ABSTRACT
This chapter takes stock of the current situation of doctoral programs in marketing, focusing especially on the nature of doctoral education in business-to-business marketing. Marketing is the study of exchange relationships. PhD programs in marketing are primarily designed to train academics to create knowledge about exchange relationships through research and to disseminate that knowledge to practitioners through teaching. However, a few respondents indicated that while the same prerequisites were applied to all, business-to-business marketing had a special nature: Motivation is most important and a “feel” for technicality. The student can pursue this specialty in research projects tied to the required marketing seminars as well as through a research assistantship. Corporate access and funding are available for dissertation research and students have the opportunity to teach electives, like Business Marketing, if they wish. The ideal business marketing researcher would be sophisticated methodologically, have a multidisciplinary background, and draw on extensive industry experience.
