Uncovering Collaborative Value Creation Patterns and Establishing Corresponding Customer Roles

Abstract

Research on value creation traditionally has focused on value created by the company, though customers increasingly serve as active partners, able to create value with firms in a collaborative manner. Despite interest by both scholars and managers, existing research has not yet clarified the interdependencies of service offerings and customer role patterns. This article explores value creation rooted in three generic offerings (configuration, solution, and network) and identifies differences in their prerequisites, customer activities, challenges, abilities, ability enhancers, and perceived benefits that arise in collaborative value creation (CVC). Data from 105 collaborations, collected through in-depth interviews, support the qualitative and quantitative analyses that reveal distinct patterns in customers' value creation for each service offering. A categorical principal components analysis, combined with cluster analysis, identifies five customer roles: bargain-hunting independent, comprehensive help seeker, engaged problem solver, technology-savvy networker, and self-reliant customizer. Our theoretical contribution includes the identification of customer roles across generic offerings and empirical evidence that customers perform multiple roles when engaging in CVC processes. Our findings provide managers engaged in CVC with recommendations on criteria for segmenting customer groups, on the role of the service provider in various value creation processes, and on tailored communication strategies to attract customers.

Customer Roles in Self-Service Technology Encounters in a Tourism Context

“…For example, there is a research gap with regard to customers' experiences and reflections in forced usage situations (Reinders et al, 2008) and in voluntary usage situations (Lawlor, 2010;Ritzer & Jurgenson, 2010). Therefore, the present research follows Moeller et al's (2013) recommendation that further emphasis should be placed on the customer as creator of value, and also that the service provider and other customers be viewed as facilitators of that value creation. The S-D Logic proposes that value is always uniquely and phenomenologically determined and therefore, the customer experience and value creation are intertwined, whereby the social context, customer inner dialogue, and identities determine value creation (Helkkula & Kelleher, 2010).…”

“…For example, a convenience seeker can be compared to the roles of contributor to quality, satisfaction, and value, as suggested by Bitner et al (1997), decision-maker and hunter (Chervonnaya, 2003), and bargain-hunting independent and self-reliant customizer (Moeller et al, 2013). Even so, the convenience seeker role does not only broadly state that customers make decisions and contribute to the service, but it specifies that SST users seek out convenience, and then enhance their decision by highlighting how much more convenient the SST option is in comparison with other service channels.…”

“…The S-D Logic broadly defines the role of the customer in service as a co-creator of value which is a rather vague concept and has attracted much discussion and refinement (Grönroos & Gummerus, 2014). A review of the relevant literature suggests that the customer as a cocreator may involve three roles, comprising a co-creator role in innovation (Roberts, Hughes, & Kertbo, 2013), a co-creator role in the delivery and customization of the service (Moeller et al, 2013), and a co-creator role whereby customer resources are applied to derive value in consuming a service (Grönroos & Gummerus, 2014). The co-creator of value concept in the S-D Logic incorporates all aspects of customer involvement in the production (co-producer) and consumption of the service which creates value for the customer (Grönroos, 2006).…”

“…Co-creation also takes place when the customer becomes involved in the customization and co-production of the service in roles such as productive resource and contributor to quality, satisfaction and value (Bitner et al, 1997), partial employee (Mills & Morris, 1986), ingredient (Chervonnaya, 2003), self-reliant customizer, bargain-hunting independent (Moeller et al, 2013), decision-maker and hunter (Chervonnaya, 2003). The customer integrates resources in relational exchange with the service provider and other stakeholders in co-creating their service experience (Lusch et al, 2010;Payne, Storbacka, & Frow, 2008).…”

“…Yet, whilst customers' co-creation has been explored in a general service context (see for example Moeller, Ciuchita, Mahr, Odekerken-Schroeder, & Fassnacht, 2013) and in a specific health context (McColl-Kennedy et al, 2012), there is a gap in the literature with regard to customer value co-creation when exposed to SSTs in a tourism context. In order to understand the customer perspective value co-creation in SSTs in tourism, this study draws on the Service-Dominant (S-D) Logic framework (Vargo & Lusch, 2004) and also examines the extant literature on customer service roles (see for example Bitner, Faranda, Hubbert, & Zeithaml, 1997;Chervonnaya, 2003).…”