International Dynamic Marketing Capabilities of Emerging-Market Small Business on E-commerce

: For better export marketing strategies (EMS), companies mobilize their internal resources, which are managerial commitment, firm experience, and product uniqueness. However, Small businesses with constrained resources cannot be well explained with this view. So, more research on how small business come up with EMS have been called for. To explain how resource-restricted firms which rely heavely on entrepreneur, this study adopted the concept of dynamic managerial capabilities (DMCs) and resource versatility to better explain small business exports. We analyzed small businesses in Mongolia with qualitative research methods, including interviews with entrepreneurs and support organizations, site visits, and group discussions. We suggest international dynamic marketing capabilities (IDMCs), which are entrepreneurial orientation, networking capability, and versatile dynamic capability for small business. Theoretical and managerial implications are discussed.


Need of Dynamism in Marketing Capabilities
Small business takes measures to mitigate the constraints upon them [14,36,73].
However, internal-resource-based view has been criticized as being static [82,95]. Not fixed resources, but dynamic capabilities have positive impatcs on in CBEC [35,42,89] and firm performance [93,95]. Although firms' capabilities are derived from internal resources, they are not just sum of internal resources [3,7,44,95]. Capabilities are bundles of skills and knowledge that firms make use of their resources [29].
There are key dynamic maketing capabilities that small business make use of. These are distinguished from internal resources of large firms. First, most small firms are managed by a single owner [53,91]. Small business relies heavily on the entrepreneur's capabilities compared to large firms [64,95]. To assess this characteristic, we adopted research on dynamic managerial capabilities (DMCs), which explains variations in entrepreneurs' capabilities [5,45]. DMC provides a useful theoretical lens to assess this. Second, small firms also incorporate external partners' capabilities to extend their resource bases, not just mobilize capabilities from existing resources [34,93,94]. DMC also entails collaboration with external partners [5,45]. Because DMCs well explains this dynamism, it has gained popularity in recent years [9]. Thirdly, small firms are more cross-functional than large firms. It modifies the certain capabilities and use them in many ways. Certain capabilities are applied in multiple roles. This makes the existing resources more versatile [78], so we adopted research on resource versatility [78]. More detailed explanations on how we incorporated extant research is following.

Entrepreneurs' Dynamic Capability
Managerial capability is how managers build, integrate, and reconfigure their organizational resources [2]. It includes managerial cognition; their personal beliefs and mental models for decision-making [2,49]. This affects how the firm sense market changes and thusm affects subsequent behavior. For example, firms with inert managerial cognition fail to recognize the market changes and fail to achive high performace [49], while entrepreneurs' capabilities to be proactive in seeking new markets impacts their adoption of Preprints (www.preprints.org) | NOT PEER-REVIEWED | Posted: 4 January 2022 doi:10.20944/preprints202110.0068.v2 EMS resulting better export performance [70]. Entrepreneurial orientation refers to the ability to be proactive in seeking new markets [66,101]. Strong entrepreneurial orientation leads to the development of EMS [35,56].
Hence, we propose the following: Proposition 1. Entrepreneurial orientation is a prerequisite for small companies to develop EMS.

Networking Capability
Network is interconnected firms and managers involved in economic activities that convert resources into outputs [22,88]. It also includes external agents, such as technological alliance partners [36,50,59] and even informal relationships [52]. Firms leverage networks to obtain competitive advantages and achieve business goals [4]. Network enables firms to renew resources and develop marketing capabilities and marketing strategies [35,61,67]. In exporting, network is also important. For example, external partners perform even core activities, including export marketing [35]. and local partners identify new market opportunities [81].
Small business use network capabilities continually to reinforce their own capabilities [87]. Especially in the early stage of internationalization, they leverage external partners' capabilities [23,36,38] and sense market opportunities [1]. Entrepreneur's network capability makes up for the firm's lack of resources [10] and determines the firm's network [79]. Entrepreneur's network helps a firm to obtain and reconfigure resources [49,97]. In this way, entrepreneur's formal and informal networks and networking activities function as marketing [49,59,61] and lead to better marketing strategies [35].
Hence, we claim the following: Proposition 2. The networking capability of entrepreneurs has a positive impact on EMS.

Versatile Dynamic Capability
Constrained by the scarcity of resources, small businesses need to use existing resources effectively. Often, they modify certain capabilities and use them in multiple roles [12]. For example, capabilities in marketing and product development overlap [73]. Resource versatility conceptualizes how certain resources support multiple roles in resourceconstrained firms [78].
Hence, we claim the following: Proposition 3. Versatile dynamic capabilities have a positive impact on EMS.
To summarize, Figure 2 explains the international dynamic marketing capabilities (IDMCs) of emerging-market small firms. Based on recent findings in managerial dynamic capability theory and resource versatility, these are are different from the internal resources of large firms. For small business, entrepreneurial orientation, networking capability, and versatile dynamic capability are more relevant than restrained internal resources. More specifically, entrepreneurs' dynamic capabilities and the effective use of existing capabilities lead to better EMS and export performance.

Research Design
The aim of this study is to explore how small businesses in emerging economy adopts EMS in CBEC. We adopted qualitative study methods to derive findings from under-studied phenomena [33], and to understand processes that could not be disassociated from their context [11,13,30,57]. This is to compare new empirical findings with those of prior studies [77].

Data Collection
For case analysis, we selected small business in Mongolia for several reasons. First, Mongolia is an emerging economy with growing e-commerce. Its domestic e-commerce industry shows unprecedented growth; its revenue increased more than 60% during 2020 [39]. It also has relatively good infrastructure for e-commerce in the capital city, Ulaanbaatar. Of the country's total population of 3 million, 2.6 million have internet access, 2 million use smartphones, and 1.3 million use social networking services (SNSs) on a regular basis [39]. All these show its potential for CBEC. Also, CBEC is necessary for Mongolia to overcome the challenging geography of the country. Mongolian entrepreneurs and to support their e-commerce, including CBEC.
We collected data from multiple sources for triangulation [33]. With the support from The Asia Foundation, we could implement internal documents reviews, interviews, site visits, and focus-group discussions with many relevant parties. We visited Ulaanbaatar and interviewed entrepreneurs. To select representative small businesses, the following criteria were applied: the business (a) had to be located in the WBC service area; (b) had to have fewer than 15 employees; (c) had to have experience in generating revenue in to be selected by a support organization as having potential for exporting.
To enhance feasibility and practicability of the resaerch, we also interviewed with external partners of small business in Ulaanbaatar, including The Asia Foundation Mongolia office, IT service firms, and banks. To ensure the resaerch findings, we also interviewed people who have experience in exporting Mongolian goods to Korea. We selected five interviewees from small businesses and seven from external partners. Table 1 shows the details of the interviews.

Data Analysis
For data analysis, we described the interview results and identified how the interviewees' experience and opinions relate to the research framework. Two researchers repeatedly reviewed the interview results and reach the consensus [98]. This analysis was similar to the Strauss and Corbin's notion of open coding [40]. Then the results were grouped into first-order categories. We shifted back and forth between the findings and the broad scope of literatures to identify the findings that theoretically supported the consensus (second-order constructs). For example, interview results were first labeled as "lack of firm experience." Thereafter, relevant theoretical constructs and responses, which can replace internal resources, were classified in suitable categories according to theories. For example, entrepreneurs' ten to rely on his/her own networks for export, and external partners also agree that small business can get better export result with network capaibility. After all, that was integrated into theoretical construct, networking capability. The consensus and findings were reported back to support organizations to ensure their practicality and validity. The level of disagreement was generally low. Through these processes, we tried to match the data with existing theories [40]. Figure 3 explains the data structure and research findings.

From "Managerial Commitment" to "Entrepreneurial Orientation"
Entrepreneurial orientation can be facilitated for EMS [35], so this might lead Mongolian entrepreneurs to adopt EMS for better export performance. According to the interviews, most of the entrepreneurs were not commited enough to CBEC. Although they had experience in domestic e-commerce, cross-border presents unprecented challenges since it entails export procedures, including customs and cross-border deliveries that they are not accustomed to. However, they want to enter foreign markets to expand their business.
All in all, despite low level of commitment, small business entrepreneurs had entrepre- One of the main challenges small businesses facing is adoption of a digital platform for CBEC. Large companies develop their own digital platforms [19,28]. However, it takes a lot of resources for small firms to set up their own digital platforms. Instead of making investments to set up own website, small firms can utilize existing third-party platforms [99]. Third-party digital platforms provide easy access to international markets [24], and help small businesses take advantage of existing industrial chains, trade processes, payment methods, logistics, and warehousing [104]. They also help reduce risks and transaction costs with existing trust to the platform [90]. Small firms can rely on third-party digital platforms [6] such as Amazon and Alibaba, which provide small exporters with technological tools to analyze customers [100], payments, and even logistics services [74].
To validate these findings in the Mongolia context, we analyzed concrete options for Mongolian entrepreneurs to export their products to the Korean market.  Another case for small firms to use network capability is exporter service. Exporter services include deliveries, customs, and administrative procedures. While export is challenging procedures for small business, it can be outsourced to specialzed and experience agencies [90]. Outsourcing improves the service, reduces costs, and enables entrepreneurs to focus on their core business [63]. Currently interviewed entrepreneurs deal with export procedures individually. However, after interviews and discussions we suggested that small business could make a collective to use exporter services, such as making contract with multiple small firms with distributors. The possibility of this suggestion was confirmed by experienced exporter. For example, the Korean government agency provides collective delivery services for Korean SME products: In this way, support organizations can foster partnerships between exporters and multiple small firms. In fact, this strategy is already implemented in advanced countries.
In Korea, a government agency now provides collective delivery services for Korean small and mid-size enterprise (SME) products.

Versatile Dynamic Capability
For small businesses, satisfying the unique needs of customers in foreign markets is challenging. Withought differentiated products with competitiveness, it is hard to persuade foreign consumers to buy the product. Mongolian products are also challenged by this. Entrepreneur who has experience in exporting Mongolian products to Korea for many years shared his view that in several categories, there are posibilities of competitive edge. It seems that only few product categories have product uniqueness, and many others face challenges regarding product uniqueness: For small business, this challenge is much more critical obstacle for them to export to foreign markets. However, according to the resource versatility, product uniqueness can be supplemented with marketing capabilities. Innovative marketing enables small firms to differentiate their products [79]. For example, branding, which entails names, signs, symbols, or designs, differentiates the products in export markets [63].
Therefore, we suggest that smalll business can gather and collectively form branding In addition to this, digital marketing, especially social media, enables word-of-mouth communication and increases sales [21]. With small budgets, innovative communication can be employed [71,83,91]. Small firms use less-resource-intensive open-source solutions [60,71,92]., such as SNS [28] and search engine advertisements [42]. Digital marketing clearly leads to better export performance [18,46,91], since it helps to build longlasting customer relationships [48].

Discussion
Based on resource-based view, internal determinants of EMS are management commitment, firm experience, and product uniqueness. However, small business lack resources and this perspective is static and does not consider dynamism in small business.
So, this resource-based view does not apply to small firms from emerging economies which are doing critical role in economy of developing countries.
To add dynamism in understanding how small firms adopts EMC, we adopted find-

Conclusions
Theoretically, this study presents a fresh point of view on how small business adopts export marketing strategies. It needs a procedural approach with dynamism rather than a static approach based on resourced-based view. Scholars have specifically called for research applying the effectuation theory to further our understanding about the topic [53] and the dynamic marketing capabilities concept [73]. Whereas previous research often The results of this research are also valuable in practical terms for developing countries. While support organizations seek effective ways to enhance exports, they should not approach small businesses with static, resource-based views. Current policy prescriptions often focus on the creation of property-based resources in the form of patents and technical skills [102]. However, they need to facilitate small businesses by connecting them with cross-border partners' capabilities [41]. Small firms can learn through their interactions with foreign customers, and they can work well with e-commerce platforms, thirdparty logistics services, and local marketing agencies.
There are several limitations to this study. First, our examination was conducted in the unique economic context of Mongolia and Korea. Also, data was collected only from the capital city of Mongolia, which may not represent the whole country's population.
Secondly, we relied on interviews with a relatively small number of informants. Even though we tried to enhance the interview data with support organizations that have rich experience with small businesses, we have limited number of business cases. Third, as a related aspect, the concept of external partnerships raises concerns regarding control and power issues between the focal firm and its partners [81]. Finally, we focused on the capability perspective, which does not address many other aspects, such as organizational structure and routines.
Future studies could be extended to more diversified group of entrepreneurs, such as rural producers, other countries, and other markets, which would provide the possibility for comparison with the role of IDMC in small businessesr operating in other markets.
The collection of additional case studies and survey data would enhance the generalizability of the results. Also, to confirm each determinant, quantitative research is needed.