Authors: Christine Falkenreck; Maximilian Froch; Ralf Wagner
Recent research challenges in business-to-business (B2B) marketing confirms the value of business relationships. This paper investigates the influence of dark side characteristics on buyer-manufacturer relationships, complementing previous research on customer dissatisfaction. Prior relationship-related research tends to focus on bright side characteristics. However, the influence of dark side characteristics such as power imbalance or dependence is under-represented in marketing research. Based on an empirical study of 190 European cases, this paper investigates and empirically confirms that dark side characteristics have a strong impact in B2B and business-to-government (B2G) relationships dealing with customized capital goods. A weaker impact of these characteristics is confirmed in B2B relationships dealing with standardized products. The authors empirically demonstrate that dependence and power imbalance influence the majority of B2B and B2G relationships and identify these features as significant drivers of customer dissatisfaction in both B2B and B2G customized capital goods contexts. We confirm their volatile nature during the duration of these relationships.
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