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This chapter is a response to observations from previous chapters where we have learnt that the context surrounding B2B sales seem to deviate quite a lot from a traditional market view based on neoclassic theory. In the first part of this chapter, we contrast the two different views of markets and with that as our reference point, we discuss some general implications for marketing, sales, and purchasing.

The chapter looks deeper into a “markets-as-networks” perspective and argues that such lenses applied on marketing and sales activities in business markets will have implications on ways to organize marketing and sales. Actors, activities, and resources are embedded into structures (activity, actor, and resource structures), and it is important to have a reasonable sense of what and how these structures look in order to make the best priorities for the short- and long-term success of the business.

The chapter addresses how the market system surrounding the supplier–customer interchange contributes to setting the scene for operating exchange processes. Five general network themes and challenges for sales and marketing have been identified and explored. Against these, the chapter puts organizational issues in focus. Two aspects are in focus of this concluding discussion: first, organizational variety and ongoing processes of organizational adaptation, and second, coordination and communication.

In the final chapter of the book the authors discuss potential continued developments of some of the topics addressed in the previous texts of the book. The final overview of the book starts with a set of some more practical, empirical issues that deserve attention.

The choice of practical issues in marketing organization are collected from the authors of the various chapters, in contacts with marketing practitioners, and from various secondary sources. The issues deal with, for example, the new business landscape with well-informed and capable procurement organizations and aspects of organizing marketing in order to deal with customers in the public sector. Furthermore, the practical issues discussed deal with the organizing of marketing as part of the organizing of markets.

The aim of this chapter is to introduce the reader to the complexities of marketing organization especially in bigger firms. This chapter draws attention to one of these major drivers for change — globalization. This is done with the help of an in-depth case study of ABB Robotics.

The case describes how a change is achieved through a major marketing reorganization process. Initially, there are major difficulties grasping the organizational problem and identifying its causes. Many different organizational “issues” are part of the problem in the multifaceted case. Relying on complexity theory, the case suggests that a more complex environment with greater number of relevant players, which are — themselves — interconnected through networks, will also exhibit a greater range of change. Change and reorganization processes like the one confronting the case company would rather be the normal situation for companies embedded in complex global networks.