Markor: A Measure of Market Orientation

TLDR

In recent years, academic and practitioner interest has focused on market orientation and its enablers, yet little attention has been given to developing a valid measure of the construct. The study defines market orientation as the organization‑wide generation of market intelligence about current and future customer needs, its horizontal and vertical dissemination, and organization‑wide action or responsiveness to that intelligence. The authors developed the MARKOR scale through several rounds of pretesting, a single‑informant assessment, and a multi‑informant replication and extension involving marketing and nonmarketing executives. The 20‑item MARKOR scale is best represented by a factor structure comprising a general market orientation factor, separate factors for intelligence generation, dissemination and responsiveness, and distinct marketing and nonmarketing informant factors, with validation tests moderately supporting the construct.

Abstract

In recent years, academic and practitioner interest has focused on market orientation and factors that engender this orientation in organizations. However, much less attention has been devoted to developing a valid measure of market orientation. Here we define market orientation as the organizationwide generation of market intelligence pertaining to current and future needs of customers, dissemination of intelligence horizontally and vertically within the organization, and organization-wide action or responsiveness to market intelligence. The authors describe a procedure to develop a measure of the construct. Key features of the research methodology include several rounds of pretesting, a single-informant assessment, and a multi-informant (both marketing and nonmarketing executives) replication and extension. The multi-informant results indicate that the proposed 20-item market orientation scale (MARKOR) may be best represented by a factor structure that consists of one general market orientation factor, one factor for intelligence generation, one factor for dissemination and responsiveness, one marketing informant factor, and one nonmarketing informant factor. Taking into account the informant factors, the subsequent validation tests are moderately supportive of the market orientation construct. The authors discuss methodological, substantive, and application directions for future research in light of these findings.