Drivers and consequences of business-reference-content (BRC): The role of narrative transportation in B2B communication

Jung, Chang Mo Article Drivers and consequences of business-referencecontent (BRC): The role of narrative transportation in B2B communication Journal of Business Economics and Management (JBEM) Provided in Cooperation with: Vilnius Gediminas Technical University (VILNIUS TECH) Suggested Citation: Jung, Chang Mo (2021) : Drivers and consequences of business-reference-content (BRC): The role of narrative transportation in B2B communication, Journal of Business Economics and Management (JBEM), ISSN 2029-4433, Vilnius Gediminas Technical University, Vilnius, Vol. 22, Iss. 5, pp. 1323-1341, https://doi.org/10.3846/jbem.2021.15527 This Version is available at: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/317525 Standard-Nutzungsbedingungen: Die Dokumente auf EconStor dürfen zu eigenen wissenschaftlichen Zwecken und zum Privatgebrauch gespeichert und kopiert werden. 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Published by Vilnius Gediminas Technical University *Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected] This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons. org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Journal of Business Economics and Management ISSN 1611-1699 / eISSN 2029-4433 2021 Volume 22 Issue 5: 1323–1341 https://doi.org/10.3846/jbem.2021.15527 DRIVERS AND CONSEQUENCES OF BUSINESS-REFERENCE-CONTENT (BRC): THE ROLE OF NARRATIVE TRANSPORTATION IN B2B COMMUNICATION Chang Mo JUNG * School of Business Administration, Yonsei University, Seoul, Korea Received 10 October 2020; accepted 21 June 2021 Abstract. COVID-19 is bringing changes in B2B sales and marketing strategies. Digital interaction with potential customers has become more critical. Business-reference content (BRC) is the most shared content, mainly using narrative format, available to potential customers through digital touchpoints. Reducing perceived purchasing risk has been recognized as the primary benefit of using BRC, but empirical research on this has been insufficient. Therefore, this research investigated the underlying mechanisms of BRC and related processes that lower risk perception based on narrative transportation theory. For empirical analysis, a serial-parallel mediating model was established in which BRC type (narrative versus non-narrative) influences purchase intention through the mediation of narrative transportation and perceived purchase risks – functional risk and financial risk. In this experimental study, an online survey was conducted in which 233 purchasing managers in Korean companies participated. The analysis confirmed that the BRC type had a significant effect on the level of receivers’ narrative transportation. In addition, serial-parallel mediating effects through narrative transportation (primary mediator) and perceived functional risk and perceived financial risk (secondary mediators) were all significant. This research provides meaningful implications in that it broadens the theoretical understanding of BRC by presenting the integrated BRC effect model. Also, it clarifies the importance of narrative BRC in B2B marketing practices. Keywords: B2B content marketing, business-reference content, B2B digital-marketing, narrative content, narrative transportation, B2B purchase risk. JEL Classification: M41, C83, L20. Introduction Fast innovation in information and communication technology (ICT) has created new ways for individuals and businesses to search for, acquire, and use information (Lamberton & Stephen, 2016). Above all, in a situation where face-to-face interactions are limited due to COVID-19, digital interaction has become 2–3 times more critical for B2B suppliers (Harrison etal., 2020). These dramatic changes are drawing attention to the importance of mar- 1324 C. M. Jung. Drivers and consequences of business-reference-content (BRC): the role of narrative... keting activities that narratively transport potential customers (Van Laer etal., 2019). The increase in using narrative contents is also found in B2B marketing. Business-reference content (BRC) is the most shared content, mainly using narrative format, available to potential customers through digital touchpoints (Bonnin & Alfonso, 2019). BRC can be defined as using existing customers as referrals to attract new customers or build a reputation (Morgado, 2020). The main difference between BRC and general portfolio is that B2B suppliers actively and strategically use existing customers’ referrals in marketing activities (Jaakkola & Aarikka-Stenroos, 2019). BRC types are divided into non-narrative type (e.g., “reference lists”) and narrative type (e.g., “success story”) (Salminen & Möller, 2006). Prior researches also called BRC “customer referencing” or “customer-reference marketing” (Jaakkola & Aarikka-Stenroos, 2019). They are very similar in that it is the marketing content of B2B suppliers that use existing customers as a referrer to influence potential customers’ purchase decision. The primary purpose of B2B suppliers using BRC is to lower the perceived purchase risks of potential customers (Morgado, 2020). B2B buying involves a high level of purchase risks (Brown etal., 2011; Paluch & Wunderlich, 2016). Because the product is complex, the customer’s level of customization is high, and the purchase amount is significant. Moreover, since tangible product characteristics and intangible service characteristics are often integrated, it is difficult to compare B2B products objectively, and the uncertainty is high (Sharma, 2020). Previous scholars suggested that functional risk and financial risk are the core dimension of B2B purchase risk (Paluch & Wunderlich, 2016). Functional risk refers to the risk that the purchased product could not provide the promised benefits, and financial risk refers to the net monetary loss that accompanies product purchase. These two purchase risks are called economic risk (Brown etal., 2007, 2011). BRC can reduce the perceived purchase risks of potential customers (Jaakkola & AarikkaStenroos, 2019). Because BRC provides indirect learning opportunities to potential buyers by delivering successful purchasing experiences of existing customers. According to social cognition theory (SCT), indirect learning changes an individual’s attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors (Bandura, 1986). In particular, narrative content such as a success story promotes social cognition by enhancing the receiver’s mentalizing and empathy (Mumper & Gerrig, 2017). Scholars went beyond SCT and argued that the persuasive effect of narrative is caused by narrative transportation (Green & Brock, 2000). Narrative transportation refers to the state of being “placed into and immersed in the world of a narrative” (Van Laer etal., 2019). Narrative transportation changes attitudes, perceptions, and behaviors by eliciting the receivers’ positive cognitive and emotional responses to the narrative (Green & Fitzgerald, 2017). Green and Brock (2000) suggested that transportation stories mentally affect people, reducing their counterarguing motivation. So, narrative transportation theory can explain the reason why narrative BRC types such as success stories are more commonly used in B2B transactions with high purchasing risks (Ruokolainen & Aarikka-Stenroos, 2016). Earlier, Jalkala, and Salmienen (2010) argued that academic knowledge lags behind B2B industry practices due to the lack of BRC research. Previous researchers remain at the level of establishing the concept and type of marketing communication using BRC or qualitatively clarifying influence on the inside and outside of the organization (Jaakkola & Aarikka- Journal of Business Economics and Management, 2021, 22(5): 1323–1341 1325 Stenroos, 2019; Terho & Jalkara, 2017). Morgado (2020) also pointed out that we are still lack of firm understanding of the effect of BRC on the purchasing behavior of potential customers. A recent empirical study showed the effect of narrative transportation on the executives’ perception of a supplier (Anaza etal., 2020); however, as far as the author knows, there is no empirical research on how BRC and narrative transportation lower B2B purchase risks. Considering that the core benefit of BRC is to lower perceived purchase risk (Jaakkola & Aarikka-Stenroos, 2019), there is a high need for research on this. Therefore, this study presents a theoretical model that explains the effects of BRC’s perceived risk reduction and purchase intention enhancement on the basis of narrative transportation theory and conducts an empirical analysis targeting companies’ purchasing managers. The purpose of this study is to 1) broaden the theoretical understanding of BRC’s persuasive power with narrative transportation theory, and 2) to provide practical insights for B2B marketers to strategically develop BRC. This study consisted of literature review, research methodology, results of analysis, discussion, and conclusion in order. The current paper focused on the effects of narrative transportation generated by BRC on purchase intention through the mediation of perceived purchase risks. 1. Literature review 1.1. Business-reference content (BRC) Business-reference content is defined as “leveraging existing customers and the value delivered to them in the company’s marketing activities” (Jalkala & Salmienen, 2010). Previous studies explained that BRC concretizes and demonstrates complex solutions and provides an indirect experience of previous performance, relationships, technological functionality, and delivered customer values (Jalkala & Salmienen, 2010). Potential consumers can in advance understand and learn the supplier’s competencies, the relationship-maintenance method, and the purchase results (Kumar etal., 2013). Therefore, it effectively lowers perceived purchase risk in that more information on value-in-use can be obtained from BRC. In the same vein, Anderson, Narus, and Van Rossum (2006) explained that the reference customers’ case serves as a value document which provides reliable information on the value of the supplier’s product. As such, business references play an essential role in improving reliability by increasing B2B suppliers’ perceived competence. At the same time, it decreases buyers’ uncertainty and perceived risk (Jaakkola & AarikkaStenroos, 2019). In order to maximize the effectiveness of these BRC, the strategic approach of suppliers is necessary. Because it takes much time for suppliers to select referrers that meet potential customers’ needs, in particular, it is costlier to find the first reference (Jaakkola & Aarikka-Stenroos, 2019). On the other hand, potential customers recognize the risk of biased decision-making due to blindly following others’ opinions with overly positive information. 1326 C. M. Jung. Drivers and consequences of business-reference-content (BRC): the role of narrative... Prior research explained that there are two types of BRC. One is the customer-reference list that focuses on the amount of positive evidence about a supplier, and the other is “value-in-use” stories, such as success stories that emphasize the richness of the evidence (Salminen & Möller, 2006). Jalkala and Salminen (2010) classified the types of business referencing into relationship level and delivery level. Relationship level refers to a marketing tool which involves displaying the name of the customer, whereby relationships with reputable customers have a higher reference value. On the other hand, the delivery level involves delivering value-creation activities through several solutions referring to individual projects or deliveries that could be used as reference solutions, reference projects, or reference deliveries. Morgado (2020) explained that narrative BRC provides evidence of real business benefits to potential customers in that it involves “a description of the problem faced by the customer, the solution generated by the vendor and the customer’s assessment of the outcome or customer value”. Therefore, it can be classified that the relationship level is a non-narrative BRC type and the delivery level is a narrative BRC type. In a similar context, Ruokolainen and Aarikka-Stenroos (2016) classified BRC into quantitative references and qualitative references. Quantitative references are customer-reference lists emphasizing the amount of evidence, and qualitative references are descriptive stories introduced to increase understanding of a B2B company’s offerings and value-generation potential. Taken together, BRC can be divided into two types: narrative BRC (e.g., case studies, success stories, top story, white-label stories) and non-narrative BRC (e.g., customer-reference list). The desired outcome of both BRC types is the same, but narrative BRC exists in a much wider variety of forms (Salminen & Möller, 2006). The reason why BRC is widely used as a persuasive B2B communication tool can be explained with social cognitive theory (SCT) (Bandura, 1986). According to SCT, personal knowledge acquisition is directly influenced by observing others in the context of social interaction, experience, and outside media influence. Thus, individuals observe the behavior of role models they admire, leading them to make inferences and attributions about consequences of behavior (Bandura, 1986). It should be noted that narrative acts as a trigger to change the attitude and behavior of receivers by promoting social cognition (Mumper & Gerrig, 2017). Raymond and Medina (2018) explained that narrative promotes social cognition by increasing the receiver’s mentalizing and empathy. Mar (2018) pointed out that the reason narrative bolsters social cognition is because social processes and social contents are entertained through the narrative framework. Therefore, narrative BRC could be more effective in promoting social cognition that changes the attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors of potential customers. Indeed, the most adopted practices of BRC are success stories and case studies in narrative BRC (Jalkala & Salminen, 2009; Morgado, 2020). Scholars in the field of narrative went beyond the framework of SCT and suggested narrative transportation as a concept that comprehensively explains the cognitive and emotional influences that narrative has on change in attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors (Green & Brock, 2000). 1.2. Narrative transportation theory Researchers proposed narrative transportation theory to explain the underlying mechanism via which narrative content works (Green & Brock, 2000; Van Laer etal., 2019). Narrative transportation refers to “when people lose themselves in a story, and their attitudes and in- Journal of Business Economics and Management, 2021, 22(5): 1323–1341 1327 tentions change to reflect that story” (Van Laer etal., 2014). Researchers have summarized the characteristics of narrative transportation as follows: (1) Narrative transported people may be less likely to disbelieve or counterargue story claims. Thus, narrative influences a receiver’s beliefs (Banerjee & Greene, 2012). (2) Narratives enable receivers to mimic an experience and act as a powerful means to form attitudes as much as a direct experience (Green & Brock, 2000). (3) Transportation creates strong feelings toward story characters. Therefore, receivers identify themselves with a character and are influenced by the character’s experiences and beliefs. In other words, narrative transportation promotes empathy for narrative characters and mental simulation of the story plot, making the audience experience a feeling of entering a world evoked by the narrative. As a result, it triggers a change in the receiver’s real-world affective and cognitive responses, beliefs, attitudes, and intentions (Van Laer etal., 2014). Narrative transportation theory clearly suggests narrative’s persuasion mechanism. Green and Brock (2000) argued that, unlike elaboration likelihood model (ELM; Cacioppo & Petty, 1984) and heuristic-systematic model (HSM: Chaiken, 1980), which emphasize the amount of thought and logical consideration, immersion experience into a story leads to persuasion through narrative transportation. Several studies on narrative transportation’s persuasive effect have proven that transportation affects attitude, perception, and intention through two pathways: the receiver’s cognitive response and emotional response (Banerjee & Greene, 2012; Feng, 2018). In the marketing communication, narrative transportation increases as the content adheres to the narrative format. Deighton, Romer, and McQueen (1989) indicated that a higher degree of dramatization in a commercial induces greater immersion and transportation into the commercial. Kim, Ratneshwar, and Thorson (2017) defined the element of narrative advertising as “who, what, where, why, how, and chronology”, and they demonstrated that narrative advertising enhances a viewer’s narrative transportation compared to non-narrative advertising. Ruokolainen and Aarikka-Stenroos (2016) showed in a qualitative study on B2B communication that qualitative reference information elements with narrative structure enhance the persuasive power of arguments. Therefore, the authors predicted that there is a difference in the level of a receiver’s narrative transportation depending on the BRC type (narrative versus non-narrative). H1: BRC type has a significant influence on the receiver’s narrative transportation. 1.3. B2B purchase risk According to previous studies on BRC, the most critical reason for B2B supplier firms to use BRC is to lower the perceived purchase risk of potential customers (Jaakkola & AarikkaStenroos, 2019; Kumar etal., 2013). B2B marketing scholars commonly pointed out that functional risk and financial risk are the essential factors in B2B purchase risk (Brown etal., 2007; Paluch & Wunderlich, 2016). This is because B2B purchase risk is determined by the magnitude of the impact of purchase decisions on organizational productivity and profitability. 1328 C. M. Jung. Drivers and consequences of business-reference-content (BRC): the role of narrative... Functional risk is a concern that the performance of a product does not meet the customer’s expectations. It refers to the risk that a product will not provide the promised benefits, and it is caused by predicting a product’s future quality at the time of purchase (Ha, 2002). B2B purchasing has high uncertainty because B2B products are technically advanced and represent a bundle of tangible and intangible attributes Sharma etal. (2020). Moreover, B2B products are important for the production process, and the perceived functional risk is evaluated as high in that purchase results can be objectively measured (Brown etal., 2007). Financial risk relates to the potential loss of money due to the introduction of products (Lippel & Quinlan, 2011). Financial risk is defined as the net monetary loss and unexpected cost that can occur for the customer, including situations such as product repair, replacement, and refund (Horton, 1976). In addition, the possibility of repeatability of financial losses due to fraud is included in financial risk (Featherman & Pavlou, 2003). In the B2B context, this means overall loss, i.e., not just loss associated with the product price, but also the occurrence of ongoing maintenance costs incurred after product purchase (e.g., follow-up cost). Therefore, B2B customers make purchasing decisions considering current and future financial burdens. Some researchers suggested that social risk should be considered a B2B purchase risk (Paluch & Wunderlich, 2016). However, since B2B purchasing is a group decision-making process, the social risk to individuals may not be significant. If a person is not in charge of purchasing decisions, the impact of social risk could be smaller. Anaza etal. (2020) revealed that the effect of narrative transportation of B2B advertising on “tendency to advocate for the suppliers” is more significant in non-C-level executives than in C-level executives. This means that the social risk of B2B purchase depends on individual differences such as organizational position, role, and responsibility. Considering the above, this study focused on perceived functional risk and perceived financial risk, which are economic risks at the organizational level. 1.4. Narrative transportation and B2B purchase risk According to the perceived risk theory, risk is expressed as the product of “probability of consequences of occurring” and “negative consequence of poor brand choice” (Peter & Ryan, 1976). In cases where the product is complex, expensive, and infrequently purchased, the uncertainty perceived by the buyer is high (Mitchell, 1992). Thus, B2B purchase carries a high level of perceived risk. As mentioned earlier, well-organized BRC promotes vivid indirect learning through mental simulation. In addition, as a positive emotional connection and identification with referrers are formed, purchase results are expected to be more positive. As a result, the uncertainty about the purchase result is lowered and then the perceived purchase risk is decreased (Fitzgerald & Green, 2017). Previous studies demonstrated that highly transported viewers make less critical assessments and reduce counterarguments toward the advertisement and products (Seo etal., 2018). Taken together, narrative transportation could lower the perceived purchase risks. H2. Narrative transportation will lower perceived functional risk. H3. Narrative transportation will lower perceived financial risk. Journal of Business Economics and Management, 2021, 22(5): 1323–1341 1329 Scholars explained that narrative transportation changes behavioral intention through changes in a receiver’s attitudes and beliefs (Kang etal., 2020). Consumer behavior scholars revealed that narrative transportation influences product evaluation or behavioral intention through changes in a buyer’s attitudes or beliefs (Kim etal., 2017). In a study on the effect of story-based microfilm marketing, Su, Lu, and Lin (2018) found that narrative transportation using a story plot influences purchase intention through a receiver’s affective responses. Escalas, Moore, and Britton (2004) showed that narrative transportation increases positive advertising attitude and brand evaluation by lowering critical thought. In a similar context, Krakow etal. (2018) compared the effects of narrative versus non-narrative advertising and confirmed that narrative advertising lowers negative emotions and counterarguing and raises awareness of completeness, thereby increase purchase intention. By synthesizing the results of previous studies, a multi-mediated path hypothesis was established stating that the BRC type (narrative versus non-narrative) would increase purchase intention through the serialmediation of narrative transportation and potential customers’ risk perception (Figure1). H4. BRC type influences purchase intention through serial-mediation of narrative transportation and perceived functional risk. H5. BRC type influences purchase intention through serial-mediation of narrative transportation and perceived financial risk. Figure 1. Research model 2. Research methodology and measurement 2.1. Population and sampling In this study, an online experiment and survey were used to verify the effect of BRC on narrative transportation, perceived risk dimensions, and purchase intention. The author conducted a study with Korean employees in occupations related to B2B purchasing. The online survey was conducted by Company M, a survey company that has the largest online marketing panel in Korea. After the survey respondents belonging to the panel completed their own survey, they recommended personnel in the same department and the new respondents joined the online survey by using the URL provided by online survey company (Leiner, 2016). Respondents were given a voucher of 5 USD. Filtering questions were presented to confirm that the respondents are valid samples for the research: 1) “Are you currently in charge of B2B purchasing-related tasks?”, “How long have you been in the B2B purchasing task?”. If a respondent was not related to the B2B purchasing or understanding of the task was low because he or she does the purchasing task less than one year, they were 1330 C. M. Jung. Drivers and consequences of business-reference-content (BRC): the role of narrative... excluded from the sample. A total of 291 respondents participated in the survey, of which 240 met the requirements. Among the collected responses, 233 samples, excluding incomplete responses, were used for analysis (narrative BRC group = 121, non-narrative BRC group = 112). The sectors that respondents belong to were ICT 31.2%, manufacturing 27.2%, distribution 14.9%, construction 11.1%, and other 15.6%, showing a relatively even distribution by industry. The average length of time respondents was engaged in B2B purchasing was 7.3 years. Securing a valid sample is essential in B2B empirical research. This study’s sample is judged to be composed of respondents with appropriate experience in B2B purchasing. 2.2. Stimuli development As a product for the experiment, the author prepared “Y-Cloud”, a B2B supplier, “Fast-It”, a mobile enterprise solution, and “RainFin”, a referrer. Stimuli in the study adopted a virtual firm and product to eliminate the effects of existing brand power and the reputation of a particular firm or product. The stimuli for the experiment consisted of a story about the successful introduction of mobile enterprise solution Fast-It by Y-Cloud. The author also considered that a mobile enterprise solution is an augmented product with high technology and intangible service factors. So, perceived purchase risks were expected to be relatively high. In this study, two BRC types (narrative versus non-narrative) were provided to respondents as stimuli. The author developed narrative BRC with elements of narrative which previous researches commonly emphasized (Gilliam & Flaherty, 2015). In addition, the author produced a non-narrative BRC stimulus in a format that lists factual information and arguments according to the definition of argumentative advertising (Lien & Chen, 2013) (see Appendix). BRC presented as stimuli was developed to have the same word and wordoccurrence frequency, so that there was no compounding effect due to other factors besides BRC type. The BRC stimuli was randomly assigned to the respondents. 2.3. Measurement All constructs were measured using multi-item and formative scales. The authors adopted measurement items that had proven reliability and validity in relevant prior studies. 5-point Likert scale was used to measure the items (1 – strongly disagree and 5 – strongly agree). The BRC type used as an independent variable was treated as a dummy variable. The stimuli provided in the experiment, narrative BRC as 1, and non-narrative BRC as 0, were coded and analyzed. The level of narrative transportation that occurred due to viewers’ exposure to the BRC was measured in three items (Green & Sestir, 2017). The items were “while I was reading the BRC, I could easily picture the events in it taking place”, “the events in the BRC are relevant to my everyday life”, “I was mentally involved in the BRC while reading it”. Perceived purchase risks were measured in the same way. “Perceived functional risk” introduced measurement items used in the study of Grewal, Gotlieb, and Marmorstein (1994): “How confident are you that the product will perform as described?”. “How certain are you that the product will work satisfactorily?”, and “Do you feel that the product will perform the functions that were described in the BRC”. Three items measured “perceived financial risk”: “considering Journal of Business Economics and Management, 2021, 22(5): 1323–1341 1337 confirm that there is a difference in the effect of narrative BRC on the position of the B2B supplier firms on the industrial value chain. Analyzing the difference in the BRC effect according to buyers’ purchase situation and buyer-referrer congruency is a good research topic. In this study, the author included firm size and industry of respondents as control variables, but results were not significant. However, a multigroup comparison according to distinctive factors would be a meaningful study. Lastly, it is imperative to identify the effect differentiation and mechanism when BRC is presented as rich media (e.g., video testimonial). In particular, at a time when the center of B2B marketing is moving to digital due to COVID-19, the importance of research analyzing BRC effects by using various new digital technologies is further increased. 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