Fresh ideas: services thinking for social marketing

Abstract

Purpose – The social marketing literature tends to focus on upstream marketing (policy) and downstream (individual behaviour change) and has a limited view on midstream (working with partners and community groups) social marketing. The paper proposes midstream social marketing should also include an understanding of how services and service employees influence and support individual behaviour change goals. The paper presents four key services marketing principles – derived from services theory and thinking – which the paper believes to be essential for implementing effective midstream social marketing. Design/methodology/approach – This is a conceptual paper that uses service theory and case-examples to show how service thinking can be used as a midstream social marketing approach. Findings – For effective uptake and impact of social marketing services amongst people and populations, social marketers need to design programs that consider the service experience, the service employee, service quality/customer value and the active role of the customer in value creation. Research limitations/implications – Services marketing is a well-established sub-discipline of marketing which, until recently, has not interacted with social marketing. The extension and application of services theory for social marketing can enrich and propel the social marketing discipline forward. Further research is recommended to evaluate how service principles can be applied in practice. Social implications – Given that social marketing services tend not to be accessed in sufficient numbers by the people who most need them, social marketers need to think beyond the technical, cognitive, and organisational-focused goals when designing social services. Originality/value – This paper identifies key service theories that social marketers should understand and use and is thus a source of fresh ideas for theory and practice.

Transformative service research and service dominant logic: Quo Vaditis?

“…However, TSR could gain a much broader scope in various other research fields, which SDL has already gained. Furthermore, this paper did not provide a comparison with social marketing (e.g., Russell-Bennett, Wood, et al, 2013;Russell-Bennett, Zainuddin, et al, 2013). Additionally, no closer assessment of customer-dominant logic (Heinonen et al, 2013) and TSR was undertaken, while other related concepts, such as the service logic by Grönroos (2006;Grönroos and Voima, 2013) were not taken into account.…”

Midstream value creation in social marketing

“…Operating in a network environment brings up questions concerned with accountability, governance and collaboration management (Domegan et al, 2013;Kleindorfer and Wind 2009;Russell-Bennett, Wood and Previte, 2013). The study pointed out the challenges of integrating the capabilities of partners in a value network.…”

“…Recent scholarship has started to explore such collaborations as a value creation process and has applied service concepts to interrogate the active role of the 'consumer' in social marketing (Russell-Bennet, Previte and Zainuddin, 2009;Zainuddin, Previte and Russell-Bennett, 2011;Zainuddin, Russell-Bennett 9 and Zainuddin, 2013). Researchers have also applied network and social context theories to conceptualise the processes of multi-actor action, but empirical research, in particular on the socio-cultural dimensions of networks is lacking (Domegan et al, 2013;Luca, Hibbert and McDonald, 2015;Russell-Bennett, Wood and Previte, 2013;Spotswood and Tapp, 2013). We similarly argue that service concepts and theories can inform understanding of collaborations for midstream social marketing.…”

“…Such ecological approaches (Gregson et al, 2001;McLeroy et al, 1988) acknowledge that fostering change within social change open systems requires a system view to understand and tackle the factors that might constrain behaviour at the interpersonal, community, organisational, and societal levels (Brennan and Binney, 2008;Dibb, 2014;Domegan et al, 2013;French, 2011;Gordon, 2013;Hastings, 2003;Luca, Hibbert and McDonald, 2015;Russell-Bennett, Wood and Previte, 2013). Despite this shift in thinking, research that examines how social marketing is applied in practice to address behavioural contexts is still limited (Gordon, 2013;Whitelaw et al, 2010) and scholars continue to call for a broader understanding of processes that strengthen social change programmes (French and BlairStevens, 2010;French, 2011;Gordon, 2013).…”

“…The term 'midstream' social marketing was coined to distinguish interventions focused at the community (meso) level, involving collaborations with public services and other community actors (Russell-Bennett, Wood and Previte, 2013) and personal networks such as family and 7 friends as means to facilitate change (Gordon, 2013;Dibb, 2014;Russell-Bennett, Wood and Previte, 2013). The types of problems around which these interventions are developed (e.g., environmental sustainability, healthy eating, adolescent drug and alcohol abuse etc.)…”