Transformative marketing in the new normal: A novel practice-scholarly integrative review of business-to-business marketing mix challenges, opportunities, and solutions

Transformative marketing has been heralded as the future of marketing. While the initial catalyst for trans -formative marketing was the desire of customers for more meaningful engagement, the global impact of great crises (or mega disruptions) has accelerated the evolution of transformative marketing. With a focus on business -to-business (B2B) marketing, this article aims to offer transformative marketing insights to support B2B mar-keters in preparing for, navigating in, and recovering from great crises using the great lockdown that transpired during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic as a case. To do so, this article employs the marketing mix as an organizing framework and performs an integrative review of practice and scholarly articles relating to B2B marketing and COVID-19. In doing so, this article delivers a seminal integrative review that is informed by both practice and scholarly sources in B2B marketing, thereby establishing its methodological novelty and value. More importantly, this article highlights "what" is necessary and "how" B2B marketers can (re)configure the product, price, place, promotion, people, process, and physical evidence elements of their marketing activities to steer their B2B marketing operations toward success in a world where global crises are a commonplace. Therefore, this article contributes in two major ways: the first from a theoretical perspective, by extending the theoretical generalizability of transformative marketing, and the second from a managerial standpoint, by shedding light on practitioner issues and offering practical suggestions for B2B marketers to prepare for, navigate in, and recover from great crises in the new normal.

Preparing for, withstanding, and learning from sales crises: Implications and a future research agenda

The response from many firms to the recent COVID-19 crisis underscores a more fundamental and overarching question: How should salespeople and their firms prepare for and respond to sales crises more generally? In response, a group of sales scholars recently convened at the American Marketing Association's Winter Conference to discuss the challenges and opportunities facing salespeople and their firms before, during, and after a sales crisis. Thus, based on this session and subsequent follow-up discussions, this paper develops a framework detailing how the sales function should prepare for, withstand, and learn from a sales crisis. In so doing, we argue that sales crises can originate internally and externally to an organization and can impact the entire sales organization, the sales manager, and/or individual salespeople. Moreover, viewing a sales crisis simply as a turning point rather than a devastating event, we highlight the implications for salespeople and their managers who must inevitably deal with sales crises and the changes involved. Finally, we conclude with potential future directions for sales scholars interested in exploring the impact of crises on the sales function, as the next sales crisis is likely just around the corner.

Surviving the hectic early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic: a qualitative study to the supply chain strategies of food service firms in times of a crisis

Purpose The COVID-19 pandemic and the subsequent lockdown have hit the food service industry very hard. The COVID-19 outbreak has created a sharp downturn for firms in the food service industry, compelling actors across the whole food service supply chain to rethink their strategies. The purpose of this paper is to document the impact of COVID-19 on the food service supply chain, as well as to identify crisis management strategies food service firms use during the hectic early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic to survive the current and prepare for future pandemics. Design/methodology/approach We performed a qualitative descriptive study using 21 semi-structured interviews with actors across the food service supply chain (i.e. farmers, wholesalers and food service providers). Data were collected to shed light on food service firms' decision making during the hectic early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic to uncover various crisis management strategies used. Findings By integrating the disaster and crisis pyramid and resilience theory, four core crisis management strategies to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic are conceptualized, i.e. (1) managing resources, (2) diversifying strategically, (3) prioritizing long-term outcomes and (4) bonding socially. Originality/value The theoretical contributions include documenting the performance impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the food service supply chain and exploring crisis management strategies food service firms employed during the hectic early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, functioning and survival during a pandemic, an emerging field in literature, are central to this study. Additionally, while recent research suggests that integrating crisis management and resilience literature may provide a more complete understanding of the organization-crisis relationship, these literature streams mainly developed in isolation. By integrating the literature streams of crisis management and resilience and applying these theories to the COVID-19 crisis, our study provides specific managerial guidelines.