Effects of B2B Customers’ Perceived Benefits on Willingness to Disclose Information in an Online Exchange: An Abstract

Abstract

The active role played by B2B customers in searching for and consuming online information has forced firms to embrace pull strategies, such as inbound marketing (Bleoju et al. 2016) and content marketing (Järvinen et al. 2012). The goal of those strategies is to create firm-generated content (Kumar et al. 2016) that attracts the attention of B2B customers who are already looking for information in online environments (Chaffey and Smith 2012). Once they show interest in the content, the firm proposes an exchange for information about the customer. Through this exchange, the firm can develop a perceived expertise or authority within an industry or topic (Rieh 2002), which increases customer’s willingness to disclose information (WTDI) (Järvinen and Taiminen 2016). Hence, the firm uses this data for the leads qualification process (D’Haen et al. 2013).

Previous research has analyzed content marketing from the B2B customer behavior through the eyes of B2B marketers (Holliman and Rowley 2014). However, those studies have not been validated with B2B customers. Unlike the B2C sector, there is a lack of research about the underlying mechanisms functioning in the relationship between content marketing and B2B customer online behavior.

Based on this context, the current research seeks to explain what factors B2B customers take into account when making an assessment of online firm-generated content when they are required to provide information in return for the firm content. Also, this study explores the effects of those evaluations on B2B customers’ perceived authority and WTDI in an online setting. To achieve this goal, three studies are conducted to reach the goals proposed. The first study tests drivers (information quality) and inhibitors (privacy risks) that simultaneously impact the customer’s perception of cognitive authority and influence customer’s WTDI. The second and third studies analyze three different boundary conditions, such as perception of content authenticity, perceived relevance of information exchange, and privacy assurance.

The novelty of this study lies in the use of judgment of information (Rieh 2002) and information privacy (Li et al. 2010) as antecedents of B2B customer perceptions and WTDI. Although the notion of exchange information and privacy calculus is common in the digital marketing and e-commerce contexts (Kim and Srivastava 2007), those have not been applied to a B2B context. From the managerial perspective, this study could provide support for B2B marketing decision-makers on how to present firm-generated content in order to obtain a better assessment by B2B customers.