Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to create a model that compares the effects of product content differentiation and service content differentiation on small- and medium-sized enterprises’ (SMEs) perceived importance of customer reference marketing in foreign markets.

Design/methodology/approach

A theoretical model is developed and tested through multiple regression and mediation analysis, on an effective sample of 188 Swedish SMEs.

Findings

The results show that foreign market business assignments characterized by differentiated services make companies relatively more dependent on relationship learning and customer reference marketing. By contrast, situations of differentiated product content correlate negatively with customer reference marketing.

Practical implications

Reference customers can function as vehicles for international expansion when marketing offerings are complex. The findings imply that in service settings, SMEs need to maintain learning regimes with foreign market customers to effectively use them as references to win new business.

Originality/value

The study applies a service perspective to explain the contingencies of customer reference marketing, particularly in international business settings. The study contributes to international small business literature and research focusing on service–firm internationalization by explaining the marketing mechanisms at play in the internationalization of SMEs. In so doing, the findings can enrich relationship and network perspectives of internationalization and add a missing link to studies on networking and internationalization.

中文翻译：

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中小企业国际化中的客户参考营销：服务视角

目的

本文的目的是创建一个模型，比较产品内容差异化和服务内容差异化对中小型企业 (SME) 感知国外市场客户参考营销重要性的影响。

设计/方法/方法

通过多元回归和中介分析，对 188 家瑞典中小企业的有效样本开发和测试了一个理论模型。

发现

结果表明，以差异化服务为特征的国外市场业务分配使得企业相对更加依赖关系学习和客户参考营销。相比之下，差异化产品内容的情况与客户参考营销负相关。

实际影响

当营销产品复杂时，参考客户可以作为国际扩张的工具。研究结果表明，在服务环境中，中小企业需要与外国市场客户保持学习机制，以有效地将其用作赢得新业务的参考。

原创性/价值

该研究应用服务视角来解释客户参考营销的偶然性，特别是在国际商业环境中。该研究通过解释在中小企业国际化中发挥作用的营销机制，为国际小企业文献和专注于服务公司国际化的研究做出了贡献。通过这样做，这些发现可以丰富国际化的关系和网络视角，并为网络和国际化研究增加一个缺失的环节。