The New Paradigm Of Marketing Channel Theory: A Learning Perspective

Marketing channel is a set of interdependent organizations which delivers value to and create value for end users. The need for coordinated development between organizations, for dynamic adaptation in ever changing environment seems to be more pressing today than any time before. Therefore, the organizational learning by channel members themselves, inter-organizational learning of channel members, and network learning of channel members become increasingly important. However, issues concerning the learning of channel organizations and network are still absent from contemporary marketing channel theories.The author therefore made some attempts on reviewing and commenting on the theories and questions arising from the dominant "relationship paradigm" of channel theory, and comes to conclude that the theory has caused marketing channel theories to lag behind the marketing practice in enterprises all over the world as well as the development of related sciences. Moreover, the source of enterprises' competitiveness in an era of information and network cannot be sufficiently explained. In this sense, a brand new theoretical framework, i. e. the "learning paradigm" of marketing channel theory, appears to be imminently necessary.An overall framework of the "learning paradigm" marketing channel theory is established in this dissertation. Based on the division of the organizational learning by marketing channel members themselves, inter-organizational learning of channel members, and network learning of channel members, the dissertation has set up several theoretical frameworks including the learning orientation, learning types, relationship learning, observational learning, adaptive learning, and dynamic adjustment of channel structure, and have carried out empirical studies on learning orientation, relationship learning, and observational learning.Basic conclusions include the following:(1) Learning orientation serves both as a guide of practice and the core component of corporate culture of the channel members. It directly influences the channel performance positively.(2) The learning types of channel members are predominated by factors such as the environmental uncertainty, organizational characteristics, transaction-specific investment and frequency of transactions, etc. Different learning types exert different influences on the performance of marketing channel members.(3) Relationship learning is the core of the vertical learning between channel member organizations, and observational learning as horizontal learning. Relationship learning has a positive impact on the channel performance through relationship quality. Observational learning has a positive impact on observational effect, and it is impacted by observer's learning orientation, model's behavior and the power of the focal firm in the network. Furtherly, learning orientation and power also have direct influences on observational effect.(4) Dynamic learning is promoted through the mechanism of joint problem solving, and cognitive learning centered on knowledge transfer and sharing is enhanced with a platform of knowledge innovation. Moreover, knowledge learning centered on the sharing of values is boosted by the trust mechanism between channel members. All of these are the important characters of channel network's internal learning.(5) With a comprehensive point of view of the social network analysis, this dissertation offers to study on the knowledge transfer and sharing between channel network member organizations, together with the co-evolution between the whole channel network organization and its environment. This model proposes the four main network governance mechanisms---restrict access to exchanges, macroculture, collective sanctions and reputation---enhance the adaptive ability of channel network by channel coordination and network safeguarding. Furthermore, this dissertation develops a new theoretical model regarding to how the network adjust its own structure to meet with environment selection. According to this model, environment uncertainty affects the channel member's imagination ability and then promotes the channel structure adaptation behavior, and the network characteristics also have some moderation effect on this relationship.