Innovative marketing in SMEs: a theoretical framework

Purpose - Previous research has identified and clarified the nature of innovative marketing in small and medium size enterprises (SMEs), providing a list of key constituent elements. While this list of innovative marketing variables goes some way towards explaining the nature of innovative marketing it does not aid the understanding of the relevance and inter-relationship of these variables. The aim of this paper is to develop a theoretical framework to facilitate further exploration of the core elements of innovative marketing in SMEs. Design/methodology/approach - A case study approach is adopted in order to facilitate the emergence of new theoretical relationships based on the understanding of the complex and dynamic nature of innovative marketing in SMEs. Eight case SMEs are recruited, two of the case SMEs from the service industry, three from manufacturing and three of the SMEs combined elements of both service and manufacturing. Findings - The findings of the study illustrate the component parts of innovative marketing and the inter-relationships between those parts in accordance with their role in innovative marketing and practices in SMEs. In order to categorise SME innovative marketing constructs, the conceptual framework transformation, assimilation, prediction and exceptionality (TAPE) is developed from relevant literature. This helps to encapsulate and explore elements of SME innovative marketing. Based on this study, the TAPE framework can more appropriately be changed to transformation, assimilation and prediction (TAP), to reflect the finding that exceptionality is inconclusive in terms of its relevance to innovative marketing in SMEs. The exclusion of exceptionality from the framework is a surprising insight emanating from the research as it contradicts previous studies. Traditionally, these elements will have been considered to be the core of innovative marketing. The conclusion here is that exceptionality be treated with caution in relation to SMEs. Originality/value - This paper presents a theoretical framework TAPE to re-conceptualise elements of innovative marketing. In light of the role each element plays in SME marketing activities and practices, this paper confirms the value of TAP but not exceptionality.