Understanding and shaping customer co-creation value perceptions

Abstract

Value co-creation concerns the active participation of the customer in the creation of a unique offering. In both the academic and management literature co-creation is considered as an important source of competitive advantage. The benefits of co-creation include long-term customer-firm relationships due to enhanced productivity and improved customer evaluative judgments. In contrast to the immense popularity of the topic is the scarcity of the empirical academic research available. The aim of the proposed doctoral research is to contribute to marketing practice and theory by conducting several empirical studies aimed at better understanding customer value perceptions concerning co-creation. In particular, the focus will be on; understanding what drives customer co-creation value perceptions and how these perceptions change over time, assessing the consequences of co-creation value perceptions in terms of firm performance, and examining how firms can positively influence these customer value perceptions. Unraveling these issues represent a necessary condition for realizing the benefits associated with co-creation.