This research demonstrates the impact of unconditional business-to-consumer (B2C) gifts. It contributes to the literature by examining how an unconditional gift at the beginning of a shopping experience can influence both loyalty and transactional spending. The findings show that an unconditional gift creates feelings of gratitude, driving loyalty and transactional spending. At the same time, receiving such a gift can lead to a sense of obligation, prompting increased transactional spending to alleviate this feeling. To address the identified gaps in research on B2C gift giving and provide managers a clear path to successfully launch an unconditional gift-giving program, we conduct two firm-partnered field experiments, tracking the behaviors of customers after receipt of an unconditional gift. We then conduct five experimental studies to validate the theoretical process and examine three managerially relevant contingencies: value of the gift, new versus existing customers, and a promotional reward versus an unconditional gift. We find that even unconditional gifts with little monetary value provide benefits for a firm and the effects are robust across new and existing customers. Furthermore, we find that unconditional gifts create greater feelings of obligation than promotional rewards. Managers can use our findings to design unconditional gift-giving programs regarding when, what, and how unconditional gifts should be given to have the largest impact on customers. 

Services are key enablers in the transformation toward the circular economy because they provide the prerequisites for sustainable value co-creation. Services in the circular economy include “traditional” offerings such as maintenance and remanufacturing, but also newer types of services in the sharing economy. This chapter discusses three sustainable value co-creation activities in more detail: (1) extending product life, (2) dematerialization, and (3) replacing service systems. It also provides illustrations of services that support sustainable value co-creation and, ultimately, improved environmental sustainability. The chapter concludes by highlighting key challenges for firms and customers involved in sustainable value co-creation activities.

This prescient Handbook adopts an overarching perspective on service experiences in business contexts. Incorporating up-to-date research and empirical case studies, chapters focus on customer experience design, innovation and management in the digital era. The Handbook of Service Experience sheds new light on the field, presenting novel theoretical and managerial insights to enhance our understanding of this complex area. Global experts from academia and practice contribute by addressing key themes, including theoretically conceptualising the service experience and exploring how to leverage digital technologies to better design, innovate and manage customer experience, whilst also acknowledging sustainability considerations, risks and ethical implications. They present different perspectives across various public and private sectors, such as healthcare and the fast-food industry, as well as B2B services, to improve understanding of what a service experience is, how it can be facilitated, when it occurs, and why it is important. Comprehensive in scope, this unique Handbook is an invaluable resource for students and academics in business administration, digital marketing and service design, and organisational, social and occupational psychology. Its detailed practical applications and examinations of service experience will also be highly beneficial to professionals and entrepreneurs alike.

This paper is positioned at the intersection of servitization and product innovation, addressing an important research gap regarding the key adjustments required in service offerings when introducing product innovations. We focus on electric vehicles as an eco-friendly product innovation often associated with high technological turbulence. Through a single case study of a truck manufacturer and eight confirmatory cases of other commercial vehicle manufacturers, this study examines how these companies adjusted their service offerings (e.g., financial services, parts and repair services, fleet management services, and connectivity services) in response to the launch of new product innovations. When introducing product innovations, these manufacturers adjust the scope and sophistication of their service offerings-for instance, by advancing financial services, parts and repair services, fleet management services, connectivity services, and by adding charging infrastructure services. Meanwhile, services for existing products also evolve in terms of scope and sophistication (e.g., adding product life extension and fuel optimization services). Surprisingly, these adjustments mostly occur within existing organizational structures. At the same time, they contribute to a potential increase in the share of service revenue, reflecting the growing share of electric vehicles in commercial vehicle sales. These insights offer important theoretical and managerial implications for integrating servitization with product innovation.

PurposeDrawing on value cocreation, this study examines health-care customers' perceptions of patient-centered care (PCC) in hospital and online primary care settings. This study aims to address how are the key principles of PCC related, how the relationships between key PCC principles and outcomes (subjective well-being and service satisfaction) vary depending on the channel providing the care (hospital/online primary care) and what differences are placed on the involvement of family and friends in these different settings by health-care customers.Design/methodology/approachThis study comprises four samples of health-care customers (Sample 1 n = 272, Sample 2 n = 278, Sample 3 n = 275 and Sample 4 n = 297) totaling 1,122 respondents. This study models four key principles of PCC: service providers respecting health-care customers' values, needs and preferences; collaborative resources of the multi-disciplinary care team; health-care customers actively collaborating with their own resources; and health-care customers involving family and friends, explicating which principles of PCC have positive effects on outcomes: subjective well-being and service satisfaction.FindingsFindings confirm that health-care customers want to feel respected by service providers, use their own resources to actively collaborate in their care and have multi-disciplinary teams coordinating and integrating their care. However, contrary to prior findings, for online primary care, service providers respecting customers' values needs and preferences do not translate into health-care customers actively collaborating with their own resources. Further, involving family and friends has mixed results for online primary care. In that setting, this study finds that involving family and friends only positively impacts service satisfaction, when care is provided using video and not voice only.Social implicationsBy identifying which PCC principles influence the health-care customer experience most, this research shows policymakers where they should invest resources to achieve beneficial outcomes for health-care customers, service providers and society, thus advancing current thinking and practice.Originality/valueThis research provides a health-care customer perspective on PCC and shows how the resources of the health-care system can activate the health-care customer's own resources. It further shows the role of technology in online care, where it alters how care is experienced by the health-care customer.

In the competitive world of manufacturing, where profit margins deteriorate over time, service infusion might be a way to help a business turn in the right direction. This chapter briefly explains the concepts of servitization and service infusion, before identifying service growth opportunities and obstacles. From a strategy-based perspective, we present a conceptual model that evaluates the current and future growth potential of the service business. We identify four specific service growth strategies and illustrate them through business cases. The service growth strategies represent physical services (free-to-fee and ownership change) and digital services (remote and upgrading).

The rapid growth, large volume, and easy access to publicly available netnographic data have increased the need for understanding its potential in leveraging innovation. At the heart of quality management is a focus on customers and their needs, driving the innovation of products and services. In this study, we systematically compare netnography and focus groups as research methods regarding their ability to capture various types of customer needs. This study makes four valuable contributions to quality management theory: (1) netnography and focus groups captures similar customer needs, (2) netnography provides clear need statements, which are rich and overrepresented compared to focus groups, (3) both netnography and focus groups are vulnerable to groupthink, where customers prioritize consensus; however, this effect is more evident in netnography, (4) netnography captures more need statements about current product and service usage, while focus groups focus more on past product and service usage.