, increasing market share, more
profitability, and more satisfied customers (Ewah, 2013). Marketing research
per se is a proactive strategy that can potentially influence the firms’
performance. In more competitive marketplaces, the role of marketing
managers and their strategies is more evident. Marketing managers’
capabilities can increase the performance of the firms (Ramaseshan, Ishak,
& Rabbanee, 2013) and raise the shareholder's value at the same time
(Hansen, McDonal, & Mitchell, 2013). Researchers argued when more focus
is on marketing versus operations, higher organizations’ competitiveness
will result in higher shareholders’ value (Hansen et al., 2013). The result of
such studies expressed the important role of marketing strategies of
marketing departments on the companies’ competitive advantages.
In response to the high demand of practitioners for understanding the
linkage between marketing and other departments, Huang and Wang (2013)
studied the conflicts between marketing department and organizations’
department of Information Technology (IT), as two different functions with
a different worldview. While marketing managers are more selective in
adopting the technology than their counterparts in the IT department, both
marketing and IT managers recognize the advantages of market orientation
more than learning orientation (Huang & Wang, 2013). A simple alignment
between marketing and IT departments is not enough for improving the
performance (Huang & Wang, 2013). Therefore, to enhance the
performance, marketing managers should be more learning oriented, and IT
managers need to see a culture consistent with the technology.
Although organizations’ leaders attempt to move marketing from a
distinct function to an everybody’s responsibility model, marketing
managers should entail especial capabilities for developing and conducting
marketing strategies. Feiler and Teece (2014) reviewed an exploration case
in the oil and gas upstream and suggested dynamic capability as a pillar for
sustaining the execution of strategies. Managers can empower the
organizations’ internal and external competencies by merging dynamic
capabilities with strategies to address fast changing markets (Shuen, Feiler,
& Teece, 2014). Loveland, Thompson, Lounsbury, and Dantas (2015)
considered assertiveness, visionary leadership, optimism for career
satisfaction, and customers orientation as some of the competencies that
marketing managers should have to take the best marketing strategies.
Loveland et al. (2015) studied more than 465 marketing managers including
141 female marketing managers across U.S. firms between 2012 and 2014
and argued marketing education is an essential aspect of elevating the
marketers in their positions. Such training should be in line with the
organization expectations from marketing managers to deliver strategic
marketing decisions, which is an important part of the complex strategies for
development and growth. Milichovsky and Simberova (2015) advised
marketing managers to focus on the potential behavior trend of the market
by selecting the appropriate metrics that can address the market needs and
can reposition the company in the marketplace. Therefore, effectiveness of
marketing strategies is an interrelated aspect of business, especially in highly
competitive environments. The marketing strategies of the companies
can also affect the financial plans. A strategic alignment between marketing
strategies and financial policies may lead to higher profitability for the
organizations’ leaders (Mohammadzadeh et al., 2013). In other words, the
performance of the firms depends on such alignment between different units
of an organization including the finance and marketing departments.
Marketing capabilities will increase the operational capabilities, and
consequently, operational capabilities will increase the financial capabilities
(Yu, Ramanathan, & Nath, 2014). Marketing capabilities can affect the
export performance of companies positively (Nalcaci & Yagci, 2014; Tan &
Sousa, 2015) and influence the social performance of the firms (Liu, Eng, &
Takeda, 2015).
Marketing activities have a positive effect on the firms’ value (Ryoo,
Jeon, & Lee, 2016). In a quantitative study with more than 300 marketing
managers of professional firms in manufacturing and service sectors,
Ramaseshan, Ishak, and Kingshott (2013) showed the important role of
marketing managers in formulating and implementing the strategic
decisions, and consequently increasing the firms’ performance. Ramaseshan
et al. (2013) argued market competitions have a negative effect on the
strategy credibility while positively involve the marketing managers in
making new strategies. Therefore, marketing managers will influence the
overall performance of the firms as long as top managers involve them in the
firms’ strategic decision-making process.
Marketing capabilities and strategic decisions of marketing managers
not only affect the organization’s policies but also may influence the
customers’ decisions. Siahtiri, O’Cass, and Ngo (2014) explored the role of
marketing capabilities in delivering critical customer-centric performance
through studying 140 senior managers of businessto-business (B2B) firms.
The findings of the study showed both marketing capabilities (MC) and sales
capabilities (SC) of marketing and sales units in B2B markets have a
considerable influence on getting customers, retaining them, and making
them satisfied.
Firms’ managers should reinforce the marketing capabilities, especially in
facing with new product development (NPD) to ensure their advancements
are in line with customercentric strategies (Mu, 2015). Such approach
requires an alignment between marketing strategies and the needs of
marketplaces to be able to cope with the market changes. The success of the
marketing strategies relies on the ability of the firms’ leaders in aligning
their innovation capabilities with the pace of changes in technology (Danciu,
2013). However, marketing capabilities mediate the relationship between
market orientation and the performance of the firms (Heirati, O’Cass, &
Ngo, 2013). The ability of firms’ management in embracing the market
changes and adopting novel market-orientation policies that can support the
innovativeness and creativity is a crucial factor to produce a successful
strategy (Božic & Ozretic-Došen, 2015). In other words, being market
oriented will not assure higher performance; rather market orientation is the
ability of the firms’ managers in translating market knowledge to achieve
superior performance.
One of the important aspects of any marketing strategy is to consider
the effectiveness of marketing strategies in addressing the disruptive
elements of today’s competitive environment (Filieri, 2015). Cavousgil and
Cavousgil (2012) discussed four forces affecting the international marketing
namely the huge volatility in the global markets, strenuous engagement with
turbulent business environments, the advancement in novel strategies that
can cope with shifting market forces, and innovative comprehension of
marketing performance. While some MNEs’ leaders have managed to
transform their organizations, such as Apple, GE, and Tesco, through
creative ways, some others have struggled to cope with challenges of new
technologies, addressing the customers’ expectations, and reflecting on
government conventions (Cavousgil & Cavousgil, 2012). In all cases, a
comprehensive understanding of the changes and development of fast
response, in addition to strategies for risk mitigation are key parameters in
distinguishing surviving companies from those facing extinction.
Focusing on objectives of the business units may influence the
marketing strategy creativity and effectiveness. Slater, Hult, and Olson
(2010) studied the effect of environmental condition on marketing strategy
creativity and implementation effectiveness and showed that environmental
changes had a small effect on the organizations’ performance. Marketing
manager should direct the organization’s activities towards the proper focus
when they face constraints such as culture, resources, or skills and integrate
different functions of the firm (Slater et al. 2010). Slater et al.
argued that quality of communication among firms’ functions, managers’
commitment to the firms’ visions, and managers’ focus on the company’s
objectives have positive impression on the creativity in marketing strategies
and marketing strategy implementation effectiveness.
Marketing strategies that involve brands into the lives of consumers
by building value-based relationships seem to favor some companies.
Graffigna and Gambetti (2015) studied variety of brands from luxury to
mass-market and argued that consumers weigh more on brands that they can
emotionally connect with them. As a result, marketing managers should
design their marketing strategies in a way that consumers feel interpersonal
relationships with particular products or services. Partner linking, customer
engagement, and marketing sensing are three dimensions that could affect
the power of adaptation of companies to the external market changes (Mu,
2015). The closer the marketing strategies target the customers’ wants, the
greater the chance of maintaining current customers and attracting new ones.
Therefore, marketing strategies should create an emotional band between
consumers and the products and services of the firms. Another common
practice in marketing strategy is direct selling. Ragland,
Brouthers, and Widmier (2015) studied a sample of 51 nations across Asia,
Europe, Africa, and Latin America representing 91% of global GDP and
found direct selling is not identical across different countries. Countries from
Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America showed higher level of market
attractiveness and higher degree of direct selling performance for the
companies that expand their business into these regions (Ragland et al.,
2015). Findings of Ragland et al. indicated some business models such as
direct selling may work better in one marketplace than others, which may
affect managers decisions on whether entering a new international market
will be profitable or not.
Utilization of advanced technologies such as smart phone applications,
Internet, and social media may provide a foundation for managers to develop
their marketing strategies via offering state-of-the-art marketing solutions to
the customers (Danciu, 2013). Advanced technologies assist both marketers
and customers in rectifying their relationships. Royle and Laing (2014)
concluded that while public sector primarily used digital technology to
encourage more engagement of customers by sharing information, marketers
in the private sector used digital marketing as a complementary channel for
communication, which allowed them to promote their products and services.
Danciu (2013) argued that new business models and activities might emerge
because of easier access to worldwide customers through use of gigantic
resources of data collection and data analysis. Internet-based technologies
have dramatically reduced the total final cost for both sellers and buyers,
which have led in higher productivity (Danciu, 2013). Therefore, developing
and utilizing advanced Internet-based knowledge is an inevitable part of
marketing management and marketing strategies.
Although using novel technologies and Internet provides powerful
tools for marketing managers in developing their strategies, the role of
customers in response and use of the same technologies is important. In a
qualitative study across US, France, and UK, Holliman and Rowley (2014)
found using technologies such as social media and
Internet web pages had a significant influence in building trust and ensuring
sustainability of the business-to-business relationships. Organizations’
marketers require acquiring new sets of skills, competencies, and tactics to
develop novel strategies. Aligning the marketing managers’ competencies
with the pace of the marketplace changes is in agreement with the findings
of Holliman and Rowley that emphasized on firms’ managers’ obligation in
identifying a variety of objectives such as brand building, brand awareness,
and creating trust for developing the best marketing strategies that can
answer the clients’ needs. Royle and Laing (2014) revealed skills such as
technical competencies and strategic integration are the key missing
proficiencies marketers need to develop. Lack of a solid practice guideline
for the best-in-class practices, lack of clear standard for evaluation measures,
and shortage in future-proofing capabilities in dealing with rapid changes in
the marketplaces are some of the main areas for progress (Royle & Laing,
2014).
Sales Performance
The success of an organization is the ultimate goal of all its
departments and segments, which requires a close collaboration among all
business units.
Mohammadzadeh et al. (2013) emphasized the importance of having
comprehensive collaboration among different segments of an organization
including marketing and finance to enhance the overall performance. The
complexity and volatility of the marketplaces have raised the necessity for
cooperative collaboration among different disciplines within an organization.
Organic forms of organizational culture will enhance the overall
performance (Wei, Samiee, & Lee, 2013). Findings of a mixed method study
in the oil and gas industry expressed the relationship between agile supply
chain and business performance across United Kingdom North Sea upstream
oil and gas industry (Yusuf et al., 2014). A significant relationship presents
between competitive objectives, business performance, and the agility of the
delivery system in the oil and gas industry, which affects the profitability of
the corporates (Yusuf et al., 2014). Hence, marketers should involve other
department managers while making marketing strategies to ensure the
alignment of the organization as a system.
One of the other parameters that can influence the firms’ performance
is sustainability (Yusuf et al., 2013). Developing strategies for sustaining a
business in the oil and gas industry is not a task for an individual company
rather is a collective task for individuals, businesses, governments, and
multilateral agencies. Some companies suffer from lack of a solid
sustainability plan in the marketing strategies, in particular, small companies
do not have the sufficient financial and technical resources to develop their
sustainability programs, and require support from the industry giants,
international agents, or governments (Yusuf et al., 2013). A sustainable
marketing strategy requires a sustainable business unit that can support both
short-term and long-term plans.
With emergence of the Internet and promotion of novel means of
communication, marketing has entered a new era of development. Many
marketers have upgraded their strategies from using traditional channels of
communications towards social media such as Facebook and Twitter
(Oztamur, & Karakadilar, 2014). Organizations’ leaders started using
Internet in their marketing practices because of its ability to improve
business processes, increase communication efficiency among all
stakeholders, and get edge over competitors (Apăvăloaie, 2014). There is no
geographical or time limit for innovation and utilization of online facilitators
in promoting a business (Apăvăloaie, 2014). Innovation will give significant
edge over competitors by giving specific orientation to the marketing
strategies (Božic & Ozretic-Došen, 2015). Novel technologies have led to
new tools and techniques that were not available to marketers over a decade
ago. Therefore, marketers who can adopt such technologies properly will get
advantages over their market rivals.
Legitimacy and trustworthiness of the marketing strategies is an
essential factor in sustaining the sales performance of the firms. Yang and
Su (2014) found positive relationship between legitimacy and efficiency of
the firms. The way that regulations determine the marketing key
performance indicators for a particular business influences the organizations’
establishment in the market (Doherty, Chen, & Alexander, 2014). Such key
indications may differ from one industry to another and can vary across
different geographical locations. However, regardless of the nature of the
industry, the level of trustworthiness is in connection with authorities’
perception on firms’ legitimacy and consequently affects the relationship
between authorities and organizations’ leaders. As indicated by Doherty et
al., meeting the industry key performance indicators will assist companies’
management in promoting their products and services.
Marketing and sales forces’ capabilities may also affect the sales
performance and enhance the profitability. Both marketing capabilities (MC)
and sales capabilities (SC) of marketing and sales units in B2B markets have
considerable effect on getting customers, retaining them, and making them
satisfied (Siahtiri, O’Cass, & Ngo, 2014). Having greater capabilities in
marketing and sales will potentially increase the competitive advantages in
the marketplace. Siahtiri et al. concluded sales capability is a superior driver
for customer centric performance (CCP) while market orientation has
moderate effect on the relationship between marketing and sales capabilities
and customer centric performance. The stronger the customer centric
performance (CCP), the higher the brand performance. However, during the
economic downturns, the role of operational capabilities is more than the
marketing skills (Ahmed et al., 2014). The study outcomes identified that
during the economic growth, leaders of the organizations that gave more
weight to the operations and marketing functions will see a higher
performance (Ahmed et al., 2014). Hence, while operational and marketing
capabilities are a source of competitive advantage, organizations’ leaders
should pay attention in developing strategies that can enhance the firms’
profitability according to the market condition. Lages, Mata, and Griffith
(2013) argued continual learning and analysis processes by managers is a
key to ensure a steady performance.
Sales performance of international companies is in connection to some
other parameters such as level of entrepreneurial orientations, customer
oriented selling, and absorptive capacity. Javalgi, Hall, and Cavusgil (2014)
found a positive relationship between corporate entrepreneurial orientations,
customer oriented selling, and international sales performance in the B2B
setting. Therefore, during the process of designing the marketing strategies
for a company, marketers should consider the nature of the organization and
the vision of the leaders to be able to provide the most effective strategies.
Specificity of the industry, geographical distributions, and particular settings
of business units within the company may influence the strategies (Kafouros
& Wang, 2015). Cultural diversity may also affect the internationalization
and consequently shake the sales performance. A positive relationship exists
between sales performance and the cultural diversity for the multinational
enterprises that operate in countries with similar cultures, while the
relationship is negative for multinational companies that operate in culturally
diverse countries (De Jong & van Houten, 2014; Peterson, Kushwaha, &
Kumar, 2015). ). However, inefficiency in resource allocation during an
increase in internationalization may offset the positive effect (De Jong & van
Houten, 2014).
Salespeople have a long-lasting, direct, and intimate relationship with
customers and are the initial face of the organizations in the customers’
office. Therefore, whereas marketing strategies are critical in promoting a
product or service, per se, marketing strategies cannot guarantee the success
of the business and efficient and capable salespeople are an integral part of
the system. The proficiency and perceptions of the salespeople affect the
profitability of the organizations (Mullins, Ahearne, Lam, Hall, & Boichuk,
2014). Karanja, Sma, and Thuo (2014) discussed that sales and marketing
managers need to encourage their companies’ leaders in dedicating special
budget for training the sales team to enhance their marketing skills, which
enables them to identify the market needs, trends, and requirements for new
products and services. Also, building a stronger relationship between
marketing and sales teams will enhance the profitability (Wiersema, 2013).
Salespeople, as the face of the company, gather the required data that
marketing managers should translate it to the knowledge, as a competitive
advantage resource (Denicolai, Zucchella, & Strange, 2014). In addition,
there should be compensation and incentive plans to motivate salespeople to
develop their capabilities and extend their support to the customers (Karanja
et al., 2014). A capable salesforce will facilitate the flow of marketing
strategies.
Because of heterogeneity of the business environments, having a one-
size-fits-all approach across all marketplaces is not possible. Therefore,
managers should train their salespeople to use variety of techniques and
tactics to increase the sales performance (Terho et al., 2015). Understanding
the customers’ business models, creating value proposition, and
communicating the customers’ values are some of the key areas that
marketing managers should consider when prioritizing their strategies
(Terho et al., 2015). Integrated marketing communication directly and
positively affects the brands’ performance and, consequently, leads to better
financial performance (Luxton, Reid, & Mavondo, 2015). For example,
when dealing with high-potential customers, a valuebased strategy could be
more appropriate than being customer oriented. Since different clients in the
oil and gas sector have a wide range of characteristics in their buying
centers, marketing managers should familiarize themselves with client’s
characteristics and needs prior to practicing any marketing strategy.
Some managers prefer to use specific marketing and sales strategies
such as drip pricing, price partitioning, or bundle pricing to increase the sales
performance. Robbert (2015) identified drip pricing as a pricing tactic in
which organizations’ managers advertise only part of the product or service
price and express additional charges in the process of purchasing. The extra
charges can be in the form of optional add-ons or mandatory surcharges.
Robbert described price partitioning a process in which businesspersons
divide the total price into a base price for the main product and one or more
surcharges. Compared to partitioned pricing, drip pricing negatively
influenced the consumer’s decisions in terms of perceived deception,
perceived value, and buying intentions (Robbert, 2015). Repetti, Roe, and
Gregory (2015) found bundle pricing is a preferred choice for the majority of
the customers in the hotel and resort industry. While for those consumers
who pay less attention to the price, drip pricing does not have a significant
effect on their perceived value or buying intention, for highly price-
conscious consumers perceived value for a particular offer and the purchased
intention were lower (Robbert, 2015). Therefore, knowing the buying center
attitude is essential for marketers to design their strategies accordingly. For
example, Chahal, Dangwal, and Rania (2014) and Dean and Pacheco (2014)
argued overall tendency of the marketplaces towards green marketing has a
direct influence on the performance of the companies in terms of bigger
market share, higher sales growth, and greater profitability. Consequently,
marketing managers should develop their marketing strategies in accordance
to general direction of the market.
The dynamics of marketplaces necessitates a high level of flexibility
and innovation in marketing strategies. Innovative organizational culture,
which encourages employees to develop innovative ideas, products, and
dynamic thinking, will give rise to delivering positive results (Toaldo,
Didonet, & Luce, 2013). Innovativeness and adaptation of marketing
strategies are two primary contributors in the performance of the firms
(Hallback & Gabrielsson, 2013). Emergent marketing strategies will enhance
the performance of the firms but have a little effect on the hard aspects (i.e.
product and distribution) of the marketing strategy (Chari, Katsikeas,
Balabanis, & Robson, 2014). Emergent marketing strategies means
developing new ideas and approaches based on the changes in the market
demands. Chari et al. argued one-size-fits-all strategy is not suitable for
uncertain markets in which there is a need for more flexible approaches. The
uncertainties of the external environment may require regular updates in
marketing strategies. In a quantitative study across UK, Zeriti, Robson,
Spyropoulou, and Leonidou, (2014) found differences exist between home
and export markets in terms of economic, competitiveness, technology,
customer type, and the desire of the stakeholders in perceiving the business
operation and adapting marketing strategies. These external environmental
factors were influential on the fit and performance of the organizations.
Changes in the oil price, for example, imposes a threat for oil companies,
and entails novel marketing strategies.
Internal pressures such as performance decline, will also affect the
marketing decisions. Some managers tend towards certain decisions during
the performance decline period that can affect their managerial effectiveness
and increase their risk-taking power
(Chng, Shih, Rodgers, & Song, 2015). In such downturn conditions,
marketing managers play a key role in directing the company towards the
right route. Chng et al. argued managers should improve their managerial
self-regulation capabilities by raising their awareness. Therefore, business
leaders should ensure their managers have consistent and up-to-date
trainings that can prepare them for any unexpected changes, either internally
or externally.
Marketing managers should consider the short-term and long-term
effects of brand equity in their marketing strategies, which in turn, will affect
the profitability of the firms. Mizik (2014) argued brand equity could affect
the firms’ financial performance based on the marketing strategies that
organizations’ leaders choose. According to Mizik, analyzing and
understanding such effect would assist marketers to avoid underinvesting the
value-generating process of the brand. In other words, marketing managers
should consider the short-term and long-term effects of brand equity during
the creation of marketing strategies to develop strategies that can leverage
brand equity and financial performance of the company. Davcik and Sharma
(2015) found brand equity as a pillar for sustaining the pricing strategy of
the firms, which in turn will influence the profitability and revenue.
Marketing strategy, as a holistic blend of an organization’s
management effort, may have an influence on the financial performance and
profitability of the organization. Shin (2013) studied some independent
businesses across Korea and found managers can enhance the profitability of
the firms by implementing market information into the business strategies.
In another study, Mitchell and Olsen (2013) found utilization of marketing
metrics would leverage the firms’ performance through providing better
analysis of marketplaces and enabling a more accurate profitability forecast.
Business executives of the organizations can elevate the profitability by
ensuring a continual engagement of market assessment information and
customers behavior in all business decisions (Groenewald, Prinsloo, &
Pelser, 2014). Therefore, using marketing intelligence in strategic decisions
of the organization can potentially foster the profitability of a firm.
Variation in products and services may have a positive effect on the
sale performance and profitability of the firms. Civic (2013) argued
developing new products and remodeling the current designs are useful
marketing strategies to enhance the competitiveness of a firm. Chen and Liu
(2013) discussed generating product marketing gatekeepers would leverage
the profitability of the firms. However, new products should be in line with
customers’ expectations to protect their profit and loyalty. Kumar, Sharma,
Shah, and Rajan (2013) found increased profitable customers would
maintain loyalty, and consequently, would raise the profitability of the firms.
Therefore, marketing managers and business executives should ensure the
integration of marketing strategies into decision-making processes to
enhance the profitability and sales performance of the organization.
Marketing Strategies of Oilfield Service Companies amid Downturn
Oilfield service companies are providers of services, products, tools,
and consultancy to the oil and gas companies, which in turn explore, extract,
produce, refine, and distribute oil, gas, and all related products. According to
American Marketing Association (2013), marketing includes all activities,
plans, and procedures that lead to creation and establishment of
communication channels between firms and their clients, customers,
partners, and societies through value creation and addressing customers’
needs. While the fundamentals of the marketing are the same across almost
all industries (Kotler & Keller, 2012), some industry leaders may focus more
on a particular aspect of marketing mix or alternatively give more weight to
the relationship marketing. Regardless of the business nature, sometimes,
lack of enough appropriate information may lead to unknown situation and
uncertain business environment (Merigó, GilLafuente, & Gil-Lafuente,
2016). Uncertainty in business may affect the strategic decisions and result
in ambiguous market leading to financial crisis.
Global economy has been experiencing series of difficulties
throughout the history. Economic recessions not only negatively affect the
customer demands and expectations (Kaytaz & Gul, 2014) but also depress
the sales of the products, and consequently decline the organization
profitability (Bamiatzi, Cavusgil, Jabbour, & Sinkovics, 2014). Decline in
product sales due to economic downturn will speed up the processes of
organizational changes (Hampson & McGoldrick, 2013). Aligned with such
organizational changes, managers strive to modify the sales and marketing
strategies to meet new market requirements. According to Brooksbank,
Subhan, Garland, and Rader (2015), regardless of the economic conditions,
marketing strategists can benefit from basic marketing strategies to facilitate
their competitive achievements.
Irrespective of the economic downturn or growth, strategic marketing
has a significant role in giving edge over competitors. Rollins, Nickell, and
Ennis (2014) argued during the recession period, marketing managers are
under a great pressure from top management to cut the marketing spending.
Nevertheless, Rollins et al. (2014) asserted a significant part of the pressure
for reducing firms’ spending is due to customer reduction in expenditure
during the recession period. However, marketing managers use variety of
marketing strategies to sustain the profitability of their organizations.
Brooksbank et al. (2015) argued firms’ managers give different priorities to
marketing strategies during the recession time comparing to the time of
business growth. Notta and Vlachvei (2015) named variety of approaches
towards marketing strategies during the economic downturn including
offering price discount, delivering higher quality products, customizing
services, targeting specific markets, and handling cost reduction methods.
Fluctuations in oil price, as a global commodity, will affect the
international markets and influence the corporates investment capabilities.
Tayebi and Yazdani (2014) studied a sample of seven oil exporter and
importer Asian countries and argued both financial crisis and shocks in the
oil price have a direct effect on business trades, at least in the short term.
Nickell, Rollins, and Hellman (2013) reviewed 190 samples from both
consumer companies and service providers across U.S. and found
companies’ leaders who managed to maintain their existing customer
relationships were more successful in surviving the financial crisis. In
addition, marketing managers of companies that survived the market
downturn successfully developed novel marketing tools such as social media
and innovative marketing to overcome the market depression (Nickell et al.,
2013). Reallocation of marketing strategies may result in developing
innovative marketing approaches. Rollins et al. discussed that firms’
marketing managers need to focus on relationship with customers and
leverage the marketing effort during the recession. According to Rollins et
al., managers who rapidly understand and adapt to the economic downturns,
have a great chance to emerge stronger. Therefore, while having a
wellplanned marketing strategy will potentially highlight the way forward
and act as a blueprint, building and retaining a close relationship with
customers, clients, and all other stakeholders will act as a survivor during the
financial crisis.
In industries like oil and gas, where a huge competition exists, a
complex set of factors affects the competing power of the firms and makes
the emulation difficult for the rivals. Garcia, Lessard, and Singh (2014)
found although assets are one of the most important parameters in
differentiating competitors, a combination of tangible and intangible assets
drives the firms’ strategies and gives edge over competition. One of the main
strategies corporate managers seek is to solve client issues by value creation
through in-depth understanding of the existing challenges. A comprehensive
discernment of the customers’ challenges comes from engaging all the
integrative dynamic capabilities and developing strategies that are hard to
imitate or develop (Garcia et al., 2014). Therefore, based on company’s
vision, firms’ managers strive to develop strategies that put them ahead of
the competitors across different marketplaces.
Distribution of oil and gas reserves is not even all around the globe;
thus, geopolitical forces push for additional consideration while creating
marketing strategies of the firms. Michael (2014) argued market distortion,
because of imbalance power of the producers and consumers, has altered the
market equilibrium and brought uncertainties in the supply section
comparing to the prediction of the demand part. Nevertheless, oilfield
service companies seem to be more sensitive to the market volatility in
comparison to the production and exploration companies (Michael, 2016).
Supply of the oil and gas, in turn, affects the companies’ strategies for
introducing new projects and expanding ongoing developments. However,
according to Michael (2016), conventional and unconventional energy
sources influence the sensitivity of the companies towards oil price changes.
Hence, in such puzzling situations, senior marketing managers of the oil and
gas service companies may find themselves in a challenging position in
which conventional approaches will be blemished.
Oil price fluctuations affect activity and investment in the oil and gas
industry; consequently, oilfield firms’ managers face reduction in revenue
and profitability. In the annual market outlook report of British Petroleum
(2016), as one of the well-established international companies in the
petroleum industry, supply and demand of oil in the global level is predicted
to continue to strive for a balance situation in short to medium term, and
subsequently, would affect the investments in new exploration projects.
Same prediction held true in Statoil energy perspective report (2015), which
showed up to 40% deduction in upstream investments in 2015 and predicted
the same trend in upstream investment for short to medium terms. When
international and national oil companies encounter revenue drop due to low
oil price, they put more pressure on oilfield service companies to implement
strict cost control activities (Al-Fattah, 2013). Therefore, senior marketing
managers of the oilfield service companies will keep facing enormous
challenges from both external and internal forces. Civi (2013) asserted
firms’ leaders should weigh more on aggressive marketing functions during
the economic downturn. Understanding the marketing strategies senior
marketing managers of international oilfield service companies use to
enhance the profitability during the downturn period was the main purpose
of this doctoral study.
Transition and Summary
The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore marketing
strategies that senior marketing managers of international oilfield service
companies used to enhance the profitability of their organizations, especially
during the downturn periods. The problem was that some senior marketing
managers of ISCOGI across the Middle East lack strategies to enhance sales
performance, revenues, and profits in periods of declining oil prices. I used a
qualitative multiple case study to answer a central research question by
targeting the senior marketing managers of international oilfield service
companies. The conceptual framework of this study was Smith’s (1956)
model of STP that provided a tool to comprehend the attributes of different
segments of a market to tune the marketing strategies accordingly. In
addition, Section 1 of this study covered a brief introduction to the nature of
the study, explanation of assumptions and limitations, elaborating the
significance of the study, and a holistic review of the existing literature
pertinent to the research topic.
In Section 2, I provide a detailed description of research methodology
and design, target population of the study, sampling method, ethical research
considerations, data collection instrument and technique, data organization
and analysis process, and identification of the study’s reliability and validity.
In Section 3, I will present, analyze, and discuss the findings of the study in
accordance with the conceptual framework and the literature review. In
addition, I will offer some practical recommendations for action followed by
the way forward for further research. Last, I will provide a review of the
conclusion of the study.
Section 2: The Project
In Section 2, I provide a detailed description of the steps I took to
explore the strategies that senior marketing managers of international oil
field service companies used to enhance the sales performance, revenues,
and profit. I discuss why a qualitative multiple case study was best suited to
answer my research question and how I, as the data collection instrument,
ensured the reliability and validity of the data collection process. Section 2 is
composed of the following subsections: (a) purpose statement, (b) role of the
researcher, (c) participants, (d) research method, (e) study design, (f)
population and sampling, (g) ethical research, (h) data collection, (i) data
analysis, and (j) reliability and validity.
Purpose Statement
The purpose of this qualitative case study was to explore strategies
that senior marketing managers of ISCOGI used to enhance sales
performance, revenues, and profits during periods of declining oil prices.
The target population consisted of senior marketing managers who worked
in ISCOGI in the Middle East, each with several subsidiaries worldwide. I
selected participants from the list of companies attending the annual event of
Abu Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference (ADIPEC,
2016), which is one of the world’s most influential oil and gas conferences.
Participants included marketing managers who successfully used strategies
to enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits in their corresponding
companies during periods of declining oil prices. The overall
accomplishments of companies in terms of competitive advantages indicate
marketing managers’ capability in using successful marketing strategies
(Ahmed et al., 2014). The implications for positive social change include the
potential for profit sustainability of the corporations and contribution to
prosperity of employees’ dependents and local communities. Greater sales
performance means more operations and further activities that necessitate
employment, and, consequently, reduced unemployment rates through
interactions within local economies.
Role of the Researcher
My role as the researcher of this qualitative case study was to collect
the data from the research participants through interviewing sessions and
from reviewing the companies’ annual reports and website contents, which
were available to the public. In a qualitative study, the primary role of the
researcher is to collect the data for future analysis (Collins & Cooper, 2014).
I explored the meanings of participants’ responses to interview questions and
reported them without any bias by using a member checking process in
which participants had the opportunity to review my interpretations and
make any required corrections. The researcher in a qualitative study acts as
an instrument for data collection (Green, 2014; Leedy & Ormrod, 2013;
Peredaryenko & Krauss, 2013), analysis, and interpretation of the required
data (Cater, Machtmes, & Fox, 2013). In addition to conducting
semistructured interviews with open-ended questions, I reviewed available
sources of annual reports and companies’ archival contents on their
websites. Yin (2014) and Balzacq (2014) argued that researchers could
minimize bias through validating interview data by employing additional
sources.
Before conducting the interviews, I attempted to nurture an authentic
relationship with participants through open communication to encourage
them to participate in an informative interviewing session. I followed the
same order of interview questions for most participants with a variety of
open-ended questions that varied regarding the adaptation of questions to the
semistructured interview situations. In semistructured interviews, researchers
use a variety of forms and a number of questions mostly in a set order but
with some degree of flexibility (McIntosh & Morse, 2015; Rowley, 2012).
Following the interview protocol (see Appendix A), I officially obtained
participants’ approval for the interview buy offering the interview consent
form to each participant and having each participant sign the form.
Rowbotham, Astin, Greene, and Cummings (2013) considered a consent
form to be a cornerstone on any study related to human research. Montalvo
and Larson (2014) stated that the informed consent form should be written at
an understandable level for comprehending the research process.
In addition to conducting semistructured interviews with senior
marketing managers, I reviewed the companies’ annual reports and website
contents. Using secondary sources of information enriches the data quality
of the study (Yin, 2014). Therefore, a higher quality of information reduced
my bias in data collection and analysis.
In a qualitative study, the researcher has a large degree of freedom in
selecting the research method for data collection, conducting the interviews,
and analyzing the data (Bansal & Corley, 2012). I followed the research
guidelines of The Belmont Report, outlining the respect for justice,
beneficence, and persons (U.S. Department of Health & Human Service
[USDHHS], 1979). The Belmont Report includes three main principles such
as the necessity of individuals’ consent to partake in the study and right
protection of children and individuals with diminished abilities, minimizing
the risk and maximizing the benefit of participants, and treating the
participants fairly (USDHHS, 1979). To ensure the protection of
participants’ rights, I submitted my application form to the Walden
University Institute Review Board (IRB) for approval. Having standard
certificates of confidentiality protection increases the likelihood of
participation (Beskow,
Check, & Ammarell, 2014; Wolf et al., 2015). The process to prevent a
person’s identity from being used to connect with information is called de-
identification, which includes privacy for research participants completing
human subject studies and their affiliated organization (Deleger et al., 2014).
Moreover, obtaining official certificates that protect researchers from
revealing participants’ identity will increase participants’ confidence on
privacy protection (Check, Wolf, Dame, & Beskow, 2014). Therefore, I
completed the web-based training course of the National Institute of Health
(NIH) Office of External Research under the title of Protecting Human
Research Participants with certificate number 1719790 on March 9, 2015
(see Appendix B).
Researcher bias may influence different phases of study including data
collection, analysis, and interpretation. Use of semistructured interviews
with open-ended questions reduces and mitigates bias (Cridland, Jones,
Caputi, & Magee, 2015). I used semistructured interviews with open-ended
questions as primary source of data collection. Researchers should identify
the sources of personal bias from their previous experiences on the topic, as
well as the assumptions and factors that can limit the level of bias (Anderson
& Hartzler, 2014; Snelgrove, 2014; Yin, 2014). Researchers’ knowledge
about marketing may add some value to their understanding of the
importance of marketing strategies on the organization’s performance
(Cronin-Gilmore, 2012). My personal experiences in the oil and gas industry
as a senior petroleum engineer who has experienced the technical sales and
marketing positions assisted me in a better understanding of the topic and
enriching the content of the research. However, it might make me vulnerable
against preconceptions and prejudgments. Using memory information may
increase the tendency of bias judgments (Fay & Montague, 2015; Malone,
Nicholl, & Tracey, 2014). Therefore, I was vigilant throughout the study
from research design to data collection and data analysis to avoid forcing the
findings to align with my background.
I applied the bracketing technique to minimize the research bias
throughout the study. Bracketing gives researchers the ability to increase the
rigor of the study and improve the process of data analysis (Chan et al.,
2013; Sorsa, Kiikkala, & Åstedt-Kurki, 2015). In bracketing technique,
researchers keep aside their personal experiences on the research topic to
avoid influencing customers’ insights. During interview sessions,
researcher’s bias may divert interview towards incorrect predisposition
(Cairney & St
Denny, 2015). Šimundić (2013) considered bias as a misleading factor that
may result in false conclusions. To achieve the goal of refraining the
researcher bias, I took notes during collecting the data, as well as data
analysis phase. Also, open-ended questions gave more flexibility to
participants to talk about their experiences. Roulston and Shelton (2015)
recommended researchers to use reflective journaling techniques during the
data collection phase to mitigate the potential personal bias. Reflective
journaling is a method for increasing researchers’ cognitive understanding of
events that happened by extracting in-mind thoughts and ideas (Burns, 2016;
Herrington, Parker, & Boase-Jelinek, 2014). Researchers benefit from
reflective journaling by leveraging critical thinking and improving thinking
skills (Padden-Denmead, Scaffidi, Kerley, & Farside, 2016). In addition,
Ruiz-López et al. (2015) argued reflective journaling is a way to gather
experiences and identify personal reflections in information gathering. I used
reflective journaling alongside field notes to have a detail and
comprehensive track of all events and observations during interview sessions
and reviewing the companies’ annual reports.
Moreover, I requested all research participants to review my
transcripts and interpretations to ensure the accuracy and correctness of the
content. Member checking is a technique that researchers use to ensure data
saturation and increase the credibility and reliability of the research
(Houghton, Casey, Shaw, & Murphy, 2013). During the member checking,
researcher submits their interpretation or transcripts of interview sessions to
the participants, and follows up with them to acknowledge the completeness
and accuracy (Harper & Cole, 2012; Reilly, 2013). Researchers can benefit
from transcription process to explore new themes and ideas (Charmaz,
2015). Researchers should be reflexive to research participants to ensure the
subjectivity. Groven and Engelsrud (2013) discussed researchers’ reflexivity
during data collection phase means continuously evaluating the perception
and bias of the researcher and avoiding introduction of any personal bias.
Reflexivity is a way of promoting critical thinking (Zori, 2016). Rubin and
Rubin (2012) argued that following the research participants during the data
collection, rather than leading the conversation, might reduce the influence
of the personal bias in interpreting participants’ responses.
To assure the ethics of the research, following an interview protocol is
an inevitable task (Foley & O’Conner, 2013). I prepared and employed a
substantive interview protocol (see Appendix A). An interview protocol is a
defined plan for conducting the interview and provides an instruction for a
systematic progression. Researchers use interview protocols to expedite the
focus during the interview and improve the replication of the process
(Elbanna, 2013). Labaree (2014) considered interview protocols as a guide
for setting a logical process of data collection and data interpretation. The
interview protocol is necessary to ensure consistent and thorough questions
that would not lead the participant (Gioia, Corley, & Hamilton, 2013). An
interview protocol will give me the chance to learn about the strategies that
senior marketing managers of the service companies in the oil and gas
industry use to enhance their sales performance. I audiotaped the whole
interview and assigned a unique code to each participant on top of the
interview sheet. Gioia, Corley, and Hamilton (2013) argued researchers
should allocate unique codes for each respondent to ensure privacy
protection. Next, I asked the interview questions and requested participants
to provide as detail and complete answers as they can. At the end of the
interview session, I acknowledged the participants contribution to my study
and promised them a copy of the interview transcripts for their further
review. The interview protocol I used is in
Appendix A.
Participants
The population of my study included senior marketing managers of
international oil and gas service companies engaging in activities across the
Middle East. Accessing a fraction of the target population of the study is an
initial stage of selecting the participants (DiGaetano, 2013). I selected
participants based on the list of companies attending the annual event of Abu
Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference
(ADIPEC, 2016), as one of the world’s most influential oil and gas
conferences. The potential participants partook in my study as experts in
marketing and did not represent their corresponding companies. A
purposeful selection of participants allows researchers to ensure participants
have relevant information on the research topic (Leedy & Ormrod, 2013;
Poulis, Poulis, & Plakoyiannaki, 2013). Main eligibility criterion for
participants of my doctoral study was being a senior marketing manager of
an international service company in the oil and gas industry in the Middle
East who successfully used strategies to enhance sales performance,
revenues, and profits during periods of declining oil prices. According to
Ahmed et al. (2014), the overall accomplishment of companies in terms of
competitive advantages is an indication of marketing managers’ capability in
using successful marketing strategies.
My plan was to approach potential participants throughout the
ADIPEC exhibition and acquire participants’ contact information upon their
preliminary agreement on partaking in my study. After receiving the initial
consent of the participants, I initiated an introductory email to establish the
relationship with those meeting my research criteria. Sending initial emails
will increase a researcher’s chance to establish a relationship with potential
participants (Byrne et al., 2016). I possessed no direct business or personal
interaction or relationship with any of the participants. Before gaining access
to the target participants, I got the approval of the Walden Institutional
Review Board (IRB) to ensure I followed the appropriate ethical process and
protect human rights. I sent invitation letters to the prospective participants
via email, explaining my intention for the study. Also, I attached a consent
form to the invitation email and asked participants to review and digitally
sign the consent form. Alternatively, participants could express their consent
by reply to my email. Consent form comprised of a brief expression about
background of my doctoral research, purpose of the study, the voluntary
nature of the participation, any possible risk, and privacy policies. After 5
days, I sent a reminder email to those participants who had not responded to
my invitation email. After receiving the participants’ approval for
participation, I contacted each of the participants via telephone to adjust a
suitable date and time for conducting the interview sessions.
My key strategy to establish a working relationship was to build a
circle of trust with my participants. Researchers should treat participants
with respect (Fassinger &
Morrow, 2013), and be honest with participants about the purpose of the
study (Rubin & Rubin, 2012). According to Rubin and Rubin (2012),
researchers should be honest in expressing the outcomes of the study and try
to establish a relationship with participants based on mutual trust (Rubin &
Rubin, 2012). I guaranteed the privacy and confidentiality of the
participants, their companies, and their brand names by using pseudonyms.
Because of my background as a petroleum engineer with 15 years of
experience in the oil and gas industry, participants felt more comfortable to
talk about their experiences and stories with regard to the research question.
Researchers experienced with the topic may increase the participants’
willingness to speak openly and honestly about the research subject (Unluer,
2012). Deepening the knowledge on the research topic might reduce the
chance of facing any involuntary bias.
Research Method and Design
Research Method
A qualitative research was the method of this study to explore the
marketing strategies that senior marketing managers of the international oil
and gas service companies used to enhance the sales performance of their
company. Choosing the most appropriate method is critical for a successful
study (Bamkin, Maynard, & Goulding, 2016). A qualitative methodology
gives the researchers the chance to explore information based on individual
perspectives of participants (Andriopoulos & Slater, 2013; Nassaji,
2015; Tong, Winkelmayer, & Craig, 2014; Yüksel & Yıldırım, 2015).
Researchers use the qualitative method to comprehend the topic and explore
the subject based on the facts that study participants are experiencing
(Barnham, 2014; Hazzan & Nutov, 2014; Sandelowski, 2015; Yilmaz,
2013). Qualitative measures provide a basis to embrace the events as they
are, so the authenticity of the phenomenon will remain intact (Shelton et al.,
2014). Also, researchers use qualitative method to uncover trends in
opinions and thoughts for a deeper understanding of the problems (Garcia &
Gluesing, 2013; Upjohn et al., 2013). Furthermore, in a qualitative method,
researchers can gain detailed experiences from a small group of participant
(Powell & Eddleston, 2013), in which the quality of the researcher is of high
importance (McCusker & Gunaydin, 2015). In this study, I aimed to explore
the strategies that senior marketing managers of international oil and gas
service companies used to enhance their profitability and increase the market
share; therefore, a qualitative approach was appropriate for addressing the
study purpose.
A quantitative method was not a proper method for this study because
of the nature of the quantitative approach. The aim of a quantitative
approach is to meet the objectives and specific outcomes by utilizing
standard instruments for data collection, as well as implementing statistical
models (Shelton et al., 2014). Researchers use a quantitative study to
describe numerical changes via assessing the variables (Harrison, 2013;
Karanja, Zaveri, & Ahmed, 2013), generalize the results, test the hypotheses,
and find the causal relationships (Wisdom et al., 2012). Moreover, numerical
data from quantitative research method is more suitable to validate the extant
hypotheses and generalize the findings to a larger scale of population
(Shelton et al., 2014), which was not the intent of this study. Yin (2014)
argued using quantitative research method may not provide the researchers
the chance of using in-depth and probing questions; therefore, the
researcher’s understanding of the phenomena may remain superficial. A
mixed method or a hybrid method is a combination of qualitative and
quantitative methods to answer the research questions (Gelling, 2014;
Harrison, 2013). Mixed method researchers require a widespread level of
experience in research and should allocate an extensive amount of time for
data processing (Venkatesh et al., 2013). Researchers use qualitative,
quantitative, or mixed-method methodologies when addressing problems
(Palinkas et al., 2015). However, since the aim of this doctoral study was not
to examine the relationship between different variables and factors,
quantitative and mixed methods methodologies would have not been
appropriate for exploring the strategies that marketing managers of
international oil and gas service companies used to enhance the sales
performance, revenues, and profits.
Research Design
I employed a multiple case study design to collect required
information from my purposeful sample of senior marketing managers of
international oil and gas service companies located in the Middle East.
Researchers design their studies to explore the research question and direct
the study towards conclusions that lead to a final report (Leedy & Ormrod,
2013). Researchers use a case study to build a foundation based on previous
theoretical propositions and collect the required data according to a
predefined guideline (Hyett et al., 2014; Patton, 2015; Yin, 2013). Cronin
(2014) discussed a case study is a rigourous and systematic approach in
research studies. There are several qualitative designs such as case study,
ethnography, phenomenology, grounded theory, and narrative inquiry
(Erickson, 2012; Petty et al., 2012; Rowley, 2012). However, I used a case
study design to comprehend the marketing strategies that marketing
managers use to enhance profitability. Researchers utilize case study design
to explore more in-depth information about a phenomenon (Thyme, Wiberg,
Lundman, & Graneheim, 2013; Yazan, 2015). Baškarada (2014) argued case
study design is suitable for research related to business, marketing, political
science, operations management, and similar fields of study.
Evaluating of all available research designs underpined the choice of
case study as the preferred design for my doctoral research. Researchers use
phenomenological studies to find out how people interpret and comprehend
the true meaning of their lived experiences (Charlick, Pincombe, McKellar,
& Fielder, 2016; Hills, 2015; Jardim, 2015); therefore, I might not be able to
produce the relevant results by implementing phenomenology. The aim of
the narrative design is to study the life stories of a single individual (Huber,
Caine, Huber, & Steeves, 2013; Safari & Thilenius, 2013). Narrative
research is appropriate for unfolding the experience of one or more
individuals in a chronological manner (Beattie, 2014; Loh, 2013;
Wolgemuth, 2014); hence, narrative design is helpful in story-telling
processes rather than getting an in-depth understanding of an issue; thus, I
did not select a narrative design. Grounded theory is an appropriate design
when researchers aim to generate a new theory (Cooke, 2014; Hussein,
Hirst, Salyers, & Osuji, 2014; Khan, 2014; Timmermans & Tavory, 2012;
Thomas, 2012), which was not applicable to my doctoral study in which I
attempted to explore the phenomenon using STP as my conceptual
framework rather than creating a new theory. Ethnography design has
similarities with grounded theory with a focus on the cultural aspects of the
study (Zhu & Bargiela-Ciappini, 2013). I excluded ethnography since I did
not intend to explore the cultural features of the marketing strategy.
The approach for the proposed study was a qualitative case study
method to explore strategies senior marketing managers of ISCOGI in the
Middle East used to enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits during
periods of declining oil prices. The case study design allows the exploration
of the phenomenon and understanding the way it works (Gee, Loewnthal, &
Cayne, 2013). Perry (1998) argued that case study design is a proper
research design to study the contemporary subjects, especially when little
literature is available on the specific topic. Although marketing strategies in
international companies may not seem to be a new topic; however, little
published research exists on marketing strategies for the international oil and
gas service companies. Particularly, advancements in technology and
emerging challenges in the marketplaces call for novel and innovative
strategies built upon previous experiences. Therefore, a case study was
provide me the opportunity to get in-depth insights and find a holistic view
of the phenomenon.
The case study is a rigorous design to perform a research on
marketing-related topics (Perry, 1998). The aim of a qualitative case study is
to have a rich and comprehensive description of a phenomenon through
collecting sufficient and quality data (O’Reilly & Parker, 2013). To assure
the quality of the data, I used a variety of resources and techniques to
collected the required data. Therefore, in addition to using semistructured
interviews with open-ended questions, I reviewed companies’ annual reports
and publicly available information on companies’ websites. Methodological
triangulation is a tactic in which researcher integrates multiple sources of
data such as interview, archives, company annual reports, and observations
to comprehend the results (Balzacq, 2014; Denzin, 2012; Houghton et al.,
2013). I interviewed five senior marketing managers of ISCOGI. However, I
was open to invite more participants, if required, in case I could not reach
data saturation status with the initial five participants. Data saturation is a
stage in the research in which no new information is emerging and the same
pattern is visible among the responses (Meyer & Ward, 2014; Rubin &
Rubin, 2012). Once the interview sessions were complete, I forwarded the
summary of interview interpretations to the participant, as part of member
checking, to review and acknowledge the correctness and accuracy of my
interpretation. Houghton et al. (2013) explained member checking as a
technique that researchers use to ensure data saturation and increase the
credibility of the interview transcripts.
Population and Sampling
The population for this qualitative case study included senior
marketing managers of ISCOGI working in the Middle East, who
successfully used strategies to enhance sales performance, revenues, and
profits in their corresponding companies during periods of declining oil
prices. The overall accomplishment of companies in terms of competitive
advantages is an indication of marketing managers’ capability in using
successful marketing strategies (Ahmed et al., 2014). To explore the specific
business problem, I used purposeful snowball sampling based on the
predetermined criterion for selection of participants in my doctoral study. I
started with five participants and was ready to continue to add more
participants until I reached data saturation. Researchers use snowball
sampling to reach more participants, who are information rich and
knowledgeable about the research topic based on referrals from existing
participants (Colvin, Witt, & Lacey, 2016; Li, 2014; Patton, 2015; Waters,
2015; Yin, 2015).
Researchers leverage the credibility of the study by using purposeful
snowball sampling (Cin & Walker, 2013). Researchers utilize purposeful
sampling to assure engagement of participants with the most appropriate
level of knowledge and understanding of the research topic (Cleary,
Horsfall, & Hayter, 2014; Leedy & Ormrod, 2013; Poulis et al., 2013; Wan
& Ng, 2013). In purposive sampling, researchers select participants
deliberately according to a set of predefined criteria (Konig & Waistell,
2012). Purposeful sampling is superior to random sampling in terms of being
less expensive and more targeting the study purpose (Acharya, Prakash,
Saxena, & Nigma, 2013). Moreover, researchers use purposive sampling
when access to the whole population is impossible (Barratt, Ferris, &
Lenton, 2014; Bodlaj & Rojšek, 2014). Therefore, a purposeful snowball
sampling was a proper sampling technique in understanding the marketing
strategies that marketing managers in international oil and gas service
companies use.
To select the most knowledgeable participants, I conducted a
purposeful sampling using in-advance set of criteria. Predetermined criteria
for deliberately selecting the participants is one of the key aspects of a
purposive sampling (Konig & Waistell, 2012; Bryman & Bell, 2015). Main
eligibility criterion for selecting the participants for my doctoral study was
being a senior marketing manager of an international service company in the
oil and gas industry in the Middle East who successfully used strategies to
enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits during periods of declining
oil prices. The overall accomplishment of companies in terms of competitive
advantages is an indication of marketing managers’ capability in using
successful marketing strategies (Ahmed et al., 2014). Selection of senior
marketing managers of international oil and gas service companies provided
the opportunity to explore the holistic strategies they used to enhance the
sales performance, increase the revenues, and boost the profits.
Interview with participants in a qualitative case study is an appropriate
method for collecting rich data (Yin, 2014). In semistructured or
unstructured interviews, researchers can improvise probing questions to their
prepared questions to gain additional information (Jamshed, 2014; Ross &
Blumenstein, 2015). I conducted in-depth semistructured interviews and
inquire participants’ insights on the research topic. Cotter et al. (2015)
argued that interview setting might influence the participation rate. Interview
setting can influence the quality of interview session in qualitative research
studies (Wolgemuth et al., 2015). I directed all interview sessions in
participants’ offices to ensure their comfort and privacy, and avoid any
unintentional distraction by surrounding environment. Conducting
interviews in public places may jeopardize the confidentiality of the
interview process (Easterling & Johnson, 2015). Interviews could be within
or outside of the business hours based on participants’ working schedule and
convenience; however, participants fixed the exact timing during the pre-
interview contact that I made prior to interview due date. Although the
period for each interview session was estimated to be 30-45 minutes, I gave
participants enough time to respond freely. Alsulami, Scheepers, and Rahim
(2016) argued that dedicating sufficient time to research participants would
lead to more in-depth responses. Researchers should try to minimize the
stress of participants due to negative impact of stress on participants’
perception during the interview sessions (Sharma & Gedeon, 2014).
Although I planned to interview five senior marketing managers as the
sample size for collecting data, I was ready to continue adding more
participants until reaching data saturation stage. More sample size does not
necessarily mean a richer study (Marshall, Cardon, Poddar, & Fontenot,
2013); however, having the adequate number of samples is crucial for any
successful study (Ward, Vaughn, Burney, & Ostbye, 2016). Rowley (2012)
believed that a sufficient number of participants in case studies to be
between one and 10 members. Researchers can justify any sample size based
on contextual evidence and scientific depth of the investigation for a
particular study (Boddy, 2016). Defining the sample universe, sample size,
sample strategy, and sourcing cases are the most challenging steps in
conducting an interview-based qualitative study (Robinson, 2014).
Researchers have the chance to start their study with any number of
participants and later tailor the participant size to reach the optimized data
collection. Accessing a fraction of the target population of the study is
important in preparing a list of potential future participants (Dykema, Jones,
Piche, & Stevenson, 2013). Marshal et al. (2013) argued the literature
contains a vast variety in the number of interviews in qualitative studies. In a
qualitative study to explore disruptive marketing, Kirchner, Ford, and
Mottner (2012) interviewed five participants including executive directors
and marketing managers of nonprofit organizations using semistructured
interviewing sessions.
In qualitative studies, researchers aim to collect sufficient data to
ensure the report on the study findings is thorough and rich (O'Reilly &
Parket, 2013). Although initial number of participants was five, I anticipated
the need to add more participants to achieve data saturation in case data
saturation could not be achieved during the first five interview sessions.
Researchers reach data saturation when no new idea is emerging on the
phenomena under investigation, and the same patterns appear from different
interview sessions (Rubin & Rubin, 2012). Therefore, the number of
participants is enough only when the information coming from research
participants become repetitive (Dworkin, 2012). O’Reilly and Kiyimba
(2013) emphasized on the importance of collecting data from various cases
and reaching data saturation. Researchers should have provision of their
sample size prior to embark their study (Robinson, 2014). The initial number
of participants for my doctoral study included five senior marketing
managers of international oil and gas service companies.
I forwarded my interpretation of interview contents to individual
participants for member checking. Houghton et al. (2013) considered
member checking as a technique for assuring the accuracy and completeness
of the transcripts. Member checking is a technique that researchers use to
ensure data saturation and increase the credibility of the research (Marshall
et al., 2013). Morse, Lowery, and Steury (2014) argued that data saturation
for each interview session occurs when a repetitive trend exists in responses
and there is no additional information to acquire. I planned to continue data
collection for my study until no new information emerges from participants,
which would be the state of data saturation.
Ethical Research
Ethical considerations are an integral part of any research involving
human subject (Drake, 2014; Vainio, 2013). Bromley, Mikesell, Jones, and
Khodyakov (2015) discussed the importance of determination of ethical
level in a research. Therefore, participants should know whether the focus of
the ethical research is to protect the subject or the participant. Avasthi,
Ghosh, Sarkar, and Grover (2013) stated each participants must receive
information regarding the risks and benefits of the research. All researchers
have an individual and collective responsibility to ensure ethical practice and
responsibility in ensuring compliance by all participants (Kaye et al., 2015;
Vanclay, Baines & Taylor, 2013). There are some common factors in all
ethical researches including confidentiality, harm prevention, informed
consent, protection of vulnerable populations, and voluntary nature of
participation (Kendall & Halliday, 2014; Morse & Coulehan, 2015; Rovai,
Baker, & Ponton, 2013). According to The Belmont Report (U.S.
Department of Health & Human Service [USDHHS], 1979), three principles
of research ethics consist of: (a) respect of persons, (b) beneficence, and (c)
justice. Whitley and Kite (2013) used the same components for categorizing
an ethical research. Respect and justice refer to the voluntary nature of
participation, freedom of withdrawal at any stage, and informed consent,
while beneficence entails protection of vulnerable populations and
confidentiality (Whitley & Kite, 2013). Respecting the ethical practices, not
only protect the researchers but also minimizes the harms, preserve the
integrity, and impart trust throughout the study (Aluwihare-Samaranayake,
2012). Barket (2013) found trust as the most significant factor in a
relationship between a researcher and a participant. I considered all these
factors throughout the data collection stage.
All participants received a letter of invitation via email explaining the
intent and nature of this study. The invitation letter included the consent
form that gives participants the chance to read and come back with any
potential question pertinent to the study. Consent forms comprises of vital
information indicating the risks associated with participation in the study
(Cook, Hoas, & Joyner, 2013; Kawar, Pugh, & Scruth, 2016). The consent
form contained a brief introduction to my doctoral study, the purpose of the
study, interview procedure, sample of interview questions, a statement on
the voluntary nature of the participation, the right of participant to withdraw
from the study at any time without any consequences, and data privacy and
confidentiality. Bull et al. (2013) and Dixon (2015) discussed the necessity
of indicating the voluntary nature of the study in the consent form. Hadidi,
Lindquist, Treat-Jacobson, and Swanson (2013) argued that as soon as
participants sign the consent form, they agree to the terms and conditions
indicated in the form including the voluntary nature of the participation and
freedom of withdrawal throughout the study. Rowbotham et al. (2013)
considered a consent form to be a cornerstone on any study related to human
research. All participants receive the consent form to see the research
process along with the interview questions for the study (Bristol & Hicks,
2013). The consent form of my doctoral study included my contact detail
and the phone and email address of the Walden University representative.
Should any of the participants desire to withdraw from my study, they
could call me at any time after receiving the invitation letter. Alternatively,
participants could inform me about withdrawal decision verbally during the
interview session or within 2 days after the interview. Having the right to
withdraw from the study will improve the trust and transparency of the
research (Kaye et al., 2015). Upon expressing their willingness to withdraw
from the study, participants would receive a copy of their interviewing notes
and transcripts, in case participants already attended the interview session.
Since the nature of the participation in a study is voluntary (Whitley & Kite,
2013), there was no penalty or negative consequences for any withdrawal
(Bull et al., 2013; Judkins-Cohn, Kielwasser-Withrow, Owen, & Ward,
2014). Should participants choose to withdraw from the study within 2 days
after the interview session, I would provide a copy of their interview notes,
as well as the audio recording so they had the opportunity to destroy the
documents. Providing incentives to participants may raise some concerns
about the data quality (Parsons & Manierre, 2014; Robinson, 2014) and even
improve the response rate (Bernstein & Feldman, 2015). Some researchers
use variety of incentives to motivate participants to partake in the study
(Medway & Tourangeau, 2015). Participants did not receive any
compensation or gift for their contribution to this doctoral study; however,
they received a copy of final results of the study in a two-page executive
format for their further information.
Since archiving digital data on hard drives has a limited lifetime
(Burda & Teuteberg, 2013), my plan is to store all the recordings, interview
transcripts, documents, and research outcomes in a password-protected
Dropbox, as well as a Cloud storage, and destroy the files after a period of 5
years. Researchers are responsible to take utmost care of data confidentiality
at all stages of data collection, analysis, and storage (Yin, 2014). Respecting
the ethical standards ensures maintaining the purpose and intention of the
study (Akhavan, Ramezan, & Moghaddam, 2013). Therefore, at all times,
research ethics remain an integral part of this doctoral study. Researchers
achieve anonymity by modifying participants’ recognizable information
(Drake, 2014; Vainio, 2013). To maintain the confidentiality of all
participants and their corresponding companies and products, I applied a
coding process to all files, names, and interview transcripts and used
pseudonyms instead such as P1 for participant 1 and C1 for company 1.
Prior to data collection, I received the Institutional Review Board (IRB)
approval to ensure the following of ethical guidelines and practices. Walden
University IRB approval number for this study is 03-03-17-0478713 and it
expires on March 2, 2018.
Data Collection Instrument
Data collection is a critical and extensive stage in a qualitative case
study to manage different sources of information. I was the primary
instrument for data collection in this doctoral study. In qualitative research
studies, researchers are the primary instrument because researchers are in the
front line to hear, observe, and interpret (Marshall & Rossman, 2016). The
researcher is in the room with participant as the physical data collection
instrument in qualitative studies, an environment that can provide an
intricate and inclusive view into participant’s responses (Anleu, Blix, Mack,
& Wettergren, 2016). There are some principal sources that researchers can
use to collect case study substantiation including interviews, archival
records, documentations, physical artifacts, direct observation, and
participants’ observation (Carter, Bryant-Lukosius,
DiCenso, Blythe, & Neville, 2014; Kaczynski, Salmona, & Smith, 2014;
Yin, 2014). According to Yin (2014), the more the number of resources, the
higher the quality of the case study. Therefore, researchers should make
sure they use as many resources as possible for data collection. In
qualitative case studies, researchers are the primary instrument for data
collection (Camfield & Palmer-Jones, 2013). I used semistructured
interviews with open-ended questions, companies’ annual reports, and
website archival contents as the primary and secondary resources for my
data collection step. One of the most important aspects of each
interviewing session is selecting the right topics to extract the right
information (Burnay, Jureta, & Faulkner, 2014). My research topic was the
leading subject in developing my interview questions. Interview is one of
the most effective techniques for data collection in qualitative studies
(Onwuegbuzi & Byers, 2014). However, Netshitangani (2014) believed the
quality and skills of the interviewer is superior to the quality of the
questions. A variety of methods exists for conducting an interviewing
session. Rubin and Rubin (2012) considered semistructured interviews as
one of the most common interviewing techniques. Researchers use
semistructured interviews to increase the reliability of the study
(Seethamraju & Sundar, 2013) and acquire in-depth understanding on the
research topic (Esteves, 2014). Morse (2015) noted reliability of the study is
improved when results are confirmable through semistructured interviews.
In semistructured interviews, researchers have the opportunity to improvise
probing questions to the initial prepared questions to gain additional
information (Jamshed, 2014). The purpose of my study was to explore the
strategies that senior marketing managers of international oil and gas service
companies used to enhance their sales performance and increase their
revenues and profits. Therefore, I conducted in-depth semistructured
interviews and inquired participants’ knowledge and experiences on the
research topic. Companies’ annual reports and archival contents on the
companies’ websites were the other data collection resources for my doctoral
study.
Prior to conducting the data collection phase, I prepared and
developed the interview protocol (see Appendix A) and adhered to the
protocol throughout the interviewing sessions. Following an interview
protocol is an inevitable task to ensure the ethics of the study (Foley &
O’Conner, 2013) and retain the consistency throughout the interview
(Hunter, 2012). Researchers use interview protocols to have more control on
their personal bias during the interview sessions (Brown et al., 2013; De
Ceunynck, Kusumastuti, Hannes, Janssens, & Wets, 2013). Researchers
should keep a power balance within their interview sessions and avoid being
dominant to or by research participants (Anyan, 2013). Therefore, following
a predesigned protocol provided a means of assurance that neither
interviewer nor research participants take full control of the interview
session. The duration of each interview was between 30 to 45 minutes
except the last interview that lasted 75 minutes because of P5’s desire to
continue the session and provide further info. The venue was participants’
working office to increase the chance for in-site observation, wherever
possible. At the interviewing session, I reminded participants about the
voluntary nature of their participation, as well as their right to withdraw
from the study at any stage without any consequences. During the
interviews, through asking open-ended questions, I encouraged participants
to reveal as much information as possible about their experiences on the
research topic. I audiotaped all the interviews and send transcripts to
participants for correcting any misconception or confusion.
Act of reviewing the transcripts and researcher’s interpretation of
participants’ responses by research participants is part of the member
checking process. Member checking is a technique that researchers utilize to
ensure data saturation and increase the credibility of the research (Houghton
et al., 2013; Koelsch, 2013; Marshall et al., 2013). Using member checking
increases the researchers’ confidence in the collected data (Harper & Cole,
2012; Simpson & Quigley, 2016) through considering, comparing, and
contrasting participant’s responses among others prior to presenting a
synthesized product to the participants for member checking. Participants’
involvement in data collection gives a chance to reflect on interview
responses and sharing more in-depth insights (Cridland et al., 2015).
Researchers ask participants to review interview records to verify the
accuracy and precision of the transcripts (Alsulami et al., 2016). Harvey
(2015) argued that a significant gap in time between data collection and
member checking might result in undesirable detachment in participants’
connection with their original responses. Therefore, I conducted member
checking as soon as possible after summarizing my interpretation of
participants’ responses in one paragraph for each question. Once I received
participants’ feedbacks, corrections, and comments on my interpretations
summary, I reviewed the summaries with participants individually and
applied the required changes. Modifying the interview documents after
member checking will increase data reliability and credibility (Faseleh-
Jahromi, Moattari, & Peyrovani, 2013; Hudson et al., 2014). Subsequently, I
went through my other data collection sources such as companies’ annual
reports and archived materials on companies’ websites.
Data Collection Technique
The data collection process in this multiple case study consisted of
several techniques. In-depth interview session was the primary data
collection source in my doctoral study to understand what strategies senior
marketing managers of international oil and gas service companies used to
enhance the profitability of their enterprises. The secondary sources included
the annual reports and contents of the website of the participants’
corresponding companies. Interview sessions are the primary and the most
important sources of information yet inexpensive and relatively quick way of
data collection in case studies (Lamont & Swidler, 2014; Yin, 2014).
Interview is one of the most effective techniques for data collection in
qualitative studies (Onwuegbuzie & Byers, 2014; Morse & McEovy, 2014;
Wang & Zhu, 2015). Irvine, Drew, and Sainsbury (2013) discussed that in
face-to-face interviews, researchers have the chance to complete, formulate,
and express their understanding of what research participants is talking
about.
Researchers benefit from face-to-face interviews through understanding
participants’ experiences and expand the findings to the real world (Pacho,
2015; Peters & Halcomb, 2015). Pugh (2013) considered interviews as a
means of revealing emotional aspects of social practices. However, the
asymmetrical power relations between interviewer and research participants
may result in data obscurity (Anyan, 2013). Yin (2014) argued that one of
the weaknesses of interview sessions is the reflexivity of research
participants in providing bias answers. Therefore, I considered all available
maneuvering options to increase my abilities in controlling the power
imbalances and avoid asking leading questions.
Concerning the secondary sources of data collection in my doctoral
study, I looked over the company’s annual reports and website contents. Yin
(2014) argued that researchers could review documents as many times as
required due to the stability of such resources. In addition, documentation
included a wide range of data in the course of a long span of time. However,
there might be some difficulties in accessing all the reports and archival
documents (Yin, 2014). Also, there is always the chance of receiving biased
documents due to the unwillingness of data owners to share the entire sets of
documents. Therefore, building a respectful and trustworthy relationship
with participants may increase the chance of access to a broader range of
data. Rubin and Rubin (2012) indicated that a mutual honesty and respect
between researcher and participants might increase the chance of receiving
more unbiased and trusted responses.
Researchers should develop their interview techniques and plan
carefully to conduct a successful interview (Doody & Noonan, 2013).
According to Yin (2014), asking open-ended questions gives the participants
the opportunity to share their experiences with a high degree of freedom.
Therefore, I asked open-ended questions during my semistructured
interviews (see Appendix A) to allow my participants to express their views
on the study topics. During the interviewing sessions, I observed the
participants’ reactions, feelings, and physical expressions, and then
transferred all notes to a Microsoft Excel document for further references.
Besides, I audio recorded all the interviews on a digital recorder for future
transcriptions.
In the modern world of research, researchers have a variety of options
to select their interview venue, either for face-to-face interview sessions or
for remote interviews (Deakin & Wakefield, 2014). The venue for
conducting the interviews in my doctoral study was participants’ private
offices to provide more convenience for them in terms of time and
accommodation. Moreover, being in participants’ office gave me the chance
to observe their working condition at firsthand. However, being in
participants’ office did not mean to receive facilities from their
corresponding companies. Leedy and Ormrod (2013) argued researchers can
use any data collection approach to enrich their studies. I allocated extra
time for each interviewing session to compensate for any unintentional
interruption. Prior to starting the interview, participants received a copy of
their signed consent forms to have a quick recall of the study and the nature
of the interviewing session. According to the consent form, all participants
have the right to halt the interview at any time without encountering any
consequences.
Throughout the interview sessions, I employed my interview protocol (see
Appendix A). Interview protocols not only enlist a set of interview questions
but also show a procedural guideline for researchers to conduct a rational
and meaningful process of data collection (Jacob & Furgerson, 2012).
Researchers use interview protocols to have more control on their personal
bias during the interview sessions (De Ceunynck et al., 2013). My interview
protocol started with thanking participants for their participation and time
dedication followed by a brief introductory about the research topic, which
presented to the participants on the phone a day before the official
interviewing session. The introduction included a review over the consent
form and reminding participants’ approval. Participants received the
schedule for follow-up member checking process. Then I went through each
interview question. During the interview session, I politely monitored any
non-verbal gesture and asked follow up questions to acquire more in-depth
insights. After finishing the interviews, I reminded participants that shortly
they would receive my interpretation of their responses to each question via
email as part of member checking process.
Companies’ annual reports and website contents, which were publicly
available, were the other sources of information in my doctoral study. Also, I
reviewed the articles and websites related to the financial results of
participants’ companies to get more insights on their marketing activities and
sales performance. Having more than one source of information is part of the
triangulation technique to increase the credibility and reliability of the
gathered information (Fusch & Ness, 2015; Houghton et al., 2013; Wirtz,
Pistoia, Ullrich, & Göttel, 2016). Researchers utilize triangulation techniques
to add more insights to their works by using different sources of information
(Choi, Cheung, & Pang, 2014; Hussein, 2015; Torrance, 2012). De Massis
and Kotler (2014) discussed the role of triangulation of secondary sources in
reducing researchers’ bias. Furthermore, qualitative researchers use
triangulation to address quality issue (Paradis et al., 2014). Therefore, to
increase the validity of the findings of my doctoral study, I combined,
compared, and contrasted different sources of data.
Researchers continue data collection process until they reach a point
that participants do not add any novel information to the research topic,
which means researcher achieves data saturation stage. Data saturation for
each interview session occurs when a repetitive trend exists in responses and
no additional information is to acquire (Morse et al., 2014). Data saturation
is a way to ensure research findings are dependable (Anyan, 2013).
Therefore, researchers utilize data saturation to enrich their studies through
the data inquiry procedure (Morse, 2015). Lack of data saturation may
negatively affect the analysis and results (Elo, Kääriäinen, Kanste, Pölkki,
Utriainen, & Kyngäs, 2014). To ensure the correctness and accuracy of the
collected data, all participants received a copy of the interview interpretation
as part of the member checking process. Providing interview transcripts and
interpretation for participants’ review is an essential part of the member
checking process in qualitative studies (Houghton et al., 2013; Simpson &
Quigley, 2016). Using member checking involves participants in a mutual
process of clarifying the true meaning of discussed topics within the
interviewing sessions (Reilly, 2013). Therefore, after data collection and
data analysis phases of my doctoral study, I conducted member checking.
For this reason, I provided each participant a copy of my interpretations of
their corresponding responses to review and acknowledge the accuracy and
correctness of my analysis. Subsequently, I compiled all feedbacks,
comments, and corrections and reviewed the summaries with participants
individually.
Data Organization Techniques
To increase the reliability of my doctoral study and allow future
access to review the collected data and evidence, I kept the data in organized
and well-documented database. My database contained all interview notes,
audio records, transcripts, interpretations, companies’ annular reports, online
available archival files, and any other supporting documents gathered during
the data collection phase. I used MS Excel and Word to keep track of all
files by giving them unique codes and reference numbers. Functions such as
filtering and sorting in addition to the ability to generate pivot tables, make
Excel a powerful tool to look at data from different perspectives (Kuhlmann
& Ardichvili, 2015). Moreover, I used NVivo software alongside an Excel
file to identify themes, keywords, trends, and patterns during the data
organization procedure with corresponding details including dates. NVivo is
one of the most common techniques in organization and analysis of textual
data from interview sessions to endorse proper coding and recovery of data
(Hilal & Alabri, 2013; Woods, Paulus, Atkins, & Macklin, 2015).
Researchers use NVivo software to extracts the right themes, generate
categories, and visualize data in a variety of formats (Edwards-Jones, 2014;
Ijaz, Malik, Nawaz Lodhi, Habiba, & Irfan, 2014; Sotiriadou, Brouwers, &
Le, 2014). I also compared the results of NVivo software with the outcomes
of the Excel file to increase the reliability of extracted themes.
To ensure data security and protection of data confidentiality, I stored
my database on a password-protected hard drive, a Dropbox account, and a
Cloud storage. Using a Cloud storage not only prevents unintentional loss of
data (Burda & Teuteberg, 2013) but also provides a means of remote access
to data for more convenience (Wang, Chow, Wang, Ren, & Lou, 2013).
Using reliable means of data storage will increase the trust and satisfaction
of participants (Burda & Teuteberg, 2014). All the hardcopies remain safe
and secure within a digital password protected safe. I am the only person
with exclusive access to the Dropbox and the digital safe. After 5 years from
study completion, I will destroy all the collected data including the
electronic versions and hard copies to ensure the protection of data
confidentiality. I will use a shredder machine to shred any document in the
form of hard copy.
Data Analysis Technique
To answer the research question on strategies that senior marketing
managers of the international oil and gas service companies used to enhance
the profitability of their firms, I used semistructured, open-ended interview
question. Right after finishing the interview sessions, I summarized my
understanding of each interview and forwarded my interpretation to
participants for checking the accuracy and correctness. Also, I collected
supplementary information through reviewing companies’ annual reports
and archival contents available on companies’ websites. Using more than
one source of data, known as triangulation, gives the researchers more
comprehensive understanding of the response to the research question
(Heale & Forbse, 2013; Hussein, 2015). Moreover, researchers utilize
triangulation to increase the confidence and reliability of collected data
(Fusch & Ness, 2015; Houghton et al., 2013). Researchers use triangulation
to decrease the risk of bias (De Massis & Kotler, 2014; Kothari, Hovanec,
Sibbald, Donelle, & Trucker, 2015). Therefore, to improve the validity and
dependability of the findings of my doctoral study and minimize the bias, I
combined, compared, and contrasted different sources of data.
Analysis of transcripts, alongside with annual reports and available
companies’ website contents was the key phase in responding to the research
question. In my doctoral research, I studied five different cases to get in-
depth insights and find a holistic view of the phenomenon. After organizing
the data in NVivo software and MS Excel file, I deepened my analysis by
identifying the themes and ideas from the entire collected data. For this
reason, I used automated pattern-based coding inside NVivo software, which
is comprised of algorithms for coding the text passages with similar words to
previously coded content. NVivo software is a practical tool for coding and
clustering the large volume of texts (Woods et al., 2015; Yin, 2014;
Zamawe, 2015). Researchers can use NVivo to organize their transcripts,
extracts the right themes, generate categories, search throughout the data,
and visualize data in different formats such as graphs, maps, and charts
(Edwards-Jones, 2014). A commensurable and systematic process will
ensure a successful data coding and consequently lead to extraction of
meaningful themes (Cho & Lee, 2014; Claps, Svensson, & Aurum, 2015;
Pierre & Jackson, 2014). I followed
Rowley’s (2012) steps for data analysis, which consisted of (a) make the
data organized, (b) become familiar with data, (c) put data in nodes, (d) give
data the proper codes, (e) interpret the data, and (f) present the data in a
writing mode. Using NVivo facilitated my data organization process through
identifying the word frequencies and performing keyword research
throughout the text.
Data organization includes a compiling stage in which researchers put
the whole collected data in a meaningful order to create an appropriate
database, and disassembling stage in which researchers fragment the
compiled data into themes and labels (Rowley, 2012; Yin, 2014). Once I
extracted the right themes and concepts from collected data and put them
into proper clusters, I reassembled the categories into applicable sequences
for further interpretation and conclusion. STP served as the conceptual
framework for my doctoral study. Based on STP, marketing managers use
different strategies to increase their competitiveness in the market by
dividing the market into appropriate segments, targeting the right audiences,
and positioning the products and services in the market (Dibb & Simkin,
1991). Through careful analysis and review of all extracted themes, I
explored the strategies that senior marketing managers of international oil
and gas service companies used to enhance the profitability of their
companies.
I compared and contrasted the findings with extant literature. In data
analysis stage of the qualitative research in which interview is the primary
source of data collection, researchers have the power to decide whether they
want to share their interpretation and analysis with participants (Anyan,
2013). Researchers should also avoid hubris during the data analysis and
interpretations (Cassidy, 2013). In my doctoral study, participants had a
chance to review my interpretations and provide their corresponding
feedbacks, corrections, and comments. Reviewing the researchers’
interpretations is a part of the member checking process as a best practice in
assuring the accuracy of qualitative research studies (Simpson & Quigley,
2016). Such practices will give more credibility to the findings by requesting
participants’ opinions about my understanding of their responses to the
interview questions.
Reliability and Validity
Reliability
This part of my doctoral study contains a description of my endeavors
towards establishing reliability and validity throughout the doctoral study
research. Reliability and validity are two key topics related to accuracy and
precision of a research (Alshenqeeti, 2014; Street & Ward, 2012). In an
empirical study, Kihn and Ihantola (2015) emphasized that validation of a
study is an ongoing process in any methodological approach. Some
researchers argued that the concepts of reliability and validity relate more
precisely to the quantitative methodologies rather than qualitative methods
(Foley & O’Conner, 2013; Kadioğlu, Şişman, & Ergün, 2012). In qualitative
studies, researchers use trustworthiness and rigor to ensure reliability (Titze,
Schenck, Logoz, & Lehmkuhl, 2014). I considered the four criteria that
Houghton et al. (2013) defined for assessing the rigor of any qualitative
study including: (a) dependability, (b) credibility, (c) confirmability, and (d)
transferability. Munn, Porritt, Lockwood, Aromataris, and Pearson (2014)
argued that concepts of reliability and internal validity in a quantitative study
bear the same meaning of dependability and credibility in qualitative
research studies. To address the reliability of my doctoral study, I used
member checking by asking participants to review my interpretations of their
responses to interview questions.
Dependability. In a broad concept of research studies, reliability
means assuring the consistency and repeatability of the results (Donatelli &
Lee, 2013; Wahyani, 2012; Yin, 2014). Therefore, reliability ensures that
different researchers, or the same researcher, will come up with the same
results under the same conditions, either at the same time or in a different
time. Part of reliability entails describing participants’ experiences in a
truthful and fair manner (Moloney, Hall, & Doody, 2012). Researchers
ensure dependability of their work through an explanation of the research
design, data gathering process, and instruments they are going to use through
data collection (Wahyuni, 2012). To ascertain the reliability of my research,
I followed the procedure proposed by Yin (2014), which includes: (a) having
a detail plan for documenting research process and guidelines, (b) creating a
database for case studies, (c) using member checking to ensure accuracy and
correctness of takeaways from interview sessions. A logical, clear, and
traceable documentation process will establish the dependability of the
research (Cope, 2014; Munn et al., 2014). Preparing a stepwise and
systematic procedure for my research design, participant’s selection, data
collection, data organization, and data analysis allow other researchers and
investigators to repeat my study and confirm the quality of the research
findings.
The purpose of having a comprehensive case study database is to
increase the reliability of the study (Grossoehme, 2014; Yin, 2014).
Therefore, I documented all my case studies in an inclusive database to
allow the access to the entire collected documents including transcripts,
notes, archival files, and other evidence and results directly. To ensure the
dependability, correctness, and accuracy of my understanding of
participants’ experiences throughout the interview sessions, I used member
checking process. Reilly
(2013) and Zohrabi (2013) argued that using member checking involves
participants in a mutual process of clarifying the true meaning of discussed
topics within the interviewing sessions. Moreover, researchers use member
checking to ensure data saturation and increase the reliability and credibility
of the research (Harvey, 2015; Houghton et al., 2013; Marshall et al., 2013).
I conducted member checking after finishing the interview sessions. For this
reason, all participants received a copy of my one-length paragraph
interpretation of their responses to each interview question for further
review, possible corrective actions, and comment.
Validity
Validity reflexes the level legitimacy and correctness of a research
through measuring the rigor and credibility of the findings (Srivastava &
Misra, 2014). Validity constitutes the quality of the research procedure and
results via analysis of findings to ensure the outcomes of the study reflect the
primary purpose of the research (Aravamudhan & Krishnaveni, 2015; Rao,
2013). In a qualitative study, validity is a crucial metric to confirm a
credible, trustworthy, and plausible data generation (Venkatesh et al., 2013).
To report on validity in my doctoral study, I elaborated on credibility,
transferability, confirmability, and data saturation.
Credibility. Validity of the study indicates the degree to which the
evidence support the correctness of the data interpretations. Data validity
assures an agreement among study procedures, data analysis, results, final
discussions, and conclusions through credibility, transferability,
confirmability, and data saturation (Houghton et al., 2013).
Credibility is a function of qualitative research studies (Onwuegbuzie
et al., 2012). Researchers should assure a logical connection stands between
the original data sources and researchers’ interpretations (Munn et al., 2014).
According to Houghton et al. (2013), in qualitative case studies, researchers
adherence to certain protocols and guidelines to define the credibility of the
research. As the primary data collection instrument in this qualitative study,
I prepared and developed appropriate protocols and procedures applicable to
different stages of my doctoral study from study design to data collection,
organization, analysis, and interpretation. Through member checking
process, participants reviewed my interview interpretations and advised for
any probable change to correction. Kornbluh (2015) discussed that using
member checking technique, researchers solicit participants’ insights to
increase the credibility and trustworthiness of the study findings.
Trustworthiness shows the degree of confidence over the results of research
(El Hussein, Jakubec, & Osuji, 2015). Therefore, I assured all participants
take part in member checking process after data collection and data analysis
phases.
Yin (2014) discussed three mechanisms to ensure the validity of the
study including: (a) triangulation, (b) data saturation, and (c) identification
of study limitation. Torrance (2012) argued that having more than one
source of data in a qualitative study will increase the validity of the research
process and promotes the results. The process of having more than one
sources of information is part of triangulation technique that raises the
credibility and reliability of the gathered information (Fusch & Ness, 2015).
Triangulation, alongside with member checking, use of peer debriefing, and
providing thick descriptions, is a strategy to enhance the trustworthiness of a
research (Anney, 2014). Therefore, to increase the validity my doctoral
study findings, I combined, compared, and contrasted different sources of
data including in-depth interview sessions, companies’ annual reports, and
publicly available archival contents on companies’
websites.
Transferability. Transferability refers to the extent to which
researchers can transfer or generalize the results of a study to other contexts
or situations (Erlingsson &
Brysiewicz, 2013; Houghton et al., 2013; Thomas, & Magilvy, 2011).
Franco et al. (2015) associated tying study results to existing research with
transferability and trustworthiness. I presented the findings of my doctoral
study in a systematic and detailed presentation in which there are indirect
and rich quotes from participants. Moreover, I provided a description of my
sample size and population to allow other investigators to compare and
contrast my findings with other demographic samples. The degree to which a
study is congruent with participants’ previous experiences will influence the
level of transferability of the study (Burchett, Mayhew, Lavis, & Dobrow,
2013). In Addition to following data collection and analysis techniques
through interview protocols, I described participants demographics in order
to provide a basis reference for future researchers and ensure study
transferability.
Confirmability. Confirmability refers to the state of accuracy and
neutral characteristics of the data in a research (Houghton et al., 2013). Also,
confirmability entails keeping a systematic record of all data sources,
analysis procedures, and sample characteristics (El Hussein et al., 2015).
Therefore, confirmability is similar to dependability in a sense that
researchers strive to establish the accuracy and consistency of data through
member checking and triangulation. I examined the frequency of themes via
NVivo software to scrutinize the accuracy of the analysis and enhance the
confirmability of the study.
Data Saturation. I continued data collection until reaching the point
that participants did not add any new information to the research topic. At a
point that there is a repetitive trend in participants’ responses and no
additional information exists to acquire, researchers achieve data saturation
(Kemparaj & Chavan, 2013; Morse et al., 2014). Data saturation is a way to
ensure research findings are dependable (Anyan, 2013). Therefore,
researchers utilize data saturation to enrich their studies through the data
inquiry procedure (Morse, 2015). More sample size does not necessarily
mean a richer population (Marshall et al., 2013); however, having the
adequate number of samples is crucial for any successful study (Ward,
Vaughn, Burney, & Ostbye, 2016), as long as researchers can ensure the data
saturation. Five cases seemed to be a proper size for collecting the data;
however, I was ready to continue adding more participant in case I could not
reach the data saturation stage in which no novel information emerges from
initial five data collection sources. In addition, I used follow-up member
checking process to ensure obtaining in-depth and accurate data, and
reaching data saturation. Simpson and Quigley (2016) argued that providing
interview interpretations for participants’ review is an essential part of the
member checking process in qualitative studies.
Transition and Summary
The purpose of this study was to discover marketing strategies that
senior marketing managers of international oilfield service companies used
to enhance the profitability of their organizations, particularly during the
recession periods. I used a well-developed qualitative multiple case study to
conduct the research. In section 2, I restated the purpose of the study
followed by a detailed description of the role of the researcher; identification
of the participants, population, and sampling method; and elaboration on the
data collection tools, data organization, and data analysis process.
Section 2 concluded with an overview of the research reliability and validity.
In section 3, I present the findings of the study followed by the application to
professional practice, implementation for social change, and
recommendations for action. I conclude with providing a clear and concise
review of the conclusion of the study.
Section 3: Application to Professional Practice and Implications for Change
In Section 3, I outline the findings of the research and the social and
economic influences of the study. I will present the outcomes of the study in
different themes extracted from the interview sessions, companies’ annual
reports, and companies’ website contents. Section 3 includes (a) an
introduction to the study, (b) presentation of findings, (c) application to
professional practice, (d) implications for social change, (e)
recommendations for action, (f) recommendations for further research, (g)
reflections, and (h) conclusion.
Introduction
The purpose of this qualitative multiple case study was to explore
strategies that senior marketing managers of ISCOGI in the Middle East use
to enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits during periods of
declining oil prices. I conducted five semistructured interviews with open-
ended questions. The participants were senior marketing managers of
international oilfield service companies located in the Middle
East. I used data triangulation by reviewing and contrasting data available on
companies’ websites and annual reports. The outputs of the interview
sessions and secondary sources of information answered the following
research question: What strategies do senior marketing managers of ISCOGI
use to enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits during declining oil
price periods?
After transcribing the five interviews and collecting, comparing, and
contrasting the data with companies’ annual reports and public website
contents, I used NVivo 10 to import textual data for a qualitative analysis
and coding the data. Data analysis revealed five themes regarding marketing
strategies including (a) customers, (b) relationship marketing, (c)
differentiation, (d), services (e), and (f) price. The extent of the similarities
among participants’ responses to the interview questions and the level of
achievements represented in annual reports of the corresponding companies
supported my findings.
Presentation of Findings
The purpose of this qualitative multiple case study was to explore
strategies that senior marketing managers of ISCOGI in the Middle East use
to enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits during periods of
declining oil prices. The central research question was: What strategies do
senior marketing managers of ISCOGI use to enhance sales performance,
revenues, and profits during declining oil price periods? I conducted
semistructured interviews with five senior marketing managers of
international oilfield service companies and reviewed data from companies’
annual reports and website contents to triangulate the primary information.
Each interview lasted for approximately 45 minutes, except the last
interview, which lasted 75 minutes because of
P5’s desire to continue the session and provide further info. I extracted the
largest portion of my data from the interview sessions. Interview is one of
the most effective techniques for data collection in qualitative studies
(Onwuegbuzie & Byers, 2014; Morse & McEovy, 2014; Wang & Zhu,
2015). After each session, I transcribed the audio recordings by listening to
the audio records. Each transcribing process took between 5 and 7 hours
because of the relatively high volume of content and repetition.
I tried to reduce the bias using series of actions including the
integration of the study findings with recent and peer-reviewed literature,
use of member checking technique, and validating the interview data by
engaging additional sources of information. Data saturation was achieved
when there was no emerging data or additional information. After reviewing
the transcripts of the forth interview, I reached data saturation and the fifth
interview session just confirmed the state of data saturation without adding
any novel information. Heslehurst et al. (2013) argued that researchers reach
data saturation when no new information is coming out of the interview
sessions. I assigned a unique alphanumeric code to each participant and his
or her corresponding company. For example, P1 and C1 represent
Participant 1 and Company 1, respectively.
Analysis of participants’ responses to interview questions and evaluation of
the companies’ annual reports and the website contents of the corresponding
companies led to extraction of the following themes:
1. Customer.
2. Relationship marketing.
3. Differentiation.
4. Service.
5. Price/revenue.
I sent my interpretation of participants’ responses to each
corresponding participant for the sake of member checking to review and
comment on the accuracy, correctness, and rightness of the document. I
provided all participants the final version of the analysis for the record.
Member checking is a technique that researchers use to ensure data
saturation and increase the credibility of the research (Houghton et al., 2013;
Koelsch, 2013; Marshall et al., 2013). Using member checking increases the
researchers’ confidence in the collected data (Simpson & Quigley, 2016).
Using the NVivo software and a customized Excel file, I extracted the main
themes and keywords that participants used frequently during the interviews.
Although participants were from different companies, as soon as I started
data collection for the second case, I noticed the emergence of common
keywords. Table 1 indicates the most frequent keywords and the frequency
of the usage. As shown in Table 1, the most frequent keyword was
customer/client, followed by relationship and differentiation.
After a thorough review of interview transcripts, I noticed participants
used the word customer or client to identify and address a particular segment
of the market, as either a new segment or part of an existing market segment.
In addition, participants frequently employed the word relationship to
emphasize targeting specific clients. Furthermore, participants stated in
several cases the importance of differentiation by positioning the products
and services in dynamic marketplaces. All these keywords are among the
main constructs of the STP conceptual model, which I used as the
foundation lens for my doctoral research. Smith (1956) identified the
following key constructs for the STP model: (a) market segmentation, which
represents clustering the existing and potential customers based on their
common attributes; (b) market targeting, which discusses the process of
focusing marketing strategies on a particular group; and (c) market
positioning, which describes how to locate the products and services in
customers’ minds against competitors.
Table 1
Keywords Frequency
Keyword Count
Customers/client (Segmentation) 145
Relationship (Targeting) 98
Differentiation (Positioning) 85
Service 120
Price 67
Revenue 35
Theme 1: Customers/Clients (Market Segmentation)
The first and the most frequent theme was the customer as a central
feature in the oil and gas industry. All participants emphasized the important
and critical role of customers in business-to-business marketing, particularly
in periods of declining oil prices. Customers are the key elements for market
segmentation strategies. P1 stated that once the oil price is down, the
spending budget of the clients would reduce dramatically, affecting all the
service companies involved in clients’ projects. Clients try to lower the cost
as much as possible; therefore, customers force the service providers,
suppliers, and other stakeholders to become in line with such cost control
procedures. Per P2, during the oil price downturn, the customers become
more powerful in comparison with periods of higher oil price. P3 and P4
stressed the change in customers’ negotiating power during the market
downturns. Michael (2014) argued that market distortion, because of
imbalance power of the producers and consumers, has altered the market
equilibrium and brought uncertainties in the supply section comparing to the
prediction of the demand part.
The clients in the oil and gas industry are divided into two major
groups of national oil companies (NOCs) and international oil companies
(IOCs). According to all participants, the behavior of each group of clients is
different from the other group. P1 stated NOCs have more financial
resources that can be of significant advantage during the oil price decline. P2
and P3 reiterated the advantageous conditions of NOCs in terms of financial
budgets; however, P3 stated NOCs have their own limitations owing to the
NOCs legal commitments to the governments. P3 indicated NOCs are
generally responsible for providing and supporting a considerable portion of
the government budgets in their corresponding countries. P4 and P5
considered NOCs to be the trap zone for oilfield service companies in a
sense that NOCs managers are generally from the government side, or at
least connected to the government body, with the attitude of overweighing
the national interests over global business trends. P4 argued NOCs might
express their willingness to invest in oil and gas projects during the oil price
downturn; however, NOCs commitment to the government would probably
diminish any desire for business development in such economic conditions.
On the other hand, the IOCs have tight budgets with huge
commitments to the shareholders. All participants agreed on the wider range
of markets that IOCs are engaged and the chance of IOCs for distributing the
business portfolios across a variety of fields. However, according to P1, the
nature of this group of customers dictates more strict decisions in times of
oil price downturn. Comparing to the customers, regardless of being national
or international, oilfield service companies seem to be more sensitive to the
market volatility in comparison to the production and exploration companies
(Michael, 2016). Supply of the oil and gas, in turn, affects the companies’
strategies for introducing new projects and expanding ongoing
developments. A proper market segmentation will positively affect both
market performance and salespeople’s
performance (Terho et al., 2015).
Drop of the oil price has had a significant effect on the market players.
P1, P2, and P5 posited disruption in the oil and gas industry had emerged
new entrants into the market in all local, regional, and international scales.
P3 stated during the downturn, some new players emerge that previously did
not have enough resources to compete in the market. P2 stressed new
entrants are in both customer and service provider sectors. According to P2,
the emergence of the low-quality customers leads to the rise of low quality
service companies. P1 and P4 argued because of the low expectations of
some of the newly emerged customers, the low quality oilfield service
companies will have a chance to increase their activities and consequently
grow their market share. P1 reiterated managers of the decent international
oilfield service companies would not sacrifice the quality and reputation of
their corresponding companies for the sake of higher market share or greater
revenue; therefore, will face some challenging circumstances. P3 opined
there are also high-tech, small-size firms that use the market downturn and
provide specific services or products to solve client’s issues. Such small
firms have much lower operational costs compared to multinational
corporates and have a great chance to grow their businesses. Schlager and
Maas (2013) discussed the need for having a case-by-case analysis to
identify and evaluate the market emerging players and take the proper action
in segmenting the market.
All participants agreed the main reason some of the customers, either
new or existing, tend to cooperate with lower quality service companies is
changing priorities. All participants indicated tight budgets force customers
to reduce costs by any available means including but not limited to releasing
some employees, postponing new investments, retendering the existing
projects, and switching the service providers. In such challenging situations,
P1 believed if quality and safety were not a priority for a customer, the
customer would select service providers with lower quality products and
services to save more dollars. P1, P3, P4, and P5 emphasized on the
correlation between customers cutting budget plans and service companies
strategies. Cuadros and Domínguez (2014) argued marketers should reassess
the marketing strategies based on changes in customers’ lifetime values. P2
stated the industry downturn causes new emerging segments among
customers that requires marketers to evaluate customers’ reactions to the
market.
All participants consented on the role of senior marketing managers in
identification and establishment of specific marketing strategies during the
periods of declining oil price to match the novel situations and needs of the
customers. P2 emphasized the role of the senior marketing managers in
developing marketing strategies to meet short-term and long-term
requirements of the challenging markets during the oil price downturn. P2
stated since the approach of the customers towards existing and future
projects would change, because of the new market conditions, senior
marketing managers should be careful in promoting strategies that might
become a new norm in the future. P4 confirmed senior marketing managers
should carefully tailor any marketing decision during the oil price downturn
to avoid creation of unmanageable demands for customers, especially during
the recovery and booming periods.
The presence of new market players should not expel the existing
service providers. P5 posited senior marketing managers of the ISCOGI
should adjust marketing strategies in a more diverse manner. P5 simulated
the role of the senior marketing managers to building a diverse portfolio
across a variety of the stock markets. According to P5, only open-minded
and visionary marketers can retrain existing customers and attract new ones
during such challenging periods by monitoring the customers’ trends in
reassessing priorities and adopting changes accordingly. P2 and P3 reiterated
the necessity for having a diverse marketing strategy. P4 indicated senior
marketing managers should review the marketing strategies every single
week and put in place new marketing priorities based on clients’ priorities.
P4 believed any alternative product or services might shift the customers’
long-run wants and needs. Therefore, sales and marketing intelligence
should stay alert to discover any opportunity that might be negligible during
normal market conditions. Neglecting the hidden institutional heterogeneity
of the market may cause significant problems for companies in building
market segmentation (Schlager & Maas, 2013).
P1 revealed the customers’ approach in cutting the budget means
fewer projects would be introduced to the market. Therefore, market will
become more challenging and competitive for existing service companies.
P3 stated the necessity for reducing employees in all fields including the
sales and marketing functions. The other participants took a completely
different approach in this regard and stressed the importance of sales and
marketing forces during the downturn periods. P1 emphasized the need for
recruitment of highly skilled and experienced marketing forces that can
understand customers’ ever-growing demands. P2 reiterated the essential
role of sales and marketing people to be visible and present in clients’ office,
almost all the time. P2 and P5 said their corresponding companies had taken
advantage of existing pool of recently released employees and had recruited
some of them for the technical marketing and sales position.
One of the main classification parameters in segmenting a market is
geographic locations. Since the focus of the study was on Middle East,
participants did not discuss the marketing strategies based on geographical
changes; however, all participants reported some differences in market
segmentation according to the specific geographical needs. For example, in
areas in which the major clients were operating in offshore environments or
tight shale reservoirs, the effect of the oil price decline has been more severe
comparing to the conventional and land operators. All participants
acknowledged having divers operations and customers across variety of oil
prone countries would imply a safety margin while facing dramatic market
changes in one location. In particular, P2 exemplified how key clients in
Middle East survived the initial wave of oil price downturn while their
counterparts in U.S. land were struggling with low oil prices. As a result,
P2’s company started to reassess the market segments in United States few
months prior to doing the same in the Middle East area. In addition to
geographic factors, cultural and econometric parameters may also influence
the clients’ behavior to the market changes and consequently requires
additional attention from marketers’ side. Budeva and Mullen (2014)
suggested to marketers to review the economic and cultural variables
together on a regular basis to have a comprehensive conclusion on their
marketing strategies through international market segmentations.
Theme 2: Relationship (Market Targeting)
The second emerging theme was relationship. All participants
emphasized the importance of maintaining and leveraging a close and
intimate relationship with customers. Relationship marketing has
considerable application in promoting businesses and increasing the
profitability (Borisavljevic, 2013). P1 stated clients should feel the presence
of service providers in times of business downturn. P3 and P4 reiterated that
during the periods of oil price downturn, marketing and sales people should
prove the significance of their relationship to the customers. According to
P5, customers should not feel left alone specially when they are in shortage
of solutions and ideas. P5 opined customer relationship dictates the survival
of the business during the downturn periods. According to P5, if customers
believe in the trustworthiness of a relationship, they will maintain the
connection and involve the service provider in their market reassessing
plans.
Although maintaining an intimate yet professional relationship with
customers is not limited to the oil price downturn periods, according to P1,
during such periods a close contact with clients has additional advantages.
P1 stated customers would more acknowledge a friend than a sales person
trying to sell up services and products.
Customers’ gratitude and satisfaction, which comes from strategies beyond
solely financial benefits, will enhance the long-term relationship (Fazal e
Hasan, Mortimer, Lings, & Neale, 2017). P2 stated customers value support
and presence of service companies during the downturn periods. Building a
strong and reliable relationship marketing will give edge over competitors
during the recovery periods and implementation of long-term marketing
strategies (Gharehbashloni & Seify, 2014). P2 restated that her company’s
approach in creating communication networks and trustable relationship
with customers during the 2008 market recession had facilitated her
marketing team in execution of the marketing strategies afterward. The
fundamental rule of relationship marketing is trust, commitment, and
gratitude (Mishra, 2016). P3 and P4 emphasized the significance of having a
trustworthy relationship with clients at all time.
When participants discussed the importance of relationship with
customers, they all went beyond the regular usage of channels such as CRM.
P1 said during the oil price downturn, clients are under a huge pressure to
employ services and products with minimum operational and executional
costs; therefore, parameters such as customer loyalty and brand value might
be overshadowed by financial restraints. According to P1, in financial
downturn conditions, if senior marketing manager had already built a
relationship with his or her counterparts in the client office, the chance of
staying in the business loop would remain high. P2 opined marketing
managers of oilfield service companies should use strategies that engage and
share service company’s benefits and losses with clients. Sheth (2017)
argued in today’s challenging market places, relationship marketing should
shift towards virtual joint ventures between customers and product/service
providers. P4 also indicated the necessity of being engaged with customers
as a partner rather than a merely service provider. P5 stated CRM is vital for
capturing the opportunities, managing the relationships, and working on
loyalties; however, relationship marketing is more than that.
According to P5, relationship marketing requires breaking some
barriers, entering into the safe zone of the customers, and being considered
as an extra source of cost reduction. A thorough involvement with clients in
daily activities will elevate the relationship to the next level of contribution
and collaboration in which both client and service company will benefit. The
direction of relationship marketing is towards pushing limits and moving
towards deeper involvement of all parties (Gummerus, Koskull, &
Kowalkowski, 2017). P3 believed as the trust and reliance between
customers and service companies grow, the marketing managers will have
an easier task to empower the relationship and become a dependable and
consistent foundation of solution.
Initiating a relationship is not always an easy task and marketers may
encounter some oppositions. Both P2 and P3 emphasized the resistance of
some buying centers in some of the customers’ offices when service
providers attempt to initiate a closer relationship. According to P2, some
clients may consider an attempt to leverage a relationship as an effort to take
advantage of market situations. P3 said some customers do not like to see
service companies being involved in A to Z of the activities, though client
might be in extreme need of assistance in terms of both hardware and
software. According to P3, part of such incorrect conception is due to
privacy policies but a larger portion of the concern comes from lack of trust.
P3 considered two separate approaches to resolve this challenge: (a) building
the relationship in a gradual manner over time to increase the confidence and
avoid instant shocks, and (b) approaching different buying centers in the
client office via different channels. Sheth (2013) indicated marketers should
go beyond economic benefits and transcend the relationship to a friendship
seeking for a long-term affiliation.
All the participants indicated their corresponding service companies
have a dedicated budget for marketing and a well-established marketing
plan exists for both short-run and long run missions. However, P1 and P3
gave more weight on relationship rather than the influence of the marketing
plans. P1 stated the necessity for having a marketing roadmap in the form of
a marketing plan to ensure all parts of the company are moving in the right
direction and will aim to increase the revenue and profitability. Nevertheless,
both P1 and P2 reiterated personal selling plays a significant role in the oil
and gas industry. P4 said technical sales people with a solid background on a
specific service or product are the front line of promoting service
companies’ products in the oilfield industry. According to P4 the
relationship of the sales people during the downturn periods can determine
whether a sell would happen or not. Although all the participants
emphasized on the importance of having an established marketing plan, only
P5 highlighted that without having an integrated marketing strategy there
would be no successful selling in the mid and long term.
P5 stated oil companies, either NOCs or IOCs, would build their long-
term relationship based on the sales reputation of the service providers as
well as the perception about the abilities of the service provider in fulfilling
the assigned tasks. P5 restated building such a long-term reputation is only
possible through having an integrated marketing plan from advertising to
direct marketing, sales promotions, public relationship, and attention to
clients’ market visions. According to P5, using CRM system is a well-
recognized approach to manage the relationship with customers and track the
sales tasks and lead the opportunities; however, CRM will just assist in
documenting sales information while the main task happens in the client’s
office where the marketing and/or sales people create a trustworthy
connection with the customer. P1 said honesty and decent personality have
the same value as expertise in the oil and gas relationship marketing. P2
opined relationship with customers should be nourished and renewed from
time to time. According to P2, considering the dynamics of the oil and gas
industry and the need for innovative products and services, having a
cherished relationship with customers would facilitate the acceptance and
approval of the novel products or services.
Although all the participants gave a high mark to personal sales and
friendly relationship with clients, P2 indicated for a long-term business
growth, marketing managers should consider all the marketing channels as
an integrated strategy. P2 restated using social media and getting into the
customers’ circle of friendship is a useful strategy and paves the way of
getting closer to the customers. P3 and P4 also shared same experiences of
being actively involved with clients using the social media. In fact, although
none of the participants’ corresponding companies was active on the social
media, almost all of the participants had practiced social media in a way or
another to strengthen the relationship with clients and use that relationship
for promoting the professional connections. The ever-growing influence of
the digital marketing in everyday business transactions requires a novel view
over official trainings of marketers (Atwong, 2015). However, P5 showed
some careful forethought in using social media for building a friendly
relationship with customers. P5 stated unofficial channels might act as a
double-edged sword that can harm the professional relationships if marketers
do trespass the red lines. Red lines, according to P5, vary based on
personality and demographics, and require customization on a case-by-case
basis. Having such marketing skills might require official trainings in social
media marketing as proposed by Atwong (2015).
The nature of the oil and gas industry and the way the companies deal
with each other might impose some significant challenges in utilizing social
media for creating a strong relationship marketing with customers. P1 stated
although social media might not directly influence the relationship with
customers, the use of social media might enhance the intimacy and
friendship. Overall, an integrated relationship marketing is a facilitator to
increase profitability and building a stronger brand awareness (Hajipour,
Bavarsad, & Zarei, 2013). Relationship marketing will enhance the firms’
profitability and increase the revenues (Borisavljevic, 2013). Therefore,
marketers and salespeople should use all the available channels to develop a
trustworthy, committed, reliable, and consistent relationship with customers,
regardless of the market situations.
Theme 3: Differentiation (Market Positioning)
The third emerging theme was differentiation, both in services and in
products.
Changes in customers’ values means marketers should reassess the strategies
based on new customer values and differentiate the products and services
against competition (Cuadros & Domínguez, 2014). Differentiation
strategies not only leverage the company’s profitability but also increase the
brand awareness in the market (Yang & Chie, 2014). P2 believed
differentiation without attraction is not going to be fruitful. P2 restated the
need for innovative and novel services and products that can raise the
customers’ appetite and encourage clients to try the new services. Sarathy
and Banalieva (2014) argued marketers should address the customers’ needs
in an innovative manner to get some marketing advantages over competitors.
P3 stated differentiation should be in line with value creation, and
consequently, should attract customers’ attention to innovative values and
solutions. Generating unique characteristics for company’s products and
services should be an integral part of differentiation strategies (Torre,
Fenger, VanTwist, & Bressers, 2014).
To achieve differentiation, senior marketing managers of service
companies require working with departments of research and development
(R&D). P1 emphasized the importance of investment on research projects to
come up with state-of-the-art and quality products than can differentiate
pioneers from other competitors. Klaus and
Maklan (2013) indicated companies’ managers attempt to provide a unique
and satisfactory experience for customers, weighing more on personal
experiences than advertised quality factors. Trif (2013) identified customer
satisfaction as a main force that will lead to brand loyalty and increase long-
term profitability. Each client uses the personal experiences with products
and services as an evaluating parameter and differentiating factor (Bagdare
& Jain, 2013). According to P1, senior marketing managers can act as the
primary link between customers’ requirements and R&D
departments to provide the best feed for future innovation and development
projects.
In a challenging and price-sensitive marketplace, the level of
differentiation may vary significantly from one client to another. P4 posited
marketers should research the market thoroughly to understand which tier is
willing to pay the extra dollar for a premium product. A certain product may
receive different welcomes from different customers in dissimilar buying
sectors (Cuellar & Brunamonti, 2014). The investment on R&D projects
must be target oriented and well studied prior to introducing the products to
the market. The need for differentiation has forced marketers to become
market oriented and requires continuous update of strategies based on
market changes (Nalcaci & Yagci, 2014). P5 stated differentiation is not all
about innovation, but renewing the delivery packages and adding extra
answer products to the previous packages will assist in differentiating one
service company from another. P1 shared his experience in differentiating
the products of the company through a marketing campaign in which the
service company offered free transportation of equipment and by-products
required to fulfill the operations. P1’s experience of a simple differentiating
offer, with some extra cost for the service company, had led to more
activities and additional revenue. P1 argued the offer not only differentiated
his company from the competitors, but also strengthened the relationship
between the service company and one of the major clients.
Marketing managers can differentiate the products and services from
competitors by investing in marketing innovation (Medrano & Olarte-
Pascual, 2016). P1 said although innovation in developing new products and
services will bring more opportunities and will differentiate service
providers, the nature of the oil and gas industry does not allow a full usage
of Internet-based technologies such as social media to be utilized in the same
way marketers in other industries do. P1 argued managers in the oil and gas
industry use social media mainly to reach public audiences during the
emergency events and post-crisis activities. P3, P4, and P5 reiterated the
same concept; however, all believed in future advances of social media
within the oil and gas industry. Therefore, in the oil and gas industry, using
social media to differentiate a service company from competitors seems to
be a challenging task. P2 agreed corporate social responsibility (CSR) will
eventually forces service companies to be more proactive on social media
and such activities will act as a differentiation factor. Manning (2013)
argued as long as company’s social responsibility activities are align with
company’s mission, managers will be able to use CSR to increase the market
share and attract more customers through differentiation. Nevertheless, all
participant presumed in the future the use of Internet-based technology
would become more applicable and would make more common sense in the
oil and gas upstream.
P4 and P5 considered differentiation as a positive move for the whole
industry that may bring competitive advantages. P4 believed determined and
energetic marketing campaigns would leverage the total effort of the service
companies in developing novel technologies that can improve the whole oil
industry. A thorough differentiation will improve the positioning of the
products in customers’ minds (Maarit Jalkala & Keränen, 2014). An
aggressive marketing can potentially improve the companies’ capabilities in
providing better quality products and services that can satisfy both side of
the supply and demand chain (Sarathy & Banalieva, 2014). P5 restated that
differentiation strategies would escalate the positive competition in the
market and lead in to higher quality services. Cheng (2014) discussed an
increase in differentiation capabilities of the companies might result in
elimination of some competitors due to lack of sufficient quality products.
Nevertheless, differentiation is not always possible in all market categories.
P5 reiterated the need for a wise and on time decision to move from one
category to another, if differentiation is not possible in a particular class.
According to P5, the mission of the service company and high-level
marketing strategies will dictate whether competing in all fronts has value
for the company or not.
One way of differentiating a company from others is through
branding. Product differentiation can influence the brand equity and pricing
strategies (Davcik & Sharma, 2015). A unique and hard-to-replace brand is a
distinctive feature that customers use to differentiate available products in
the market (Alstete, 2014). All participants admitted the necessity to create,
develop, and establish a unique brand that can addresses both company’s
sustainable missions and customers’ pride. The name of the brand will also
affect the positioning of the product in customer’s mind (Kachersky &
Carnevale, 2015). One of the criteria for customers to distinguish amongst
competitors in the market is the brand strength and visibility (Reichart Smit
& Sanderson, 2015). P1 and P2 stated brand recognition and reputation is a
major differentiator in the oil and gas market and can give significant
advantages over competition. Kaur, Sharma, Kaur, and Sharma (2015)
argued a strong brand name provides a considerable differentiating mindset
for the customers that may positively influence the customer loyalty.
Altuntaş, Semerciöz, Mert, and Pehlivan (2014) found a strong relationship
between brand image and successful differentiation strategies.
P2 posited although variations in novel tools and equipment in
addition to specialized resources is a differentiator in any challenging
market, the pace of progress is unequal among competition. P2 stated many
senior marketing managers of oilfield service companies are aware of
differentiation benefits but only few have the resources, budgets, and
flexibility to risk new ideas for proposing new products and services.
Therefore, there is a visible variation in products’ quality and quantity in
different marketplaces, which allows marketing pioneers to take advantage
of the specific manufacturing power of their associate companies and make a
significant gap with competitors. P4 and P5 emphasized the importance of
differentiating the products regardless of the market booming or slump
conditions. According to P4 and P5, the challenges oil and gas companies
have been facing in recent years have provided a great chance for service
companies to discern and differentiate their capabilities from competitors
through unique products and customized services.
Theme 4: Service(s)
The fourth emerging theme was the services that oilfield service
companies offered to their customers in terms of variety, quality, quantity,
and innovativeness. Except P3, all other participants believed oilfield service
companies are centric in directing and leading the customers towards novel
services and products. P3 indicated customers are the dominant voice in the
oil and gas industry and oilfield service companies just follow the
customer’s leads even in solution-base projects. P3 believed customers will
identify what services or products should be developed to answer the ever-
growing operational challenges. However, P1 and P2 reckoned customers
only raise the issue and it is up to service providers to come up with the best
service or product that can address clients’ issues. P4 stated oilfield service
companies that have research and development (R&D) department are well
ahead of competition due to the ability of inventing products that not only
resolve the client’s problems, but also save time and cost. In P4’s opinion,
R&D should remain up and running during the market downturns for two
main reasons: (a) development of innovative and state-of-the-art products
that can specifically address clients’ concerns with lowest possible cost, and
(b) prediction of future market needs. P5 reiterated the need for innovative
services that are tailored particularly for explicit operations. Aroean and
Michaelidou (2014) argued marketing managers should pay extra attention
to innovations to leverage the market positioning and upgrade the marketing
segmentation through targeting the cognitive and emotional customers.
One of the major approaches P3’s corresponding company has taken
during the oil price downturn has been providing solutions to the clients
rather than merely offering a service or a particular product. P3 stated
customers are in need of whole package solutions more than any time.
According to P3, one of the main marketing strategies he and his marketing
team have taken since 2014 has been making sure sales and marketing
representatives visit clients’ offices every day. Therefore, he was aware of
all client’s requirements and tried to provide solutions for those needs. P2
and P4 emphasized the need for preparation of a solution-based package
during economic depressions to assist customers through shouldering some
of the market burdens. P2 reiterated clients, in general, and high profile
clients, in particular, welcome any solution-base offer that can reduce costs
and increase productivity. For the same reason, P2’s associated company has
made couple of joint ventures with smaller companies to fortify its
capabilities in offering competitive solution-base packages.
P1 posited offering different packages with different prices is one of
the best ways to support customers during the oil price downturn. P1 stated
each package would contain several offerings with different quantity and
quality of products and services allowing customers to choose the most
suitable packages. Safari and Thilenius (2013) argued discounted packages
based on quantity of sales would encourage consumers to consider more
purchases constructed upon the allocated budget. P2 said her company offers
same quality products with lower prices during the market downturn based
on clients’ type and buying power. Such achievement, according to P2, is
because of strict cost reduction policies. P4 considered variation in offerings
would increase customers’ purchase abilities and escalate the chance of
business transaction during market restrictions.
One of the difficulties with new products and services is lack of
sufficient knowledge from clients’ side to understand the functionality and
applicability of the new tools and services. P1 identified two major
approaches to abovementioned barrier. First, service developers should
provide intensive trainings for all involved customers to educate them on
pros and cons of each new product and services. Second, all new tools,
software, solution packages, and product updates should be advertised
thoroughly. While P2, P4, and P5 had similar notions on advertising the new
products, P3 had a contradictory vision about advertising. According to P3,
advertises will just impose additional costs to the company’s financial
challenges and the return of such investment would be negligible.
Notwithstanding the controversial standpoints on advertises, all participants
believed in the necessity of conducting seminars and workshops for different
customers to keep them tuned and informed of any changes on the product
and service fleets.
Differentiation, as defined by Smith (1956), is a way of converging
market demands towards particular products and services. Therefore, adding
new equipment and tools to the existing fleet is a wise way of managing
clients’ demands. P2 exemplified in 2015 her company transferred lots of
high-tech tools from low activity locations such as North America to the
Middle East, where the activity was still high. Some of these tools where
previously marketed in the Middle East; however, because of the high
service prices none of the clients had accepted to run the tools. Nevertheless
the initial redundancy of oilfield service companies to reduce the price of the
new-technology products, during the oil price downturn top managements
agreed to waive the previous policies and lower the prices. As a result, the
challenging market condition could become a win-win situation in which
clients can run new technologies with lower prices and service companies
will generate revenue by maintaining certain level of activities.
One of the strategies all participants used during the oil price
downturn has been facilitation of transforming the low-cost strategies to the
innovative-base tactics. Blending the cost cutting policies with strategies
focusing on innovation and valuecreation is a way of leveraging company’s
services and engaging interaction with customers through innovative
products (Gehani, 2013). P1 stated investments on innovative products and
services paid off well during the oil price decline through which innovative
products led the market and were on all-time demand by clients. P2 and P4
shared similar experiences of getting more market share through use of
innovative and unique equipment that could save considerable time and
money for clients. Beuren and Oro (2014) confirmed the connection between
innovation and product differentiation. P4 emphasized the role of senior
marketing managers of the international service companies in leading the
innovative initiations and convincing top management to invest in
differentiating strategies.
Theme 5: Price/Revenue
The fifth theme that emerged from the interview sessions was price
and revenue as two interconnected realities of the market. P1 used the term
return of equity (ROE) to indicate the effect of the oil price on the
profitability of the firms based on initial investment of shareholders.
According to P1, the lower the oil price the smaller the profitability of the
corporate, and consequently, the lesser the ROE. Therefore, marketing
managers seek initiatives in marketing strategies to increase the chance of
generating higher revenues. P1 believed the ultimate goal of any profitable
business is to generate profit; therefore, all parts of a company should work
in harmony to achieve the same goal. P2, P3, and P5 stated the first
impression of lower service prices within their junior marketing colleagues
was lower profits while in reality the service and product prices are not the
main influential parameters on the revenue and profit. P2 reiterated revenue
might rise if the company’s leaders can manage to control the cost and
somehow increase the activity. P2 restated marketing managers should
educate all team members about the pros and cons of lower prices.
In several studies, researchers found different effects of oil price on
the economics showing the importance of having a comprehensive view over
the prices, market players, and economic consequences (Ghosh & Kanjilal,
2016; Kang, Ratti, & Yoon, 2015; Siddiqui & Seth, 2015; Zhu, Li, & Li,
2014). However, in some cases, the relationship between oil price and
market drivers is not straightforward and requires a holistic research on
socioeconomic and sociopolitical parameters (Lin, Fang, & Cheng, 2014;
Liu, Ma, & Wang, 2015; Naifar & Al Dohaiman, 2013). In such a complex
environment, marketing managers have a critical role in adjusting strategies
with market changes to ensure the highest possible profitability. P5
explained how using a team of economic experts has leveraged his strategic
marketing decisions during the oil price downturn. P5 stated two academic
scholars were recruited in 2014 and 2015 to analyze the Middle Eastern
clients with focus on the cost-cut policies. The results, according to
P5, led to adopting marketing strategies in which the focus was to provide
solution-based offers to not only resolve the technical issues but also reduce
the cost of handling the projects. P2 also emphasized on using holistic look
at economic effects of oil price.
Prices are variable factors marketers play with during different market
circumstances to adjust the products and services based on market attraction
(Narangajavana, Garrigos-Simon, García, & Forgas-Coll, 2014). One of the
main parameters that affect any business sustainability and growth is pricing
(Iveroth, et al., 2013). Direct and indirect costs are two main factors
identifying the price of a product or service (Hassan, Yaacob, & Abdullatiff,
2014). P3 stated although price is a differentiator factor, companies may
suffer severely from the unfair pricings competitions. P3 reiterated the need
for restrict regulatory inspection to monitor the market competition and
avoid any unfair rivalry. P4 confirmed the same notion and stated that lower
purchasing power may encourage customers to weigh more on price rather
than quality.
However, Marasteanu, Jaenicke, and Dimitri (2014) argued that many small
firms’ managements try to keep the quality high and do not sacrifice the
quality for price. P1 indicated the need to accept marginal profits to maintain
the business sustainability and relationship with customers during the oil
price downturns. P1 admitted his company even risked for slightly profit loss
in some projects in order to survive its relationship with a particular client.
Altuntaş et al. (2014) argued companies’ leaders could get advantages
over competitors by either differentiating the products and services or
through manipulating the prices. Any endeavor here in between, might result
in losing ground to the competition and significantly delay the market share
growth (Altuntaş et al., 2014). P1 considered pricing to be one the most
important marketing strategies that marketers should deploy at any time. P2
and P3 believed pricing alongside quality, new technology, and uniqueness
of products and services is a differentiator factor for customers. Pricing
strategies will enhance the profitability of the firms (Xia, Xiao, & Zhang,
2013). P3 emphasized on pricing as a key marketing strategy to increase
sales and bring more revenue. P3 reiterated during the market downturn
periods, service companies should adjust the prices with market capacity. P3
divided customers into two separate categories including high profile clients
and low profile clients. High profile clients are more likely to pay for high
price services even during the market depression, though high profile clients
may not spend the same way they used to do during normal market
conditions. On the other hand, low profile clients would most probably
restrict expenditure and shift to service companies with lower price
offerings. To account for the most possible targets, service companies should
consider innovative ways of pricing the products and services. Hinterhuber
and Liozu (2014) argued innovation in pricing is a way of assuring higher
revenues and customer satisfaction.
Marketers can use marketing initiatives, including competitive pricing
and brand awareness, to enhance the profitability and revenues (Torre et al.,
2014). P1 stated right after the initial drop in oil price in summer of 2014,
his company’s top management requested senior marketing managers to
look for alternative marketing strategies and a detailed review of services
and products pricings. P1 reiterated changing the prices was not the first
action to be taken but was in top priority because everyone believed that
customers would soon start cutting costs and reducing budgets. P3 and P4
said reducing prices during the oil downturn periods is inevitable for two
main reasons: (a) all clients reduce the budgets and costs, and (b) the service
providers should also apply a strict cost control measures. P2 believed
dropping the prices would not necessarily mean a drop in revenue. P2
restated although service providers apply more discount on the prices, the
service providers employ some severe cost control measures to increase the
profitability margin. P5 emphasized the role of top management in balancing
the price reduction and profit margin. According to P5, service companies
would in turn request their suppliers and other upstream and downstream
channels to reduce the prices.
P3 considered lower prices as a negative factor that could affect the
efficiency of the workplace because of the inevitable consequences such as
employee layoff and workload pressure. Kang, Penn, and Zietz (2015)
reviewed data from 1983 to 2010 and found fluctuations in oil price would
affect the employment rate as well as overall economy in a negative way. P3
restated the overburden workload, which is a result of the oil price downturn,
is a double-edged sword that can either endanger the companies’
sustainability or awaken the hidden capabilities of the employees, if can be
managed properly. According to P3, surviving the market downturn
situations requires taking wise and critical decisions at all level of
management to ensure lower prices do not affect the quality of neither
workplace nor products and services.
Application to Professional Practice
The outcomes of the study confirm, complement, and add to the extant
body of knowledge on marketing strategies that senior marketing managers
of the ISCOGI use to enhance performance, revenues, and profits during
declining oil price periods. Reviewing the annual reports of the participants’
companies confirmed the financial success of the marketing strategies of
participants’ companies within the Middle East. Therefore, senior marketing
managers of the other international oilfield service companies, as well as
senior marketing managers of the regional companies who wish for
internationalization, can benefit from the study findings. Identifying the
customers with similar characteristics and reevaluating the changes in
customers’ needs due to market dynamics will assist marketing managers in
reassessing the market segmentation strategies. Maintaining a reliable and
truthful relationship with existing clients and knowing and developing
firsthand relationships with new customers is an essential part of the
marketing strategies. The dynamics of the market and sensitivity of the
customers require a detailed plan to review the existing market
segmentations and apply the necessary changes to the existing segments.
Marketers should pay extra attention to the new customers that have raised
because of the alteration in market requirements. Targeting the right
customers will ensure a healthy relationship in short term and long term, and
will assist marketing managers to strengthen the rapport with clients.
Senior marketing managers of the ISCOGI and their counterparts in
regional corporates should focus on differentiating the products and services
to get an edge over competitors. Paying attention to innovations, developing
solution-based packages, making partnerships with customers, and becoming
an integrated part of the solution in customers’ key projects are some of the
main strategies that senior marketing managers should follow. According to
the participants’ narrations, during the oil price downturn, clients wish to
have a reliable service company as a partner in solving the problems rather
than a mere service provider. Marketing managers should aim to provide a
unique and desirable experience for clients to not only satisfy the customers
but also exceed their expectations. Trif (2013) identified customer
satisfaction as the main force that will lead to brand loyalty and increase
long-term profitability.
Because of the low oil price, oil companies try to reduce all direct,
indirect, fixed, and operating costs; therefore, service providers should not
expect the same prices to shine in upcoming tenders. As a result, senior
marketing managers should incorporate the marketing strategies with entire
organization’s policy to reduce the costs and increase the flexibility of the
firm to offer considerable discounts to the customers. One way of assessing
competitive ingenuities is to align strategies of brand equity with marketing
targets and organizations’ profitability objectives (Mohammed, Rashid, &
Tahir, 2014). Offering different packages with different prices is one of the
best ways to support customers during the oil price downturn. Safari and
Thilenius (2013) argued discounted packages based on quantity of sales
would encourage consumers to consider more purchases based on their
allocated budgets. Lower purchasing power may encourage customers to
weigh more on price rather than quality. Therefore, marketing managers
should investigate the customers’ requirements and send the right message to
the research and development departments to come up with the most
efficient, high quality, and stateof-the-art products that can serve the clients’
purposes. Overall, business leaders can benefit from this research finding
through implementation of the marketing strategies recommended by
participants.
Implications for Social Change
With the ever-growing market pressure because of the oil price
downturn, senior marketing managers are obliged to use strategies that will
reduce the costs and increase the profitability. The fluctuations in the oil and
gas prices lead to instability in the profitability of the oil and gas companies
and pushing companies’ top managers to take disciplinary actions to reduce
the cost and increase the profitability margins (Shin, Jeong, Lacina, & Her,
2013). Unless marketing manager use strategies to offset market challenges,
the top management will keep reducing the number of employees as a direct
way of cutting costs. Job insecurities will affect both physical and
psychological health of the employees (De Witte, Pienaar, & De Cuyper,
2016; Jiang & Probst, 2016; Schaufeli, 2016) and will result in unethical
work behavior (Lawrence & Kacmar, 2017). In such complex and
challenging marketplaces, the successful marketing strategies participants in
this doctoral study offer could potentially lead to more sustainable and
profitable firms in which neither employees nor managers suffer from job
insecurities due to market uncertainties. More profitability of the firms could
cause less work stress and higher job security. Smit, De Beer, and Pienaar
(2016) argued less work stress would lead to greater job satisfaction and
healthier behavior by employees. Marketing strategies that can increase
revenue and profitability will give top management the chance to be
proactive to the market changes rather than taking reactive actions.
Higher sales performance, because of a successful marketing strategy,
can result in a better cash flow and may lead to increased operations and
activities, which requires hiring more employees and reducing
unemployment. Sustainability and profitability of the oilfield service
companies mean prosperity for employees and the surrounding families and
communities. Moreover, a profitable firm will contribute positively to the
local economy development and will increase the chance of having better
educational and recreational systems. As a result, the local societies will
become healthier and prosperous, and in an ideal case, will leverage the
happiness chain to the whole nation. Also, offering state-of-the-art
technologies through R&D may protect the world’s natural resources for the
generations to come and reduce the environmental consequences of
nonrenewable energy sources.
Recommendations for Action
Marketing strategies and decisions are among the most critical and
important aspects of any company regardless of the size, industry, and nature
of the firms. Kumar (2015) acknowledged marketing had become an integral
part of the organizations due to engaging the stakeholders in the course of
value generation through marketing practices. The role of the senior
marketing managers in the oil and gas service companies is similar to their
counterparts in other industries, though the nature of the oil and gas industry
may imply some differences. However, some senior marketing managers
lack strategies to enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits. The
outcomes of this study proved customers to be the pivotal and key players in
the market. Therefore, understanding the changes in customer needs may
result in a rearrangement of market segmentations. Marketing managers
should know what customers think about certain products and how
customers differentiate competitive brands from each other. Based on such
information, marketers can customize their brand character to address a
particular target market. Understanding the brand’s character will give a
competitive advantage to marketers to understand the consumer’s
perceptions of a particular product (Su & Tong, 2015).
Building a strong, trustworthy, and manageable relationship with
customers is an inevitable part of having a successful business and may lead
to attracting more customers. Homburg et al. (2014) found a considerable
improvement in business achievements due to a better relationship between
organizations and their end users, customers, and other business partners.
Considering the challenging environment, marketing managers should
develop a strong relationship with all stakeholders to tailor the right products
and services based on the customers’ needs and dynamic market
requirements. Exploring novel marketing strategies is necessary to stay
competitive and profitable (Appiah-Adu & Amoako, 2016). Use of the STP
model provides a means for positioning products and services to address
different clusters of customers in an efficient manner (Dibb & Simkin,
1991). Therefore, marketing managers can focus on the most profitable
segments of their business markets and create the maximum benefit from
existing and upcoming opportunities. To maintain business sustainability,
enhance profitability, and preserve market share, corporate marketing
managers must create and conduct strategies to meet and exceed the
companies’ objectives.
Marketing managers’ capabilities can increase the performance of the
firms (Ramaseshan et al., 2013) and raise the shareholder's value at the same
time (Hansen et al., 2013). All participants in this doctoral study emphasized
the importance of having the right person in the senior marketing manager
position. Loveland et al. (2015) considered assertiveness, visionary
leadership, optimism for career satisfaction, and customers’ orientation as
some of the competencies that marketing managers should have to take the
best marketing strategies. Siahtiri et al. (2014) explored the role of
marketing capabilities in delivering critical customer-centric performance,
getting new customers, retaining the current clients, and making business
partners satisfied. Mahdia and Almsafir (2014) argued organization top
managers are the pivotal points of dealing with market challenges and
introducing strategies to overcome competition.
I will consider dissemination of the findings of this doctoral study in
both academic and practitioner journals, professional seminars, and relevant
societies such as Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) as an excellent
forum for active professionals and experts in the oil and gas industry.
Participating in local forums in the Middle East region and sharing the study
findings with marketing managers of service companies seeking for over-
the-border activities may shed some light on the way forward to have a
better understanding of the challenges ahead and the possible solution for
those issues. During the inter-organizational training for marketing and sales
people, the results of the study may be useful to raise the awareness, provide
recommendations from senior marketing managers, and exchange new ideas.
Recommendations for Further Research
In this doctoral study, I have attempted to explore the strategies
marketing managers of international oilfield service companies use to
enhance sale performance, revenues, and profits. Similar to other scholar and
empirical studies, this research carries some assumptions, limitations, and
delimitations. The small sample size of five cases might create some
difficulties for generalization of the study outcomes. Although larger sample
size does not necessarily mean a richer study (Marshall et al., 2013),
expanding the sample size may give a chance to have a more precise and
truthful illustration of the target population. The methodology of the study
was a qualitative case study, which is not an ideal approach to examine the
relationship between parameters and variables influencing the strategic
marketing decisions. Future researchers may benefit from mixing qualitative
studies with quantitative approaches and aim for more comprehensive
objectives.
Another limitation of this study was the geographical location, which
was limited to the Middle East, though all participants and their
corresponding companies had extensive global experiences and subsidiaries
all around the world. Future researchers could expand the current study to
other geographical locations to understand whether the same themes would
emerge or alternative marketing strategies might appear. In addition,
researchers may wish to conduct the same study using the same
methodology and design over the same population in the future to
comprehend how marketing strategies may evolve over time. In this
research, I briefly discussed the role of Internet-based technologies in
developing marketing strategies in the oil and gas industry. However, all
participants argued oil industry is lagging behind in adoption of Internet-
based technologies the same way other industries’ leaders do. Future studies
focusing on the applications of Internet and social media on marketing
strategies of the oilfield service companies may open new doors to
innovative marketing approaches. Furthermore, researchers may include
other industries in future studies using the methodology and design of this
study to compare and contrast opportunities and challenges senior marketing
managers of other industries face and how deal with such business related
problems, particularly during the business downturn periods.
Reflections
The entire doctoral journey was a learning process for me. In times, it
was daunting and overwhelming, but my great passion for developing my
knowledge, insights, and understanding over the research topic had provided
encourage and inspiration to continue building the required blocks. Prior to
conducting data collection and analysis, I presumed the process to be easy
and straightforward; however, when I started sending interview invitations,
conducting the interviews, and transcribing the audio recordings, I
understood how tedious and time consuming the steps are. I was amazed by
the level of passion and interest that participants showed in providing details
of the challenges and endeavors they had faced during the oil price
downturn. I managed to reduce my personal bias though reporting
participants’ insights as they provided, conducting member-checking
technique, and using triangulation method. Ponterotto (2014) considered
multiple sources of information as an essential part of the data collection
phase.
Throughout this research, I recognized similarities and differences
among participants’ views and approaches to the business problems. The
entire doctoral study was revealing, rigorous, and mind opening. Completing
this doctoral study, I gained more respect and admiration for senior
marketing managers because of the determination, energy, and time they put
into promoting strategies that will potentially enhance the profitability of the
firms. Interaction with senior marketing managers of the five international
oilfield service companies in this doctoral research was an inspiration and
honor.
Conclusions
Marketing strategies contribute directly and indirectly to the financial
performance of the corporates. Understanding and identifying the right
strategies that will potentially lead to higher performance, revenues, and
profits is crucial for any business involved in global trades. The purpose of
this qualitative multiple case study was to address the overarching research
question: What strategies do senior marketing managers of ISCOGI use to
enhance sales performance, revenues, and profits during declining oil price
periods? Through face-to-face interviews and reviewing the companies’
annual reports and website contents, five major themes emerged. The
emerging themes not only confirmed the findings of the previous literature
and scholar works but also provided supporting documents related to the
conceptual framework of the study.
Reviewing the outcomes of this doctoral study, senior marketing managers
of the oil and gas industry will find out how the implementation of dynamic
market segmentation and attention to the new market players will increase
the chance of grasping new opportunities during the oil price downturn.
Such strategies require targeting new audiences while maintaining the
existing clients by providing customized services and products specifically
tailored for addressing customers' needs. In addition, the results of the study
showed the importance of maintaining a trustworthy and reliable relationship
with existing customers through visible contribution in clients' problem-
solving processes. Moreover, differentiating the products and services from
competitors will bring significant advantages and give a short-term and long-
term edge over the competition. Differentiation will be in terms of
innovative tools and services, or in the form of solution packages.
Furthermore, the outcomes of the study indicated while pricing is a great
differentiator factor in many markets, it can act as a double-edged sword and
requires marketers to treat pricing with extra caution. Based on the findings
of this study, no one-size-fits-all solution exists to market issues in the oil
and gas industry, and each case should be investigated, invested, and
interpreted uniquely to extract the most
appropriate strategies that suit a specific market.
