Stefan Worm: How Digital Retail Platforms Transform Retail Channel and Key Account Management

With a commanding share of more than 80% of global e-commerce, digital retail platforms have fundamentally transformed retail distribution channels. This research explores the shift from the traditional merchant pipeline model to a platform model. The study employs a multisource qualitative methodology. It triangulates 20 theory-in-use interviews with senior executives, a 4-year ethnographic immersion in the digital retail platform ecosystem, and a systematic analysis of platforms’ documentation for sellers.

The findings reveal three platform-inherent features, seller and category openness, sellers’ autonomy, and platforms’ focus on orchestration of interactions, that fuel three core transformative mechanisms: the expansion of channel ecosystem members, the reallocation of retailing and logistics decisions to sellers, and the substitution of relational governance by algorithmic coordination. That is, we identify a fundamental reversal of distribution logic wherein (a) sellers face an increased number of competitors and other channel members (e.g., service providers), (b) automated AI-enabled interfaces and algorithm-driven decisions replace interpersonal relationships, (c) power is exercised via the digital infrastructure rather than through negotiations between intermediaries and sellers, and (d) sellers take over responsibility for retail marketing and logistics from intermediaries. Three channel-level outcomes result from these mechanisms. First, channel competition increases both in intensity (stronger category level competition) and breadth (i.e., platform self-preferencing, product-level-, and intra-firm competition). Second, sellers need to build platform-specific Key Account Management, retail marketing, and operational capabilities to generate customer demand using the toolbox of algorithm-mediated access to consumers. Third, the altered retail economics of the platform 3 model challenge sellers’ profitability via the systematic monetization of the platform ecosystem and the predominance of per-unit logistics costs.

Our study extends the marketing channels literature by conceptualizing digital retail platforms as a marketing channel, identifying the changes induced by the platform-model, and exploring those changes’ implications for marketing channel theory and practice. We further provide directions for future research into retail platform channels.
 

Dr. Stefan Worm is Associate Professor at the BI Norwegian Business School’s Marketing Department. He holds a doctoral degree in Marketing and a master’s degree with majors in Business Administration and Mechanical Engineering from University of Kaiserslautern, Germany. Prior to joining BI, he was on the faculty of HEC Paris, France. He has previously been a visiting professor at Singapore Management University, University of Georgia, USA, and Indian School of Business, and a visiting scholar at Emory University, USA. Stefan is doctoral fellow at ISBM (Penn’ State University), and affiliated faculty at the Sales and Marketing Strategy Institute (Foster School of Business, University of Washington).

Professor Worm’s research has been published in the International Journal of Research in Marketing, Journal of Retailing, and Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science. He serves as a member of the editorial review board for the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science (FT 50). He is further an ad-hoc reviewer for International Journal of Research in Marketing, Journal of Marketing Research, and Journal of Marketing.

Professor Worm received the ISBM Business Marketing Doctoral Award for his dissertation. He has also received the 2015 SYNTEC prize, awarded by the French Association of Business Educators (FNEGE) for the best academic marketing publication in France for his research on component supplier brands. He has organized events bringing together scholars and managers, and he has co-chaired academic conferences in collaboration with INFORMS MSI, LabEx ECODEC, Journal of Retailing, and Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science.

Professor Worm’s research interest centers on Marketing Strategy and B2B Marketing. First, he looks into customer solutions and servitization. He inquires how traditional suppliers in B2B markets can profitably grow by becoming providers of services and customer solutions. Second, he investigates Marketing Channels and Customer Relationships. This research stream encompasses the transition from traditional to electronic retail and channel structures, platform-based channels, and the role of B2B brands in value-chain relationships. Third, he examines the impact of marketing strategies on firm value, with a focus on corporate social responsibility, corporate governance in marketing, and the role of senior management teams.