The Impact of New Media on Customer Relationships Hennig-Thurau, Thorsten; Malthouse, Edward C.; Friege, Christian ...
Journal of service research : JSR,
08/2010, Volume:
13, Issue:
3
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Recent years have witnessed the rise of new media channels such as Facebook, YouTube, Google, and Twitter, which enable customers to take a more active role as market players and reach (and be ...reached by) almost everyone anywhere and anytime. These new media threaten long established business models and corporate strategies, but also provide ample opportunities for growth through new adaptive strategies. This paper introduces a new ‘‘pinball’’ framework of new media’s impact on relationships with customers and identifies key new media phenomena which companies should take into account when managing their relationships with customers in the new media universe. For each phenomenon, we identify challenges for researchers and managers which relate to (a) the understanding of consumer behavior, (b) the use of new media to successfully manage customer interactions, and (c) the effective measurement of customers’ activities and outcomes.
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NUK, OILJ, SAZU, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK
We address the following questions that are becoming increasingly important to managers in service industries: Are the levels of customer satisfaction and loyalty for the same service different when ...customers choose the service online versus offline? If yes, what factors might explain these differences? How is the relationship between customer satisfaction and loyalty in the online environment different from that in the offline environment? We propose a conceptual framework and develop hypotheses about the effects of the online medium on customer satisfaction and loyalty and on the relationships between satisfaction and loyalty. We test the hypotheses through a simultaneous equation model using two data sets of online and offline customers of the lodging industry. The results are somewhat counterintuitive in that they show that whereas the levels of customer satisfaction for a service chosen online is the same as when it is chosen offline, loyalty to the service provider is higher when the service is chosen online than offline. We also find that loyalty and satisfaction have a reciprocal relationship such that each positively reinforces the other, and this relationship between overall satisfaction and loyalty is further strengthened online.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPUK
During the past decade, customers have become familiar with using various interface technologies, such as Web sites and wireless devices, to interact with firms. Increasingly, they choose the times ...and the channels through which they deal with firms for different aspects of their interactions. It is becoming common for customers to use different channels at different stages of their decision-and-shopping cycles, for example, using Web sites to obtain information but making purchases offline; in the past they typically obtained all their channel services from a single integrated channel at all stages of their decision process. We refer to customers who use more than one channel to interact with firms as multichannel customers, and marketing strategies to reach such customers as multichannel marketing. According to a study by Doubleclick (2004), the incidence of multichannel shopping among online shoppers increased from 56% to 65% between the 2002 and 2003 holiday seasons.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPUK
Using the resource-based view of the firm, the authors hypothesize that differences in adoption of radical technologies among firms can be attributed to a sense-and-respond capability of firms with ...respect to new technologies, which is termed technological opportunism. Using survey data from senior managers in business-to-business firms, the authors study the adoption of e-business, a radical technology with the potential to alter business models. The authors first establish the distinctiveness of technological opportunism from related constructs, such as organizational innovativeness, and show that it offers a significantly better explanation of technology adoption than existing constructs do. In a follow-up survey of senior managers, the authors investigate the antecedents of technological opportunism and find that organizations can develop technological opportunism by taking specific actions such as focusing on the future, by having top management advocate new technologies, and by becoming more of an adhocracy culture and less of a hierarchy culture. The proposed technological opportunism construct can inform theory development on the relative emphasis on internal (research and development) versus external (buying, licensing) development of technologies and the complementarities in technology orientation and market orientation in the firm. The results can be used by managers who seek to develop the technological opportunism capability of their firms and by those in technology vendor firms who seek to develop segmentation strategies based on the technological opportunism capabilities of their customer firms.
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BFBNIB, CEKLJ, INZLJ, IZUM, KILJ, NMLJ, NUK, OILJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, ZRSKP
As traditional sources of competitive advantage shrink, firms seek new ones. One such source of competitive advantage is product design because of its effects on customer experience. To understand ...the role and impact of product design on customer experience, we propose an integrated, customer‐based framework for product design that we call the total product design concept (TPDC). We define a product's TPDC as consisting of three elements, namely functionality, aesthetics, and meaning, each of which arises from more elemental product characteristics. We elaborate on the structure of a product's TPDC, its three elements, and the links between those elements and customers' experience with a product. We provide an illustrative application of the TPDC using data from the U.S. auto market. The findings from that application support the proposed three‐dimensional view of the TPDC, and demonstrate heterogeneity both in the TPDC's structure and its effects on customer satisfaction. For all three segments, functionality enhances customer satisfaction. For the largest segment of customers, functionality is the most important factor, followed by aesthetics. For the other two segments, customer satisfaction is most influenced by the meaning element of TPDC. We discuss the implications of these findings for the auto industry in particular, and the potential use of the TPDC more generally.
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BFBNIB, FZAB, GIS, IJS, IZUM, KILJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBMB, UL, UM, UPUK
Network externalities are playing an increasingly important role in the economy, and they have significant implications for firms' marketing strategies. The authors study the effects of network ...externalities in conjunction with other product and firm characteristics on the survival of pioneers. They apply an accelerated failure time model to data on 45 office products and consumer durables. The authors find evidence that network externalities have a negative main effect on the survival duration of pioneers. However, for more radical products and for technologically intense products, increases in network externalities are associated with increased survival duration. The larger the pioneer, the more network externalities increase its survival duration, whereas incumbent pioneers experience a decrease in survival duration compared with nonincumbents. The findings of this article contribute to theory in marketing strategy and have important implications for firms that are developing market entry strategies for products with network externalities.
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BFBNIB, INZLJ, IZUM, KILJ, NMLJ, NUK, OILJ, PILJ, PNG, SAZU, UKNU, UL, UM, UPUK, ZRSKP
Are brand names more valuable online or in traditional supermarkets? Does the increasing availability of comparative price information online make consumers more price-sensitive? We address these and ...related questions by first conceptualizing how different store environments (online and traditional stores) can differentially affect consumer choices. We use the liquid detergent, soft margarine spread, and paper towel categories to test our hypotheses. Our hypotheses and the empirical results from our choice models indicate that: (1) Brand names become more important online in some categories but not in others depending on the extent of information available to consumers — brand names are more valuable when information on fewer attributes is available online. (2) Sensory search attributes, particularly visual cues about the product (e.g., paper towel design), have lower impact on choices online, and factual information (i.e., non-sensory attributes, such as the fat content of margarine) have higher impact on choices online. (3) Price sensitivity is higher online, but this is due to online promotions being stronger signals of price discounts. The combined effect of price and promotion on choice is weaker online than offline.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPUK
Digital business platforms (DBPs) such as eBay, Google, and Uber Technologies have seen enormous growth; this paper explores their salient characteristics, the role of marketing in helping DBPs ...succeed, and important research topics for theory and practice. A new conceptual framework based on insights from transaction cost analysis outlines the role and impact of marketing in DBPs. A key role for marketing is to increase the number and quality of interactions on a DBP while reducing transaction costs for users and production costs for the DPB. The DBPs' interactions and the data thus generated are key enablers of value creation and value appropriation on these platforms. However, there are several challenges to resolve in value creation and value appropriation because DBPs cater to the needs of many different types of users. Therefore, DBPs should carefully coordinate and manage interactions among users on different sides of a platform. For researchers, there are many opportunities to reconceptualize some of the traditional roles of marketing in the context of DBPs.
•Conceptualization of Digital Business Platforms (DBPs) and their characteristics.•Transaction Cost Analysis framework to articulate the roles of of marketing in DBPs.•Marketing in DBPs must reduce transaction and production costs and enhance benefits for users.•How DBPs change the way value is created and appropriated.•Future research to address theoretical, empirical, and managerial issues of DBPs.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NLZOH, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UILJ, UL, UM, UPUK, ZAGLJ, ZRSKP
A few well-documented cases describe how the deployment of marketing analytics produces positive organizational outcomes. However, the deployment of marketing analytics varies widely across firms, ...and many C-level executives remain skeptical regarding the benefits that they could gain from their marketing analytics efforts. We draw on upper echelons theory and the resource-based view of the firm to develop a conceptual framework that relates the organizational deployment of marketing analytics to firm performance and that also identifies the key antecedents of that deployment. The analysis of a survey of 212 senior executives of Fortune 1000 firms demonstrates that firms attain favorable and apparently sustainable performance outcomes through greater use of marketing analytics. The analysis also reveals important moderators: more intense industry competition and more rapidly changing customer preferences increase the positive impact of the deployment of marketing analytics on firm performance. The results are robust to the choice of performance measures, and, on average, a one-unit increase in the degree of deployment (moving a firm at the median or the 50th percentile of deployment to the 65th percentile) on a 1–7 scale is associated with an 8% increase in return on assets. The analysis also demonstrates that support from the top management team, a supportive analytics culture, appropriate data, information technology support, and analytics skills are all necessary for the effective deployment of marketing analytics.
► Firms may realize favorable outcomes from greater use of marketing analytics. ► The favorable outcomes may be stronger when industry competition is high. ► The favorable outcomes may be stronger when customer preferences change rapidly. ► Top management team support of marketing analytics is critical.
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GEOZS, IJS, IMTLJ, KILJ, KISLJ, NUK, OILJ, PNG, SAZU, SBCE, SBJE, UL, UM, UPUK
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