This is the accepted version of the paper.This version of the publication may differ from the final published version. Many suppliers invest heavily in channel partner programs that incentivize selling and learning. Permanent repository linkThe authors conduct a multi-wave field study to investigate the roles of indebtedness and gratitude in transforming these investments into returns. The results show that indebtedness has negative effects on commitment to the supplier, as well as the reseller's sales effort. Gratitude however attenuates the effects of indebtedness on sales effort and commitment, and thus offers a buffer against indebtedness' negative effects. Indebtedness and gratitude thus play key roles in channel partner programs. In addition, the results highlight the importance of perceived motives as they differentially predict these two states.Benevolent motives are found to increase gratitude, though ulterior motives do not detract from it.Ulterior motives do however increase indebtedness. Finally, the results also reveal how entitlement negatively impacts channel partner programs: It decreases the positive effect of perceived program value on partner gratitude while increasing the effect of ulterior motives on indebtedness. This study thus assesses the simultaneous yet contrasting role of gratitude and indebtedness, as well as the complexity 2 associated with realizing the full benefits of channel partner programs. The findings have implications for suppliers, marketers, and further research.

Firms increasingly offer customers the opportunity to coproduce self-service using online technologies. This requires novice customers to adopt a new role and engage in information search. This is particularly challenging in complex, high-risk services, such as online investment trading. Actively managing customers' task-specific self-confidence, or self-efficacy, in these types of technology-based self-service (TBSS) may convert novice customers into regular users and thereby increase return on investments. The authors show that self-efficacy increases novice customers' financial performance perceptions, service value evaluations, and future usage intentions. During online information search, novices focus on credibility and argument quality cues to determine their self-efficacy. The effects differ across information sources; third-party credibility and firm argument quality are most influential. Moreover, when consumers are highly engaged in their self-service role, the impact of credibility is strengthened, whereas that of argument quality is attenuated.

The study focuses on a new service benefit derived from service usage, that is, self-efficacy increase, rather than self-efficacy evaluations as such. The authors propose that this benefit, which refers to feeling better about oneself while consuming a service, will reflect positively on service outcomes. The authors argue that self-efficacy can develop differently over time and this should be investigated to explain service evaluations more fully. Therefore, the authors separate effects related to self-efficacy level and change on value. Results show that the increase of customers' self-beliefs in their capabilities during information search positively affects perceived value irrespective of self-efficacy levels or other costs and benefits. Self-efficacy increase is predicted by a firm's strategic choice to help customers learn, the firm's tactic to provide high-quality information, and the customers' level of cognitive effort. In sum, the authors show that by fostering customers' self-efficacy build up, firms can provide a more valuable and satisfying service experience.

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