The Impact of Digital Relational Capital on Company Sales

The master thesis examines how a company build and develop its relational capital in a digital environment. It searches for proxy-indicators for digital relational capital and explores their impact on company performance taking into account different political, social and digital environments. The thesis is designed in the line with the concept of Intellectual Capital. We propose five website-based metrics of digital relational capital grouped in two dimensions – website authority and visibility. Then, the impact of these dimensions on company performance was examined by conducting a dummy-variable regression. The empirical part of the thesis is based on a database of 1,050 European and 1,096 Russian public companies. Findings of the thesis justify five metrics based on characteristics of company website that enable the estimation of the digital relational capital of the company. Empirical evidence of a significant impact on company sales is provided. Moreover, different configurations of obtained relationships for European and Russian companies allow for a better understanding of the phenomenon of digital relational capital depending on the environment and has managerial implications. Since companies can indirectly influence the proposed metrics, the results of the thesis can be considered by companies as a way to increase their performance.