Understanding Competitive Action Repertoire, Strategic Group and Performance of E-marketplace Sellers: A Latent Growth Modeling Approach

A fundamental question in e-commerce field is how to explain and predict sales performance of e-marketplace sellers. We draw on competitive repertoire perspective and strategic group theory to understand the interaction between competitive repertoire and strategic group membership in influencing sales performance over time. To empirically test these relationships, we will collect a longitudinal dataset consisting of seller-month observations on Taobao. We plan to analyze the data using Latent Growth Modeling and Latent Class Modeling. This study contributes to research in three ways. First, it develops and tests the dynamic relationship between competitive repertoire and performance by focusing on the “dynamic” process rather than “static” characteristics. Second, it extends strategic group theory, which has historically been applied to traditional industrial environment, to the e-marketplace. Third, it responds to Chen and Miller’s (2012) call for study on bridging macro strategy perspective and micro action perspective in strategic management field.