Once again I gained so much – Understanding the value of b-to-b sales interactions

: Jokiniemi Sini, Halinen Aino

: Elif Karaosmanoğlu and A. Banu Elmadağ Baş

: 2013

: 42nd EMAC Conference Proceedings

Interpersonal interactions e.g. sales meetings can be regarded as platforms for the
emergence of value. In order to understand this interaction-related value, it needs to be
studied from the viewpoint of individuals. Surprisingly, the subjective perspective on
value has remained theoretically under-developed and empirically neglected area within
industrial marketing research. We address the intriguing question of how sales
interactions as such can be sources of value for both the salesperson and customer
representative. In the spirit of symbolic interactionism and constructivist grounded
theory, we present the results of an inductive and data-driven research and offer five
value properties which extend our understanding of subjectively indicated value related to sales interactions.