Page - 262 - in Digital Entrepreneurship - Impact on Business and Society

Similarly, Pergelova et al. (2019) found that DTs encourage the improvement of international marketing intelligence that would potentially enhance export propensity of SMEs. In specific, information accessibility about customer’s need can be brought by DTs (Autio 2017; Okazaki and Taylor 2013; Yamin and Sinkovics 2006). Many digitally enabled facilities, including e-mails (Prasad et al. 2001), customer data- bases (Yamin and Sinkovics 2006), and social networks (Alarcón-del-Amo et al. 2018), would encourage international business activities by offering valuable information about customers for the focal firm. In an empirical test concerning internationalization of online apps, Shaheer and Li (2020) observed that between-country distance still has an impact on foreign expansion of these digi- talizedproduct providers.However, barriers resulted fromdistances canbe lowered by proactive online user-friendly strategies, including social sharing strategy and virtual community strategy,which encourage thefirm to acquire necessaryupdated information about foreign customers. Except for customers, experiential knowledge about collaborators and com- petitors in target market can also be accessed as a result of DTs (Mathews et al. 2016). Gregory et al. (2007) observed from their empirical results that exporters gain knowledge about local distribution channels by using the Internet, which would optimize communication and distribution for these exporters. Overall, a greater amount of information with regard to other players can encourage oppor- tunity creation and capture in specificmarket by lowering perceived risks. In particular, compared with established counterparts, we conjecture new ven- turingfirms can benefit more fromDTswhich help overcome liability of newness (Gabrielsson and Gabrielsson 2011). As novices, new ventures usually deal with the situation where other players are overwhelmingly strangers (Stinchcombe 1965). Such riskswould bemitigated through the application ofDTs.Glavas et al. (2019) found owners of small firms can utilize digital platforms to collect infor- mation about potentially available customers, supporting thenotion thatDTsmight bemeaningful for new ventures in this sense. Foreignmarket knowledge can not only be accumulated byfirm-level business network, but also be derived from entrepreneur’s social network through DTs. Especially, social networking platform has transformed the process of information transfer. For instance, by examining how international entrepreneurs accumulate foreignmarket knowledge on LinkedIn, Sigfusson andChetty (2013) found some entrepreneurs directly look for reliable foreign partners who possibly provide confidential information. Furthermore, foreign institutional knowledge, both informal and formalone, can alsobe acquiredwith thehelpofDTs.Knowledge about informal institutions, such as customary habits in a certain market, may be explored and thus fulfilled in a more sophisticatedwaywith the help ofDTs (Yamin and Sinkovics 2006; Prasad et al. 2001).TheapplicationofDTsallows the reductionof thecost associatedwith information search beyond the national border. In terms of formal institution, Glavas et al. (2019) found that a more nuanced understanding of regulatory 270 D. Song andA.Wu