Business, market, customers
Gabriel Pérez (University ETAC CEDE Roma, Mexico)
Social network analysis has been used to understand how business
relations evolve and how corporate and individual customers behave. The
first aim of this session is to discuss the networked, multilevel and
multilayered relationships of interfirm relationships. In
simplified form, interfirm relationships can be represented as dyadic
interactions between two corporate actors: the supplier firm and the
customer firm, but when reviewing in detail they are embedded in larger
network structures, with other customers, competitors, providers, and
customers of customers, among others. Whether for example trust develops
in a dyadic relationship depends also on surrounding relationships.
Also, ties among corporate actors can be disaggregated to relations
between the company and its employees, between the employees and the
employees of the client, and last between the employees of the client
and the client company. These internal networks help explain corporate
relationships. Additionally, it is helpful to review in more detail the
multilayered and dynamic nature of interfirm relations.
Second, presentations may focus on explaining the behaviors of individual customers
in the context of larger communities. Again, it is assumed that
behaviors of individual customers do not occur in isolation, but that
they are influenced by others. In this sense, SNA is a fruitful tool for
for developing better marketing strategies (such as viral marketing),
for predicting trends, or for identifying new business opportunities.
The study of such relationships allows a clearer vision about sales and personal selling.
http://jornades.uab.cat/eusn/content/call-papers-and-posters